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The School for Good and Evil

Content Caution

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The School for Good and Evil 2022

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Kennedy Unthank

Movie Review

King Arthur. Robin Hood. Prince Charming.

All stories have their beginnings—as do the heroes (and villains) within them. Were you to look for that beginning, you’d find it at The School for Good and Evil.

The school’s mission? To help keep the balance of good and evil by crafting the finest heroes and villains. And the very best of those students eventually become the subjects of the greatest fairy tales ever known—in order to teach people to make their own choices to find their own ways.

Well, the School for Good sounds quite lovely to Sophie, a beautiful girl stuck in the cruel stepmother part of Cinderella destined to one day change the world. But her best friend, an alleged witch named Agatha, doesn’t want Sophie to leave. After all, their town is quite cruel to anyone whom they suspect to be a witch, and Agatha doesn’t think she could take it alone.

But through Sophie’s actions, both of them are soon whisked away to the school by a mythical bird. And there it is! Sophie can very nearly see the ballgowns and tea parties dancing in her head as they come closer to the facility—that is, until the bird drops Agatha in the School for Good and Sophie in the School for Evil.

Surely there’s been a mistake, both of them think.

But according to the deans of both schools, they’re exactly where they’re meant to be.

Positive Elements

Agatha wishes to help others, and even when everyone else turns against someone, she refuses to follow suit. We discover that she’s very empathetic with others, as she suffered at the hands of cruel townspeople and so extends grace to others as a result.

Another, bigger message runs contrary to the fairy tales with which we’ve grown up: Simply dividing people into the black-and-white categories of “good” and “evil” is too simple and cruel. In reality, people are complicated; they make mistakes. They’re neither just knights in shining armor, nor are they solely villainous tricksters.

This complexity is revealed in the messages the schools teach. The School for Good teaches that chivalry is good, but it also implies that evil can be determined by the attractiveness of a person. Likewise, the School for Evil enjoys violence and cruelty, but it also tells its students of how unhelpful obsessing over your looks is. Furthermore, students and faculty in both schools perform actions that would be better suited for the opposite school.

Spiritual Elements

The students at the School for Good and Evil learn how to cast spells and use magic, and a variety of spells are used. One type of magic, “blood magic,” is strictly forbidden because it corrupts those who use it. At one point, blood fills a room and turns into a man. A girl has a tattoo which transforms into a demonic wyvern.

A boy claims that Agatha put a hex on him. Various people in a town claim Agatha and her mother are witches. Agatha’s mother attempts to brew a potion; that said, Agatha isn’t sure if her mother is actually a witch, as her mom’s potions have never worked.

Sophie wishes via a “Wishing Tree.” While at the School for Evil, Sophie is assigned to Room 66.

Sexual Content

Various people kiss within the film.

One woman shares a platonic kiss with another woman who’s passed away, a tender tribute to a fallen friend’s sacrifice as opposed to something that’s depicted as romantic or sexual. (The gesture is represented as a friendship-oriented version of “true love’s kiss” that various fairy tales have emphasized over the years.)

Various characters wear dresses which accentuate cleavage. A man is seen shirtless. Sophie kisses a stranger, and the boy says he’s “OK to keep it casual.”

Violent Content

We learn that the school is the creation of two brothers—one good, one evil—who fight one another in a yin-yang sort of balance. The two duel with swords imbued with elemental magic, and they launch various magical attacks at one another. As expected, the result of their feud rubs off on the two parties who make up the school’s inhabitants.

Students of the Good school fight with students of the Evil school, including Tedros, who cuts off the arm of an attacking Cyclops. A cupid shoots arrows at Agatha, who jumps through a glass window to escape. A girl threatens to throw Sophie off a balcony to her death, and the same girl attacks Sophie with her demonic wyvern. (That said, Sophie defeats the wyvern with a swarm of bees, causing the girl to convulse on the ground.) One student says they should eat another student.

A boy slams Sophie’s head into a liquid potion in a forced attempt to get her to imbibe it. Another boy is accident prone, and he recounts his many mistrials (we see him cut his finger, slam into a tree branch while riding a horse and more). Someone gets zapped by electricity and disintegrates. Sophie tears a tooth out of her mouth.

Furthermore, a man holds Agatha at knifepoint and threatens to burn her (because she’s allegedly a witch). Sophie knocks the man out with a frying pan. Agatha smacks a fairy, and it bites her. Vicious pansies with teeth bite Sophie. Agatha punches another student. People fight various monsters and beasts.

A man’s body is visible after he falls off a cliff. A couple of people get stabbed and killed, and others are hit with attacks which don’t kill them onscreen but that would typically kill a normal person. Students fight, stab and use explosive magic against one another. A group of students is forcefully transformed, and the process appears quite painful. A building collapses (and partially turns into blood), and the people inside are crushed under rubble (though most students seem unaffected).

A smoke monster kidnaps a girl, and it also drags Sophie and Agatha before the two are picked up by a skeletal bird called a Stymph. The students are given magic when teachers stick their fingers through with magical blades. (The Good school says they won’t feel pain, but the Evil school says their blades will hurt a lot.)

Crude or Profane Language

God’s name is used in vain nearly 25 times. The s-word is used once (and is cut off another time). “H—” is used three times, and “a–” and “d–n” are both used once. “Bloody” is used once.

Drug and Alcohol Content

Someone briefly mentions brewing a “love potion.” A man drinks from a flask.

Other Negative Elements

Magic is used to cause birds to defecate on a wagon full of people. A professor belches. The School for Good says that women are “empowered” by their ability to be beautiful.

Conclusion

Your favorite fairy-tale heroes and villains were once students, you know.

Yeah, it’s more than likely they attended The School for Good and Evil. Nowadays, it’s their children who attend, so don’t be surprised to hear from the sons or daughters of Captain Hook, King Arthur and the Sheriff of Nottingham. And, well, in terms of heroism or villainy, those kids tend to follow more or less in their parents’ footsteps.

But reality, as The School for Good and Evil posits, is much more complicated than a fairy tale. People don’t simply fall into one category or another, being only good or evil. Because our actions reveal the true intentions of our hearts, they also reveal that we don’t always fall into the same camp each time.

The movie, based on Soman Chainani’s book of the same name, generally follows the same plot. That means that readers and viewers will deal with many magical happenings as students engage in potion-making and honing their magical abilities.

We also see that in pursuit of the balance between good and evil, the school allows its students to come to much harm. Students are said to be transformed into beasts if they fail. One gets an arm cut off in a fight, and others are blasted with fiery magic.

And, of course, the dualistic idea that good “needs” evil in order for the world to remain in balance is one that contradicts the Christian worldview.

The School for Good and Evil may try to keep its story on the lighter side in many ways, aiming perhaps at an audience similar to the one for Disney’s Descendants franchise. But the show’s use of magic, its violence and its problematic worldview mean there’s a lot more going on here than parents might notice at first.

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Kennedy Unthank

Kennedy Unthank studied journalism at the University of Missouri. He knew he wanted to write for a living when he won a contest for “best fantasy story” while in the 4th grade. What he didn’t know at the time, however, was that he was the only person to submit a story. Regardless, the seed was planted. Kennedy collects and plays board games in his free time, and he loves to talk about biblical apologetics. He doesn’t think the ending of Lost was “that bad.”