School Raze Parts 1 and 2 Review · 5:10pm Oct 13th, 2018
It's finale time, finally! This season has been the leakiest of all the seasons, whether it was the leaked animations of several first half episodes, the foreign dumps from France and Sewden, or even the early broadcasts in Australia and Canada, almost nothing about this season stayed secret. And that included behind the scenes revelations about the nature of the season, namely that Hasbro mandated the school and the writers weren't too thrilled by it. Season 8 has been a very rocky season with the bad mostly outshining the good. But was this finale able to somehow redeem it all? Was it able to save the season from being the first one not to top the previous one? Well already there's a major hiccup going on in the writer's chair, part one of this two parter is penned by Nicole Dubac whose solo writing endevors have been awful, and part two was penned by Josh Haber who wrote "Molt Down" and then "Father Knows Beast". And no one else penned either two parter. Not a good omen when those writers are the same two who do story editing, but maybe somehow that all worked out in the end? Well, let's find out.
We begin with Cozy Glow being generally helpful, meanwhile Twilight has somehow made Cozy her friendship assistant and Cozy got Rainbow Dash and Starlight to take the students on a field trip to Cloudsdale. But it all goes wrong when Starlight's cloud walking spell starts failing and everyone who can't fly starts falling through the clouds.
It seems that magic all Equestria is fading, as even Starswirl the Bearded has documented this and he knows what will happen in three days. By sunset on the third day, all magic will fade away completely and never return. Sadly though, this is the only mention of Starswirl in any meaningful way all episode. I know that without magic he wouldn't be too helpful, but you'd expect him to at least maybe try to recruit the other pillars and see if there was anything he could to stop it.
Cozy Glow suggests Tirek offhandedly and Twilight and the mane six (plus Spike) all decide to go to Tartarus to check on Tirek in case he's found a way to operate from within his cell. Except why couldn't Princess Cadence or Shining Armor do it, or even just send some royal guards with the key? It's even revealed later that Princess Luna can travel to Tartarus on her own power and while she mentions having difficulty raising the moon she doesn't say her magic has failed. There's no reason at all for the mane six to do this other than because the plot dictates they have to leave. So they do so, and Starlight is put in charge. Spike mentions that she survived Discord so she'll be fine, except of course Starlight had magic and even then she could only banish Discord from the school in the physical sense. Heck, why didn't they just send Discord with Fluttershy and/or Twilight to go check on Tirek and leave the rest of the mane six in charge to help Starlight? They don't say anything about his magic fading.
So the mane six leave and the next day Cozy Glow announces that Starlight left a note saying that she had to leave and put Cozy Glow in charge. And everyone except the student six just buys it. I'm sorry but I'm pretty sure no one in their right mind would ever believe a school could be run by a child with no supervision. This isn't like Diamond Tiara being student president or running the Foal Free Press, those are positions of power within a school but they're not involved in running the school. No one expects a class president to do the job of a principal. If you're trying to make the student six look good by noticing the obvious, you're failing, all you do is make everyone else look stupid for not being suspicious of the blatantly obvious. This whole two parter reeks of blatant lacks of subtlely and not noticing the obvious. This is exactly what people feared would happen when the student six were introduced.
Meanwhile the mane six and Spike find out how much life sucks without magic in a scene that really accomplishes nothing. I get they wanted to show why losing magic would be such a bad thing, but they already established the problems earlier in the two parter so there was no need to repeat. They finally reach Tartarus only to find the gate locked, so they apparently didn't make a plan on how to get in and out of Tartarus even knowing they couldn't afford to be away for long. Even the design of Tartarus is underwhelming when they finally get inside with a one way key Cozy Glow provided (because potatoes I guess). You'd expect something more akin to a Greek underworld or even something other worldly, but no it's just a bunch of cages with creatures inside them and a special little area for Tirek. And he's definitely gotten a lot more creepy since the last time we saw him.
Back at the school, meanwhile, Chancellor Neighsay shows up and announces his intent to take charge. With no real rhyme or reason other than because he's a bigot, Neighsay accuses the student six of being responsible. But outside of that the sad truth is that he's been proven right multiple times over the course of the season. With the exception of one or two episodes whenever the focus was on the school it made the mane six look incompetent and ineffective. Anyway, because he's a bigot Neighsay decides he can just do what he wants and imprison the student six without any evidence. Yet on a whim he believes Sandbar has changed and wants nothing to do with the rest of the creatures. Of course we all know what happens next, he's merely pretending to have changed so Neighsay will let him go and he can get help to free his friends. He runs to Sweet Apple Acres to get the CMC's help, even though they're supposed to be friendship tutors.
They go down to the catacombs beneath the school and find Starlight imprisoned in a bubble with the magical artifacts on loan from Celestia powering it. And part one ends with Cozy Glow coming in and revealing that she's behind all of this because she thinks friendship is power. So that means everything we previously knew about Cozy was a lie. Yes, there was a hint or two that she wasn't so innocent, but only "What Lies Beneath" gave any indication that she was at all up to something. Admittedly she is kind of hammy when she starts to lose her temper. In fact, she might be insane.
Part two begins with the mane six learning from Tirek that Cozy Glow was his protege for unspecified reasons and he told her how to drain magic. I was not aware it was possible to write to someone in Tartarus. He taunts the mane six and Spike with the fact that they can't get out and they're trapped, but Twilight devises a plan to use the magic from the imprisoned creatures to power up her horn and open the gate. It's probably the most impressive thing in this whole two parter and the one that makes the most sense, though that isn't saying much. And it just seems to happen because the plot says so.
Sandbar and the CMC try to free Starlight to no avail, then they decide to spring the rest of the student six and tell Neighsay what's going on, thinking that he'll somehow believe every word they say. But they don't get a chance, Cozy Glow deposes him and humiliates and imprisons him in the headmare's office.
The mane six rope Tirek into their escape plan by pointing out that if they're stuck in Tartarus, they're stuck with him forever. And they proceed to annoy Tirek so he'll comply. Meanwhile, the CMC are sent to distract Cozy Glow while the student six try to free Starlight from her prison. But Cozy locks the CMC in a cleaning closet because she's smart enough to recognize a ruse. But that also means the CMC amount to nothing in the grand scheme of things, Sandbar could've easily freed his friends at any point when Neighsay wasn't looking and found out about Cozy on his own. It doesn't even matter that the CMC try to distract Cozy, because she finds the student six anyway while they're trying to take the items. And everyone is dumb enough to believe Cozy when she says they're the ones who imprisoned Starlight and take the magic, even though Sandbar is a pony and would have no reason to do so since he'd lose his magic. Though that's not before the student six free Neighsay, who manages to find enough power in his amulet to travel to Canterlot to inform the princesses what's going on. But when he does so he leaves for the rest of the finale, so all he did was show up to act like a bigot, take charge, get deposed by Cozy, and then leave to inform the princesses. I personally would've liked for him to play a bigger role and earn his redemption. Why not have him be tricked and locked in by Cozy so the CMC would have a chance to shine? But instead, the student six all get shoved into the bubble and their selfless scarifice somehow motivates the Tree of Harmony to do something to save them.
They tease us with the idea that the school will be destroyed, but no the title of "School Raze" is just there because the writers got lazy and couldn't think of a better title. Cozy is defeated and Starlight is freed, then the mane six, Spike, the princesses, Neighsay, and even the royal guard all show up to stop her. Cozy reveals her motive is simply because she thinks friendship literally translates into power, and Twilight points out that's not true. Then the student six convince her not to give up on teaching because of one bad example, when in fact Cozy's failures are in fact Twilight's failures. She was so ineffective at running the school, made no effort to help Cozy Glow when she was failing, accused the CMC of sabotaging her when Cozy failed a test, and only after Starlight learned the real reason did she try to make amends by letting the CMC into the school (after previously not telling them what Starlight told Cozy). The student six succeeded by learning off-screen and being tested by the Tree of Harmony. But instead of just sending them away and ending the school theme, Twilight says that it takes more than one semester to learn everything about friendship, meaning we're likely going to see the school pop up again in the next and final season. Meanwhile, Cozy Glow is thrown into Tartarus with Tirek for company.
*Sigh* and that's the story, so what do I think of the two parter? It's a mess, plain and simple. Hardly anything makes sense if you really think about it, it's just a bunch of random ideas tossed about and then put together with no thought as to whether or not they make any sense. Cozy Glow is by far the worst villain we've ever had, she has nothing going for her. She just wants power and thinks that's what friendship means. Everything we may have previously known about her was a lie, she had no ties to any big villains, not to Chrysalis, not to Tirek, not to Neighsay, not even to Sombra or the Nightmare Forces/the Darkness. Everyone just believes her with no real reason, whereas if they didn't her plan would never work, and no brainwashing is ever involved. The mane six, Spike, Starlight, and the CMC are all useless and just there to try and prove how powerful Cozy really is, but we never see Cozy do anything directly to depose them, we're just told she arranged for it all off-screen and for the CMC she just shoved them in a closet and that was it, we never heard from them again until the end. Neighsay's redemption is kind of a nice touch, but considering he was still a bigot until suddenly deposed and the most he did was get Princess Celestia instead of trying to help the students take down Cozy Glow directly it feels sudden and forced. Neighsay had a chance to be something more, but like the school he was so underutilized he ended up being handled poorly. The student six only get to save the day because Cozy Glow is a villain sue and everyone else is holding the idiot ball. What few good ideas or good moments there were, get overshadowed completely by the lack of coherency or logic. Cozy is basically just pre-reformed Diamond Tiara if she were made a major two parter villain, and even then that might have made more sense. But of course, Diamond is reformed now and been forgotten. In fact, a lot of characters this season were tossed aside or forgotten because of the school theme that was focused on so infrequently and when it was the focus it often made everyone but the student six look bad. Maybe next season if the school does come back, they'll have a chance to better integrate it into the show without resetting character growth, but I think it's safe to say that Hasbro made a very bad decision that screwed over any potential this season could've had. In the end, I give this episode a disappointing E putting it above "A Matter of Principals" which derailed Discord into a sadistic a-hole who got off with no consequences and above "Father Knows Beast" and "Fake It 'Til You Make It" which were ultimately just bad filler episodes, but below "The Mean Six" which at least had a kind of interesting premise and maybe if it were the focus of the premiere or finale it would've made more sense.
Well, all is not lost, we'll have something in a couple of weeks to hopefully make up for how disappointing Season 8 turned out to be. A Christmas special entitled "The Best Gift Ever", in which Twilight tries to find the perfect gift for Shining Armor, Cadence, and Flurry Heart. What's this? A Christmas special before Halloween? Is this The Nightmare Before Christmas all over again?
I have the exact opposite opinion on Cozy:
I think she's easily the best unreformed villain we have right now.
She's smart, fun to watch, and she's good at adapting to changes in the situation.
In fact, she's my third favorite character on the show right now BECAUSE she was so fun to watch.
As for the finale as a whole, I consider it to EASILY be the best one yet, continuing the trend that started in season 4.
Not only is Cozy amazing, with a plan that actually makes a lot of sense, but the comedy was great, the development was good, and the fact that the Tree of Harmony wasn't a Deus Ex Machina was a neat little bonus.
I can't wait to see what happens next in the show.
As for its placement in the season, I'd put it at 3, behind Parent Map and On the Road to Friendship.
And as for season 8 as a whole, I absolutely adored it.
I won't say anything as far as the comparisons for the second half of the season goes, but right now, it has a whopping 13 episodes of my top 20, with 8 of those in the top 10, and 3 in the top 5.
The closest any other season has to match that is season 7, with 5, 1, and 1 respectively.
Have you ever seen Cats Don't Dance? I felt like that movie was more justified in having a child villain than this was.
Check this out though:
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I will say this: It's about DAMN time a Female Guard has finally appeared in MLP: FIM!!! <3
:D
I said it from the start of the season: This episode was disgustingly wasteful! 😡
4952553
I agree.
As a matter of fact, to me, it’s about time they had an unreformed pony villain in MLP, a complete step up from having so many reformees in previous installments of FiM and EG. It was also about time that they explored the concept of “Not everyone is as they seem. Many times, people will also claim to be your friend, but under their guise, they are villains”. Cozy Glow delivered those lessons perfectly, as she seems innocent on the outside, but on the inside, she’s a tyrant.
4952562 That's because the film was poking fun at Hollywood trends from the 1930's and 1940's, and poking fun at child movie stars like Shirley Temple. With Cozy Glow, I get the feeling they tried to go for the same, but they missed out on why that sort of villain doesn't work here.
4952606
What makes Darla Dimple the best of that kind of villain was that they got an actual child to voice her.
4952604
While i actually like the vast majority of the reformations (heck my two favorite characters of G4 are reformed villains), Cozy is one of the few villains I'd rather stay evil
Yeah. Thanks for sharing this review. I agree that these two-parters were a HUGE disappointment.
As a matter of fact, a good rewrite idea might have "Cozy" turn out to be Chrysalis in disguise trying to sabotage the school from within while also soaking up the love from the teachers and (most of) the students (which would make her deviousness make more sense AND make her punishment seem more justified) . Admittedly, it would mean cutting "the Mean Six" out completely (as opposed to trying to rewrite it) , but hey, having Chrysalis be the main villain of both a rewritten season opener AND a rewritten season finale might be interesting to see.
Plus, reducing the Idiot Ball on most of the characters would also help (obviously it can't be COMPLETELY averted without having the main villain taken care of BEFORE she has a chance to do anything really bad, but a healthy amount of reduction should still be possible). For example, as YOU said, having Discord handle the transportation to Tartarus accompanied only by Fluttershy and Twilight would be a logical way to have two of the most powerful players kept busy without making everybody else look like idiots (ESPECIALLY if Tirek has already soaked up enough magic to give Discord and Twilight a good fight without draining them outright with Fluttershy recruiting a few of the animals in Tartarus to join the fight against Tirek while Twilight and Discord are keeping Tirek busy).
Another possible Idiot Ball reduction could be Diamond, the Crusaders and the Student Six defeating Chrysalis (after she removes her "Cozy Glow" disguise) armed with nothing except brains, courage and teamwork AFTER she proves powerful enough to defeat Starlight and the remaining four of the Mane Six in battle.
A possible line in the rewritten finale could have Diamond comment "At first, I thought she was just a more subtle Pegasus version of my old self. It turns out she was MUCH worse than that."
Of course, you could probably think of MUCH better stuff too.
My most favorite part of the episode was seeing Tirek again, as well as seeing the Main Six and Spike going to confront him. It has been my dream to see that happen someday, and now, it finally came true. Every moment with him was pure gold in my opinion.
4952613 The thing is though, we've already had un-reformed villains paraded in front of us this season, Lightning Dust and the Flim Flam Brothers. And last season we had Iron Will as an un-reformed villain. And there was also Spoiled Rich in Season 6 (though ironically people are now talking in great length about redeeming Spoiled). Cozy Glow is hardly a good example of an un-reformed villain, because there's nothing about her that makes sense.
4952625
I consider her to be more fun to watch than any of the other unreformed villains we've had.
ESPECIALLY Flim and Flam.
I don't recall reading this. Where is it? In any case, this just shows how much the show has gone down hill since Faust left. Back then, the staff at DHX were given complete creative freedom with the show. Nowadays they're pretty much Hasbro's bitch, forced to do whatever Hasbro dictates them to do.
When was he even proven "right?" The season premiere, and even this finale, went out of its way to show how wrong he was.
When? The premiere showed that the Mane Six were only incompetent or ineffective as teachers when they were doing things by the standards set by the EEA. It's only when they discarded this idea and started running the school their way that they finally started succeeding as teachers. Aside from my problems with them being teachers to begin with, I have to say that they were quite effective as teachers.
What do you mean by that? My biggest problem with these characters is that they're flat, one-dimensional characters.
Oh, how I hoped and prayed that would happen!
Uh, no. Remember that Cozy Glow was failing on purpose and didn't bother asking for help. And considering their actions in some of the IDW arcs, setting Cozt Glow up to Gail as a means of getting back at Twilight seemed to be perfectly in-character for the CMC. Remember that this isn't the first time they've done something petty out of revenge. And if anything, Twilight seemed to be running the school quite smoothly.
Uh, nobody ever said that season nine was the last season. Why are people still believing this tripe?
Like who? The only ones I can think of are Chrysalis and Lightning Dust.
When?
As for the finale itself, this was a very disappointing finale to a very underwhelming season! This season was so bad that I call it quits on this show as a whole! Goodbye, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I will not be tuning in for season nine.
4952615
I'll be perfectly honest. When they introduced Chrysalis in episode 13 and then introduced Cozy Glow, that's intially what I thought they were going for. Chrysalis would try to sabotage the Mane Six first before resorting to posing as Cozy Glow as a back-up plan. This idea is so obvious that I'm shocked you're the only one who's proposed it. But of course they went and ruined it by making Chrysalis more comical than threatening this season.
Agreed! If anypony should bet the School of Friendship, it should be Tiara and Spoon. Their folks could easily get them in. But, honestly, at this point, I've completely given up any hope that Tiara or Spoon will EVER play a major role in an episode ever again, as it seems that the writers have completely forgotten about them, which pisses me off because there was so much potential with these two!
4952562 I see I'm not the only one who noticed the similarities between these two.
4952612 Really? That's a surprise because there are parts where the voice gets really deep, too deep to be voiced by a child and more akin to an adult.
4952603 Dude, this entire season was "disgustingly wasteful."
I didn't like the part where the rest of the students went against the Student Six and just followed Cozy Glow just because she says so. It may have worked for Neighsay, but going against different creatures was not right! I hope those 'background' students get some kind of punishment! (Detention or getting expelled)
4952666 I'm surprised anyone was even dumb enough to believe Cozy Glow would actually be put in charge. Diamond Tiara has the excuse of having connections and her mother being on the school board, and even then you never saw her try to do something like ursper Cheerilee or take over the schoolhouse. Even pre-reformed Diamond Tiara wasn't that clueless. Smolder shouldn't have been the only one smart enough to smell a ruse.
With how dark cozy glow went, it made me wonder if she was an adult pony with a filly sized body.
As for the plot, I say meh. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't the greatest. I was glad it didn't go down to the level of Father knows beast. In all honesty, I wanted the ending to reveal another ill conceived plan by Queen Chrysalis, but alas, one of the most tactically genius villians did not get a huge break. I wa happy to see they finally put a female guard into the ranks, but said gaurd made me curious if Rainbow has a sibling we are unaware of. Or maybe a cousin. Perhaps it was by the suggestion of Flash Magnus to start recruiting mares.
Hopefully the season 9 premeire, whenever it comes, gives us a sweeter taste, than this mostly sour season has brought us.
I've given this show a lot of chances ever since the standard of writing started falling away during Season 7, but that's it...this season finale has killed off the last speckle of interest I had with this show. Never have I ever watched a season that is drowned with bad decisions, bad writing and bad executions. This has to be the worst season ever and that's saying something! Hasbro has committed too many errors with this one, I shall no longer be watching anymore of the main show.
Although I don't plan to leave the franchise entirely since Equestria Girls has opened up many fanfic possibilities for me. I'm not going to leave this please either, because the fan stories keep me entertained. But as for the main show, this is where it ends I'm afraid.
4952880
I've always seen Chrysalis as an idiot.
4953271 Same here, though I personally loved season 7. But this season was such a failure in terms of basic writing that it makes seasons 1-3 and 6 look good by comparison.