That is also a possibility, but it seems like OP is describing a student for which this would not be very likely. They’ve specifically asked for soft landing advice, which doesn’t sound like a student prone to overconfidence.
I have a student with a 5 on Calc BC test who could have skipped the first 2 quarters (21A and 21B), but decided to only skip the first quarter. The 2nd quarter they took was, in fact, review, but they did not find it uninteresting or boring, and did not get overconfident. Still pulling As.
Really depends on the student imo.