Michael Reaves & J. Brynne Stephens

Gwen Wetzler

Skeletor kidnaps Celice, a singer who is the only thing defending the kingdom of Tahryn from a terrible monster named Yog! He-Man and his friends will have to deal with giant centipedes, orcs, earthquakes, Skeletor, and Yog itself before things are back to normal.

Prince Adam (He-Man), Cringer (Battle Cat), Orko, Teela, Lizard Man, Man-at-Arms, Zoar (Sorceress)

Skeletor, Panthor, Evil-Lyn, Trap Jaw, Beast Man

Pangus (Prime Minister of Tahryn), Tahryn guards, disturbing conjured bunny, Celice, giant crawler/centipede, orcs, Yog

Wind Raider, sky sleds (good and bad), Basher

Adam, Cringer, Orko, and Teela show up at the kingdom of Tahryn on a diplomatic mission. Orko flubs the introductions, but Prime Minister Pangus is a forgiving fellow. They have barely gotten over this diplomatic faux pas when they are interrupted by an earthquake, and Adam almost turns into He-Man to help. But he's not needed: their "Singer" calms things down with a very eerie song. Pangus explains that a monster named Yog lives underneath their city and has to be periodically soothed with songs (something which you'd think the heroes would have known about before they visited). Celice walks off with Adam and shows off some of her vocal tricks, including making flowers bloom - much to Teela's annoyance. Skeletor just happens to be watching and decides the singer would be useful to him. He interrupts a scheming Evil-Lyn and commands her and Trap Jaw to go fetch.

The evil pair show up at Tahryn and roust Lizard Man, who is not quite able to warn anyone else in time: they grab Celice. Some clever shooting by Trap Jaw distracts a freshly arrived He-Man for long enough that they are able to fly away. Without the singer, earthquakes almost immediately start tearing through the city. He-Man splits up his party: Duncan and Teela will head to Snake Mountain to rescue Celice, while he, Battle Cat, Orko, and Lizard Man will hunt down Yog.

Teela and Duncan's mission goes awry right away, because Skeletor is watching. He gets Beast Man to call up a "giant crawler" (which Teela just calls a centipede) that grabs Duncan and takes him, at Beast Man's command, to "Ice Island in the middle of the Lake of Fire." Teela must delay her quest to save her father - though fortunately the centipede is easy to track, since it leaves behind a gross green slime trail everywhere it goes. Meanwhile, He-Man's mission is delayed by unfriendly orcs (the worst kind!), which the team works together to block up in a cave. While both teams are busy, Skeletor gets Evil-Lyn to mind-control the singer. Safe in Snake Mountain, he runs a demo on a sweet little model of Grayskull he's built in his spare time, proving to his satisfaction that Celice can sing down the Jawbridge.

Teela braves a very fiery lake, does some pole vaulting, snowball throwing, and bomb detonating to very handily save her dad. The pair arrive at Grayskull in time to hear Celice singing, a magical siren song which lays the Sorceress out flat. Meanwhile, He-Man and company show up at Yog's lair to find it has vacated the place - they deduce that it followed Celice's song. The floating head of the Sorceress then demands their quick arrival at Grayskull.

Celice was OK with hypnotizing the Sorceress, but she can't bring herself to open a door: she refuses Skeletor's command to sing down the Jawbridge. Skeletor's plan has failed, so he digs down to the bottom of his barrel and asks for Beast Man to ram down the gate. It's at this point that the cavalry (in the form of He-Man) arrives and hucks Beast Man's Basher away. He-Man gets a hold of Skeletor and it seems like things are about to get all wrapped up; but Yog chooses this moment to finally put in an appearance. Our hero has to deal with this new problem, even as a freed Skeletor is zapping him with his sky sled. He-Man traps the evil warrior in a zero G bubble, which he blows out of a tube that comes from his belt (?!?). Celice manages to sing Yog back down, but Lyn zaps the critter to make it extra angry, and He-Man follows it down into an underground cave, where he smashes it into an even deeper abyss.

Celice undoes the sleepy song-spell she put on Sorceress (giving Skeletor time to struggle his way out of the bubble and fly off home), then has a bit of an identity crisis: what is she going to do now that Yog is put away for good? Our heroes buck her up and she decides she will "do what I can."

End with a Joke: N/A

• Teela (with narrowed eyes, to Celice): Nice trick. What else can you do? / Celice: Anything I choose. Even stone will obey me.
• He-Man (having trapped Skeletor in a bubble): I always said you were a light-weight, Skeletor. (Laughs inordinately)

• He-Man jumps on the back of Battle Cat
• He-Man in battle stance on Battle Cat: Both with a sword and without
• A look through widespread legs: Teela landing while tracking the centipede; later, He-Man landing while chasing down Yog
• He-Man picks up and throws a rock: To trap the orcs
• Skeletor laughs, head back
• Teela runs away from the viewer

One false start (Adam gets as far as "By the power of -" before realizing he can hold off)
One full
Variation - we get one brief shot of Cringer cowering in the midst of the Tahryn scenery before his normal transformation

Brought to you by Teela
Feeling sad? Try whistling or singing a song. There, isn't that better? Isn't it??

Skeletor summons a monster: At a stretch, I suppose this could be added to this category, since Skeletor's actions lead to Yog waking up (even though that wasn't his main intention). You may notice a growing pattern here, as the last 5 even-numbered episodes (MU014, MU016, MU018, MU020, and this one) have fallen into this category.
Landmark Episode: Because I just think this is a cool, fun story.
Evil-Lyn power punches the glass ceiling: For Lyn's scheming in the opening of the story.

• "Yog" is clearly inspired from the H.P. Lovecraft monster Yog-Sothoth.
• Teela is immediately jealous of Celice's attentions to Adam, which she demonstrates mainly by narrowing her eyes. We don't often get a romantic angle in the show, so we have to mention it when it comes along, however subtle it might be.
• Celice seems to have a... French accent? I mean Tahryn, a Tahryn accent. The voice actor here was sort of phoning it in, with all of her lines spoken in a soft, emotionless drone.
• Skeletor does some spying on his desktop dome in this episode.
• Evil-Lyn once again demonstrates her animosity towards Skeletor, and a heretofore unseen ability to shoot ropes around things; and we get to learn that Skeletor has a giant statue of himself in Snake Mountain - which is just the best. We will see this exact Skeletor statue again in the much later episode, MU121. Lyn will be forced to work on carving a much larger version in MU094.
• The second appearance of our friend Lizard Man, who we last saw way back in MU005. He's affectionately referred to as "Lizzie." This will prove to be Lizzie's last confirmed appearance in the MOTU series, though there are some similar character designs to him that pop up in MU071 and MU109, and he will have an incredibly brief cameo in a panning ensemble shot at the end of the Christmas Special!
• It's odd that, while we see all the other heroes arrive by flying vehicle, Lizard Man appears to already be there. Is Tahryn his home town?
• Trap Jaw shows off a new and unique jackhammer arm attachment.
• He-Man shows off his deflecting skills once again, against Trap Jaw's laser and against the orcs.
• In the background of one of the scenes in Snake Mountain, I was amazed to catch a glimpse of the old "transport beam," last seen in the series pilot (MU004)!
• It's odd that Skeletor employs Evil-Lyn for mind control in this episode, since he easily got Stratos under his power in MU016. Maybe the writers felt it would be too awkward to have him hypnotizing a young maiden.
• Oh my god, Skeletor has a model of Grayskull in his house, built out of stone from the real Grayskull. What a nerd.
• In MU006, Teela pulled a string of beads out from under her breastplate, and used them to create a flash of light and scare off some shadow beasts. In this episode, she pulls out the same string of beads, only it's a bomb! Multiple uses, I guess. (We'll see the string used as a bomb again in MU026.)
• The Sorceress assumes her "lying down in distress" pose in this episode, something she did before in MU017. There's something oddly seductive about it, as if she's posing for a budoir photoshoot.
• He-Man's "zero G bubble" has got to be one of the wackier things he's ever pulled out of his belt.
• Skeletor doesn't teleport away at the end of this episode, instead settling for flying off on a sky sled. In a fairly typical move, he makes no attempt to save his minions. It's a bit unclear, but it's possible they already found their own way off the scene before he broke out of his bubble.
• Interesting note: this is the last time for many episodes that we will see the Sorceress assume the form of Zoar the falcon. It also, with only a few exceptions, begins a long period where Skeletor goes on break.

• Orko makes a poor emissary for Eternia as he tries to produce the gift from Randor for Pangus - it's a good thing the prime minister has a good sense of humor. The weird, long-armed bunny he conjures first is hilariously upsetting. But I thought Adam crossed a line when he reached up under Orko's skirts to grab the intended gift.
• I like that Lizard Man shows his lizard-like qualities by basking in the sun.
• Trap Jaw shows off his quick-change abilities, when between scenes he switches from wearing his jackhammer arm to his laser gun arm.
• I guess that since they called the episode "Song of Celice," the writers felt it unnecessary to use the character's name in the episode; at least, not until pretty darn far into it. I believe the first time it's actually mentioned is about two-thirds of the way through the episode, by Teela.
• I love how He-Man just casually lifts up the entire roof of a cave that's fallen on him, tosses it away, then says, "As I was saying..."
• After Evil-Lyn gets Celice mind-controlled, she has her arms crossed and is missing her usual wrist bracers. She should dress like that more often: she looks totally ripped!
• Whose idea was it to put an ice island in a lake of fire??
• I find it hilarious that when Teela comes upon Man-at-Arms and the centipede, it seems as if they've been fighting each other the whole time she's been tracking him down; yet he seems only mildly annoyed with the creature, as if he's hit some traffic he didn't expect on the way home from work.
• Teela gets a chance to really shine in this episode, proving herself more than up to the task of finding her father and taking out a giant centipede. I was reminded of the way she easily swept the floor with King Von in MU016.
• I wonder whether He-Man ever gets annoyed at the way the Sorceress is constantly interrupting him with demands to come and help her. Like, "Can I just have five minutes to finish what I was doing?"
• Skeletor seems extra desperate in this episode; when his singing plan doesn't work, he tells Beast Man to just batter the Jawbridge down, which he must have known wasn't going to work.
• I think it's charming that He-Man advises Beast Man to get out of the Basher before he throws it off into the distance. He then carelessly tosses Lizard Man up into a window of Grayskull.
• This is a crazy episode. There are so many characters, critters, and twists of plot that it feels jam-packed with events. I'd put it up there with the better episodes of this season.