Welcome back to Eternia! This week we see the (probably) final fate of our heroes within the Revelation/Revolution canon, the stakes are higher than ever and the ultimate battle between He-Man and Skeletor is coming, the finale is named “The Scepter and the Sword”, let’s dive right in!
1. Top notch animation
On of the things that I didn’t talk about much in this season is the incredible quality of the animation, this season is shorter, just five episodes, but it did not diminish in its energy. At the beginning of the episode, right where we left off last week, Teela was struggling to maintain the magic of the three scepters, Gwildor and Orko arrive with the sword and Adam rushes to help her.
That gives us the chance to see a gorgeously animated Sailor Moon-esque transformation into the ultimate versions of both heroes, and it ended on a kiss, which is so cheesy! But cheesy-good, and it ended up with Orko celebrating their “training”.
2. After all this time, the best versions of Teela and He-Man
Speaking of the ultimate versions, one of my favorite things of this show is that it gave us a “definitive” version of all the characters, the original show had its characters in a species of “stasis” they never grew up.
That is not bad for a cartoon in the eighties, but this time, a series that tries to be a continuation or culmination of the show, every character had to arrive to its best version, Andra, the original character, turned into Man-At-Arms and seems to be poised to be a president-figure; He-Man reached his best form thanks to the use of tech; Teela conquered the three magics and became an all-powerful sorceress; and they finally kissed! Even Orko evolved from a clumsy magical being to a complete entity.
3. Redemption
On the other hand, also the bad guys got their redemption, the dragon Granamyr, an old magic being guilty of indirectly killing a lot of people, got his redemption fighting in the final battle (and granting his powers to Teela).
And the most important redemption ark was Evil-Lyn, in the last season she destroyed Preternia, and that is pretty much unforgivable, but she was punished, or either chose to be punished by taking care of the old Granamyr, she also recovered Hav’ok scepter and even cheered He-Man and Teela when they kissed.
All those good deeds granted her the opportunity to join the Cosmic Enforcers, a team of… well I don’t know much about them but I read that they are the “equilibrators” of the universe, akin to the Watchers or the Guardians of Oa, so that’s cool.
The one who didn’t get redemption was Skeletor, always the bad guy, but more on him later.
4. An Orko-percent chance
I talked little about Orko’s journey this season, and that’s because last time he pretty much ended his ark by becoming a powerful Magician, but I enjoyed his story this time, he got to team-up with Gwildor, a character from the live-action movie, and I really enjoyed the chemistry that they got together.
They were the literal representation of Magic and Technology, not as easily mixable, water and oil; but ultimately, together they managed to help save the world.
5. A nexus of magic and tech
Speaking of, this was a recurrent theme this season, the mixing magic and tech, we saw it in Orko and Gwildor, we saw it in Skeletor, who after defeating Hordak turned into his “2.0” version, and we also saw it in He-Man himself, who thanks to the updated sword, reached his best.
It was an interesting update to the original show, we even got to see our heroes fight against tech titans that reminded me of the ones in Evangelion. Thanks to He-Man’s updated powers they managed to free both allies and forced-foes, who quicky fled and let Skeletor alone, confronting his defeat.
6. “Happy Independence Day”? that’s not how it works!
I mean, wouldn’t it be a Civil War? Well, whatever.
At the end, Adam chose to relinquish his power as king, and eliminate completely the idea of a kingdom, power to the people! Also, he will be able to maintain a relationship with Teela. A very happy and seemingly definitive ending to the mythos of the Masters of the Universe.
Continued belowThis is one of the best made shows right now, it took the old designs and gave it a faithful update. In a world of modern reboots and updates, where everything is grim and gritty and some of those adaptations take the cheesy stuff and use it sarcastically, they gave us an earnest Masters of the Universe, true to the source material and modern in itself.
So, is that it? This show was very well received by critics and normal fans, but there was a very rabid faction of weirdos who hated on the show for being “woke”, you know, that kind of things that make dumb people feel they are smart by “seeing the hidden strings”.
The point is, this new season barely got any publicity, it came out almost three years after the first one and it was shorter. I doubt Mattel wants to keep fighting with conservatives, I don’t think that we will get another season although I would be happy to see another one. They even left the doors open, with Despara saving Hordak.
I hope to get more of this beautiful show, let’s keep the hopes up.
And that’s it for this time in Eternia, I really enjoyed it, it was a very good show and I’m glad to have the opportunity to talk about it. What did you think of this episode? Leave your comments below and… well I don’t know if I will see you in another season… but you can keep reading me in my reviews of Avatar: The Last Airbender.
