Story - Richard Pardee, Teleplay - Richard Pardee, Paul Dini

Marsh Lamore

Orko's desire to please the visiting Lady Edwina leads him to the tar swamp to pick up an old medallion he lost there. Unfortunately for him, Skeletor and crew are there too, to resurrect the ancient beasts that died in its tarry depths!

Man-at-Arms, Teela, Queen Marlena, King Randor, Orko, Prince Adam (He-Man), Cringer (Battle Cat), Stratos

Beast Man, Evil-Lyn, Skeletor

Eternian guard, Lady Edwina, blue contemporary swamp monster (unnamed), winged ancient tar swamp beasts (unnamed), drachadon

Lady Edwina's flying ship, Wind Raider

Lady Edwina, King Randor's niece, arrives for a visit. Orko, meeting her for the first time, is greatly enamored of her; but Edwina immediately shows herself to be a stuck-up, shallow prig, insulting Duncan and Teela and refusing the trinket Orko tries to give her. Adam tries to demonstrate to Edwina that Orko is a hero by telling the story of Orko's first appearance in Eternia: a storm ripped him from his own world of Trolla into the tar swamp, where it so happened a young Adam and Cringer were trapped. Orko used an incredibly powerful magic medallion to save the Prince, but lost it in the swamp. This good deed was what convinced the royal family to adopt Orko.

Whether Edwina was impressed by this story or not is somewhat unclear; but Orko is reminded forcibly of the powers the medallion gave him, and in a bid to win Edwina's favor, he wanders off to the tar swamp to try to recover the magic amulet. Finding Orko's bed empty in the morning, Duncan and Teela quickly realize exactly what the Trollan is up to. It just so happens that Skeletor decided that same morning to visit the tar swamp, in order to pour some goo (which he calls a primeval potion) into it and bring back to life the ancient creatures that used to live there. The bad guys kidnap Orko and carry out their plan; with Beast Man's powers, they tame the monsters that rise from the swamp and head for the palace. There are a grand total of three monsters: two winged ones and another very large dinosaur-like, hard-headed fellow called a drachadon.

On their way, the villains notice Duncan and Teela in their Wind Raider, coming to find Orko. The swamp monsters cause the Raider to crash, completely totalling it - luckily Stratos swings by in time to scoop out the occupants. He-Man shows up to join with the other heroes, who then spot Skeletor and his Trollan hostage. Stratos has to help again when He-Man is snatched by one of the winged beasts Skeletor has conjured; a freed He-Man then tosses away the other one. But in the meantime Skeletor and the drachadon have made it to the palace!

With his family threatened, Randor sees no choice but to surrender his castle. He, Marlena, Edwina, and Orko are thrown in the dungeon. At Edwina's whiny urging, Orko tries a spell of escape, which only succeeds in teleporting the magician and the lady outside. They are almost immediately set upon by the drachadon, and must be rescued by He-Man and Battle Cat. While the pair struggle with the beast, Teela, Duncan, and Stratos tangle with the Evil Warriors in the palace. The heroes manage to take out Beast Man and Evil-Lyn with comparative ease, but Skeletor sets the drachadon on them (it has to crash through the wall of the throne room to do it). Outside, Orko spots his amulet embedded in a patch of tar on the monster's back. He manages to yank it free. Edwina, showing her true dastardly colors, tries to convince Orko to ditch everyone and use the medallion to rescue only her (and give her a lot of treasure); Orko, at first swayed by but then disillusioned with her, sadly wishes that "none of this had ever happened." The medallion promptly grants his wish, zapping away the monsters, Skeletor, his minions - and the medallion itself.

End with a Joke: Back at the palace and with his throne restored, Randor banishes Edwina from the kingdom. It appears Orko is still looking to curry the lady's favor, since he hands her another gift box; but this one contains a bouncy drachadon head that sends her running for the exit, to everyone's amusement (except hers).

• Lady Edwina (to Adam): I swear, if we weren't cousins (giggles)...
• Lady Edwina (upon being introduced to Orko): Ugh, ew... Hello.
• Lady Edwina: Well I'd love to stay and chat with the help (referring to Duncan and Teela), but I'm really rather tired.
• Adam: Somehow, the storm's incredible power had opened a temporary doorway, which pulled Orko out of his world and stranded him on ours.
• Skeletor: A hungry drachadon - and we're taking him for lunch at the palace!
• Skeletor (raising a glass while on Randor's throne): To my conquest of Eternia! / Evil-Lyn: To our conquest, you mean.

• He-Man jumps on the back of Battle Cat: After transforming, and twice more later
• He-Man swings sword overhand: Without sword, to show him punching the drachadon
• He-Man in battle stance on Battle Cat
• He-Man picks up and throws a rock: To show him throwing a stone bench at the drachadon
• Adam smiles close-up, looking at the viewer: During the PSA
• Skeletor laughs, head back: A couple of times, while his plans are going well
• A look through widespread legs: He-Man lands after dropping from the talons of a flying beast
• He-Man from above, runs to mid-screen and pauses, battle-ready: Arriving to help Duncan and Teela as they fend off a winged critter

One full
Variation - a short clip of Cringer cringing in context is shown before his transformation.

Brought to you by Prince Adam
Friendship, though more precious than gold or silver, can't be bought, and you shouldn't try to buy it; instead, you should buy He-Man action figures and playsets, available at your local Kay-Bee or Kiddie City toy retailer! (Actually Adam doesn't explicitly mention that last bit; but it's totally implied.)

Skeletor summons a monster
Main character flashbacks
Orko-specific lore
Appearance of cousins of Adam
Landmark Episode: Because this episode features Orko's first appearance in Eternia.

• This is a critically important lore episode, with some interesting firsts and peeks into the main characters' back stories. We learn first of all that Adam has a cousin, Lady Edwina, who must be the daughter of one of Randor's siblings (unless there are more Earthlings hiding on Eternia, Edwina must come from Randor's side of the family).
• For the second time in two episodes (see MU017) we get a reference to "Eternos" from King Randor. He says to Edwina that "it's good to have you back in Eternos."
• We learn from Edwina that thankfully Eternia has a taboo against incest, since she indirectly hits on Adam by saying "If we weren't cousins..."
• Edwina makes a pretty rotten excuse about not having visited her Aunt and Uncle more often; it has most definitely been a while if, as seems to be the case based on the introductions, she has never met Duncan, Teela, or Orko!
• Things that come out of Orko: an extra hand on a stretchy arm comes out of his hat to knock on Edwina's door.
• Apparently Eternia has its own monsoon season, called "the season of storms."
• We get to see a young Adam and Cringer for the first time. Turns out when Adam was young he actually wore pants!
• The last time we got to see a younger version of a main character was Teela and Duncan in MU006, which was also written by Paul Dini. You can trust him to bring the back stories!
• We also get to hear the story of Orko's first appearance on Eternia, and simultaneously for the first time hear "Trolla" given as the name of Orko's home world. A little later Skeletor refers to Orko as a "Trollan" for the first time.
• In this episode (as in MU002, which was oddly enough also written by Dini) Marlena again is voiced by Jay Scheimer as a substitute for Linda Gary.
• We get another look at Orko's bedroom, last seen in MU003.
• Evil-Lyn uses a rhyming spell to grow wings on Orko, which is a somewhat unusual form of magic for her to use (usually Orko is the one with the rhymes).
• A rare unembarrassing instance of Beast Man using his powers in this episode - he does a fine job of controlling the drachadon and other beasts! His taming of the drachadon even persists after he is crushed by a giant column in the palace throne room.
• We will see the winged tar swamp critter brought back to life again in MU024, though not by Skeletor and not with the use of any juice...
• Beast Man hears the good guys and says "Listen - a Wind Raider!" This implies that there is not just one Wind Raider, but a fleet of them, which is interesting.
• Our first look at the palace's treasure room, where Edwina sneaks off to try on crowns. It is likely the same room we will see again in MU066 and MU095.
• Another look at the palace dungeon, where the royal couple, Orko, and Edwina are imprisoned. It looks much more impressive than the last time we saw it, in MU002, where it was a bunch of dingy, cramped cells with straw on the floor. Now we see a cavernous cell with giant hand-shaped supporting columns.
• Duncan uses his wrist blaster, last seen (to absurd effect) in MU008, to knock that column onto Beast Man.
• This is the second time we see Orko's eyes get all swirly when he is being seduced by a lady. The last time this happened was in MU013, when Teela used her feminine wiles to convince him to be shot with a laser lasso.

• Teela seems ready to physically assault the King's niece within a few seconds of meeting her. She needs to work on that temper!
• Edwina's habit of getting peoples' names wrong (Tee-Pee for Teela; Porko, Go-po, or Borko for Orko) is a great touch.
• When Teela is instructing Orko by telling him that he can't buy a friend, she looks up directly into the audience, as if to make sure we're all paying attention to the episode's main lesson. Orko apparently wasn't paying attention, as he'll have to learn this lesson all over again in MU045.
• Teela, after showing her sore need for anger management classes, does Adam dirty by mentioning how glad she is he's not coming with them to find Orko: "his bumbling would only get in the way." Damn, girl...
• It's odd that Skeletor chooses to take the palace with his swamp monsters, rather than make any attempt on Grayskull. He seems more interested in kicking back on a throne with a nice goblet of wine than acquiring the secrets of the universe.
• Continuity error: in the scene where the Wind Raider is crashing, the ship itself has clearly flown much lower than the explosion that is supposed to mark its landing spot.
• Teela is not the only good guy getting unusually angry in this episode: He-Man shows his temper when he finds Skeletor has a hold of Orko, and Randor seems surprisingly pissed when Skeletor tossses him in his own dungeon. He then makes a very mean face while banishing his niece from Eternos.
• Stratos puts in a fabulous job of heroing in this episode: he rescues Teela and Duncan from certain death in an air crash, happily carries them both to the palace, saves He-Man from one of the winged beasts, and quickly takes out Evil-Lyn before she can work any magic. Sadly, he gets no respect from his enemies: when he shows up with Duncan and Teela in the throne room of the palace, the bad guys call out "Man-at-Arms! Teela!" but don't bother mentioning him.
• Continuity error: Skeletor is still holding a goblet in the wider shot where he is confronted by Duncan and Teela; in the closer shot that immediately follows, he is shaking his fists and the goblet has vanished.
• It's a darn good thing that Skeletor never learns about Orko's medallion: if it can grant anyone's wish as seems clear from the ending of the episode, our bony friend could do a heck of a lot of damage with it!!
• It's unclear just how thorough Orko's wish to the amulet is granted; or rather, just how permanently it has undone the circumstances of the episode. Clearly everyone still has their memories of what happened up until Orko undid it. But does Skeletor still have a bottle of primordial potion, which he just never poured into the swamp? In which case, what is stopping him from just trying this gag again?