A thought: Cozy's/Chrysalis'/Tirek's reformation does not need to wait until the distant future · 10:52pm Oct 22nd, 2019
Why does everyone assume we can only write reformation fics for the villains that are set in the distant future? 
Just because Discord* said "together forever" doesn't mean Twilight and her friends, who have reformed so many, would wait decades to try reforming them. Not, when one of them isn't a millennia-old immortal, but a filly. 
*He's Discord.
We know the potential exists from "Frenemies". They almost reformed each other, without outside help. No other villain ever managed to do this. We were all expecting them to get reformed. 
And looking back at this clip, it does make you wonder... Why was Chrysalis so afraid? 
... I'm gonna tell you why:
Because, to her, "accepting friendship" means admitting that everything she's believed her whole life - was all a lie. Everything she's done - a mistake. It means accepting that those who took everything away from her were right. If she's not the Queen of the Changelings... then who is she?
And the sheer scope of that is just so overwhelming she hides it behind a wall of "righteous anger" against those who have wronged her. 
THAT is what must be overcome for Chrysalis to be reformed. That would probably reduce her to tears when she finally admits she was wrong. That she's always been wrong. That everything she did was for nothing.
Chrysalis doesn't need more punishment - that won't change her mind - she needs psychological counsel! 
...But at least she has Cozy and Tirek to support her. "There's strength in sticking together!" 
...So why does everyone assume their reformation could only happen in the distant future - often so distant, that the author asserts that Twilight's friends are already dead? 
That's just messed up!
Why can't we write reformation stories that take place after only a few months? 
It doesn't outright contradict the future - we never saw their statue there, they could've already been reformed ages ago - and the staff said on twitter we could decide for ourselves if they get reformed or not.
Twilight's big on reformation - don't you think she'd have tried sooner rather than later? 
Why can't we do this?
...Why can't we tell happier stories?
I'd hate to lose the opportunity to see positive stories written about these characters interacting with the ponies we know in present-day Equestria. 
Related blog posts and story prompts:
- "Dragon Science", Immortality, and how to save the ones you love in a world of magic.
- Sleepovers at Canterlot Castle: Seven ways Twilight could see her friends MORE than just "once a month", while staying canon-compatible
- What Celestia and Luna are up to next...
- Example of how a "6 months in stone" reformation-fic could go.
- The best way to save Twilight's friends and create a happy future, without playing the immortality blues
. - Implied potential for alicorn-ascension by influencing the IDW season 10 comic writers to change canon itself – slightly less crazy than it sounds.
Because they had chances to take a more noble route and rejected them time and again. It's hard to believe they'd ever change their minds in such a short time.
Also, they never showed up in "The Last Problem," so people view that as the temporal minimum for parole.
It's like you've never met a human before. >_>
Seriously though, I'm pretty sure that making readers sad is completely deliberate on the part of each and every one of the stories you're talking about.
5143899
Just because they didn't show up doesn't mean they couldn't have been elsewhere. No reason they'd have to stick around in Ponyville specifically, or be there at that specific point in time.
Yes, the question of "how evil are they" is entirely subjective based on what stories you've read.
I must admit, the entire season leading up to it had conditioned me to expect their reformation. I'm sure most people expected it. For it to have ended so differently... it feels jarring.
I didn't, originally, but now I want their reformation. And not in the "distant future", because that... that's just too sad.
...Yet, they almost did.
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Tirek and Chrysalis, just spending time in stone with no outside guidance towards reformation?
That might not do much to change their minds, yes. Discord spent who-knew-how-long in stone, and that didn't change his mind. It was only after he got out and got taught friendship by Fluttershy that he did change.
Tirek had spent 1000+ years in Tartarus already, Chrysalis is centuries or millennia old, depending on your headcanon for changeling queen life spans.
But Cozy Glow? A filly the age of the CMC? Stuck in stone for decades, longer than her entire previous life time? She'd be lucky if she can still remember how to walk when she gets out, let alone fly.
And remember: They almost did reform. By themselves. Without a "Fluttershy" to their "Discord".
They could have been reformed. They had already changed, but not quite in the right way.
They had deluded each other into believing they didn't need friendship. "We'll work together to defeat Grogar, then we can go back to destroying each other later!" "We've defeated Grogar, so now we'll conquer Equestria together, then split it up later!"
I bet the next step would've been: "We finally won! Mwahaha! Now, let us squash what little resistance is left to cement our rule ... and then we'll split up. Later."
I bet they might have some really interesting discussions in stone. And that the real problem would start if you separated them somehow.
Sure, during the finale they tried to back-stab each other, take power for themselves... but they probably wouldn't have truly hurt the others. Sort-of a rivalry about who could take over the world.
It really makes it tragic that Twilight & Co, not even Discord, ever knew what happened on Mount Everhoof.
And don't forget:
It wasn't the magic of friendship that turned them to stone.
It was Celestia, Luna, and Discord passing their judgement.
And, unlike every other time the villain's been blasted, banished, or petrified before - this time, it wasn't in self-defense. It wasn't to turn the tide of battle at the height of the enemy's power.
The villains had already been beaten. They were weak.
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Yet Chrysalis could still not accept defeat and kept shouting threats in Celestia's face. That mare has deep-seated issues that somepony should get to the bottom of to work towards any sort of reformation.
Being turned to stone isn't gonna help that.
This time, there was no mercy, not even the offer - and that is so uncharacteristic it deserves its own analysis.
And one of the villains was a filly. A pegasus filly, stripped of her ill gotten power, who didn't stand a chance against three demigods. Princess Celestia turned a defenseless filly to stone.
Sure, she's a psychopath - but that is still beyond messed up.
And what kind of lesson would they learn from being turned to stone like this, anyway? If anything, it'd just reinforce their belief that "Might makes right". Celestia / Luna / Discord had power. They turned them to stone to enact their vengeance. Lesson learned...
So... yeah. I was expecting them to get reformed in "part 3" of the finale. That didn't happen.
Failing that, I was expecting people to write reformation stories. To write them a happier ending.
But, as 5143902 pointed out, those stories seem to be deliberately written to be sad.
Hence my proposal for a happier ending. Why can't we have that?
Well, a thought I had:
A: As you said, they almost reformed each other already.
B: They are, however, a significant danger to those around them.
So... what if they could be sent to a habitable but uninhabited world? Where there's no one else for them to hurt, and where they'll hopefully reform each other.
There'd likely be some details to work out, of course, but it's not as if Equestria doesn't already have a history of shoving menaces to itself into other worlds.
...That said, I don't think it's that bad to have their reformation be in the distant future? None of them really seem to have, ah, loved ones waiting for them, so, at least if we use an interpretation of their petrification that has them in stasis, I don't see that much difference of that sort between doing it in a month or a hundred years? Am I missing something, though?
[reads on in the comments]
5143971
Ah, but you seem to be using an interpretation of petrification that does have them conscious. In that case, aye, yes, leaving it longer does indeed seem quite likely to be worse.
Very interesting point about their possible progression if they'd won, though, and the conversations they might have in stone (if the type of petrification allows that, but it sounds interesting and hasn't been defined, soooo... :D)!
"Sure, she's a psychopath - but that is still beyond messed up.
"
Weeeell, I think that line might have already been crossed when they threw her into Tartarus.
Thanks for writing the post and comment!
edit:
(...And now my brain is wondering what would happen if Equestria dropped them on what turned out to be Spire. This Spire.
Because, come on, it's not like Sirrus's decade-plus of solitary confinement likely helped his mental health, is it?)
Sure. For the same reasons, I'm not sure why people who disliked their fate view a stone prison as some kind of execution. Unconscious petrification is probably better than keeping them locked in an underground prison where they can either plot or go crazy.
People in the fandom tend to go along with whatever the majority thinks. It's the reason why Twilight is (to a lot of people) immortal and will outlive her friends. Anyone else with a different view doesn't get much traction I'm afraid.
Me I'm going to write happy post epilogue stories that really kind of ignores whatever the fandom thinks because Canon is over and I can do whatever I want with the characters.
I'm a stubborn optimist like that. :D
5143971
Oh, as a side note: the personification of chaos putting things in stasis? That's seriously something we're just taking as possible? I give it ten seconds after we stopped looking before they're free.
5144063
It isn't just about them. It's also about their interactions with others. Certain stories that just can't exist if set "in the future".
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We would lose our chance to read happy slice of life stories about Chrysalis, Tirek, and Cozy Glow hanging out in the Ponyville we know, with the ponies we know and love... and instead of the Mane 6 or the CMC or, say Lyra and Bonbon, have them interact with Luster Dawn, who is a character I know nothing about and have no emotional attachment to compared to everypony else I've been watching and reading about for the past 8 years of my life as a Brony. It'd be too sad to not see them interact with the Equestria we've known and loved all this time, but instead, only some "future version" of it.
I have no issue with those "reformation in the future" stories - the issue I have is that no one's writing "reformation in the present" stories. If there was an equal balance between the two, this would be fine - but since it's so skewed now as to one of the options being non-existent, it means common "fanon" will calcify and stay like this forever, just like how there's vastly more matter in the universe than there is anti-matter, due to an imbalance between the two after the big bang.
5163802
Ah, thank you for the clarification, and sorry.
Antimatter and stories exploring less common concepts do exist, though, so... there's that, at least? Sorry it sounds like that's not much consolation for you, though.