The last season of She-Ra came out in May 2020, and at the time, I made a video about how
incredibly good it was. To me, it was the perfect final season that wrapped everything
up in a way that went beyond my wildest expectations. A little over a year later,
looking back on She-Ra as a whole, it’s phenomenal as a series that just exists
now as five solid seasons. I’m ecstatic that this show is just going to live on Netflix now,
a masterpiece of storytelling and an inspiring story of queer love that is legitimately going
to help so many people see themselves represented in a way that they haven’t before. This is just
such a good story, told with so much care, so much thoughtfulness, and I can’t stop rewatching it.
So today, I just wanted to talk about some of the things I love the most about She-Ra and that
have stuck with me over the last year. Let’s start with episode three of the last season, Corridors.
This is one of my favorite episodes because of the interaction between Catra and Glimmer,
two characters who haven’t interacted much aside from occasionally fighting
each other. Catra obviously views Glimmer and Bow with a level of jealousy because of their
friendships with Adora—even if she won’t admit it—but Glimmer is a new person in season 5,
changed by the death of her mother and the responsibility of being queen. Seeing these two
forced to spend time together after everything they’ve both gone through is a really unique
character moment for both of them. Catra has the time to slow down, to think about what she wants,
and who she wants to be. Glimmer reflects on the mistakes she’s made and the people she’s hurt,
and I think she realizes that she has more in common with Catra than she’d like to admit.
This episode only has a bit of fighting at the end, and Bow, Entrapta, and Adora mostly just have
a comedic time fixing the ship for the B plot. Most of the episode is just about these characters
and their relationship and their motivations. It’s meaningful and emotional in a way that I think
most people wouldn’t expect. And it all culminates in Catra having this revelation: She wants to do
something good. She maybe wants to *be* good. But at the same time, she doesn’t believe in herself.
She doesn’t believe she’s worth saving. She doesn’t think she deserves the things that she
wants. So she basically sacrifices herself to save Glimmer. And that theme of sacrificing yourself,
of martyrdom, comes up again in a big way with Adora later, which we’ll talk about. But for
the icing on the cake of this Corridors episode, I love how the goofy fixing-the-ship thing actually
feeds into the emotional stakes with Glimmer at the end. I think that’s really talented writing.
Because Bow the entire time is basically babysitting Adora and Entrapta who, in their
own hilarious ways, are in danger of damaging the ship. It’s funny, it displays their personalities,
it’s a tonal shift from the more emotional talks Glimmer and Catra are having. But at the end when
Glimmer is teleported into the vacuum of space, Bow changes his tune instantly. He’s now okay
with Entrapta messing around with the ship in anyway she wants, because he’s willing to take
that risk to save Glimmer. He was terrified by Entrapta using a rope to do a space walk earlier,
but when Glimmer is in space, he picks up the rope and throws himself after her. I just
thought that was really sweet and I love how it all got tied together at the end. She-Ra is
so good at doing that in so many of its episodes. And also, little side note, I love their
spacesuits. Because he normally wears a crop top, Bow gets a little tummy window, which is amazing,
and Adora has her ponytail stick out of her helmet because of course she does. Just fantastic design.
Anyway, let’s continue with the Catradora storyline into episode 5 of the last season:
Save the Cat. This episode sees Adora come to save Catra, even though Catra
truly believed she wouldn’t. Their fight and having Horde Prime control Catra was,
I think, a really good writing choice because Adora and Catra have fought so many times but
this fight is so distinctly different. Catra is being controlled, not fighting the same,
and Adora’s refusing to fight back. Catra’s just able to claw away at her. I really like the
detail of the Prime-controlled Catra saying “Hello, Adora” instead of her usual “Hey,
Adora.” And at the end of the fight when Catra falls off the platform, I love this little pause
from Adora. She looks down at the pit that Catra has fallen into, she steels herself for a second,
and she chooses to jump after her. I love that. It wasn’t an instinctual reaction. She didn’t fall in
while running after Catra. She wasn’t dragged in by Catra. She stopped and made an active choice
that she had to save Catra no matter what. And that leads into her transforming back into She-Ra,
which plays into how emotions drive everything in the show. She couldn’t brute force her way
back into being She-Ra, as much as she wanted to, it took love for her to really be able to do it.
But at the same time, Adora was reckless to jump down after Catra, and Catra still doesn’t believe
she was worth saving. These two, despite having gone through all of this growth and change,
aren’t fully there yet. I’m amazed at how She-Ra is able to have these big emotional moments that
are such big changes for the characters and yet it saves the biggest change, the biggest challenge,
for the finale. The thing that all those past emotional moments were leading up to.
Because in the end, it’s not a fight that saves the world, or the defeat of the bad guy or
anything, it’s Catra and Adora loving each other, and in doing so, moving past their biggest flaws.
Catra has been unable to show Adora her true feelings, to be vulnerable and to ask for what
she needs. But at the most pivotal moment she says the now-iconic one-word line: Stay. She
expresses what she needs, and she has to believe in her own worth to do that. She believes that she
is worth staying for, and so she asks Adora to stay. The growth that she has to go through to
get to that point is monumental, and it’s a kind of insecurity that so many people grapple with.
On the flipside, Adora’s choice at the end is a massive subversion of the whole “Chosen One”
trope. In so many of these types of stories, the inspirational leader is supposed to be a martyr,
to be willing to sacrifice themself to save everyone else. So many “Chosen One” characters
have to accept that their fate is to walk to their doom alone. That’s supposed to be moving
and aspirational and courageous. But it can be harmful to portray that as the way to lead, to
say that strength comes from never tending to your own needs. She-Ra flips that on its head because
Adora is ready to sacrifice herself from day one. She’s accepted her role as a hero and isn’t afraid
to sacrifice herself to save others. In Heart Part 1, which is the second to last episode,
Adora does the typical hero thing. She goes down the dangerous path alone so she doesn’t
hurt her friends, and she’s confronted by Mara, the previous She-Ra, who explains that she didn’t
want to die. She sacrificed herself so that the next She-Ra wouldn’t have to. Mara was the hero,
and it didn’t solve everything. She wants Adora to be different. She says this incredibly powerful
line to Adora: “You’re worth more than what you can give to other people. You deserve love too.”
That’s something not just Adora, but lots of people watching this show, need to hear. Because
being the hero isn’t just a thing in stories. It’s super common for people to judge themselves based
on what they can do for others, forgetting that they also have needs and deserve to be loved.
The show really drives home the point with this Mara scene that caring for others at the expense
of yourself isn’t the noble, selfless thing that it’s hyped up to be. At the end of the day,
what Adora really needs to do is be the opposite of the self-destructive hero. She can’t sacrifice
herself. She has to stay. She can’t carry the weight of the world on her shoulders and solve all
the problems herself. She needs love and support. And that’s how we get this historic sapphic kiss
to save the world. Having both characters reach this final moment of growth at the same time,
and having their doing so be the thing that saves the world, that’s such talented writing.
And I love the focus on what the characters will do after. Whether it’s Catra and Glimmer
chatting about what they’d be doing on Etheria or Mara asking Adora to think about
her own needs. The show drives home that this story isn’t just about the conflict,
but about what comes next. What it would be like to recover and rebuild.
And then at the end, we get this beautiful, heartwarming scene of the best friend squad
all together. I would describe this as a medicine, healing queer hearts
around the world who’ve been hurt by the persistence of the “Bury Your Gays” trope.
After so many years of seeing queer characters killed off or given tragic endings,
we get this hopeful, joyful ending that is so, so heart-warming.
The story of Catra and Adora is not something that could’ve been done even just like a few years ago.
I mean, when She-Ra first got started in 2018, it wasn’t even guaranteed that they were going to be
able to fully tell that story that they wanted to tell. When Korra and Asami from The Legend of
Korra became canon at the end of 2014, that was both a massive moment for queer representation,
and kind of a small step forward because they weren’t even allowed to kiss on-screen. But fast
forward to 2020 and suddenly we’ve got this epic tale of queer love that’s so important and also
just a part of an overall really strong story, with other interesting characters and fascinating
themes. We went from zero to one hundred really quick, and we have the creators of She-Ra to thank
for that, so huge thank you to everyone who poured themselves into this show because it’s really a
work of art. We are so lucky to have something this good. A year later, I still love
this show, and I think it’s going to stick around in the public consciousness for a long, long time.
Let me know in the comments how you’re feeling about She-Ra one year later.
How many times have you rewatched it? Be honest. Anyway, I’m Riley,
thanks so much for watching this video, and I hope you’re doing well. I’ll see you next time.