J. Larry Carroll

Bill Reed

The wicked Shadow Weaver kidnaps the shadow of the visiting Orko, intending to drain the Trollan's magical powers in order to juice up her shadow beastie minions. She-Ra and Eternia's Man-at-Arms join forces to help their imperiled little buddy - but Orko will have to defeat Shadow Weaver by himself!

Glimmer, She-Ra, Bow, Man-at-Arms, Orko, Orko's shadow, Light Hope

Shadow Weaver, Grizzlor, Rattlor, Leech, Dylamug, Mantenna

shadow beasties, horses, various villagers, Horror Hall critters

wagons

In the dismal, flickering light of Horror Hall, Horde sorceress Shadow Weaver is cooking up something nasty. It has to do with a bubbling lava pit full of shadow beasties - and the five Horde minions looking on (Grizzlor, Rattlor, Leech, Dylamug, and Mantenna) just know that this means bad news for the Great Rebellion.

Sure enough, when we turn our attention to the rebel camp in Whispering Woods, we find an alarmed Bow bringing that bad news to Glimmer and She-Ra: shadow beasties are going to attack the nearby town of Thaymor! The trio are worried that they don't have the numbers or adequate weapons to repel these little black clouds and their destructive eye rays. It is most fortunate, then, that this is the very moment a portal opens, disgorging Man-at-Arms and Orko. The Eternian inventor has stopped by to deliver a crate of his own electric force shields to the rebels - and Eternos's royal magician has tagged along just for funsies.

She-Ra explains the situation to their visitors, and just how happy she is to have Duncan to help them. The whole party then rushes to Thaymor, where the beasties have already wrought some havoc, burning up farmers' wagons and sending the villagers running. The electric force shields prove fully up to the task of deflecting the beasties' rays, and that - along with Glimmer's and Orko's magic - eventually sends the rebuffed monsters into full retreat.

An enraged Shadow Weaver, who's been watching the failure of her plans remotely, teleports into town to verbally threaten the rebels with swift and terrible vengeance. Orko's insulting retorts inspire enough further ire from the sorceress that she aims an attack directly at the Trollan, separating him from his shadow. Orko immediately feels weakened by the loss, and the laughing Weaver vanishes with the captured shade before anyone can retaliate. Man-at-Arms explains to the others that the loss of Orko's shadow also means the loss of his magic. They've got to get it back!

We'll find our heroes slow to act, however, and in the meantime Orko's shadow is trapped in Weaver's dwelling. The sorceress, we will learn, means to extract the Trollan's magic from the shadow and infuse her shadow beasties with it, making them invulnerable and ensuring her victory against the rebels. Before she can do that, however, Orko's shadow (having been shortsightedly released from his bubble prison and threatened with a bright light) makes a run (float?) for it. The irritated Weaver (she's just very cross today) has to send Grizzlor and Dylamug to hunt the shadow down - though neither of them has much idea how to grab hold of a shadow, even if they catch up to it. The pair eventually decide to enlist the other Hordesmen, Leech, Rattlor, and Mantenna, to help them.

So all five minions are racing around the basement of Horror Hall, trying to find a little Trollan shadow among the gloomy catacombs, while Orko's shade dodges them and the other nasty critters he stumbles across. Back in Thaymor, the friends of Orko still haven't managed to get off their butts, and Orko is feeling more and more drained of magic every minute. She-Ra finally decides to consult Light Hope for advice, and summons the wise light beam through the gem in her sword. Light Hope explains that She-Ra's sword has the power to transport them to the vicinity of Horror Hall, and the whole team agrees to pitch in, since Shadow Weaver's home is where she's at her strongest; but once they've recovered Orko's shadow, it will be the Trollan's job to use his magic, defeat the sorceress, and get everyone out of there.

Their course set, Glimmer, Bow, Duncan, and Orko join She-Ra in reciting the first line of her magic words: "For the honor of Grayskull!" The Grayskull-backed power of the sword of protection then opens a portal, and they all walk through it, finding themselves just outside Weaver's place. Orko locates a drainage pipe whereby they can make a stealthy entrance, and they're soon stalking the dank tunnels of Horror Hall. The heroes quickly run into the large and mean critter Orko's shadow met, and Glimmer finds herself caught in one of its tentacles; but She-Ra's muscles and a good spinning throw take care of that monstrous obstacle.

The rebel party finally comes upon the Horde party, just as Mantenna and company have about cornered Orko's shadow in a room stocked with a bunch of big jars. The Hordesmen have discovered that they can corral the shade by the use of Horde-branded flashlights. Mantenna does an uncharacteristically good job of fighting off the heroes, freezing both Bow and Duncan in ice with his eye beams; but She-Ra (as usual) turns the tide. She discovers that those big jars are filled with oil, and uses it to create an oil slick. While the skidding, off-balance Horde soldiers are thus distracted, She-Ra uses her sword to bounce Mantenna's ice beams back at him. Three of the remaining enemies next find themselves hoisted into a human column, each standing on the shoulders of the other, with She-Ra at the base. The heroine topples the column, leaving her foes stuffed in jars. The last minion, Leech, She-Ra simply chases off on foot.

Orko is at long last reunited with his shadow and his magic powers. But now Shadow Weaver has shown up to see why her useless minions haven't gotten the job done. Time for our little Trollan to do what Light Hope told him to do! Orko, we find, is up to the job, because he decides to turn Weaver's magic back on her: he zaps the sorceress's own shadow, causing it to get cheeky and start a game of hide-and-seek with its owner. The horrified Weaver, bereft of her power, goes racing off after the shadow. She-Ra punches Bow and Man-at-Arms out of their ice prisons, so that everyone can enjoy the distant sound of Shadow Weaver wailing in distress, and have a big concluding laugh at her expense (rather cruelly, it seems).

• Shadow Weaver: Come, my little shadow beasties - come!
• Shadow Weaver: Orko and Man-at-Arms - bah - what meddlers. I'll teach them to come to Etheria and interfere with my schemes!
• Man-at-Arms: Well I assure you, no thanks are necessary; we Eternians are proud to help the Great Rebellion whenever and however we can.
• Grizzlor (of the perils of disappointing Shadow Weaver): The last time I messed up, she turned me into a giant flower for three whole days. / Dylamug: A giant flower! Ugh! That's disgusting.
• Light Hope: She-Ra, all the mighty powers of Grayskull are in your sword. Call upon it, and by its energy you and your friends can open a magic portal which will lead you to Horror Hall and Shadow Weaver.
• She-Ra (of the pack of Horde soldiers slipping and sliding on an oil slick of her own creation): Just think what you could do if you only had skates!
• Bow: Where's Shadow Weaver? / She-Ra: At the moment, it's just plain "Weaver." / Orko: Yeah - because I took her shadow.

• Grizzlor runs at the viewer, bug-height: Hunting down Orko's shadow
• She-Ra spins monster in a circle: To toss it away, naturally

Zero (!)
She-Ra remains She-Ra through the entire episode, so no transformations are made, either off- or on-screen. However, She-Ra and her friends do recite the first line of her transformation mantra - see lore section.

3:09 - Loo-Kee looks to be taking a nap in his hiding place today. He's resting against a rather prickly looking nest of bushes with his eyes closed, in an establishing shot of the woods just outside of Thaymor. We can see the full length of his profile in the lower-right quadrant of the screen.
Did I spot him? YES!

Loo-Kee returns to a lesson he's already taught us (and been taught himself!) multiple times in the series: stealing is wrong. Shadow Weaver was wrong to take something that didn't belong to her (in the form of Orko's shadow), just as you would be wrong to take something that didn't belong to you (in the form, one assumes, of a physical object - though I'd like to see you try to steal someone's shadow). Loo-Kee learned this lesson firsthand during his second in-episode appearance in 67071; but it's something he should have already known from teaching it to us in the PSA for 67066. And if we haven't learned it after this episode... well, it would be hard for even the optimistic Loo-Kee to retain any faith in us.

MOTU crossover
Hordak-less episodes in Season 2
Shadow Weaver weaves a wicked web
Adora who?

• POP writer J. Larry Carroll returns for the third time in the last four episodes, to give us his penultimate script.
• We open on Horror Hall, Shadow Weaver's detached residence and the scene of many great POP stories. Weaver has what is likely her greatest number of visitors ever today, with five other Horde minions hanging around - I hope she bought snacks!
• Among the crowd of Horde soldiers we find the hulking Dylamug, making only his third appearance in the series, following closely off of his random and fleeting showing near the end of 67087's "The Inspector." This means that half of J. Larry Carroll's four POP scripts feature this obscure Horde villain, previously left on the bench since the beginning of Season 1. Coincidence? Or did Larry like this guy?
• Turning our attention to the rebel camp, we find an already transformed She-Ra mysteriously hanging about, even though our heroine is yet to be informed of any Horde shenanigans. This will in fact be the first of several late episodes of the series to completely dispense with Adora - our writers having apparently decided that that whole "secret identity" thing is not worth dealing with. Though this hasn't happened in a long time, there have already been three episodes in the first season (67029, 67058, and 67049) featuring only She-Ra, so this makes the fourth - quadrupling the number of times we saw He-Man without Adam in his series (see MU016).
• Bow's excited announcement, that Shadow Weaver has "set her shadow beasties to attack Thaymor again," gives us two interesting pieces of information: first, that we'll be visiting Thaymor, a common location in the series since its premiere episode (and last referenced as recently as 67088); and second, that the rebels have apparently had to deal with these shadow beasties before, in some unrecorded off-screen adventure.
• It's another MOTU crossover! And one of today's more surprising visitors from Eternia is Man-at-Arms! We did just recently see him in the beginning of 67087's "The Inspector," but the last time before that was 67005 - so Duncan has suddenly gotten about as popular as Dylamug.
• With Man-at-Arms is today's title character, Orko. The Trollan is a much more frequent visitor to Etheria; this makes his ninth appearance in the series (to Duncan's five), the most recent being a cameo in 67080's "Perils of Peekablue."
• Shadow Weaver's shadow beasties, when we finally get a good look at them outside of their cloaking cloud, are vaguely reminiscent of the squid-like balls or "darklings" employed by the slinky Shokoti in the second part of MOTU's only two-part story (MU041). The darkling character design was also reused in a She-Ra story: 67020's "Three Courageous Hearts." The beasties, however, are not green but entirely black, with two angry-looking pupil-less yellow eyes. The eyes shoot beams that start fires!
• No visit to Thaymor would be complete without a stop at the Laughing Swan Inn. Our first shot of She-Ra and her friends standing in the village has them positioned right in front of the inn's entrance, with distinctive swan logo. The swan facade has cropped up in numerous POP episodes scattered across numerous towns - some of them trapped in time for 500 years (see 67076's "Brigis"). Netossa and Spinnerella enjoyed the delights of Thaymor's own Laughing Swan most recently, in 67087's "When Whispering Woods Last Bloomed."
• The reason for Man-at-Arms's suspiciously opportune visit is to drop off a crate of "electric force shields." This makes a surprisingly consistent direct connection to Duncan's last appearance (67087 - which also happened to be this episode writer's first POP script), where we found him leading He-Man through a test of the same device. It does appear that in mass-producing the thing for the rebels, however, Duncan has cut some corners: these new force shields, though activated the same way via controls embedded in a wrist bracer, are smaller than He-Man's version, and instead of being see-through are solid gray. They actually look closer to Duncan's prototype model of the force shield, exhibited back in MU039's "Trouble in Arcadia."
• We get to see Glimmer using her light-beam powers, an occurrence that has become much more common in this second season. The light beam with which she zaps a shadow beastie looks similar to the interesting light "chains" she used to imprison Shadow Weaver at the end of 67084's "Bow's Magical Gift."
• Man-at-Arms helpfully explains for us (since there's no obvious reason why it should be so) that in taking away Orko's shadow, Shadow Weaver has also taken away his magic. (That doesn't, it seems, include his ability to float, which I guess is just a built-in Trollan trait!) The linking of one's shadow to one's magic powers is apparently something common to all magic users, as we'll find at the end of the episode.
• Shadow Weaver uses magically conjured bright light to threaten Orko's shadow self. While this makes a perfect kind of sense, it's strangely out-of-character for the evil sorceress, who is usually repelled and defeated by that very same thing (memorably in the fantastic 67047's "The Price of Power," but also on several other occasions).
• Once separated from his body, we find that Orko's shadow is capable of talking and thinking just like his owner. As such, I've decided to list him as his own character.
• As various characters trudge through the bowels of Shadow Weaver's eldritch manse, they encounter a couple of interesting critters. The giant one Orko's shadow (and, later, our other heroes) have the bad luck to meet uses a design we've come across at least twice before in MOTU. It was the horrifying Yog in MU022's "Song of Celice," and then a sort of roadblock (named a "korlock") He-Man and crew had to deal with on their way to Kobra Khan's home in the very last MOTU episode, MU130's "The Cold Zone."
• In one surprising moment, Orko's shadow reveals something about the original Orko that we weren't really sure he had: feet! See the stills above for the brief split-second when the shocked shade sticks its lower appendages out from the bottom hem of its shadow-robe.
• The general outline of today's plot, with our villains finding that a captured (form of) Orko is much more trouble than they bargained for, is reminiscent of J. Larry Carroll's only MOTU script, the pleasantly ridiculous MU118's "Orko's Return."
• Light Hope puts in an appearance for the first time since 67078. Today, as in that previous appearance, She-Ra summons the light beam to her instead of going to visit. Unlike in 67078, Light Hope manifests not in person but through the gem in She-Ra's sword - something that happened before in 67061's "Darksmoke and Fire." This will be the light beam's final appearance in the series.
• Light Hope has several interesting things to say during their visit, the first of which seems like a bit of a continuity issue. On hearing that She-Ra intends to go to Horror Hall, Light Hope points out that such a journey will be incredibly dangerous, since that's where Shadow Weaver's powers are at their greatest. The journey is best accomplished with a whole team of willing rebels and allies. No one seems to remember or mention the fact that She-Ra has already visited the place multiple times: in the already mentioned 67047, and in 67069, where She-Ra successfully infiltrated this treacherous fortress with only the aid of a single brainwashed boy. She-Ra even entered Horror Hall solo to rescue the young Jarine, thus saving the magical town of 67076's "Brigis."
• Light Hope also gives a cool speech linking the powers of She-Ra's sword of protection back to Castle Grayskull - an interesting thing for them to say, considering that (as I've complained in the past) the existence of Light Hope's character has served to sever She-Ra's connection back to the Sorceress and Grayskull.
• In a nearly unique use of She-Ra's sword, and at Light Hope's instruction, the heroine holds it aloft while she and her gathered friends recite the "For the honor of Grayskull" line, and the sword's power is able to conjure a portal directly to Shadow Weaver's dwelling. So it seems we can count "plot shortcut" among the sword's many uses! You'd think, though, that Grayskull's power could have put them inside the place, instead of in the front yard... (He-Man, the Sorceress, and Battle Cat pulled a similar trick of transportation with the hero's power sword back in MU108's "Teela's Triumph;" and She-Ra opened a portal with her sword and the help of Granamyr to end 67061's "Darksmoke and Fire." She'll ask friends to say her magic words with her again in the memorable conclusion to the series finale, 67093's "Swifty's Baby.")
• Luckily, it seems that Horror Hall has the same vulnerabilities of access that we've seen exploited by our heroes at the Fright Zone fortress. Despite Bow's insulting comment to Man-at-Arms that he's "a dreamer" for imagining there can be any way to get inside Weaver's house, Orko immediately spots a large drainage tunnel covered in a grating - just like the one our heroes have used multiple times to get into Hordak's house (see 67067, 67073, 67088).
• Mantenna uses his eye beams for the first time since (I think) all the way back in 67033's "A Talent for Trouble" - another Orko episode. At that time, I was surprised to find the beams capable of imprisoning Orko and Madame Razz in blocks of some kind of solid material, because in earlier uses, the eye beams served mainly to dizzy or stun people (for instance, they tripped up He-Man back in 67001). Today, Mantenna's beams show even further versatility by encasing Bow and Duncan in blocks of ice. Huh!
• She-Ra's battle against the various Horde minions in Shadow Weaver's basement will give MOTU scholars a case of deja vu. She first creates an oil slick, causing the villains to slip and slide ridiculously; then, reaching even greater heights of ridiculousness (both literally and figuratively), she ends up with them all stacked vertically on her shoulders. He-Man used this exact sequence of zany fight tactics to defeat multiple Skeletor cronies at the end of MU088's "Three on a Dare."
• By the way, though this story brought us many Horde characters, we won't be seeing their commander today, making this a Hordak-less episode. Also notable by his absence is She-Ra's horse, MIA for the second consecutive episode.
• She-Ra punches her friends! I've just been referencing (see lore, 67089) the supposed guideline I'd heard stated in the Power of Grayskull documentary about She-Ra not being allowed to punch people; but that's exactly what she does to free Bow and Man-at-Arms of their ice-block prisons.
• This action-packed episode opts to skip the common epilogue scene back at the rebel camp, instead wrapping up with our heroes still in the depths of Horror Hall. We're pretty confident they'll all find their way back home, though!
• Ending credits variation: The background painting for the credits is still the same alternate one.

• One of the main notes I've made about this shortened second season of POP is that its animation has become clumsier. I don't mean that the drawings have gotten worse, as the character art and backgrounds have maintained a high level of quality; I just mean that errors of color, layering, and continuity, as well as blatant recycling and copying, seem to come in greater profusion. Today's episode makes me regret that statement. I was impressed at the number of memorable tableaus and ensemble shots, the fun collection of characters and creatures, and the solid picturesque visuals throughout. (However, see lore for an interesting case of She-Ra recycling the gang-battling methods of He-Man!)
• I love the idea of Shadow Weaver finally weaving a plot involving someone's shadow. It's a very true-to-form scheme!
• J. Larry Carroll, like Bob Forward, seems to have a knack for amusing villain conversations. There's a lot of sputtering and largely ineffectual anger from our main villainess today, and also some funny side chats with Grizzlor and Dylamug. I also loved the trash talk Orko and Weaver threw at each other.
• We get some funny incidental dialogue from the villagers today. They don't say anything particularly amusing in and of itself, but they sound very silly saying it. The excess of characters means that our voice actors were likely stretched pretty thin - that probably explains why Rattlor seems to have been portrayed (as he sometimes is) as non-verbal. The Snake Man has no lines in the episode, except for an ambiguous hiss in one early scene.
• I noted in the plot summary our heroes' seeming dilatory reaction to Orko's peril; it really does seem to take them quite a while to do anything about it. In fact, the relative brevity of my plot summary highlights the dearth of events in today's story. Usually with such a meager plot, you'd expect to notice the lack through obviously padded animation sequences (slow zooms, unnecessary panning shots, pointless scenes of characters walking down hallways or across rooms); but there's an impressive lack of that here.
• Continuity error: To defeat the Yog/korlock clone, She-Ra swings the creature in a circle by one of its tentacles. She begins by swinging it in a counterclockwise direction; but after a brief cut away to a dizzied Orko, we return to find her having reversed direction, to clockwise. We also find, after she's flung the beast away, that she managed to tie its tentacles around its limbs while we weren't looking.
• I've long pinned Mantenna with the title of "most miserable" of all Horde minions (see for instance commentary of 67049, 67036); today sees a surprising turn-around for the many-legged monster, which has him successfully trapping two of the rebel rescue party, then ordering around the other Hordesmen present. What happened, guy? Have you been listening to some self-improvement audiobooks?
• Orko's revenge against Shadow Weaver in stealing her shadow gives the sorceress's shade a different personality to that of her owner. This is in contrast to Orko's shadow, which was seemingly identical to the source material. Weaver's shadow insults her and playfully runs away, in very non-Weaver-like fashion. This is probably a result of intentional tweaks Orko made to the spell; but it's interesting to consider the contrast coming at least in part from Weaver's own corrupted and divided nature. Recall from her origin story in 67047, that Weaver was once a normal human who betrayed her people and paid a heavy price for getting her magic power the easy way, via a Horde-provided gem. Is there still a more human, compassionate version of the person Weaver once was lurking inside her, evoked in the playfulness of her separated shadow? Probably not; but it's fun to speculate!
• I love what J. Larry Carroll has brought to the ending few episodes of the She-Ra series. His plots have been exciting, fun, and tightly constructed. This one had very little for me to nitpick and a lot to enjoy. Nice that there are two guys named "Larry" who can bring the entertainment to Filmation's MOTU/POP universe!