The Light of the Crystal

The Horde under Catra has conquered Elfworld and set its people to work in the crystal mines, and the elf prince Storm slips away to find She-Ra. On the way a Rock Person named Facet helps him, and in the Whispering Woods he meets Prince Arkion of Vargon, a prankster who has left home because his father is too serious. Catra traps She-Ra in a crystal dome, and the rebels are sent to the mines, but Granita helps She-Ra smash her way out and Stonedar frees Bow and Glimmer. Arkion loses his nerve and runs, and She-Ra talks him round by telling him that fear has to be faced and that growing up does not end the fun. He returns and gets inside Catra's air cruiser, and sends her and Mantenna tumbling out of it. Elfworld is free, and Arkion decides to go home and help his father.

Loo-Kee: "Here's your friend Loo-Kee again. Did you find my hiding place today? If not, try again. Here I am! You know something? When you stop to think of all the things parents do for their children, you begin to realize how really extra special they are. When was the last time you said thank you to them or better still, "I love you"? How about doing it right now?"

Catra: "I am surrounded by empty-headed, know-nothing, worthless fools!"

She-Ra: "Couldn't have said it better myself, Cat."

She-Ra: "Being afraid is nothing to be ashamed of."

Arkion: "Correction, you are our prisoners."

Is a prince who cannot stop joking any use in a war? The Light of the Crystal puts that question to Arkion of Vargon, a visitor who wanders into the Whispering Woods looking for fun, and the answer it gives is that his jokes are fine and his habit of running from everything else is the problem.

The first scene that carries the idea is Arkion's introduction. Bow is shaken by a talking tree, tells it to apologise, and is then laughed at, because Arkion can throw his voice and the tree was never speaking. He says it is "Not magic, just practice." He is the son of King Semor, he says his father is too serious, and he says he is after adventure and good times. The staff in his hand fires a beam, and Adora looks on amused. It is a cheerful opening.

The middle belongs to the Horde and the elves. Catra has taken Elfworld and set its people to work in the crystal mines, and Storm, an elf prince, has come looking for She-Ra. Imp arrives in disguise and gets dunked in water for his trouble, She-Ra is sealed in a crystal dome and freed when she and Granita of the Rock People smash it, and Bow, Glimmer, Storm and Arkion are marched into the mines to dig under Scorpia. Stonedar breaks Bow and Glimmer out. The pace is brisk, and the writing is generous to the supporting crowd, so that Facet, Granita and Stonedar each get something useful to do.

What the episode is really about is whether playfulness and responsibility have to be traded against each other, and the scene where it decides is the talk among the rocks. Arkion has run from the fight and says he is ashamed. She-Ra tells him being afraid is nothing to be ashamed of, but he must face it, and when he complains that his father keeps telling him to grow up she replies that growing up does not end having fun. The line that does the work is his: he had "never thought about being needed." It is a modest, human beat, and the episode earns it by letting the staff come back as a tactic, so that Arkion and Storm get into the air cruiser, stand over Catra and Mantenna, and drop them out of the cruiser with "Correction, you are our prisoners."

The weakness is that his change is arranged rather than discovered. Arkion's whole turn rests on that single conversation, and his father, who is the supposed cause of the trouble, never appears. We hear about King Semor in a handful of lines and never see him, so the closing decision to go home and help him ("It's time for me to go home") is addressed to a man we do not know. A scene with Semor, even a short one, would have made the ending land. King Varn, Storm's father, is present and gets a short fatherly speech about courage.

Loo-Kee's moral about thanking your parents is a sweet, if slightly shifted, echo of the plot. The Light of the Crystal is a lightweight Elfworld adventure with one good idea in it, and Arkion is a better ally than his first scene promises.

1. Continuity: The Whispering Woods, described here as the home of She-Ra and the Rebels, is also the setting of The Peril of Whispering Woods.
2. Continuity: Bow calls Stonedar "our friend from the Rock People", treating him as someone the rebels already know, and Granita and Facet are also of the Rock People.
3. Continuity: Mantenna fears that Hordak will lock him up in the Fright Zone if he does not get enough crystal, and Catra, Scorpia, Mantenna and Imp are the Horde's forces in Elfworld.