On a more practical note, this thread will serve as an archive for known facts and high-confidence inferences about Cozy Glow, intended to support fiction writing. While this may end up being a very short thread, I believe it may be useful for inspiration and ensuring canonicity.

Obvious and/or well-established facts, such as coat color, cutie mark, sadism, etc. are not the subject of interest. Rather, I ask that the focus be on deeper insights. For now I will break it up into four categories: skills, likes, dislikes, and traits. For example:

SKILLS - lock picking, oratory, puppeteering

LIKES - roasted marshmallows

DISLIKES - Twilight Sparkle

TRAITS - snoring

By high-confidence inferences, I mean conclusions that are probably true, but not fully supported by events in the show. An example would be that she's originally from Cloudsdale or some other Pegasus city. While Pegasi and unicorns are not necessarily the offspring of their respective species (e.g. the Cake Twins), most often they are.

If possible, please go the extra mile and include images documenting your discoveries (as I will shortly). Thank you in advance to any who participate for their assistance in raising awareness of Cozy Glow.

Complete List

SKILLS: lock picking¹, oratory², puppeteering³, arts & crafts (jhg), chess playing (MicahDebrink), singing/musical improvisation,⁴ baking⁷

LIKES - roasted marshmallows⁵

DISLIKES - Twilight Sparkle, magic users (Casketbase77)

TRAITS - snoring⁶, affected accent (Casketbase77), extremely unlucky (Casketbase77)

MISC - lives at the School of Friendship while attending (M_A_D_C_A_T_S)

PROBABLE CHARACTERISTICS - originated in a pegasus city or town, is wealthy and/or well-connected⁸

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5] (see 2:43-2:49), [6] (see 1:00-1:07)

[7] (see 0:03), [8] (see 0:33-0:37)

Cozy Glow seems to like arts and crafts:

7171119

Nice! This is exactly the kind of information we need.

7171113

An example would be that she's originally from Cloudsdale or some other Pegasus city. While Pegasi and unicorns are not necessarily the offspring of their respective species (e.g. the Cake Twins), most often they are.

Former doesn't lead to the latter, though - we've seen pegasi in various places, including plenty in Ponyville. I'd say her having at least one pegasus parent is extremely likely, and having two very likely, but no speculation on where they live more specific than "Equestria" can exceed "quite plausible".

Where is Cozy shown to be good at lockpicking? I don't remember

We know she has a lot of contempt for magic.

Her big solo scheme was an attempt to short-circuit the planet, Tirek claims she originally hit him up because she was fascinated by his ability to depower ponies, and even when she was wrecking sh*t as an Alicorn she shouted “That’s the thing with you magic users: So reliant on your powers that you forget to use your brains!”

So yeah, she’s very clearly got a grudge against Unicorns and magically empowered races in general. Exactly why she developed such a complex and whether it’s born of jealousy or disgust is up to interpretation. But it’s definitely a pillar of her personality.

Oh, and this isn’t related to the rest of my comment, but her accent’s fake. She speaks in that bubbly Transatlantic voice whenever she’s trying to shmooze someone over (which is admittedly most of the time), but when she loses her temper, her regular speech is shrill and tactless.

7171127

When they steal the spell book describing the magic of Grogar's bell, she very expertly picks the lock to the library (I'll get a screenshot soon).

7171125

I was thinking of it this way: say you meet someone who tells you they're from Germany. They have a strong German accent, and their English is imperfect. They also look and dress like most German people you've met. You could justifiably assume, based on probability, they're from one of the major German cities, as they are the population centers (Berlin, for instance, as opposed to Apolda). One would perhaps not voice the assumption out of politeness, of course.

7171233
i suppose. I do put her as being from a pegasus town myself (albeit a small one), but I wouldn't feel anywhere near confident in asserting it as a probability.

She also enjoys chess. And is arguably very good at chess, considering her cutie mark.

7171274

Well played

Cozy Glow also seems to be supernaturally unlucky. 

Unlike most other villains in the show whose defeats are usually spearheaded by their own hubris (Discord lets the Mane Six take a free shot at him, Tirek hands Twilight the last key to the Rainbow Chest), Cozy’s failures usually come from factors completely beyond her control. 

In School Raze, the Tree Of Harmony defies physics to empower the Student Six.

In Frenemies she just happens to come up against Rusty Bucket, the one pony in Equestria too small-minded to fall for her cutie patootie schtick.

Conclusion: Cozy Glow is a competent schemer with good threat assessment instincts, and each victory the heroes score against her are due to either blind luck or the bullheadedness of those around her. When writing a fic featuring a plan she sets into motion, having it implode through no fault of hers is the way to go if you want to keep in line with canon. No worries; if you write her to be a big enough prat, the random wrongs will feel satisfyingly karmic.

“You nincompoops!” She slammed the door to Tirek’s room and stomped back to her own room to cry herself to sleep. Why were all her plans destined to fail so close to victory? Why did the universe mock her?

- Excerpt from Nothing But The Tooth

7171125
Considering she’s a racist child, it’s unlikely her heritage is as mixed as the Cake Twins. Otherwise, parents that carry Pegasus blood but are not Pegasus ponies would suggest she’s got some self loathing spin on that trait.

Also, flight would mean someone had to teach her. Pegasus family or access to a flight camp is more than likely.

7171476
Racist against non-ponies - I don't recall any genuine dislike of earthponies on her part, although her plan of banishing magic does sugesst some possible issues with unicorns. Still, pegasus parents is most likely simply because most ponies seem to have matching ones.

7171522
Considering she has a variant on the usual pure blood type of sentiment, I think it’s unlikely she’s a mutt.

7171533
Actually thinking about it I dunno - externalsed self-loating can be a poerful force, and it's possible she learned her distaste for magic close to home.

7171414
Off topic I know.... but.... How did you do that type of style of a comment like that?!! O_o

7171599
It took a lot of finagling and tabbing into Fimfiction’s BBCode directory to eventually get the pictures, paragraphs, and page breaks all to line up. At least on desktop. The result looks like absolute sh*t on mobile devices.

I’ve embedded pictures in my own fics before of course, but this is the first time I went whole hog in a discussion thread. Glad it turned out okayish.

7171616
Dang. Now that's skill level right there. X3

7171414

Fantastic! One might extend this to her very being: she was simply unlucky to be born with/nurtured into a personality that was completely at odds with everything held to be good and true in Equestria.

7171414
Note that this doesn't mean her plots are well thought through or sustainable - if not for the Student Six she might have succeeded in her magic draining, but her actually rising to power in the aftermath instead of being trampled underfoot as the world fell apart is an extreme unlikely outcome. But then, not thinking things all the way through is very in character for a child, even an evil genius one.

In this thread, I predict many fanfictions will be disproven, and that scares me.

But along what we know about Cozy, she sends letter to Tirek through the mail. There's only one mail pony who would be absent-minded enough to help her (not calling her stupid; just saying it's a possibility). Derpy is seen specifically giving mail to Cozy in the opening of School Raze so we can assume that Derpy is the one that Cozy has talked into delivering mail to Tartarus in secret.

Another fact is that Cozy gave the Friendship Journal to Flim and Flam in the episode Friendship University.

7171962
Any ideas why? (And while I can't check the script right now, they must be referring to some other, private book - perhaps a compilation of lesson plans - rather than the publicly sold Journal.)

7172172

Just speculating, but Cozy may have been trying to get Twilight ousted as headmare so that she could take her place, or act with less supervision.

7172554
I doubt she could have accomplished that - I mean, the School was basically running on Twilight's personal say-so. It's not like there was anyone who could fire her - she was an owner-operator.

7172172
I believe it was the actual Friendship Journal since it involved all of the friendship lessons Twilight had used over the years. The lesson plans were Flim and Flam's though since Twilight read one of them and was interested by it, implying that she had never thought of it and confirming that it wasn't hers. I actually involved the event of Cozy giving them the journal in the backstory fanfiction I wrote (Glow in the Dark) but the story hasn't gotten to it yet.

7172588
But... why would they need someone to sneak them a book that was published all over Equestria? Even Rusty Bucket in the middle of nowhere had one!

I can only conclude that Twilight was working on a sequel or second edition - maybe rewriting it into something more like a textbook.

7172608
In my interpretation of the event, I had written that Twilight specifically told everypony not to give a book to Flim and Flam because they would exploit it for bits. Because of this, anyone that sold the book had specific orders from the Princess of Friendship not to give the two a book. And the two couldn't get the book from random citizens either because there would've been posters that warned everyone not to give a book to them. So nopony would be brave enough to give over a book except for one filly who wasn't afraid of Twilight Sparkle in the slightest.

7171476
7171522
That tends more to the theory side of the argument though. While Cozy is unquestionably capable of inspiring speciesism, we see no sign that she's motivated by it. Her scheme would have indirectly benefited certain non-pony races as she herself points out, and we see no signs that she wasn't pursuing an alternate agenda every time she used speciesist rhetoric. She never utilizes anything of the kind in Season 9 and we see no signs that it was anything other than but a tool for her to cast doubt on her enemies.

7172172
My theory is that she was trying to start knock-off Friendship Schools to undermine Twilight's authority on the subject, (either for revenge or to better pave the way for establishing her own school). Or else she was trying to destroy the idea of competing Friendship Schools in order to establish a monopoly on teaching friendship, so that when Twilight's School fell under her control, her ties to Twilight would ensure she was the premier 'friendship expert' in Equestria.

7172845
Seems that if they were that universally known as untrustworthy, nopony would attend their university at all.

7172846
She sows inter-tribal discord in Season 9 - which once again, could be a mere tool or her real feelings.

And her setting up Flim & Flam to fail is an interesting idea. Actually, I'd love to know who they thought they were dealing wih...

7172861

She sows inter-tribal discord in Season 9 - which once again, could be a mere tool or her real feelings.

Fair enough. I had forgotten about that. My point was that she never brings up non-pony discrimination again.

7172861
Twilight would have simply told the citizens of Equestria not to give them a book. But if you know market ponies like Flim and Flam, they're advertisements to learn the same lessons in half of the time would definitely motivate ponies to come to their school over Twilight's simply because it seems like the better option. Not to mention that Neighsay accredited the school so that Flim and Flam's university got the chancellor's seal of approval. Nopony would know that Neighsay only did it to discredit Twilight's school since it had non-ponies.

7173066
And you think everypony in Equestria listens to Twilight at that point? Furthermore, why would she do that unless she foresaw their scheme, which clearly took her by surprise?

7173079
Twilight has had plenty of occurrences with Flim and Flam to know that they're not trustworthy, so she wouldn't want them to get a book for fear that it would be corrupted. Obviously if she expects someone to have absolutely no possible way of acquiring something and then they end up actually acquiring it, it would take her by surprise. Furthermore, Twilight didn't have the mentality of a friendship school when she published the journals, so when she created the school in the season 8 premiere, it definitely would have shocked her to think that Flim and Flam got the same idea and found a way to exploit it using something she never thought they would get.

7173095
Still, I honestly don't think she really thought about Flim and Flam before that - and if she did imagine them reading her book, I expect she hoped they might learn something from it.

7173099
Usually, I'd think that Twilight would want them to read the book and change, but you can see Twilight's skepticism throughout the episode, especially after she knows that they got her book. She is unwilling to believe that they could change, and then at the end, she is proven right (which is actually sort of screwed up when you think about it).

7173108
She's only sceptical of them once she finds out they're running a friendship school. (And ponies like that you really should always treat with suspicion.)

I might be a bit late to the party, but I would like to point out that Cozy Glows veiled hatred towards the Student Six might not be motivated entirely by racism or power-hungry tendancies.

Remember that Equestria has been attacked beforehand and invaded on at least three separate occasions at this point: twice of which were done by the Changelings through direct and indirect means. Equestria had known about the threat they posed, and had one of them become a turncoat to help glean information, but nopony decided to act on such information to figure out where their Hive actually was, or to strategize a way to try inciting revolution within the Hive to overthrow the Queen much sooner.

Then looking towards Silverstream, she indirectly points out how in their own cowardice had allowed for The Storm Kings' invasion to happen unabated, and was entirely willing to leave Equestria to be subjugated into slavery by the mad merchandise king that had already before subjugated twelve Nations, and annihilated twelve more. Chances are that Equestria would have been the latter category... with multiple cities destroyed, and thousands left dying in the streets... once The Storm King and his minions finished having their... "fun" with them...

While brief, Cozy had implied that after they had finished with Equestria, The Storm King would have turned his attention towards Griffinstone to destroy them just for fun. Along with briefly mentioning that because of their isolationism and lack of economic unity they were absolutely powerless to commit anything of an offensive or support for Equestria: which shouldn't even be the case at all since it is clarified through the friendship between Gilda and Rainbow Dash that trade can become opened to Griffinstone once again, and that Equestria was willing to initiate it with them to help Griffinstone rebuild YEARS ago. Cozy is taking a stab at their Pride which she sees as both the Griffins' Virtue and greatest Vice.

Towards Smolder, Cozy implies that Dragons are too close-minded; only putting on a show of interest in Equestria, but deeply not caring at all about what happens there and how it might even try to affect them. A level of arrogance that would greatly cost them should they be invaded by something more powerful and vicious than even them.

In much the same way as with Griffins and Dragons, Cozy is attacking the Yaks culture because of their own isolationism and pride; wholly unaware or uncaring at all what happened to Equestria in the years since Pinkie Pie first arrived there. That they would have potentially contributed towards defeating The Storm Kings forces, and that due to their arrogance had rolled out the welcome mat for a completely airborne invasion force to attack and subjugate Yakyakistan altogether once they finished with Equestria.

It may not seem like it for those that were within Canterlot at the time of the Storm Kings' Invasion, but to experience war firsthand from wherever Cozy Glow had lived had left its mark on her, and festered enough anger and hatred not directed at the other nations, but instead at her own people for their sense of Complacency these last few years with so many invasions and attacks by foreign powers. All the while Princess Celestia and Twilight constantly preaches about the importance of Harmony and Peace in Equestria, when Cozy Glow knows full well that there can never be any true "peace"throughout all facets in this world, that Twilight is too naïve to fully understand the other side of the coin, to understand the opposite of Peace: she failed to have learned about War, and how it serves as a means to destroy Peace, and also a means to better understand what is truly needed for Peace to be possible.

7398518

Outstanding! Twilight could have learned from Cozy, as you say, to gain additional perspective on preventing wars and invasions before they happen, rather than just react to them and hope for the best. Great insight on Cozy's distrust of the other creatures as well. Everything she said during that scene was accurate, or at least expressed a reasonable (though limited) opinion based on prior experience and pony understanding of other species. I for one didn't see it as necessarily racist: she was commenting on the perceived behavior of other nations that just happened to be composed of other types of creatures. Other pony tribes, city states, or sub-principalities could easily have been substituted (one might imagine her ideas about Crystal Ponies). Sadly, the Young Six did nothing to try to change her opinion (they might have saved Cozy's life if they had!).

7398535
"Do you know the difference between an Error and a Mistake? Anyone can make an Error, but an Error ultimately doesn't become a Mistake, unless the one who made the Error: refuses to correct it." -Thrawn

Ah, penning a new Cozy Glow fic so I'm back to this thread for research. The former Empress of Friendship didn't get much screentime, so she had so much left unsaid. Maybe a magic microphone near her statue and a Princess-mandated weekly radio show will inform Equestria of Cozy's Glowpinions.

7632275

Beautiful. Can't wait!

7171113

this thread will serve as an archive for known facts and high-confidence inferences about Cozy Glow

My niece has been staying with me while she recovers from COVID and has gotten into the series. We are through 7 seasons and tonight I noticed a statement that I missed previously. In School Daze (Season 8, Episode 1) Twilight made an announcement to all the students that Starlight Glimmer would be showing them to their living quarters. This pretty much makes it clear Cozy Glow was staying at the school in Season 8.

The biggest mysteries I see remaining:

1. Where are her parents?
2. How is she providing for herself?
3. Who passed the pen-pal messages from Cozy Glow to Tirek? Celestia/Luna/Twilight would certainly read them and everyone else lacks power (except Discord).
4. Why did Cozy Glow grow bat wings when given Discord's power? Pinkie Pie merely grew larger with it. Also, when Tirek drained Discord, he also only grew larger.

7639251

Excellent find, M_A_D_C_A_T_S. The fact that Cozy (and the other students) live at the Castle of Friendship is an important one. One might infer that there's a hefty tuition to attend, and that the parents are all fairly well-off (except Gallus). Combine this with Cozy's ability to procure Sapphire Shores tickets, and one would have grounds to say she's from an upper class family.

I wonder who her roommate was.

7639308

I wonder who her roommate was.

In The Hearth's Warming Club (about 4 minutes into the episode) Twilight went into the hallway where the young 6 was staying and each of them came from different rooms. It appears to be one room per student.

7639709

Hm, could be. I thought I saw a bunk bed in one of the rooms. Perhaps it's like college dorms and some of them are doubles and triples.

7639746
I also thought the young 6 shared rooms as I remembered seeing a bunk bed as well. Will be looking for it when I rewatch the episodes. Maybe they elected to share rooms after the Hearthswarming Break?!

On a side note - Cozy was imprisoned in Tartarus for approximately a year. We can infer this from the Holiday Special which occurs between season 8 and 9:

S8E15 Hearthswarming Club - Cozy is still in school at the time of this Hearthswarming
S8E26 School Raze (part 2) Cozy is imprisoned in Tartarus (Fall has not yet happened). It likely happened the following Spring semester as the student 6 were still in class.
Holiday Special occurs at Hearthswarming and the events in Season 9 have not yet happened.
S9E1 Beginning of the End occurs - at earliest the following spring/summer.

7639308
Maybe the unicorn she's partnered with for the Spellvenger hunt? Or perhaps it's a case of shoddy continuity?

7171962
7172172

Partly because I feel NO obligation to pretend that canon can't have any continuity glitches or logical difficulties, I don't know whether to give higher praise to Shadow Spector or to Latecomer, for noticing this...interesting set of questions. (Just in case, I went and checked wikipedia; "Fame and Misfortune" is in s7, while "Friendship University" with the 'mystery' of how Flim & Flam got a copy of the book is in s8. On the other hand, my fuzzy recollection of the latter episode seems to feature Flim & Flam having copies of worksheets, and having students fill out only half of Twilight's worksheets to get their 'education' in only half the time After that, I went and looked at the episode transcript to double check: https://mlp.fandom.com/wiki/Transcripts/Friendship_University, to see it does indeed seem to be Twilight's book being discussed, and Neighsay seems to know that it is indeed her book. )

I think the discussion and rationalizing about this in this thread is funny.