Thoughts On Cozy Glow · 3:59am Oct 30th, 2019
So something occurred to me about Cozy Glow today. She's a pony.
Wait, hang on, I'm going somewhere with this.
"Yup, this is a pony." - Me
"Prove it!" - My version of Chrysalis
Okay, so she's a pony, and she's a fairly young pony, but she isn't, like, the Cake Twins' age or something. She's about as tall as the Cutie Mark Crusaders and so can be probably presumed to be about the same age as them reasonably enough. Which probably also means that she only very recently got her cutie mark.
So, she's a pony, and so is probably from Equestria...and does anyone remember something that happened relatively recently in Equestria's history? Like, just a couple years or so before the School of Friendship opened its doors?
If he had first premiered in Season 9, we would have learned in the finale that he was actually Iron Will and Suri Polomare in a costume
Cozy Glow is young enough that she might not have had a cutie mark when Tirek was doing his thing, rampaging across Equestria with Discord and absorbing all the magic around in order to gain more and more power. But Tirek is rather specifically absorbing cutie mark magic (especially according to FIENDship is Magic #2), which means that foals who don't have their cutie marks yet aren't going to be targeted by him. It's not mercy, they're just not useful, not a threat, and probably too busy hiding.
So here's Cozy Glow, pegasus filly who is very smart for her age, and let's imagine she doesn't have a cutie mark yet so she isn't rendered weak and helpless by Tirek. This giant red and black motherfucker rolls into town, steals the magic of everyone with a cutie mark effortlessly, brushing aside all opposition. How? Because not only is he very powerful himself, but he's also convinced the Lord of Chaos, Discord, to work for him. She isn't taken out by Tirek since she has no cutie mark magic due to being a blank-flank, so she can spend a lot of this ordeal thinking.
And once the dust settles, she has a lot more time to think as well. And here's what she may have thought.
- By subordinating Discord, Tirek became stronger, able to do things that he couldn't do on his own. But even on his own he was an incredibly powerful force, able to effortlessly push through everyone Cozy had ever personally met in her hometown.
- By harnessing all the cutie mark magic in Equestria, Tirek was able to stalemate Twilight in a battle, despite Twilight wielding the power of all four alicorns at the time. Quantity clearly has quality all of its own.
- Ultimately, Tirek is able to break the stalemate by playing onto Twilight's fears of losing her friends, showing how true friendship can be a liability
- While Twilight is eventually able to beat Tirek, this defeat takes the form of getting even more powerful magic from the Tree of Harmony.
Cozy Glow might look in to other times that Twilight has acted to save Equestria, and learned about that time she wielded the awesome power of the Elements of Harmony against Nightmare Moon and against Discord. Friendship is demonstrably power in Cozy's eyes, she's personally seen it proven three times in her short life already. And if you get sufficient pony-power behind you, you can stand up to even the Princesses themselves.
And she learns all of this from, essentially, Tirek. A plan starts to form in her mind, a way to gain power...all thanks to Tirek. The plan becomes so much a part of her and defines her that she earns her cutie mark, a chess piece but a rook, not a king or queen, showing off how she values strategy and power...all thanks to Tirek.
"Golly, mister, do I look like the kind of pony with a plan?"
Just some thoughts. Not sure where, if anywhere, I plan on going with this, I'm just trying to give some logical backstory and depth to a character in desperate need of both.
Don't forget to take it one step further.
In season 8, Cozy and Tirek are pen pals. Now I don't recall seeing a wealth of paper and ink in Tartarus during that episode, so it stands to reason that Cozy was the one who initiated this arrangement, not Tirek. She sought him out. This already implies a degree of respect on Cozy's part to the unfortunate centaur, even after his clear defeat. Tirek being the source of her evil before they even first get in contat is a much stronger argument than he corrupted/controlled her through the letters like he claims.
I missed a few episodes. Was it ever explained what Cozy's motivations were and why she was evil?
5147862
Nope. Not even the barest hint
Well this is something to think about. And makes a surprising amount of sense.
As much as I want to disagree...but given what they did with Grogar, I wouldn't be surprised.
And I have a headcanon I would like to share with you about the first Equestria Girls movie. Like how did Sunset know to come through the mirror? And how did she know where Twilight's room is? Or what know the Element of Magic would look like? And why does the crown for the Canterlot High Fall Formal look exactly like the Element of Magic?
My answer is Discord is responsible. I mean the movie takes place after Season 3 and Discord wasn't exactly reformed. He found out Princess Summit and went to the 'Human" world and told Sunset everything she needed to know so she swipe it. I bet he secretly order the crown for the Formal to be shaped like Element of Magic. With the Element of Magic gone, the other elements won't work an thus he wouldn't have to fear them.
I dare you to say Discord wouldn't pull a stun like this. You know he would.
Bretty gud, bruh.
No, seriously, this is now my head‐canon. Well, my head‐canon for something I actively practice discontinuity for, but still.
5147875
What does "practice discontinuity" mean?
5147860
Definitely.
Now, my own headcanon for Cozy and her Mark is different. But I'll still take this for her personal motivation.
See, her mark is rook not a queen. A rook is a powerful piece on it's own, but one of it's basic functions is to *protect* the queen (Princess in Equestria I suppose) by taking it's place. She's got a mark for replacing royalty. As to how you get such a thing, it's by taking over a project among other kids when the person who was supposed to be in charge failed, then making it look like they didn't fail so they'd owe you. Her ambitions have just... scaled since then.
I don't know how I feel about the most mysterious villain in Friendship is Magic (the show, at least), is... just a filly. Not the shape-shifting bug queen, not the mythical Pony of Shadows, not even the ancient Lord of Chaos. Even though we don't know very much about them, we at least know who they are and why they are evil. But not Cozy Glow. We know basically nothing about her, other than the fact she views friendship as a source of power. We can't even be sure Cozy Glow is her real name.
This could mean a variety of things. It could mean that the team never came up with a backstory, and just left it "for the fans to fill the gaps" (like too many things, IMO). Perhaps there were plans to cover her backstory in the future, and those were left on the cutting room floor due to the show ending. Perhaps it's symbolic, showing that true evil can come in any form, even a pony (which the moral to take away from that would be that real monsters are the ones who don't look the part) . Maybe someone really liked Baby Doll from Batman: The Animated Series. I don't know. But what I do know, is that whenever there's a space for fan interpretation, we interpret the hell out of it. I look forward to seeing all the speculation and fan-fiction that will come from this mystery that will never be officially answered. (Unless the Season 10 comics explain it. But then again, most writers here tend to ignore the comics anyway, so I doubt that would matter)
5147893
It’s a flat out refusal to accept canon as canon. Fan revolt, if you will. “MLP:FiM only ever had one season and there’s nothing you can say to prove otherwise!”
My personal cut‐off is Discord’s reformation. Everything before that point is canon, it (and everything past it) is but the fever dreams of madmen.
This makes a disturbing amount of sense. And explains why she began correspondence with Tirek. Indeed, those letters could predate the School of Friendship.
5147904
So in a better timeline, she could've been Captain of the Guard? A haunting glimpse of what could have been.
5147865
And lord how that still pisses me off.
5147941
Well, until such time as we get something different, I’m using the above. It connects her to the world, it gives a pretty simple explanation for why she views friendship as power, and it also can help to explain why she has an affinity for Tirek. He helped her get her cutie mark!
Which I also think is significant because Tirek has huge father issues himself towards his dad Vorak.
There’s a reason why I’ve been writing Tirek as having something of a paternal attitude towards her. “Don’t listen to the changeling”, “you’re too young to gamble”, “you could go camping with me”, etc.
5147938
My thoughts exactly.
5147919
It’s that they didn’t think bother to think of it, according to Big Jim.
5147904
I can dig that.
5147938
Or chief royal adviser yeah. I like it better if she's not born for trouble, and there are positive ways she could use her Mark. It's not destiny screwing her, it's just her being rotten.
5147942
Good point about Tirek's huge daddy issues, it works well for informing their relationship if it's twistedly paternal.
5147970
I also don't like to consider the idea of exclusively evil cutie marks. Actually I think that most cutie marks are very open to personal interpretation. Remember, for example, that Rainbow Dash's special talent is winning, something she seems to interpret not necessarily as always coming in 1st (although she likes to do that), but rather in always trying to go over and above the expectations of whatever role she's in.
5147973
Which, when you think about it, a talent for Winning is as or more broken than talent for Magic. It's an interesting trade off, in that it won't make things any easier for you to get good at something. But it will mean you've got the potential if you put in the work for it the hard way.
Cutie Mark magic is really fascinating to play around with.
Sure Tirek can burst in and cause all these problems around her and lead to what you outlined but you're still missing the WHY of it.
Was she bullied? That seems a bit boring and overdone.
Bad family life at home? That could be neater. But again seems a bit stock.
Doesn't have any friends to start with? Now that has possibilties. Like a dark reflection of Twilight. Extremely studious or just isolated from her peers and wants to make friends for 'power' after seeing all it can mean rather then any positive reason. Could be neat.
Already the scary weirdo who no ponies like because she's shown these tendencies? Or is she instead a super nice pony before this and this just lets her see a way to never fear something again or whatever?
Lots of options there and your concept of Tirek being some shining example of how to seek power can be really neat think you need to fill in the reasons around why she feels such a need for that more then it being just Tirek gave her the idea.
5147997
Oh, there's still lots to fill in, I agree. I just think that this gives us a sort of starting point to build around. A kernel at the core of her character.
5147936
Not even Applejack’s parents?
5147942
I didn't disagree with you on the headcanon. It is legit good. It's just I'm not doing the show's work this time around. That finale pissed me off way too much.
That sounds really cool.
My head cannon was that she WASN’T actually a little filly, she just had some glandular or hormonal problem (which would explain her wild mood swings). She just invested her self worth into behaving like a filly since she enjoys wrapping ponies around her hoof through her cuteness.
In other words, my mind for her went for Baby Doll from Batman: The Animated Series rather than Darla Dimple from Cats Don’t Dance.
Wow, that idea makes so much sense. Especially if she actually interacted with Tirek during his rampage.
Picture it - I can totally see Cozy as a fearless filly, in character, going up to Tirek and asking him what he is doing? And then following it up with why? And him being the overbearing pompus character he is, and her being completely useless to him as she is, him giving her some snarky answer to the effect of he is using others to increase his power.
It totally fits....
5148077
I'm in the same boat. As much as I like this interpretation, I hate we have to come up with something because they gave us nothing. Nevermind that she's still a child so it's still hard for me to accept her actions considering the lengths she goes to. And it's really no fault of the headcanon because that's what we were given.
I don't think she's a filly. I think she's a full grown mare. Just growth stunted.
A great, thorough painting of Cozy's thought processes. I find myself agreeing. Just want to add two points:
1) The CMC told Cozy they were excited to see someone their own age running the School of Friendship, so if Cozy is some sort of 40 year old midget at least the CMC were fooled. I think its pretty likely she's the same age as the CMC.
5147904
2). One other interpretation available for her cutie mark? To "rook" someone is to con or manipulate someone, which Cozy is quite good at.
They could have handled her so much better, but I guess they needed those filler episodes...
RIP Cozy Glow.
https://www.gollydidnothingwrong.club/history.html
OK, but why did she want power in the first place? And what about her parents? This also, at least to me, doesn't explain why she was evil.
5147862
5147941
I enjoyed getting a pony character that was just instinctively evil. Not just disgruntled or sociopathic, but a pedal-to-the-metal supervillain. When even the parents are scared of what they spawned. I suppose it just reminds me of the TV characters I grew up with, with Vicky from Oddparents, and Mandy from Grim Adventures.
Doesn't mean that I wouldn't like to see her parents. But the villains I always wanted to see origins of were Tirek, then Chrysalis. With Tirek I just wanted to know if Scorpan would get his own story, and to find out if there's a whole land of centaurs and gargoyles. For Chrysalis, to see how much of her refusal to reform is just her upbringing or not, and explore her relation with the hive. Origins tell us about the character sure, but when done right tell us their environment; and we already know SO MUCH about Equestria, I want to see some other part of the world.
Although before any of the Legion of Doom, I'd have preferred the origins of the Princesses or Discord.
Wait.
Hold up.
If Cozy admires power, why is she fangirling over the guy that got his ass handed to him? Twice?
Personally I love her because she's ridicoulously, cartoonishly evil. I had some vague thoughts about a child playing with an evil book of spells and making some kind of deal to be a.kid forever.
5147893
Definitely either that or Canterlot Wedding is when the show started to go downhill for me.
I believe it was Alondro who said, in the context of how little sense everything about Cozy Glow makes, "only Satan is that good of a liar" to which I basically responded "that would answer more questions than it raises".
Okay, so I have got a theory on what Cozy's talent is, and a base line of why she's the way she is, and nowhere to post it. If I were to do a blog about the subject, do you think you could send me some tips?
5181056
Sure, if you link the blog.
5181121
Okay thanks. If I get around to finishing editing it, i'll send it you're way.
...
5147904
So expanding on that, what if Cozy is a like a mimic who can copy others talents, sort of like The Taskmaster?
5184710
Not sure if we saw anything to support that, though.
5184729
Nothing concrete maybe, but I would ask you to consider the knowledge she demonstrates and how she acquired it. She spends time with the CMC's and suddenly she's charming enough to fool a entire school.
By the events of School Raze she's pretty good at arts and crafts for a child of her age, this spills into Season 9 in Frenemies where we see artwork that looks like Pinkie Pie's own works, and cupcakes that seem to draw from both Applejack and Pinkie's baking practices.
Before Neighsay we don't see her debating anyone but within days of his arrival she becomes competent enough at it to oust him from power and take over his position at the school.
Then there's to spell the drain magic which she somehow adapts from the natural abilities of Tirek and artificially produces on her own with seeming little to no help from any other creature.
Tirek would have had no reason to produce his abilities artificially nor any prior experience draining Equestria's environmental magic so on some level that was probably all her.
Even the right books could have only done so much because draining magic from Equestria has never been done before.
Then there is the fact that after only a little time as a alicorn she was able to master several spells all of which interestingly enough she's had limited interaction with before, (the shield spell which was over the entrance to the cave of Grogar's bell, a blast spell which Tirek used to bypass the barrier in Freneimes, and a teleportation gate which Chancellor Neighsay uses with Celestia and Luna to get the drop on her at the end of School Raze, and the spell to trigger Grogar's bell which she saw utilized in the beginning of The Ending Of The End) when previously the show had mentioned that even certain unicorns need extensive training to reach the limits of their magical potential.
Given the average foal's learning time in regards to things not specifically relating to their Cutie Mark is medium to slow, and given Cozy's talents appear to mostly mimic stuff she has seen in action at one point or another, would it really be far fetched to say she has exceptional learning ability based on a incredibly precise sense of memory and the talent to take what she learns and apply it within certain limits with a remarkably high sense of accuracy?
5147862
Not exactly. We can make infferences based on the emotions she exhibts, the actions she takes, and a few of the things she says, but anything beyond that is going to be conjecture.
5148806
My personal theory is she wants power because she craves admiration and respect.
A lot of the earlier steps she takes seems to be geared towards getting attention, like her bribing the other students, or signing her name in her letters to Tirek.
A lot of things she says lines up with this idea too. "Maybe when I am waiting for them at the top, then they'll appreciate me". (Freneimies)
Additionally certain lines indicate that she generally holds in contempt the various members of the Equestrian leadership.
"As headmare of this school I can collect more friends than you!" Said by Cozy to Twilight during the end of School Raze, is a line quite possibly intended as a dig at Twilight's ablity to make friends, given Cozy is revealed to be more popular than Twilight as headmare during the events of School Raze part 1.
And again when she insults Celestia and Luna for their reliance on magic in "The Ending of the End".