Adam is training with Teela when the Three Magics begin tearing her apart, and he calls on the Power of Grayskull. Teela becomes the Sorceress and is told to restore Preternia. The allies get their orders: Orko and Evil-Lyn protect Teela, and Duncan and Andra handle the Horde. Gwildor is asked if the sword is safe for the infected. Skeletor, upgraded with magic and technology, tells a crowd he will remake the Universe, and He-Man walks out to meet him. Granamyr fights a Horde machine, and afterward tells Evil-Lyn she saved his soul. Preternia returns, and King Randor appears at He-Man's side. Skeletor is told he may have been born Keldor but will always choose to be Skeletor. Adam then tells the people of Eternos that the monarchy is dissolved and the power is theirs. Zodac welcomes Evil-Lyn to the Cosmic Enforcers, and in a Horde chamber a voice promises the Exalted One that Horde Prime will make the Exalted One whole.
Skeletor: "Meet Skeletor 2.0!"
Granamyr: "You saved my soul."
Man-at-Arms: "I'm Man-Out-of-a-Job, but I'm okay with that."
Zodac: "Today we learned a lesson in balance."
The Scepter and the Sword is the fifth and final of five episodes, written by Kevin Smith, and it ends the series on a change of government. Adam stands in the ruined royal arena, tells the people of Eternos that the monarchy is dissolved, and hands the power to them. The war comes first. Skeletor arrives with new upgrades and a plan to remake the Universe, and the heroes get their assignments: Orko and Evil-Lyn protect Teela while Duncan and Andra handle the Horde. Gwildor is asked whether the sword is safe to use on all the infected Eternians at once, and answers that by his calculations it should do the trick, with an Orko-percent chance of flattening reality. Teela is the Sorceress now, and her task is to restore Preternia so that anyone who dies today will find their rest and reward.
Adam gives his power away, where most of the people around him are trying to take, hold or restore theirs. Skeletor tells the crowd that Hordak sought to rule the Universe, but that he would rather remake it, and that everyone will be remade in their king's beautiful image. Teela is restoring the afterlife and Gwildor is asked about a sword for the infected, while Adam ends the finale by letting something go.
The Horde is a line of purple machines under a red sky, among them a crab, a spider and a tentacled one with gold sensors, and Teela appears with her staff and her golden wings spread. Granamyr hangs upside down from one of the machines, and in another frame green fire glows in his open jaws. After the fight he tells Evil-Lyn "You saved my soul" and calls her good. Zodac later welcomes her to the Cosmic Enforcers.
The standout scene is the confrontation that follows. Skeletor tells his nephew to bow down or he will send his brother's soul to Subternia for stealing his crown. A voice answers with "You still think you're the victim?" and "What did you do with it but subjugate and destroy?", and Skeletor is told he may have been born Keldor but will always choose to be Skeletor. Adam then turns to the people. He says he was wrong to crown Keldor, wrong to think one person could decide what is best for them, and that granting power by blood strips Eternians of their agency. Then he gives Keldor credit for one point, that the power should belong to the people too. Chris Wood voices Adam, and the speech is a plain account of a mistake and a correction.
The last stretch is crowded. It closes the monarchy, takes Man-at-Arms's title and leaves him Man-Out-of-a-Job, has Andra talk about running for office, welcomes Evil-Lyn to the Cosmic Enforcers and has Teela offer Adam a place to stay, and some of those beats get a single exchange. The "sitting in a tree" rhyme arrives in the planning scene, before Preternia is restored, and it sits a little oddly beside what is at stake. The Horde coda is brief too: a voice in a dark chamber tells the Exalted One that Horde Prime will make the Exalted One whole, and that they will return to Eternia to destroy Skeletor and this He-Man.
Adam and Teela end the main story together on a rampart overlooking the city, after a crowd cheers in the broken arena. Adam gives up the crown and promises to be there if evil rises again.
- Voice cast: Melissa Benoist took over Teela from Sarah Michelle Gellar for Revolution, according to Wikipedia's list of changes from the Revelation cast.
- Continuity: TV Tropes says Teela's new look after she fuses the Three Magics resembles the Goddess from the original mini-comics.
- Toys: The He-Mania fan site identifies the Cosmic Enforcer seated beside Zodac in the closing scene as Strobo. It traces him to a planned but never produced 1988 vintage figure that would have paired Zodac's head with Sy-Klone's chest, and notes a 2013 Classics figure followed.
- Production: TV Tropes says the music as Adam drains Skeletor's nanotech reuses the climax cue of "The Power of Grayskull" from Revelation. Bear McCreary scored the series and carried over themes from the earlier run.
- Reception: Wikipedia reports Revolution holds a 100 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes from 11 reviews, with an average rating of 7.60 out of 10.
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