Robert Lamb

Steve Clark

Teela's attempt to give Prince Adam a break from constant training by playing a fun game results in life-threatening danger, as she finds herself injured and trapped partway down the bottomless abyss surrounding Castle Grayskull - and no one even realizes where she is! Who can save her?

The Widgets (Squinch, Lara), Teela, Orko, He-Man (Prince Adam), Sorceress, Cringer, Man-at-Arms

Beast Man

rock creatures, Pookie

N/A (though the sky sled is mentioned)

Important note to start: if for some reason you would be irritated by me revealing important plot points about this forty-year-old animated show, be aware that there are some spoilers in this entry. At the least, if you haven't already, you should consider watching/reading about MU006 first before looking at this one.

We join our story already in progress: the Widgets are in trouble! Beast Man is right in their fortress with a gang of toughs, in the form of rock monsters. Luckily He-Man is there as well, with Teela and Orko. They smash a few rock creatures, who quickly decide that Beast Man is not the right leader for them and hightail it, leaving a frustrated Fur Face to once again flee his foe.

Afterwards, the heroes convene at Castle Grayskull to provide a play-by-play for the Sorceress, who seems to have tasked them with the Widget-saving job. Teela then decides it's time to wrap it up, since she has to get back to Eternos to give a lesson to that consummate shirker, Prince Adam - at which disclosure He-Man gives an ironic twitch of his eyebrow. Just outside the castle, Orko takes a moment to flit about the bottomless abyss that rings the fortress, earning a warning from his friends about the treacherous air currents, and a lecture about the moat reaching to the center of the planet and holding the power of Grayskull. Orko, who seems oddly ignorant of the bottomless hole even though it's been mentioned multiple times in other episodes, is encouraged to toss a rock down there, and (sure enough) finds that he cannot hear it hit anything. Hmm, I wonder if this information will come up again later...

True to her word, Teela wanders the palace in search of the prince on her return, and finally locates him lounging under a tree with his sleepy tiger. Adam selfishly brushes off Teela's request that he do his duty, then interrupts and rudely dismisses her. Cringer is aghast, but Adam complains that he is overworked and needs a break. A (quite justifiably) angry Teela goes to carp about the prince to her father, who rather than provide a commiserating shoulder instead tells her she needs to loosen up and give the poor royal heir his playtime.

A suggestion of Duncan's to combine work with fun gives Teela an idea, and she runs off to Adam to enact it. First they head off for a nice picnic, with Cringer also attending. Then Teela challenges the prince to a friendly (but sophisticated, mature, and challenging) game of hide and seek. To make sure Adam doesn't get himself lost, Teela has a pair of signal devices; hers is set to receive, his to send. She then trips off into the Evergreen Forest. Adam holds still long enough to confirm that Cringer is going to nap his way through the rest of the episode, then sets off in pursuit.

In the first part of their game, Adam tracks Teela by her footprints and is able to catch up to her when the Eternian captain finds an adorably friendly forest creature, whom she grabs and names "Pookie." Adam finds her up on a ledge, cuddling the bug-like critter. Promising further challenges for her royal student, Teela leaps off again. She intends to leave Pookie behind, but the creature turns out to be very needy and follows her just as Adam does. Teela and Pookie manage to cross a narrow gorge, but Adam is not so lucky: while he's standing at the edge complaining about the jump, the ground crumbles out from under him and he falls.

Teela, blithely unaware of the prince's discomfiture, makes her way to Grayskull, and while waiting for her friend to arrive must pluck the naive Pookie from the edge of the castle's abyss. While she's standing there chiding the creature, the ground crumbles out from under her and the pair plummet into the fissure! Luckily for them both, Teela's fall is arrested by a projecting ledge; but her arm is broken and there is no easy way up. She has her signal device, and she can switch it to send, but there's no guarantee that Adam will think to switch his own to receive, and no one knows where she's gone. Things aren't looking good.

Adam, blithely unaware of the captain's discomfiture, has found his way out of his own gorge but cannot pick up the trail of his friend. He wanders back to Cringer, who has been sleeping all this time and definitely hasn't seen Teela. Doubtful that the captain would have returned to the palace without telling him, but unable to think of anything better to do, the prince goes home and has a lovely dinner. Only after his meal does he mention Teela's disappearance to Duncan, and both men become concerned. Adam remembers the signal device, and Man-at-Arms is able to boost its usually short-range signal and locate his daughter - somewhere in the environs of Grayskull.

Arriving at the castle in the night and searching with handheld flashlights, Duncan and Adam poke around (with Orko supervising) and catch sight of Teela's footprints - leading up to the edge of Grayskull's deadly chasm. They are just contemplating the horrendous conclusion drawn by this evidence when the Sorceress comes to her tower window to ask them what the heck they're doing in her front yard, and why they all seem so sad. Adam gives her the bad news: Teela has very likely fallen to her death.

A grief-stricken Sorceress cries out Teela's name. The telepathic message behind the word is conveyed into the abyss, where Teela senses the presence of - her mother. The communication goes both ways, and the Sorceress realizes that Teela is still alive and trapped below. When she informs the three-man rescue party, Adam knows what to do: he transforms into He-Man. In a unique and illuminating transformation sequence, we watch as the energy from his power sword dives past Teela and into the center of the planet, then rebounds to our main character to imbue him with He-Mannishness.

Roped together, our three rescuers make their dangerous way down the cliffside and reunite with Teela, then somehow manage the ascent.

End with a Joke: N/A; instead we get a touching scene with some implications about Teela's parentage. Safely on solid ground again, Teela mentions to the others that the strangest thing about the whole experience was her certain sense, in the abyss, that her mother was nearby and protecting her, sending her love. A tender Sorceress, watching unseen from her tower window, replies quietly: "She does, Teela. She does."

• Beast Man: Mark my words, He-Man; some day you will wish you never heard the name "Beast Man." / He-Man: I already wish I never heard it.
• Orko: Bottomless? How can something not have a bottom!?
• Prince Adam (to Teela): Work, work, work! It's all you ever think about. Well, I don't feel like it! / Teela: But Adam, I - / Adam: That will be all, Captain.
• Man-at-Arms: Look, Teela; I'm very proud of you and the way you handle your responsibilities. But you've got to loosen up occasionally.
• He-Man: You know, Adam is very worried about you, Teela.
• Teela: You know the strangest thing about this whole experience is my mother. / He-Man and Man-at-Arms: Your mother?! / Teela: Well, I don't know how to explain. (to Duncan) You're the only parent I've known. But in the middle of everything I had this overwhelming feeling that my mother was protecting me. I felt that she loves me and wants me in her arms. / Sorceress: She does, Teela. She does.

• He-Man punches the viewer: Smashing a rock creature

One partial (missing Cringer/Battle Cat sequence)
Variation - instead of pointing the camera at Adam when he says the first line of his incantation, we see Teela in the abyss, along with the magic energy that is about to transform our hero

Brought to you by He-Man and Man-at-Arms
He-Man and Duncan spend a lot of time talking about the important lessons that the silly and heedless Teela learned in today's episode - lessons about mixing play with work and being careful when playing. Teela, Eternia's responsible and experienced captain of the guard, who spends her time trying to corral and teach the lazy and obnoxious prince who insulted her and thoughtlessly considered only his own feelings and preferences in this episode. Uh-huh, it's definitely Teela who needed to learn things...

Appearance of the Widgets: Technically accurate, though the Widgets have no lines and are tacked onto the beginning only to provide an establishing activity to set up the main plot.
Teela does something dangerous by herself: Again, this one stretches the category a bit. Teela's dangerous situation is not necessarily of her own choosing, as much as Duncan and He-Man try to convince us of the fact in the PSA; and it doesn't actually happen with her entirely alone, since she has "Pookie" with her.
Dealing with Adam's secret and his connection to the power of Grayskull: For the brief but very fascinating suggestion of where He-Man's power comes from.
Skeletor-less episodes in Season 2
Landmark Episode: If it wasn't obvious from all the other categories tagged here, there is some very interesting content in this episode that addresses the characters and their relationships and powers, so this is a Landmark for sure.

• The Widgets are back, and as usual they need He-Man's help! Though they have no dialogue and only appear in the opening minutes of the episode, and really have nothing to do with the story at all. We can see Squinch in a close shot, and he and his girlfriend Lara in the opening wide shot of the interior of the Widget fortress; but we don't ever catch a glimpse of the Widgets' leader, Kando, who has appeared in the other Widget episodes. The last time we saw the Widgets was in MU043, when they were trying to deal with a bullying, troubled Man-E-Faces.
• For some reason Beast Man attacks the Widgets with a small army of rock creatures or rock monsters, a common enemy design that we've seen briefly in MU012 (ironically or coincidentally the first Widgets episode), MU050 (as sand demons), more centrally in MU056, and in sandier form in MU059.
• Though it has been mentioned previously (MU072, MU043, MU002), this story addresses the abyss around Grayskull more directly and thoroughly than any other. We learn that there are dangerous drafts coming from below, but also that in the abyss lies "the source of Grayskull's powers." Makes you wonder why Skeletor didn't just get some climbing gear and try to rappel down there, instead of charging the front door! We also learn that, even though everyone has always described the abyss as "bottomless," it does actually have a bottom: the center of the planet.
• Things that come out of Orko: on the end of a third sleeved arm that comes out of the usual hinged top of his hat, a sock, a clock, and finally a rock, the thing he actually wanted (because apparently his third arm can't hear him very well - which makes perfect sense since it has no ears!). This mishearing of himself will happen to Orko in future episodes as well.
• While looking for the wayward prince, Teela rather intrusively enters Adam's bedroom, giving us a peek at his bed and the window from which he was once summoned by Zoar in MU043. The last time we were invited into Adam's room was MU066.
• We witness Prince Adam laying some very rude language on his childhood friend, Teela, in this episode. He arrogantly interrupts her by saying, "That will be all, Captain," and sends her packing. WTF, man? Even Cringer is offended.
• Cringer mentions his dislike of being Battle Cat but admits, in a rare confession, that the tiger is "glad he's around when we need him."
• Teela reminds us that she and Adam "grew up together like brother and sister."
• Teela's hug with her father after talking with him in his lab is very likely identical to their hug at the end of MU068's "Day of the Machines." It's an interesting call back, since Duncan has just been advising his daughter to "loosen up," when in MU068 he firmly demonstrated his own inability to do so, by threatening to quit his job after he couldn't get a remote-controlled rocket to work.
• Teela makes use of a Man-at-Arms invention, a pair of "signal devices" that allow her to track Adam over a short distance without him being able to use it to find her. (Simple and logical, but see my commentary note about this.)
• We've seen Pookie's character design before, used as a bug-like creature at the beginning of MU045's "Orko's Missing Magic." In similar fashion to that episode's use of the creature, Pookie also inadvertently lures a main character into disaster - sort of like the cat Jones in Alien.
• "The Evergreen Forest is on the other side of the Fertile Plains," says Man-at-Arms - surprisingly evincing a consistent and accurate description of Eternia's geography based on maps we have been shown (see MU034 for instance). He then sort of ruins it by locating Teela's signal around Grayskull, which he claims is "not coming from the forest" - a strange assertion given that maps show Grayskull sitting plump in the middle of said forest.
• Adding to a growing trend in the second season, Battle Cat does not appear in the episode, though we get plenty of Cringer content.
• In one of the coolest and most crucial parts of the episode, a telepathic communication travels between the Sorceress and Teela, reminding us of the close bond between them (revealed and then un-revealed in the landmark MU006) and giving our heroes hope and the information necessary to rescue Eternia's captain.
• In the episode's other coolest and critical scene, we witness what happens under Grayskull when Adam says his magic words. Bolts of energy travel from the power sword down into Grayskull's abyss, passing by a confused Teela, only to travel back up again to aid in a transformation. It makes sense, given the actual content of Adam's words ("By the power of Grayskull"), that his power would come from there; but it's exciting to see it so directly depicted.

• Why does Beast Man use rock creatures to attack the Widgets? Are they technically "beasts" that he can control with his animal-persuading powers? Seems like a stretch to me; and in fact Beast Man is unable to command them once our heroes have smashed a few to bits, suggesting he really chose the wrong sub-minions for this fight. I'd rather have seen our friends the shadow beasts again (the wonderful horned apes previously seen in MU006, MU029, and MU071).
• Beast Man gets no respect from anyone: not even the rock monsters he hired to help him abuse the Widgets.
• Animation/continuity error: In the exterior panning shot of Grayskull just before the heroes exit, we see the Jawbridge door shut, along with a very undetailed drawing of the face or seal that is stamped in the door's center. After a quick cut, however, the Jawbridge is suddenly down so the heroes can walk out.
• Adam's complaints to Cringer in the opening half of the episode are somewhat at odds with other depictions we've seen of the prince. In previous episodes (see for instance MU029 and MU036), Adam has explicitly stated that he is only "pretending" to be a fun-loving goofball; in this one, he seems to actually want to goof off and be lazy.
• Some of the language in Adam and Cringer's conversation explores an issue I've addressed in multiple other episodes, namely the question of whether Adam and He-Man are two different personas. "But you're He-Man!" exclaims Cringer, directly equating the two characters. Adam's response contradicts this: "Yeah, he never gets tired. But Prince Adam does!"
• Adam's whining that he wants to "do something relaxing for a change" seems groundless and lame. Adam is always goofing off - it's his whole thing - so it's hard to see why he would be wishing for a vacation. True, we've seen him training with Teela in several episodes (MU072 is a recent example), but I suspect we've seen him lazing around the palace and jungle and working on art projects much more. His quibbling would be excusable if he were talking about being tired from rescuing people as He-Man, but he's clearly not.
• I suppose if you were a child watching the show, you would be all with Man-at-Arms sticking up for Prince Adam, when Teela has come to complain to her father about Adam's rude behavior. But as an adult man and father, I found Duncan's partiality unfounded and embarrassing. Support your daughter, jerkwad! He even turns it back on Teela, persuading her that she is the one at fault and then unconvincingly claiming that he is "not taking anyone's side." This is really just the latest in a long line of instances in which Duncan feels it necessary to cover for Adam's hijinks and foolishness, since he knows the prince's dirty (if heroic) secret. Usually he's doing it with Adam's perennially disappointed dad.
• Teela's explanation to Adam for how the signal devices work doesn't actually make any sense. The idea should be that, with her device on receive and his on send, Teela will be able to track down Adam, but Adam will not be able to track down Teela (since that would be cheating). However, when explaining this to the prince Teela specifically says, "this will help you find me." Well, no, it won't; that's the whole point of the episode. As Adam asks a few seconds later, "What happens if you get lost?" The idea is that (with the devices set as they are) Adam is unable to find her, which is what compounds Teela's accident.
• Adam's falling into the chasm that Teela leaps oddly presages and echoes Teela's subsequent fall into Grayskull's moat. We don't get to see Adam climbing out of the pit he falls into, which seems like a strange oversight. When Adam gets into trouble it seems much less important and more easily solved.
• And why was Adam unable to track Teela to Grayskull? He saw her jump the first gorge, so he knows the general direction she was going, and he showed his ability to follow her footprints earlier. Later in the episode we even see clear evidence of Teela's footprints right at the lip of the abyss - something you'd think Adam would have been able to spot several hours before.
• For someone who has been able to psychically sense threats to Eternia over much greater distances, the Sorceress seems disturbingly ignorant of the danger to someone very close to her (in several senses of the phrase). She has to have Adam tell her what they think happened to Teela, since she only manages to sense "great sadness" coming off of him.
• Adam's transformation, cool as it is, seems like a potentially very dangerous exposure of his secret identity. From the way the scene is directed, it appears that Teela is within earshot of Adam's crying "By the power of Grayskull," and one would think that she would recognize her childhood playmate's voice.
• I think there are some weaknesses in this episode's story, but they are largely outweighed by its deep dive into character development and lore. It's interesting as well that the story lacks much of the sword-and-sorcery aspect of many lighter He-Man episodes, instead opting for a surprisingly grounded story of friends arguing, tracking and pursuit, and real-life threats with realistic problem solving (excluding the rock monsters in the opening scene, I suppose). Normally I would object to this, since my feeling is the show's aim is fantastic escapism; but when it serves a good story and is done well (i.e., doesn't focus on a boring story about people stealing corn - see MU082), I guess realism is acceptable. By the way, our writer here is Robert Lamb, giving us the first of what will be four He-Man scripts. His next episode, MU101, will also be a realistically grounded and powerful story.