(SPOILER WARNING!!)
With the recent resurgence of 80's franchises still ingrained into current pop cultural ephemera, it should've been no surprise that eventually someone somewhere would get their hands on the "Masters Of The Universe" property. What was surprising, however, was that they decided to forego re-imagining He-Man and instead went for his opposite gender counterpart/twin sister; She-Ra.
One thing I want to get out of the way; I am not all that familiar with the "Masters Of The Universe". I know who He-Man is and I have the general idea of what the stories usually entail. But in regards to larger details such as lore or the large cast of characters, I'm basically a newbie. I might eventually check out the original show, but I still have a lot of other stuff to get through first. At least I can say that the Netflix "anime" (it really isn't) reboot for She-Ra, appropriately named "She-Ra and The Princesses Of Power", got me interested enough to even consider checking it out.
Plot:
The story takes place on Etheria, a planet trapped in the pocket dimension of Despondos. The planet itself is caught in the midst of civil war, waged between the Rebellion lead by Queen Angella of Brightmoon and the Horde, with their leader being the elusive Hordak. One of the Horde's trainees, Adora, finds herself seeing visions of a sword that rests in the middle of the Whispering Woods, thus convinces her best friend Catra to cover for her while she tries to find it. She, however, ends up accosted by Glimmer, the princess of Brightmoon, and her best friend Bow, an archer and self-taught tech master, who tell her that the Horde has caused nothing but chaos and destruction since their arrival. Upon learning of the lies that the Horde has told her regarding their cause, Adora takes the sword and joins with the Rebellion, using the sword to become the legendary warrior known as She-Ra. This, as a consequence, leaves Catra feeling betrayed by her friend, turning the pair into bitter rivals as Catra's feelings of abandonment twists her ideology to make Adora regret ever leaving her behind; especially in the hands of their abusive mentor, Shadow Weaver.
Pros:
I absolutely love this cast of characters. Each of them are distinct and unique from each other, having really funny interactions while still showcasing their own struggles. I came out of this liking Sea Hawk, Mermista and Swift Wind the most; Sea Hawk had that lovable boisterous energy expected from a sea-faring adventurer, Mermista's general "don't give a fuck" attitude was hilarious, and Swift Wind being a narcissistic, smartarse flying horse was a major highlight to off-set Adora's selfless attitude.
But by far my favourite character was easily Entrapta.
This character was such a breath of fresh air, as she is basically a twist on the "mad scientist" archetype. She has an obsession with ANYTHING tech related, but never does any of her experiments out of malice or to hurt anyone; it's simply for the sake of curiosity and scientific discovery. She can be a bit aloof or oblivious at times, but that's primarily because she is written as representation of someone on the autism spectrum. And speaking as someone with autism, I can really appreciate that they don't just simply make her an all-knowing savant of information; she has weird fixations (such as only eating tiny foods and fizzy drinks) and isn't very good at social interactions, both of which are also common with those on the spectrum.
Besides, she's also fucking hilarious!
In this house, we stan Entrapta.
But of course, the heroes are only ever as good as their villains. And thankfully, this show delivers on that as well.
Catra made for a great foil for Adora, primarily because of how the show established their friendship very early on. We see not only her descent into pure anger and the lengths she'll go to in order to beat Adora, but also her cunning and intellect which sells her as a credible threat. The dance between her and Adora in "Princess Prom" highlights the source of their main conflict; Catra showcasing her guile and her bitterness, while Adora shows he resolve and determination to keep fighting. And at the heart of it all, you remember how these two treated each other at the start; as the best of friends who swore to always stand side by side. Thus, it creates a cycle of tragedy when you fully understand why Catra goes to such extremes to prove herself.
Shadow Weaver, formally known as Light Spinner, has to be one of the most detestable bitches I have ever come across in animation. And unlike other shows I dislike where their unintentional unlikability is played for laughs, Shadow Weaver's despicable attitude was recognised as damaging to people. She's manipulative, cruel, callous, selfish, and worst of all, abusive towards her disciples, especially Catra. Thus, during the finale, it is extremely cathartic to see her lose all of her power when Catra kicks her ass and has Shadow Weaver locked away in a cell. If anything, what Catra did to her was too merciful in comparison to what Shadow Weaver had put her through for years.
Scorpia might actually tie with Entrapta as my favourite character, namely because she isn't really a villain like the rest of the Horde. While Catra wants beat Adora and prove she is stronger, and Shadow Weaver is manipulating things so that she stays in a position of power, all Scorpia wants to do is make friends in the Horde. That's it. She just loves making people like Catra happy and stays cheery and optimistic even in the most dire of situations. She kind of reminds me of Kronk from "Emperor's New Groove", in a way; a big, burly doofus with endless charm and charisma. She may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but I'll be damned if she isn't really funny.
The animation and action scenes are amazing. It's bright, colourful and bursting with a lot of energy. This is helped by how each character has a unique and fun fighting style. Mermista can control water and fuse her legs together to form a mermaid tail; Perfuma can manipulate plant life; Glimmer teleports; Frosta has ice powers; Bow has his trick arrows; Adora uses She-Ra; Entrapta has hair that can move on its own; I just love the wide variety that these characters have, as it gives the action scenes much more appeal. And because time had been spent in getting to know these people, we thus care when something terrible happens; in an episode where the princesses infiltrate the Fright Zone for a rescue mission, Entrapta is believed by the princesses to have been killed. It's shown later that she's fine, but for a moment I actually felt bad that my favourite character was seemingly killed off after a short amount of time.
Cons:
In all honesty, I never really cared about Hordak in this show. And before anyone starts saying anything about how the character changed over the course of the series, let me get this out of the way; I know. I am fully aware of how Hordak's character evolved over the course of the show. But I am not analysing Hordak from the perspective of the entire series; I am looking at his character strictly from how he is portrayed in the first season. And in the first season, Hordak is not the most interesting of villains. For much of it, he spends his time in his inner sanctum performing experiments (eventually recruiting Entrapta to help) while everyone else in the Horde is actually waging the war. Again, this is solely what we see of him in the first season; he does become more active in other seasons, especially in regards to his interactions with Entrapta. But as is, Hordak was one of the weaker elements in this season for me with how he was just kind of generic in his characterisation.
And speaking of weaker elements;
I don't actively dislike Frosta or Perfuma, but I personally felt they had the weakest characterisation out of the princesses. Initially, Frosta seemed to be a more serious character who doesn't tolerate disrespect, which could've made for funny interactions with more energetic characters like Sea Hawk or Bow. But as soon as we see her join the alliance, she's suddenly acting just like a loud kid who loves beating up Horde soldiers. It's kind of implied that she's enjoying her newfound freedom due to being brought up as a stoned faced princess, but this is otherwise kind of brought up out of nowhere to force a sibling dynamic between her and Glimmer. As for Perfuma, she did kind of have a bit of the stereotypical "airhead blonde" persona at first before using her botanokinesis to fight back against the Horde and join the Princess Alliance. She wasn't overly annoying or anything, but I just felt that her characterisation wasn't as well developed as the others. Again, this is simply from the perspective of the first season; they do get better in the rest of the show.
And while I can praise the characterisation for a good chunk of the cast and I really enjoyed the action and music, there wasn't really much in terms of world-building. The Best Friend Squad (meaning Adora, Glimmer, and Bow) visit a bunch of different places like the labyrinthian Crypto Castle in Dryl (Entrapta's home) and the massive ocean kingdom of Salineas (Mermista's home), but we don't really get much in terms of Etherian lore or backstory for the different kingdoms on Etheria. Scorpia is revealed to be a princess who joined the Horde after her kingdom was given to Hordak to create the Fright Zone, but we don't get any real explanation about her backstory or why her Runestone, the Black Garnet, was given to over to the Horde in the first place. I think it was implied that either it was stolen or Scorpia's people just really liked Hordak. But either way, it is very minimal in regards to actually giving organic lore and history to Etheria. The most we really get as concrete details is with Entrapta studying the technology of the First Ones, the first inhabitants to make settlement on Etheria, but that's more of a plot device as opposed to building a major history for the planet. I'm not asking for a three hour history lesson about Etherian politics, but a little bit of backstory for some of these kingdoms would really help give the setting more life and flavour.
Conclusion:
Lack of world-building aside, the few issues I have with this show are little nit-picks. I really enjoyed watching these characters on their adventures and the emotional tension between Adora and Catra is what carried a lot of the season for me, which is executed excellently through the performances from Aimee Carrero as Adora and AJ Michalka as Catra. Bring this together with great music, animation and voice acting from the rest of the cast, and you have an entertaining and solid first season.
Overall rating: 8 out of 10 (excellent).
I would like to thank everyone who took a part in the voting poll for this review. If anyone else reading would like to partake in other polls for what to review next or just to follow me on Twitter, then my handle is @MediaHood23; I post tweets every couple of days or so. Feel free to leave a comment telling me what you thought of "She-Ra and The Princesses Of Power", and be sure to share this on social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc) to anyone else who may have watched the series. Any form of support would be greatly appreciated.
But until next time; this is Callum Lewis, the Media Hood, signing off!
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