The School for Good and Evil

If you’ve spent any time navigating the "New Releases" row on Netflix over the last few years, you know the specific brand of vertigo that comes with their mid-budget fantasy epics. They arrive with the roar of a million social media impressions and the budget of a small nation, only to be swallowed by the algorithm forty-eight hours later. Paul Feig’s The School for Good and Evil is perhaps the ultimate example of this "here today, gone in twenty minutes" phenomenon. It’s a 149-minute maximalist explosion that feels like it was laboratory-grown to be a Tumblr aesthetic post, yet it somehow slipped through the cracks of the cultural zeitgeist faster than a glass slipper on a grease patch.

I actually had to pause the movie halfway through because my neighbor was playing "Toxic" on a tuba, and for a second, I genuinely thought the brassy, chaotic energy was just a part of the soundtrack. That’s the kind of movie this is: loud, colorful, and utterly convinced that more is more.

The Pink, The Black, and The Messy

The premise is classic YA wish-fulfillment with a subversive paint job. We have Sophie (Sophia Anne Caruso), a girl who looks like she escaped from a Disney parade and desperately wants to be a princess, and her best friend Agatha (Sofia Wylie), a gloom-and-doom outcast who the local village has already preemptively labeled a witch. They are whisked away to the titular academy, but—gasp!—there’s a clerical error. Sophie is dumped into the "School for Evil" (The Nevers), while Agatha is sent to the "School for Good" (The Evers).

It’s a fun setup, especially seeing Sofia Wylie try to navigate a dormitory filled with singing birds and aggressive pastel color palettes while Sophia Anne Caruso deals with a school that looks like a glitter-cannon was fired directly at a Pinterest board for "Goth Architecture." The film leans hard into the idea that "Good" is just as vapid and cruel as "Evil" is dirty and jagged. It’s a contemporary conversation about binary morality, but it’s delivered via a script that occasionally trips over its own shoelaces trying to fit a massive book’s worth of lore into a single sitting.

The Heavyweights vs. The Newcomers

What keeps this from being a total slog are the adults. In the era of the "Streaming Blockbuster," you usually get one or two bored A-listers cashing a paycheck. Here, however, we get Kerry Washington as Professor Dovey and Charlize Theron as Lady Lesso, and they are clearly having a competition to see who can chew the scenery the hardest. Charlize Theron, in particular, looks like she is having the time of her life with a red wig that has its own zip code, while Laurence Fishburne pops in as the School Master to provide the necessary gravitas that only a man who has survived the Matrix can offer.

The younger leads hold their own, though. Sofia Wylie is the emotional anchor, providing a grounded performance that almost—almost—makes the 149-minute runtime feel justified. Her chemistry with Sophia Anne Caruso is the only thing that feels "real" in a world made of CGI gargoyles and magical makeup. And then there’s Jamie Flatters as Tedros, the son of King Arthur, who plays the "clueless hunk" trope with just enough self-awareness to be charming rather than annoying.

Why Did We Forget This One?

Released during the height of the post-pandemic streaming wars, The School for Good and Evil was Netflix’s attempt to claim the YA fantasy throne left vacant by Harry Potter. It has all the ingredients: a director known for hit comedies (Paul Feig of Bridesmaids and Spy), a massive production footprint in Belfast, and eye-popping costume design by Renee Ehrlich Kalfus. Yet, it feels like a victim of the "binge" model. It’s so stuffed with plot and visual information that it’s exhausting to watch in one go, yet it doesn’t have the weekly "water cooler" staying power of a series.

The CGI is hit-or-miss, which is a common complaint in modern cinema where virtual production and tight deadlines lead to creatures that look like they were rendered on a lukewarm toaster. When the film uses practical sets and those incredible costumes, it’s a feast for the eyes. When it relies on blue screens for its third-act battle, it loses the "adventure" spirit and starts to look like a screen saver.

Still, there’s a genuine heart here. It’s a story about female friendship being more important than the "true love’s kiss" trope, which is a message that still feels relevant and necessary in the current cinematic landscape. It’s an adventure that dares to be campy, and in an era where everything has to be "gritty" and "realistic," a movie that features Charlize Theron sneering through a veil of lace is a welcome distraction.

Ultimately, The School for Good and Evil is a flawed but fascinating artifact of the 2020s streaming gold rush. It’s too long, the pacing is a rollercoaster, and it tries to do way too much, but the sheer enthusiasm of the cast and the boldness of the production design make it worth a watch for any fantasy completist. It’s a messy, overstuffed, and delightfully weird journey that proves that sometimes, being a little bit "Evil" is way more fun than being perfectly "Good." If you have a rainy Sunday and a high tolerance for glitter, give it a shot.