The School For Good and Evil is a prime example of when executives cast celebrities to make lackluster book-to-film adaptations look better. Spoiler alert, Netflix, it doesn’t.

   The School For Good and Evil has always held a very special place in my heart. I’m a sucker for a good fairy-tale with a twist, and Chainani’s novel doesn’t disappoint. With lovable yet complex characters and an interesting examination of the morality of good and evil, I couldn’t wait to see this story come from page to screen.

   I was very underwhelmed.

   The School For Good and Evil follows the characters Agatha and Sophie as they are swept away from their town to an enchanted school for heroes and villains. Sophie dreams of becoming a princess, obsessed with exquisite gowns and skin care routines, while Agatha seems destined to become a witch with her antisocial tendencies and “villainy”. However, Sophie and Agatha soon learn that not everything is as it seems, and are sorted into schools different from their expectations.

   There are certainly some redeeming qualities to the film. Sofia Wylie and Sophia Anne Caruso steal the show, and their dynamic is what saves the heart of the feature. Sure, movie Sophie could be more conceited because she only cares about herself and her appearance, and movie Agatha could be more anti-social and “witch-like”, but the change in character creates a much stronger friendship between the two.

   The costumes of The School For Good and Evil are also excellent, immersing the audience in fairy tale fun and witchcraft whimsy with frilly dresses, sparkling armor, and over-the-top black lace costumes. The royalcore and dark academia aesthetic immerse viewers into the story, and it is one of it’s best assets. 

   Even so, casting directors cannot just throw Kerry Washington, Charlize Theron, and other a-list actors in to compensate for the budget cuts needed to create a million dollar fantasy film. Casted characters looked little to nothing like they did in the novel, and the story was incredibly poorly written. A Patti LuPone cameo can’t make up for the plothole of Sophie not knowing what the School for Good and Evil is. She reads every fairy tale on the planet and yet she doesn’t know about the fairy tale school in every one of her books?

   That’s just poor writing, and Netflix knows it. 

   I understand that when creating a book-to movie adaptation, change is to be expected. If directors wanted to include every single part of their novels, they would either have to make overly long movies or realize that television is a better medium to adapt with, shown by series like A Series of Unfortunate Events and Game of Thrones. In this instance, The School For Good and Evil gets by in an attempt to keep the major story intact with many of the trimmings cut.

   However, in terms of a fantasy film, it’s more of a Descendants than something of a Harry Potter. The cgi is terrible, the writing is extremely campy, and adding Billie Eilish to your soundtrack only upgrades you to CW original instead of a Disney Channel original movie. It was like a royalcore trainwreck, where nothing made sense but I couldn’t look away.

   All in all, The School For Good and Evil wasn’t a terrible watch. It was a good way to kill two hours and thirty minutes of fairytale fun, and it’s most enjoyable if you let go of your expectations and enjoy its redeeming qualities. It was a fun film, but I wouldn’t watch it again.