J. Larry Carroll

Bill Nunes

The insecure Spritina the Twigget, anxious to find a talent to show off at the Summer Moon Festival, accepts a set of magic paints from a mysterious old woman. There couldn't be anything wrong, because the portraits she makes look wonderful! It's just a coincidence that everyone she's painted has since vanished...

Bow, Netossa, Kowl, Broom, Madame Razz, Princess Adora (She-Ra), Spirit (Swift Wind), Glimmer, Queen Angella

Hordak, Shadow Weaver, Catra (old woman), Horde Prime (mentioned only), Entrapta

various rebels, Twiggets (Spritina, Sprint, Spunky), Bright Moon guards, Horde soldier, Frit the Bottle Man

wagons, batmeks, Hordak-faced ship

That Catra! She's failed again in the latest attempt to defeat Etheria's pesky rebels. Hordak is understandably crabby about it - but Shadow Weaver has a plan to take out those rebels one by one. In fact, she intends to make one of the rebels do it themselves! We're dying to know the details, but for now we'll just have to wait, because...

...it's time for the Summer Moon Festival! That's right, Etheria's famous Summer Moon Festival, which gives our rebels the chance to show off their special talents to their fellows. Bow - that polymath and pain in the Horde's patoot - has so many talents that he's having trouble deciding which one to put on display in his performance. Shall he play a tune on his instrument, as he's doing for Twiggets Spritina and Sprint in the midst of the rebel camp? Or should he put on a magic show? Demonstrating his skills in that area, Bow produces a lovely bouquet of flowers out of nowhere and hands it to the pleased Spritina. Sprint knows what he's going to do: an impressive series of cartwheels. He'll just have to make sure to practice a bit more if he doesn't want to finish upside-down in a heap on the stage.

But what about Spritina? The little Twigget can't decide what she wants to do, and is worried she doesn't actually have any talents worth showing. Feeling down and indecisive, Spritina strolls off alone through the woods. She happens upon an old woman with an easel and canvas, who seems engaged in painting a landscape. The friendly stranger asks after Spritina's troubles, and when the Twigget explains, graciously offers up her own paints for Spritina to use. Spritina should paint everyone's portrait at the festival! When the bashful sprite argues that she doesn't know the first thing about painting, the woman reassures her: these paints are magic!

Spritina at first offers to practice by painting the old woman's portrait; but the stranger emphatically declines, saying she's not worth the pigment, and instead suggests that the Twigget paint Netossa, who is standing nearby. Spritina happily goes along with this suggestion, and gets Netossa's agreement; what neither of the rebels see is the old woman walking off, cackling evilly, and transforming into Catra! Uh-oh; I bet those paints have a nasty side effect of some kind...

As far as Spritina is concerned, those paints are perfect: all she has to do is swipe her brush over the canvas, and an astoundingly realistic likeness of Netossa appears. The Twigget is too excited at the prospect of showing off her new-found skills to the rest of her friends to notice that as soon as the painting is finished, Netossa begins to feel unwell. Moments after Spritina departs, we watch as Netossa falls to the ground - and vanishes into thin air!

Back at the camp in the Whispering Woods, Spritina is as busy as a bee person, plying her paints and popping off portraits. She's painted Kowl, Broom, and as we watch, she knocks out a picture of Bow. The other rebels looking on notice that as soon as the painting is finished, Bow becomes woozy and decides he's very tired. As the archer staggers off for a nap, Madame Razz declares that everyone seems sleepy today, because Broom did the same thing earlier just after being painted, and she hasn't seen him since. Hmmm.

When Bow goes off alone to sit on a rock in the forest (weird place to take a nap), we watch him disappear the same way Netossa did; but this time, we see where the vanished subject ends up: imprisoned in a duplicate painting on a wall in the Fright Zone! We find Hordak admiring his growing collection, which includes all four of the people Spritina has painted. He's delighted at the success of Shadow Weaver's plot and is sure Horde Prime is going to love it, too. An impatient Catra is ready to capitalize on the reduced rebel forces by attacking Castle Bright Moon right away; but Weaver instructs the force captain to wait a little longer. There are other important rebels who should be committed to canvas...

Such as, for instance, Princess Adora! The rebel leader is the next person Spritina wants to paint; and even though Adora is very busy doing... things... she grudgingly agrees to indulge the Twigget's wish and stand with Spirit for a double portrait (girl and her horse). Spritina is just lifting the brush, about to seal our heroine's fate - when they're very luckily interrupted by news from Bright Moon. The Horde is attacking! (I guess Catra wasn't willing to wait.) Our heroes want to rush to the castle to help Queen Angella and Princess Glimmer defend it; the only problem is, there are a whole lot of them missing! Razz explains that she can't find Broom, or Bow, or Kowl, or Netossa. Adora instructs the witch to lead a search for the missing people, then wanders off to a private spot to prepare for a trip to Bright Moon - as She-Ra.

The freshly transformed golden-haired heroine returns to the main camp to check in with Razz and gets a weird vibe from all of Spritina's paintings. There's something funky going on there, and She-Ra imparts her hunch to Madame before leaving. At the castle, She-Ra arrives atop Swift Wind as the only rebel reinforcement for Angella and Glimmer, explaining to the dismayed queen that they can't find anybody else right now. Fortunately, the defenders hold their own pretty darn well, with the mother and daughter team zapping down batmeks with their light beams, the guardsmen firing anti-aircraft rockets, and She-Ra slicing ships to bits. Still, the Horde forces outnumber them; and Catra, flying in the lead in her Hordak-faced ship, announces her intention of dividing the attack by riding off to strafe the village of Thaymor. How can the decimated rebel ranks defend both places at once? And where are all those missing soldiers?

Madame Razz has decided to use magic to solve that puzzle. Sitting in a circle and holding hands with Spritina and Spunky, the witch chants a spell and is granted a vision of the unlucky prisoners, frozen on the walls of the Fright Zone dungeon! Spritina, aghast, realizes that her own magic paints have been the cause of all this trouble, and that the Horde must have been at the root of it. While Razz rushes off to inform She-Ra what they've learned (does the imprisoned Broom have a brother?), Spritina tells Spunky of her determination to travel to the Fright Zone herself. This was all her fault, and she needs to do something about it! Even though he's sure this is a terrible idea, Spunky decides he needs to go with his friend; so the pair run off together.

True to Spunky's presentiments, though the Twiggets do make it all the way to the room in the fortress where the wicked paintings are hung, they're then caught by Hordak himself, who snatches up one Twigget in each hand. The Horde commander is laughing over his success and sure everything is going wonderfully - until She-Ra shows up, striding over the wreckage of a Horde soldier she's just disintegrated. (She-Ra incidentally explains to her Twigget friends that she got the news about the paintings from Madame and hurried here.) Hordak calls for aid against the golden goddess, but no one comes; turns out all his soldiers and minions are being used by Catra in her big attack. Deciding to cut his losses, Hordak drops the Twiggets and flees, crying for help. Nyah nyah!

She-Ra, Spritina, and Spunky take advantage of the lack of Horde interference by collecting all their painted friends and sneaking back out of the Fright Zone. While they were busy doing this, however, Hordak was not idle: he made a call to Catra. The feline foe was forced to cut off her offensive and return to the fortress. Her Hordak-faced ship arrives with a pair of batmeks just as She-Ra and crew are preparing to jump onto Swift Wind and make themselves scarce. She-Ra urges the Twiggets to take the paintings and get out of there, while she delays the bad guys. Doing better than her word, She-Ra again plies her blade against the vessels, cutting them all to bits. Even the Hordak-faced ship is split in half, and Catra and co-pilot Entrapta are left fluttering down to the ground in their parachutes, defeated.

Back at the rebel camp, our heroes collect all the cursed paintings together, and Madame Razz works a desperate spell. Thankfully, at this crucial moment the witch gets all her words right, and the heroes are freed from their painted prisons! While everyone else celebrates this happy conclusion to the day's events, Spritina tries to sneak off alone, sure that the others will blame her for her part in the plot - even if it was all unwilling. But She-Ra stops the Twigget, and everyone else assures her they don't hold a grudge - especially Bow, who gives Spritina a big hug. Aw.

• Queen Angella: Once again we must fight for the freedom of our home. Are you ready, my daughter? / Glimmer: Ready, Mother. / Angella: Then - for Bright Moon!
• Madame Razz: Oh deary my, those paints! They were enchanted with Shadow Weaver's evil magic! (to Spritina) She tricked ya into helping the Horde capture our friends!
• Bow (with unencouraging vagueness): You may think you can't do anything special, Spritina - but to us you'll always be very, very special.

• She-Ra mounts Swift Wind and flies off: Preparing to lead Catra and her batmeks away

One full

7:42 - Loo-Kee adopts an almost identical pose and hiding place to that in the previous episode (67087): he's hanging upside down by his tail from the branch of a tree, hugging the trunk and looking off to the right. This time he appears in a panning shot of the Whispering Woods that takes us to a sleepy Bow.
Did I spot him? YES!

Don't be alarmed, but we may be caught in a time loop. In addition to using a very similar hiding place to that from the last episode, Loo-Kee also begins his PSA segment the same way, by suggesting that his viewers didn't find him during the episode; and his subsequent reveal shot has the same inconsistencies that 67087's did. For his lesson, he points us to Spritina, who wanted to be able to play an instrument like Bow. Loo-Kee advises that we shouldn't waste our time as Spritina did wishing for talents we don't have; instead, you've got to work with what you've got. But remember, kids: eating glue isn't a talent.

Kowl DOESN'T avoid capture: though it's just one part of the larger plot, you can't deny that our usually self-preserving bird is among those trapped by the Horde plot today - which undeniably meets the criteria for this category!
Shadow Weaver weaves a wicked web: Sure, for some reason it's Catra who gets into disguise to hand out those magic paints, but the idea and the paints all came from Shadow Weaver.

• Our writer/director team for this episode is the same exact one that brought us the previous episode, 67087's "The Inspector." That bodes well for the quality of this story!
• In the insulting harangue which opens the episode, Hordak refers to Catra by her rank of force captain - a rare, but not unique, occurrence.
• It seems that today's evil plot will once again be brought to us by the devious Shadow Weaver. In a rare show of preference for his sorceress, Hordak actually tells Catra to hush up and listen to Weaver's idea for getting rid of the rebels "one at a time."
• I've spoken before about the qualities that make Bow the rebellion's one true renaissance man (see lore for 67019 and 67023); today, we're reminded of this when Bow's many talents leave him in a conundrum over which to exhibit at the upcoming Summer Moon Festival: shall he play his lyre/harp (as he's just been doing for a pair of Twiggets), or put on a magic show? Decisions, decisions...
• Today brings us a recurrence of one of our rarer Twiggets, in Sprint. This cartwheeling crazy has only shown up in two previous episodes: 67017 and 67066.
• We find Catra using an old lady disguise that mimics the common old lady used by many MOTU villains of the past (Evil-Lyn in MU021 and Jarvan in MU010, among others). The last time we saw a Horde member looking old was when Shadow Weaver was spying on Spinnerella in 67078 - that character design mimicked a slightly different old lady, however.
• The setup for today's story, with a disguised Hordeswoman preying on the vulnerability of a gullible rebel aching for the recognition of her peers, recalls the recent 67086's "Glimmer Come Home."
• Appearing for her second consecutive episode is Netossa! I have to admit, I didn't expect to be seeing this rather obscure character (sorry, Netty, but I think the label fits) so often in these last few episodes of the series.
• The inspiration for the surprisingly dark concept of supernatural portraits that steal people away must lie with Oscar Wilde's enduring Gothic tale, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). In Wilde's story, a beautiful young man sells his soul and becomes immortal, with all the marks of his sins and aging instead transferred to his portrait. Obviously the portraits in this story don't work in quite the same way, but the general idea of a painting capturing the essence of a person is there.
• We've had opportunity to see the guards of Castle Bright Moon on a few previous occasions, but they have an odd habit of changing their uniforms. In 67022 and 67067, they wore blue; when they briefly appeared in 67028, they had on orange; but when a few of her men escorted Corporal Romeo to Queen Angella in 67079, we found them wearing more casual outfits in shades of green. Today, the guards are back to orange, but it's not the same uniform from 67028, and it features a snug helmet with a nose guard. Maybe Angella is bored and spends her time redesigning the castle livery.
• The exchange Queen Angella and her daughter have atop the battlements of the castle just before the attack is nearly word-for-word identical to an exchange they shared before a battle in 67067's "Return of the General" (compare the memorable lines in both entries and you'll see what I mean!). Just as in that episode, we then find Glimmer evincing the ability to fly - something she hasn't done in any other part of the series.
• Glimmer and Angella are seen firing rays from their hands, capable of destroying the Horde fighters. We saw Glimmer doing something similar in the recent 67086's "Glimmer Come Home."
• A late addition to today's Twigget contingent gives us the even rarer appearance of Spunky, the shirtless fellow whom Bow was serenading at the beginning of 67028's "Bow's Farewell." This is only Spunky's second episode. Oddly our animators have entirely avoided using Twigget a-listers Sprag and Sprocker in this story.
• Madame's magic: The spell our second-string Twigget team casts with Madame in order to track down the missing rebels is identical to one Razz used to find He-Man back in 67002. It was used again in 67052, to find two of the same people they're looking for this time: Broom and Kowl.
• She-Ra uses her sword as a sword, cutting a pair of flyers (or batmeks - take your pick) in half. The split flyers then both fly into a mountainside, mimicking an action scene from the end of 67067's "Return of the General." The scene is mimicked once again later in the episode, when She-Ra cuts up a few more batmeks, then the Hordak-faced ship.
• With regard to the Hordak-faced ship: you'd think Hordak would be flying it, but today it's Catra at the controls. She was also piloting this craft during the attack on 67031's "The Reluctant Wizard."
• Swiss army sword: To take out some of the robot flyers attacking Bright Moon, She-Ra wordlessly transforms her sword into a sword-shaped pile of rope (while retaining the sword's hilt). Though in the initial shot it seems there is only rope, once She-Ra has flung the line out, we find it ends in a grappling hook.
• While leaving her robots to continue the raid on Bright Moon, the devious Catra flies off to attack the village of Thaymor, apparently with the intention of spreading our rebel forces perilously thin. (Copying her bragging behavior at the end of 67028, the villain first pauses to announce her intentions to the watching rebels via the PA system in her ship.) Thaymor has been playing a recurring part in the series since the very first episode (67001). The last time we visited there was in 67078's "When Whispering Woods Last Bloomed." Today, though the village is mentioned, Catra never seems to get there, being called away by Hordak beforehand. We'll actually visit Thaymor in the upcoming 67090's "Shades of Orko."
• The grate-covered tunnel outlet by which we see She-Ra and the "Twigget army" exiting the Fright Zone looks to be the same one General Sunder used to get in for the aforementioned 67067. This tunnel, or one very much like it, was also used in 67073. They should really block that thing up - or at least put a padlock on it!
• Making a very late-stage cameo today is Entrapta. She has no lines but is shown riding shotgun with Catra - and later plummeting out of the destroyed Hordak-faced ship next to Catra.
• Madame's magic: Our trusty (?) witch has to pull out a last-minute unfumbled rhyme in order to free her friends from their painted prisons. And she does it! Madame's magic plays a very crucial role today.
• Speaking of late-stage cameos - a particularly shocking one comes in the final minute of the episode, just as Madame is working her successful spell. In the back of a crowd of cheering heroes is Frit the Bottle Man! This is Razz's old (old!) flame, who we first met in 67030's "Play It Again, Bow." Nice to see you, Frit, but - what the heck are you doing there? The elderly trash collector only shows up in that one shot, making a wordless cheering sound, and is never seen again. I guess we're just meant to realize that old Frit is still hanging around with his gal.
• Believe it or not, though we still have five episodes to go, this one will be the last appearance of many regular members of the Great Rebellion: we won't be seeing Queen Angella, Madame Razz, Broom, or any of the Twiggets again. Kowl will appear only one more time, in the next episode (67089); and Glimmer will get one more in 67090.
• Ending credits variation: The background painting (of Castle Bright Moon) remains unchanged from what it's been for almost every other second season episode.

• Catra oddly complains about all the "rebel spies" she has to deal with. Though we've seen evidence of farmers and even princes willing to secretly aid the rebellion, rarely have we encountered an actual rebel spy - an undercover agent passing on Horde intelligence. The funny thing is, there is a rebel spy character among the POP action figures, in the form of Double Trouble; but she never makes an appearance in the Filmation series. It would have been fun to have some plots that explored this idea of espionage and subterfuge on the part of the rebels.
• Animation error: When Bow first produces the bouquet of flowers, the flowers have no visible stems.
• It was a huge surprise for me when the old lady with the "magic paints" turns out to be someone other than Shadow Weaver. I was absolutely certain it was going to be her! Exciting that what is usually an incredibly predictable old cartoon can still throw me for a loop every once in a while.
• Since Spritina had no idea what was going to happen when she made her first brushstroke with the magic paints, it's hard to understand why she chose the odd shade of green that she uses for Netossa's portrait - Netossa's outfit is definitely not that color!
• There's a very obvious side effect to the use of the paints that somehow doesn't reveal itself until Spritina has painted at least four separate people. How is it possible that no one notices all of Spritina's subjects vanishing into thin air ten seconds after she's done? They all just happened to find a private place to "take a nap" before disappearing? Honestly, it seems to be pure luck that this gambit was as successful as it turned out to be.
• The plot takes a contradictory twist about halfway through, where following a scene in which Shadow Weaver explicitly tells Catra to wait before beginning any attacks on the rebels, Catra immediately attacks the rebels. This would make more sense if Catra made some denigrating comment about Weaver's advice, making it clear that she was choosing not to follow it; or if Weaver eventually delivered an "I told you so" line to Catra. But neither occurs. In fact, after giving her unheeded advice, Weaver is oddly absent from the rest of the episode.
• Catra's rash decision here, by the way, proves immensely critical, and highlights Shadow Weaver's good judgment. As we see, if the feline foe had waited just a tiny bit longer before showing up at Bright Moon - like, five minutes tops - Spritina would have painted Adora and Spirit, making it impossible for She-Ra to save the day!
• Continuity error: You can put it down to those magic paints; but I don't think Spritina's portraits were supposed to change poses! In different shots, we see Bow's portrait posed with arms hanging at his sides, or with hands on hips. This reminds me of that time he squirmed all over the place while ostensibly frozen in a block of ice (see 67052's "The Wizard"). (Mind you, I'm referring here to the original painting made by Spritina; the copies of the portraits in the Fright Zone depict our heroes in positions of more obvious distress, which makes a kind of supernatural sense.)
• It seems a bit unfair to have She-Ra be the one who first senses the magic nature of the paintings. Why not the Great Rebellion's resident magic user, Madame Razz? At least Razz gets to cast the finding spell - and eventually lift the curse.
• The scene where a cowardly Hordak - presented with the sudden approach of She-Ra - turns tail and runs, crying "Somebody save me!" is amusing but seems out of character. After all, we've seen the Horde commander aggressively engage in multiple one-on-one battles with the golden-haired heroine: Hordak's shape-changing duel with She-Ra in 67017 immediately comes to mind. Maybe Hordak has finally realized from all those previous times that he really can't win a fight against the woman, especially without any robotic backup.
• Animation error: Just as in the last episode's PSA (67087), when Loo-Kee reveals his hiding place today, we find the the layering of cels and a varying foreground have changed the scene from how it looked in the episode. We again find puffy bushes having been placed in front of the tree, and we again find that Loo-Kee's tail no longer curls around the tree branch. These differences are particularly strange when you consider how much of Filmation's time-saving animation measures center around reusing clips - this is their bread and butter!
• Though this story was not quite as enjoyable as the previous episode's J. Larry Carroll script, it did bring us an interesting adventure, which took us to some surprisingly disturbing places. The scenes with the trapped heroes making distressed noises while frozen on canvas must have been traumatic for our young 80s selves! I like the concept, though it feels like it was executed a bit clumsily in a few places, with characters acting illogically or against type. Carroll will have another chance to wow us very soon, with 67090's "Shades of Orko."