Talk:Mission Ed-Possible/@comment-756329-20150930163203/@comment-3242362-20150930201551

I disagree. Edd is actually very loyal to his friends. The thing is, though, this episode actually fits in very well with his personality, and gives some insight into his character and his beliefs.

Allow me to start off by partially agreeing with you: Edd is incredibly respectful of authority. One of the main facets of his character is that he prizes, above many other things, RULES. In fact, his character can be summed up as somebody who obeys the rules all the time, from making the appropriate driving gesture at a traffic light even though nobody else cares, to complimenting Ed on obeying traffic signals from someone who really shouldn't be giving them (admittedly, it's their fault that Sarah is a stoplight, but still), to trying to set up a labor relations board with Rolf. One of the main things he does is try and obey the rules set before him.

This ties in with his overall fastidiousness; he had a freakout in "The Ed-Touchables" when he lost his magnifying glass where he refused to believe that he could have misplaced it, was rattled by having slept in (saying he'd never done it before) in "Hot Buttered Ed," and absolutely refuses to believe in curses despite the evidence clearly pointing in that direction in "Sorry, Wrong Ed." In addition, take into account how rattled he gets when rules are broken. This can range from merely being irritated to waves of guilt (especially if he's broken a rule) to full-blown meltdowns.

There are examples of each sprinkled throughout the series. For example, in "They Call Him Mr. Ed," Edd is more annoyed than angry that Ed has gone through his maze incorrectly; after all, what else is to be expected of simpleminded Ed? And in "An Ed in the Bush," Edd merely feels nervous and guilty about pranking the Urban Rangers (although this might be because he knows any talk of morality will be ignored by his friends). However, when things verge towards anarchy, Edd begins to lose it. For example, when he lost the Spelling Bee in "Too Smart for His Own Ed," was he disappointed and saddened? Yes. He had his prized quality–being the smartest kid in Peach Creek–thrown into question (as had happened before in "In Like Ed," where he likewise was tempted into acting unusually, for once ignoring his morals in order to become a spy). However, there he was able to accept it, because he understood why he had lost and what rules applied. But in "Sorry, Wrong Ed," his dark side comes out–because he doesn't believe in luck, and it is implied that his disbelief is due to the fact that luck does not work by rules, it works by chance. Likewise, when the rule of law is trampled and ignored by the kids when they ransack his house for school supplies in "Out with the Old, In with the Ed," he suffers a minor nervous breakdown, shocked that anyone would so blatantly ignore the rules, from the minor ones like not wiping feat to the major ones like burglary.

But let's move on from this, and address Edd's "lack of loyalty." This is, to put it blatantly, a false accusation. If Edd is disloyal, why did he not abandon Ed when Ed was being a brat in "Little Ed Blue?" Why did he enlist both Eddy and the Urban Rangers to rescue Ed from the Kankers in "Ed Overboard?" Simply put, why does he continue to hang out with Ed and Eddy even though they repeatedly get him grounded, get him pounded, and generally make his life worse? Why does he go through so much human misery instead of eschewing them as friends if he is as disloyal as you claim? After all, of all the Eds he's probably the least disliked and, were he to cut ties, would probably have a decent chance of ingratiating himself with the kids as "the smart guy." So why doesn't he just DO that?

He sticks with them because they're friends, and because he's a loyal person. And from this you get the crux of his personal belief system that makes him able to stick with his friends through all the bad times and yet able to sell them out to authority: he evidently believes very strongly in personal responsibility.

This belief is at the core of what makes this episode work, along with his devotion to rules, systems, and his general belief that the world works better when the appropriate process is followed (which, given how much time he spends on science and math, makes sense). With Edd, the question for him isn't "Should I help my friends lie to their parents?" For him, this isn't even an option. The question is "Have my friends gotten the grades they deserve?"

Think about it. Does Eddy deserve his Fs? After all, he's not a very good student, he frequently engages in destruction of school property, and as can be seen on his report card, he's got comments from all his teachers, which suggests that he is, indeed a problem student. So yes, Eddy may well deserve his grades. But what about Ed? As you pointed out, Ed is probably developmentally disabled, and nobody's doing anything about it.

So, does Ed deserve his grades? On the one hand, YES. Ed is freaking stupid, and almost certainly does not know enough to pass (no, Ed, 17÷3≠a boot, and yes I realize that's a simplification of the actual equation). On the other hand, he again has mental problems (which the unmade episode "Special Ed" may have tried to take a look at). But what happens here is Edd's belief in systems leads him awry: instead of thinking that Ed should be in a remedial class, he assumes that the system has evaluated him and found that he's "normal". In other words, his belief in systems has led to ignorance (quite possibly willful ignorance) that sometimes kids slip through the cracks. He believes the system works, and that Ed does indeed deserve his grades.

This, in turn, is why he's loyal to authority: he believes that those in power understand the system, know how to run it, and in turn make the best decisions for those involved. As a result of this, he believes that showing his friends' parents their grades will lead to the best outcomes, with both of them possibly taking their studies more seriously. And, to be honest, he may not be wrong in thinking this is the best option; at the very least, this could well lead to their parents taking a more active role in their schooling, which may lead to better scholastic achievements.