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impyIt's time for some babbling about S3 of She-Ra and the Princesses of Power!
We're going to preface this whole thing with the fact that I am not fully awake yet and more importantly, I probably need to rewatch this season because I'm already a little fuzzy on things. I watched the first episode and then binged the rest on my day off last week so. Sorry if I'm talking out of my ass more than normal.
So. We all agree King Micah ain't dead, right? Like that's my big take away from the finale. I really enjoyed getting to see him but his "I'm not-" was him saying he's not dead, right?
Overall, S3 Or the back half of S2, however you wanna look at it but it's technically being called S3, is very, very short and unlike S2, doesn't have room for a fun filler ep. Which means we spend most of our character development on the villains. To such a degree that as I'm watching one of the episodes, I'm marveling at how well they do a villain storyline, especially when compared to say, Queen Angella's. I find myself rooting for the villains more often than not on this show and it's not because I ultimately want them to win. I want the Rebellion to step up their storytelling game, dammit. Because right now they are losing, badly.
Still not a Hordak/Entrapta 'shipper but I don't think it's possible to watch this season and not appreciate their relationship, however you look at it. And it doesn't mean that I don't see full well that it's meant to be 'shippy. I do. I just... look. I love me a good villain, but I am also the person who doesn't want to see the planet destroyed and Hordak's tale of being a clone with a defect is touching. It really is. And Entrapta's entire thing about flaws being amazing is perfection. But I want Entrapta to be happy and there's no way happiness lies in Hordak. Which doesn't mean it's not going to be a 'ship that goes down in glorious flames (possibly taking them both with it, who knows) it just means it's not one I'm cheering from the sidelines the way Scorpia cheers Catra on in just about everything until, well, y'know. So I have accepted that it's a 'ship but it's not my 'ship of choice, if that makes sense. Actually, no. Scratch some of that. My problem is that my read on Entrapta for a long time was that she wasn't romantically inclined towards anyone. At all. Possibly ever.
But Hordak, buddy. My guy, my dude. Bro, if you will. You know who lies like she breathes? Catra. It's not like you don't know this. Still, his heartbreak over thinking Entrapta betrayed him might've made me tear up. You can prove NOTHING.
Huntara was fun. I don't fully love the character design but y'know, she wasn't my favorite character design before either so you do you, show. Adora's fixation on her was fab and I loved it. Geena Davis in more things, please.
I desperately missed Sea Hawk, Swift Wind, and the rest of the Princess Alliance. Mermista and Co showing up at the end was nice but I could've used more. I think my critique of most episodes will always be "needs more Scorpia. Needs more Mermista." But in this case, the Alliance is probably less a factor when you watch S2/3 all the way through together. I think. Dunno, haven't done it yet.
Let's talk about Scorpia, shall we? She remains my favorite and I love her and I want her to be happy and ohmygod, I spent the whole damn season, especially once Catra showed her any niceness at all, waiting for her to die. Her willingness to go into what could only be described as possibly hell, all because she didn't want Catra to be exiled alone, is just so... I love you, Scorpia. I also love how stupidly, blissfully easy the Crimson Waste was for them both and how Scorpia was ready to just keep walking away from the Horde and set up shop in the Waste because it seemed to be where she and, most importantly to her, Catra belonged. And she was right. Catra should have stayed there. I'm not saying she'd have been blissfully happy there, but maybe enough time away from everything wrong in her life would have seriously helped Catra.
Instead we get suicide mission Catra. I dunno if anyone else read the end of the arc the way I did, but once Catra learns that once again Shadow Weaver threw her over for Adora, she's not just out for revenge or to prove herself once and for all. Nope, Catra wasn't going to be satisfied until someone died... and she wasn't above it being her, either. You don't open a portal and possibly doom everything and every one, yourself included, if you're not on a suicide mission. It's one thing if she honestly believed that Adora was wrong and Entrapta was wrong and everyone was wrong and it'd be fine to open the portal. But she didn't. She was counting on them being right.
Best case scenario: Everyone is wrong which means ADORA was wrong and Catra really is queen of the hour.
Worst case: Everyone was right but everyone is dead so who the fuck cares.
But then the show would be over so Catra missed the absolute worst case scenario for herself which is that Adora was right, she saves the day, and Catra just screwed herself. Again.
My only problem with Adora telling Catra that she made her choice was the whole obvious death wish behind it.
Glitchy Catra was glorious, btw.
Back to Scorpia. Her reaction to Catra turning on Entrapta was also heartbreaking for me. And not in the "I'm now going to spend sixteen pages discussing why this is a terrible, abusive relationship" kind of way. Just heartbreaking to see Scorpia realize how far gone Catra was/is at that point. And also Entrapta! Take all my exclamation points of love, villains!
And Scorpia's dislike of Adora following through to the Portal!Reality was just icing on the cake. I loved that little AU.
Hey, I forgot to mention Mara. That was a nifty twist. Not so much the fact that the show had to issue an apology for fucking up the lighting on She-Ra!Mara being a radically different skintone (and she was) but the fact that she was actually a hero and not the fuckup Adora was led to believe. Huzzah!
Which I suppose leads me back to Angella and the ending because if the MCU has a villain problem, She-Ra has a hero problem. They're just... there. And even if you do get some storylines with them, it still feels like all the care and attention went into the villains. I don't know if it's because I am usually pretty villain friendly or if there's actually a storytelling blindspot here. It could be that we just haven't gotten to the good stuff for them and this is another problem of the weird seasons. But as it is, it felt like Angella's sacrifice was because they haven't been able to find anything for her to do other than be upset that Glimmer keeps being a teenager with a side helping of trying to save the world. With Micah's neon sign that he's not dead, killing Angella (or trapping her?) means that Glimmer won't be an orphan for long but they will maybe get to play those beats if they chose and then "surprise!" Micah.
Honestly, they seem to be struggling with giving anyone on the good side anything to do if they're not Bow or Glimmer... and even then it's still not as compelling as it feels like maybe it should be. Like they're clearly in the right about a lot of things so you'll root for them to win on that alone but character wise they still suffer.
Loved other little things in the season, like Glimmer and Shadow Weaver teaming up (I'm sure that'll have no lasting repercussions at all), or Glimmer and Angella's supreme cuteness in the portal realm.
We're going to preface this whole thing with the fact that I am not fully awake yet and more importantly, I probably need to rewatch this season because I'm already a little fuzzy on things. I watched the first episode and then binged the rest on my day off last week so. Sorry if I'm talking out of my ass more than normal.
So. We all agree King Micah ain't dead, right? Like that's my big take away from the finale. I really enjoyed getting to see him but his "I'm not-" was him saying he's not dead, right?
Overall, S3 Or the back half of S2, however you wanna look at it but it's technically being called S3, is very, very short and unlike S2, doesn't have room for a fun filler ep. Which means we spend most of our character development on the villains. To such a degree that as I'm watching one of the episodes, I'm marveling at how well they do a villain storyline, especially when compared to say, Queen Angella's. I find myself rooting for the villains more often than not on this show and it's not because I ultimately want them to win. I want the Rebellion to step up their storytelling game, dammit. Because right now they are losing, badly.
Still not a Hordak/Entrapta 'shipper but I don't think it's possible to watch this season and not appreciate their relationship, however you look at it. And it doesn't mean that I don't see full well that it's meant to be 'shippy. I do. I just... look. I love me a good villain, but I am also the person who doesn't want to see the planet destroyed and Hordak's tale of being a clone with a defect is touching. It really is. And Entrapta's entire thing about flaws being amazing is perfection. But I want Entrapta to be happy and there's no way happiness lies in Hordak. Which doesn't mean it's not going to be a 'ship that goes down in glorious flames (possibly taking them both with it, who knows) it just means it's not one I'm cheering from the sidelines the way Scorpia cheers Catra on in just about everything until, well, y'know. So I have accepted that it's a 'ship but it's not my 'ship of choice, if that makes sense. Actually, no. Scratch some of that. My problem is that my read on Entrapta for a long time was that she wasn't romantically inclined towards anyone. At all. Possibly ever.
But Hordak, buddy. My guy, my dude. Bro, if you will. You know who lies like she breathes? Catra. It's not like you don't know this. Still, his heartbreak over thinking Entrapta betrayed him might've made me tear up. You can prove NOTHING.
Huntara was fun. I don't fully love the character design but y'know, she wasn't my favorite character design before either so you do you, show. Adora's fixation on her was fab and I loved it. Geena Davis in more things, please.
I desperately missed Sea Hawk, Swift Wind, and the rest of the Princess Alliance. Mermista and Co showing up at the end was nice but I could've used more. I think my critique of most episodes will always be "needs more Scorpia. Needs more Mermista." But in this case, the Alliance is probably less a factor when you watch S2/3 all the way through together. I think. Dunno, haven't done it yet.
Let's talk about Scorpia, shall we? She remains my favorite and I love her and I want her to be happy and ohmygod, I spent the whole damn season, especially once Catra showed her any niceness at all, waiting for her to die. Her willingness to go into what could only be described as possibly hell, all because she didn't want Catra to be exiled alone, is just so... I love you, Scorpia. I also love how stupidly, blissfully easy the Crimson Waste was for them both and how Scorpia was ready to just keep walking away from the Horde and set up shop in the Waste because it seemed to be where she and, most importantly to her, Catra belonged. And she was right. Catra should have stayed there. I'm not saying she'd have been blissfully happy there, but maybe enough time away from everything wrong in her life would have seriously helped Catra.
Instead we get suicide mission Catra. I dunno if anyone else read the end of the arc the way I did, but once Catra learns that once again Shadow Weaver threw her over for Adora, she's not just out for revenge or to prove herself once and for all. Nope, Catra wasn't going to be satisfied until someone died... and she wasn't above it being her, either. You don't open a portal and possibly doom everything and every one, yourself included, if you're not on a suicide mission. It's one thing if she honestly believed that Adora was wrong and Entrapta was wrong and everyone was wrong and it'd be fine to open the portal. But she didn't. She was counting on them being right.
Best case scenario: Everyone is wrong which means ADORA was wrong and Catra really is queen of the hour.
Worst case: Everyone was right but everyone is dead so who the fuck cares.
But then the show would be over so Catra missed the absolute worst case scenario for herself which is that Adora was right, she saves the day, and Catra just screwed herself. Again.
My only problem with Adora telling Catra that she made her choice was the whole obvious death wish behind it.
Glitchy Catra was glorious, btw.
Back to Scorpia. Her reaction to Catra turning on Entrapta was also heartbreaking for me. And not in the "I'm now going to spend sixteen pages discussing why this is a terrible, abusive relationship" kind of way. Just heartbreaking to see Scorpia realize how far gone Catra was/is at that point. And also Entrapta! Take all my exclamation points of love, villains!
And Scorpia's dislike of Adora following through to the Portal!Reality was just icing on the cake. I loved that little AU.
Hey, I forgot to mention Mara. That was a nifty twist. Not so much the fact that the show had to issue an apology for fucking up the lighting on She-Ra!Mara being a radically different skintone (and she was) but the fact that she was actually a hero and not the fuckup Adora was led to believe. Huzzah!
Which I suppose leads me back to Angella and the ending because if the MCU has a villain problem, She-Ra has a hero problem. They're just... there. And even if you do get some storylines with them, it still feels like all the care and attention went into the villains. I don't know if it's because I am usually pretty villain friendly or if there's actually a storytelling blindspot here. It could be that we just haven't gotten to the good stuff for them and this is another problem of the weird seasons. But as it is, it felt like Angella's sacrifice was because they haven't been able to find anything for her to do other than be upset that Glimmer keeps being a teenager with a side helping of trying to save the world. With Micah's neon sign that he's not dead, killing Angella (or trapping her?) means that Glimmer won't be an orphan for long but they will maybe get to play those beats if they chose and then "surprise!" Micah.
Honestly, they seem to be struggling with giving anyone on the good side anything to do if they're not Bow or Glimmer... and even then it's still not as compelling as it feels like maybe it should be. Like they're clearly in the right about a lot of things so you'll root for them to win on that alone but character wise they still suffer.
Loved other little things in the season, like Glimmer and Shadow Weaver teaming up (I'm sure that'll have no lasting repercussions at all), or Glimmer and Angella's supreme cuteness in the portal realm.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-08-13 02:22 pm (UTC)Given Shadow Weaver's new hold on Glimmer, I'd wager we're up for a little more with her next season, but overall there do seem to be more compelling villains. S1 it was mostly Best Friend Squad vs Super Pal Trio, which I'd say was in the neighborhood of "even", but S2/S3 went in on SW and Hordak, so...
(no subject)
Date: 2019-08-13 03:03 pm (UTC)I wonder what SW knows about Micah. I know we're pretty likely to get Prime but I do hope they manage to give us a little more on the heroes.