Just some random responses to ideas that were brought up:
Was Clamp Champ the Man At Arms already when Skeletor returned in part 2? Or did Eternos just not have a Man At Arms for the 6-or-whatever years after Teela quit? On the one hand, nothing states it directly. On the other hand, CC says he sent the King and Queen off, Teela and Adam and to some extent Fisto seem to acknowledge him as the one in charge, and there is no specific uniform for a Man At Arms so it isn’t like we’d know unless someone says it out loud.
Speaking of CC and Fisto, Adam says something to the extent of “our friends are long gone,” in effect giving the other characters permission to kill the demons that took over their bodies. Skeletor having “ripped out their souls” using the mist also supports that killing the demons was the right thing to do. I feel like the script writers were trying to put in some extra effort to explain why killing them (or technically their possessed bodies) was morally okay. In Filmation I doubt we would have ever seen a curse that couldn’t somehow be lifted, but that is what sets Revelation apart, for better or worse. I think the audience was meant to agree with Teela that they deserved better deaths, but that’s part of why I imagine they weren’t forgotten when Teela and Adam “set things right“ in the end. Did they restore Preternia and return the souls that that belonged there, even if it wasn’t explicitly shown? In absence of a sequel I suppose it’s up to the viewer.
In some respects, it was a kindness that Andra was the one to kill them, since she knew Fisto and Clamp Champ for 10 minutes but the others knew them for years. Andra tends to do something vital to the plot in nearly every episode. In her introduction alone, she is responsible for making the tech she and Teela uses, to nabbing the chalice, to answering the hero’s call to Grayskull when Teela refuses. Her relationship to Teela shows how Teela tries to walk in the footsteps of her hero He-Man when taking on a mentorship role. She also a foil to Evil Lyn, as they were both gifted children who were practically orphaned and living alone on the streets, but where one was taken in by an abuser the other found a supportive mentor, and what a difference the company we keep makes on our worldview. Andra wasn’t born into nobility or with a magical destiny, she is a hero purely because she chose to be one, which is a nice counterbalance to some of the other characters.
I think a good argument can be made that she earns her Man At Arms title by the end. She has been a disciple of two past Man At Arms, Teela and Duncan. She has gone on a world spanning adventure to legendary strongholds, faced her fears in Hell and impressed He-Ro in heaven. She has made friends and lost friends and been betrayed by friends. As a Lieutenant she demonstrated discipline and loyalty by going along with Adam’s plan even when she didn’t think it entirely wise. She distinguished herself in battle in front of Duncan and the King, quite similarly to Duncan’s fighting style. She might not have been in the army itself for very long, and who knows if military strategy was ever one of her prowesses, but in terms of life experience, quick thinking skills, and technical capability, she seems to be the strongest candidate out of those who are alive and non-retired.
Andra may be a more appropriate choice for Man At Arms than Teela was. After all, Teela did quit after her first day and never really showed an aptitude for the tech wizard stuff her father did, though that does not seem to be a prerequisite of the position. Teela worked hard to achieve that worthiness in the eyes of her dad and the King, I have no doubt. Much of what I remember about Filmation involved her either in training or trying to get Adam to train, but filling the entirety of Duncan’s shoes didn’t really suit her, and an outsider could easily wonder if it wasn’t a bit of nepotism that placed her in her retired father’s role. Andra gives off more of an impression of being a true successor to all the things Duncan was doing.
I also wonder if it was an intentional A Team reference when Andra shows up with that mohawk styled hair at the end and says “Thanks, T!”
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Also the idea that Lyn was kind of a fake sorceress does seem possible. Skeletor described it as enhancing Lyn some with his own power, though I interpreted that as him gaslighting her about the Champion being more powerful than the sorceress, so she better not try to pull any funny business. I don’t think either of them really understand how the power works, and certainly neither does Beast Man.
How many Sorceresses and Champions are there allowed to be at once? Perhaps it stands as tradition that there be one because if there are more they could wind up fighting each other, but perhaps it is also possible for there to be an entire order of Sorceress nuns.
I really dig the Eternian gods creation story set forth in this series, with the falcon and snake and ram. The carvings on the entrance to the tides of transformation depicting it are also great. I can’t tell what is next to the Zoar icons towards the middle of the circle, but I thought that maybe it was images of sorceresses bearing witness to the miracle. If they do a sequel, it might be fun to see them introduce a bat god that stands in opposition to Zoar, or some kind of alternate take where the Bat is in Zoar’s place as supreme creation deity, and how that changes the Horde characters’ worldview.
Originally Posted by Rikki Roxx
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