Don Heckman

Marsh Lamore

Bow and Adora stumble into Etheria's slummier part of town: Bibbet Land. There, they'll have to contend against the annoyingly peaceful, clown-like inhabitants: the Bibbets. They'll also have to foil Hordak's plans to build a robot factory - and Adora will have to do it (for a while, at least) without the aid of She-Ra!

Princess Adora (She-Ra), Spirit, Bow

Hordak, Mantenna, Grizzlor (mentioned only), Shadow Weaver

Horde soldiers, Arrow, Bibbets (including Dee, Koo, wizard, elder, Scout, Rob), horse

Horde tanks, glonders, ground buster, destructors, Scavenger, wagon, batmeks, Crawler, Horde auto-reaper

Weep for Devlan! This innocent Etherian village is about to be crushed under the iron heel of the Horde! In roll the vehicles, tank after tank with vicious painted faces adorning their metal hulls, and rank after rank of robot soldier, some on foot and some mounted on flying glonders; and at the head of the column, the wicked Mantenna in his ground buster, busily assuring his boss Hordak back home that he'll succeed... this time. How could Devlan - and the rebellion - not be doomed?! If you thought that all sounded imposing, though, you probably haven't seen that many episodes of this show; because when the Horde comes knocking, She-Ra will always be there to stop them.

Just like she is today! The invaders roll into the town center to find the blonde goddess waiting to repel them. With her sword of protection, she deflects all the laser fire hurled at her, slicing and smashing glonders. A more powerful rocket momentarily blinds the heroine, but she shakes it off and takes to defeating the soldiers with her bare hands, rolling them into piles of dismantled machinery. A line of chainsaw-nosed destructor vehicles she buries in a chasm pried from the ground by her magic blade. With a rope tied to a tree stump and a superhuman tug, she closes the chasm to ensure there are no messy disruptions to Devlan's transportation infrastructure. Take that, Horde!

Afterwards, Hordak exacts vengeance on the piteous Mantenna for this latest failure, dropping the minion through the throne room trapdoor. His sorceress Shadow Weaver appears to inform the commander that this victory of She-Ra's has resulted in an appalling loss of soldiers and materiel: their forces are decimated. They need to churn out more robots! Hordak orders that a new factory be built to make up the loss, and Weaver knows just the place to do it: Bibbet Land. The peaceful, minuscule inhabitants won't put up a fight, and can be easily enslaved to serve as a workforce for the factory. A pleased Hordak gives the okay to the plan.

An undisclosed amount of time later, cut to Bow and Princess Adora. The rebel leaders are enjoying a leisurely horseback ride through the beautiful countryside - in Bibbet Land. At first, all seems as usual, with lush vegetation and vibrant flowers; but up ahead Adora spies that the landscape has been marred by a hideous tower of steel. It's the Horde factory, already well into construction, with bustling excavating vehicles rolling by at its base. Aghast, the heroes are determined to undo this obscenity; but it's been a long day, and both are tired, so they decide to sleep on it. (I suspect Adora was hoping to wake up early while Bow was still snoozing, turn into She-Ra, and take care of the whole problem single-handed.)

While the pair doze on the ground that evening, however, a contrasting pair of diminutive figures are spying on the campsite. It's two of these Bibbets we've heard tell of: Koo and Dee. Dee thinks Bow's snoring is hilarious, but Koo is all business, and both Bibbets believe they've encountered a pair of Horde agents. They sneak up on the dozing duo and successfully confiscate Adora's sword and Bow's combow. The rebels, awakened at last, spot the Bibbets already walking off with the plunder and give chase. They're led into rope snares which hobble each hero at the ankles and leaving them dangling upside-down in the air. Additional Bibbets appear to examine their catch, none of them interested in listening to Bow and Adora's talk. At Koo's direction, the two are dropped gently into the back of a hay wagon and transported, bound, to the Bibbet village.

There, Adora and Bow have an audience with the Bibbet elder, who (unlike Koo and Dee) believes their protestations of innocence and lack of affiliation with the Horde. The heroes learn that though all Bibbets are horrified at what the Horde is doing to their home, the elder is determined to stay true to his people's code of nonviolence. They will just have to grin and bear the horrible factory and bad treatment. (Besides, the elder has made an agreement with Hordak not to carry any weapons or make any attack on the Horde.) Bow thinks this is crazy talk, but Adora - regardless of any opinions she might personally hold - respects the elder's choice. Koo and Dee, however, are enraged by the situation and determined to act. They rashly dash off to make their own attack against the Horde - taking Adora and Bow's weapons with them!

The rebels ask permission to run off and aid the misguided Bibbets, who are sure to get themselves into trouble. Though the elder explains that his people still refuse to fight, he offers them two escorts, named Scout and Rob, to lead the heroes through the woods. Soon enough the party is making its way to the closest Horde guard station, where - true to everyone's predictions except theirs - Koo and Dee, who had no idea how to use the weapons they stole, have been caught and imprisoned by the soldiers they tried to fight.

Bow and Adora infiltrate the base through the use of ideas, not muscles - though they alert the Horde forces in the process. Inside, they find Koo and Dee hanging by their wrists, completely unguarded, their stolen weapons laid on the ground at their feet (convenient!). The rebels take back their weapons and Adora cuts the Bibbets free. The princess then convinces Bow to leave her there alone to fight off the Horde, while he takes the rescued pair back to the village and works on getting the pacific forest people to go to war. As soon as a reluctant Bow finally leaves - it's She-Ra time!

In the final battle, She-Ra has to deal with batmeks, glonders, a giant Crawler tank - even a Horde auto-reaper is thrown at her, the hardware-strapped enemies apparently reduced to employing farming equipment as weaponry. She does just fine on her own, but is eventually aided in the fight by a small party of Bibbets, since Bow actually did manage to sway the folk into fighting back. Once the archer explained that the Bibbets' entire home and their very lives were at stake, the elder realized there was no choice. So the Bibbets bring their own Ewok-style guerrilla warfare to the battle, using tripwires and pumpkin-flinging catapults. Eventually, She-Ra flings a final tank into the broad side of the factory, demolishing the entire structure, and the day is definitively saved.

She-Ra and Bow (who's glad She-Ra showed up and doesn't seem to care that Adora hasn't reappeared) receive the thanks of the elder, who recaps the lesson he's been taught about sometimes having to fight for peace and freedom. Likewise, Bow admits that he's learned a lesson, too: that "choosing not to fight takes as much strength and courage as fighting does." But that's not an amusing enough way to end the episode, so let's all enjoy a laugh at the expense of Koo, who has managed to get herself tangled up in Bow's bow's bowstring. Oh, you silly little Bibbet!

• Mantenna: Don't worry, Master: She-Ra will never stop us. You've got Mantenna's guarantee on that. / Hordak: The last time he gave me a guarantee, I lost fifty batmeks!
• Bibbet elder: We Bibbets are a peaceful people. We live in harmony with nature. We do not believe in violence.
• Princess Adora: I can't transform to She-Ra without my sword, so I'll have to use ideas instead of muscles.
• Bow: Sometimes - like now - when your home or your family are threatened, there may not be any choice. Please Elder, we rebels don't like fighting either, but I know that if you don't stand up to the Horde now, they won't stop at cutting down the forest to build a factory - they'll destroy all of Bibbet Land!
• Bow: I sure am glad to see you, She-Ra; but then, I'm always glad to see you.
• Bibbet elder (to Bow and She-Ra): You've taught us a lesson we'll never forget: that peace and freedom are priceless, and always worth defending. / Bow: And you've taught me that choosing not to fight takes as much strength and courage as fighting does.

N/A

One partial (missing Spirit/Swift Wind sequence)

5:54 - A rather prominent Loo-Kee, revealing most of his body, is seen looking to the left at an approaching Adora and Bow while standing beside a withered tree.
Did I spot him? YES!

Seemingly turning today's lesson on its head, Loo-Kee reminds us of the brash recklessness of Koo and Dee in running off to fight the Horde without any training or plan, and reminds us that "Sometimes, it takes more courage to walk away from a fight." While this is a lesson taught often in MOTU and POP PSAs, it doesn't seem to have been the one we were meant to glean from this particular story, which was more about those times when fighting is the only option. Are you rebelling against the rebellion, Loo-Kee?

Changing hearts and minds: Though it was really Bow who did the final bit of convincing, not Adora or She-Ra (as is normally the requirement with this category), we definitely saw the Bibbets changing their peaceful ways to aid in the fight against the Horde.
Bow regrets his actions: Along with the Bibbets, Bow regrets his first reaction to today's crisis, and eventually admits he learned a lesson about nonviolence.

• We'll have to endure one more script by Don Heckman, my least favorite POP writer, who gave us 3 episodes of MOTU before turning to She-Ra. This is his ninth, and last, She-Ra tale. Don't be scared away: contrary to how I just made it sound, this isn't really that bad an episode.
• We open with a Horde attack on Devlan, site of the early 67006's "Duel at Devlan." A lot of the rebellion were also busy there during the events of 67013's "King Miro's Journey."
• Hordak again refers to She-Ra as a "muscle maiden," a taunting name for our heroine that has become very popular with the Horde ever since Entrapta first came up with it in 67079's "Romeo and Glimmer." You can tell how much it's caught on, because a few minutes later a Horde soldier uses the same epithet.
• Guess what Devlan has? The same thing every major village on Etheria has: a Laughing Swan Inn franchise. The familiar swan logo, this time on the left side of the street, is seen just before the Horde soldiers begin their attack on She-Ra. We just saw Thaymor's version of the inn in a background from 67090's "Shades of Orko." Devlan's Laughing Swan was being patronized by Dylamug and his men at the opening of our first visit to Devlan, in 67006.
• Note that Mantenna actually uses the vehicle name "glonder" in his dialogue, a term for the hover bikes ridden by many of the Horde soldiers in the opening battle. As with the just-mentioned inn, we first encountered these bikes in our initial visit to Devlan, back in 67006. We didn't hear their name spoken until Leech mentioned it in 67052. Given the usual job the series does with consistent naming of vehicles, Mantenna's repetition makes for a special occasion.
• Another old vehicle callback today with the use of the "destructors," tank-like, treaded jobbers with chainsaws attached to their noses. We saw these used only once before, in 67010's "The Laughing Dragon."
• Interestingly, She-Ra manages her entire opening battle without transforming her sword. Even the rope she uses to seal up the chasm she's made is just picked up off the ground, not formed from her magic blade.
• Hordak transformations: Our Horde commander doesn't mind using his transforming powers; in the scene following She-Ra's victory, for Mantenna's post-mortem meeting, we find Hordak's arm already sporting its typical cannon form.
• How about a good old trapdoor dunking? Mantenna gets his latest today from Hordak. The last time we saw someone going through the throne room hatch, it was an embarrassing blunder on Hordak's part (see the end of 67087's wonderful "The Inspector"); the last time Mantenna was sent through was in 67083.
• Mantenna tries to deflect some of the blame for his failure on Grizzlor, who he claims was also part of the battle. However, we never see the furry fellow on screen, making us wonder whether Mantenna was just desperately inventing scapegoats.
• We find Hordak again leaving the management of technical, mechanical, and very non-magical tasks to his righthand woman, Shadow Weaver. This is a puzzling trend I've noted in previous episodes (see 67089 and 67085) - it just doesn't seem like a sorceress is who you should call when you need a gadget fixed or a robot soldier assembly line set up.
• As the title suggests, this episode will be introducing us to a previously unheard-of set of Etherian critters, in the Bibbets. They can be found, appropriately enough, in Bibbet Land. And what do Bibbets look like? Well, you can refer to the stills above to find out, or you can imagine an Oompa Loompa dressed in a racist Indian Halloween costume, combined with a clown wig and nose. It's... horrific.
• At the construction site of the new robot factory we can catch a brief glimpse of what I believe is another recycled Horde vehicle: the same "Scavenger" that Mantenna so enjoyed operating while the Horde was attempting to acquire 67044's "The Rock People."
• For the first time, Adora refers to Bow's weapon... as a "combow." This suggests it's a combination of several tools/weapons, but other than the fact that it's collapsible, we've never been directly shown what else it can do. I did once theorize that the bow was also meant to transform into his musical instrument (see lore for 67024), but the idea seemed far-fetched. Maybe I was right! (According to Wiki Grayskull, I'm exactly right. It's just weird that it took until the second-to-last episode for me to confirm this, and indicates how strangely unconcerned the show creators were with clarifying the details of their invented world.)
• This episode has a ditched horse problem that was fairly common in earlier episodes of the series. Bow and Adora clearly come to Bibbet Land on their beloved steeds; but once they're robbed in their sleep, the heroes spend the rest of the story blundering through the forest on foot, and the horses are never seen again.
• It looks like Adora, the rebel leader who contradictorily assured us in the annoying 67066 that "fighting is hardly ever the right way to handle a problem," is going to have to take the opposite position today and convince the peaceful Bibbets to take up arms against the Horde. She-Ra just had to convince the peaceful bee people that war is awesome in the previous episode - 67091's "Assault on the Hive." It's a distressing theme in the series, though a logical enough stance for members of a rebellion to take.
• Against a Horde soldier, Bow makes use of the classic MOTU judo throw, used by He-Man, Adam - and Bow himself in previous episodes (for instance 67014).
• To add to the long list of vehicles today, we see one of the more confusingly named ones: what Bow identifies as "Horde fighters," and what have also been variously named batmeks or Horde flyers. They sometimes seem to be completely robotic drones, sometimes more manually operated flyers piloted by Horde soldiers. It's hard to say which one we're getting today, since we never get a shot of a pilot in a cockpit. I've chosen to list them as "batmeks" since that name is mentioned earlier in the episode.
• Because she's so long separated from her sword, or in situations where the irritatingly helpful Bow is clinging to her side, it takes Adora until almost 17 minutes into the episode before she's able to perform her first on-screen transformation into She-Ra. Of course, we already witnessed She-Ra impressively wiping out an entire Horde army in the opening scene, so the late transformation wasn't as much of a delayed gratification as it could have been.
• In a somewhat unusual turn of events, due to the aforementioned ditching of Spirit well before Adora's transformation, we won't be seeing the horse's winged alter ego today. She-Ra highlights the inconvenient absence of her flying mount: "Sure wish Swift Wind were here."
• The vehicle cavalcade is not finished yet! Hordak's giant Crawler tank shows up during the final battle. We recently saw this one in the similarly vehicle-heavy 67089's "Hordak's Power Play."
• Swiss army sword: In the ending fight She-Ra finally does transform her sword, this time opting for the standard shield form in order to block a missile from the Crawler.
• The same animation sequence of She-Ra slicing a passing glonder to bits is used in both the opening and ending battles today.
• ...And yet another vehicle to list, marking another callback to our previous Devlan episode (67006). Oddly, this supposedly military vehicle is a harvesting machine: the "auto-reaper" that ran amok and almost injured a young girl in its first and only other appearance. I guess the Horde was really throwing everything they had at our heroine!
• Secret identity problems: As noted earlier, we do see Adora having some problems today with her secret, since she not only loses her sword for a good portion of the episode, but also has to contend with Bow's determination to stick by her side. Once she's finally shaken the loyal archer loose, however, and taken care of business, She-Ra doesn't get any inconvenient questions from the returned Bow about where Adora has gotten to.
• Speaking of Bow - this will prove his last appearance in the series. For that matter, this is also the last time we'll see Spirit or Adora in a regular episode!
• In a rare but not unique occurrence, when Loo-Kee returns us to his hiding place at the end of the episode, we also see Bow and Adora riding by on their horses. It's rare to see other characters moving by when Loo-Kee is about to reveal himself. He does tactfully wait until they're gone before moving.
• Ending credits variation: Yep, same alternate background painting of the Crystal Castle that we've been seeing almost all season.

• Today's episode title has the distinct sound of a working title that never got replaced with a snappier, finalized version.
• Should we be aghast at the idea of Adora blushingly accepting compliments and flowers from Bow? Has she forgotten her pirate boyfriend, Captain Sea Hawk, so easily? Tsk, tsk. There does seem to be more than a little flirting today between the two, at least on Bow's side.
• Many closeup shots of characters in Bibbet Land show some unusually rough and abstract background paintings of flowers and foliage, with very visible brush strokes. The paintings are pretty enough, but seem to hint at a rushed production schedule for our animators.
• Animation error/dialogue error: There are a couple of instances throughout the episode of a Bibbet line of dialogue being made to come out of the wrong Bibbet's mouth; usually a mixup of Koo and Dee.
• The character list above details a surprisingly long list of specific Bibbets, many of whom are actually given names, contrary to typical Filmation practice; the only one who I never mention anywhere else in this entry is the "wizard." This is because, though he's visible on screen, the character has no lines (at least, none containing any words) and oddly contributes nothing to the story. He just stands next to the elder in his wizard-like moon-speckled cloak and hat, and gives a big yawn during the elder's speech on nonviolence. You have to wonder why the animators bothered to include this guy! It would have been cool if he showed up to do some wizard stuff in the final battle.
• Animation error: In one of the shots where Koo is resting the sword of protection against her shoulder, the hilt of the blade is drawn much too long.
• This story gives me uncomfortable echoes of the most horrendous of Heckman's scripts, the jingoistic and racist 67057's "Jungle Fever." We're clearly meant to understand that the pacifist society of the Bibbets is just plain wrong, and needs to be fixed by our smarter, more cultured, heroes. This was the same line Adora followed when she waded into the business of the jungle tribe on Beast Island in 67057. Today, we find her being more respectful, at least compared to Bow, claiming that the Bibbets have "the right to choose to fight or not fight;" but it's pretty obvious that the Bibbets are going to learn the error of their ways by the end of the story.
• Also like 67057, this Heckman script strives to keep Adora separated from her sword and her alter ego, delaying the appearance of the all-powerful She-Ra. This idea seems to be one cherished by Don, and to be fair, it does serve to put a little more tension and excitement into the story - and makes Adora's eventual and inevitable transformation sequence more fulfilling when it finally occurs. It's interesting how thoroughly this concept clashes with the surrounding stories: 67090, 67091, and 67093 all completely dispense with Adora in favor of an all-She-Ra adventure.
• Though the opening of the episode gave us several Horde stars to check off on my character list, the latter half of the story in Bibbet Land is strangely devoid of any named villains. Hordak makes one token appearance, but only to dictate some remote orders from the comfort of his Fright Zone throne. It seems that the only people left to manage the construction of the factory are the factory's prospective products: robots. It makes for a somewhat unfocused, if action-packed, final battle.
• Continuity error: Bow, trying to be more convincing with the Bibbets after having earlier called them "crazy," quotes Adora as having said "Sometimes it's harder not to fight than it is to fight." However, she never quite said this in their earlier conversation.
• Animation error: The end of the transformation sequence shows She-Ra making the slightest twitch of her sword towards the absent Spirit.
• It may be that She-Ra's great success against the Horde's many robots and machines comes not only from her super strength, but the Horde's corner-cutting, low-quality manufacturing processes. In scenes that follow closely upon each other, we see a pair of Horde soldiers falling to bits after simply tripping on a rope, then an entire factory reduced to rubble when one tank is flung into its side. This is what happens when you always choose the lowest-bidding contractor - and all your labor is slave labor!
• The story makes such a big deal about the necessity of the Bibbets choosing to fight; but in the end, the only act of aggression they perform apart from the tripwire is flinging one pumpkin into one Horde tank. Kind of seems like She-Ra could have handled this on her own, actually!
• So I will say this for today's story: it wasn't as bad as 67057's "Jungle Fever." Rather than baldly depict our heroes as being in the right, with the Bibbets in the wrong, as Adora was with Beast Island's jungle folk, today sees a somewhat more balanced exchange of ideas. While the Bibbet elder has decided that sometimes fighting has to happen, Bow has likewise seen the courage required in avoiding conflict. Still, though it wasn't terrible, I can't say this final Heckman script won me over to his side. And the garish Bibbets aren't going to be supplanting the Twiggets as "cutest race of tiny forest people" anytime soon.
• Animation error: If you want to be very picky. In Loo-Kee's reveal scene, he's shown in front of the tree trunk he was standing behind in the main episode.