#it's such a good introduction to their dynamic

[riteliso]

ALRIGHT SO

Here's how we're doing things, right? We're gonna go one episode at a time, and I'm gonna give my thoughts whenever they come up. This is a train of thought type beat, alright? Unlike my usual grandstanding authorial and analytical self, this re-watch is purely for the rant factor. If you don't know me, and you just happened upon this thread because you like reading she-ra rewatches, hello. I'm a writer from Canada who found she-ra in 2025 and is currently on her sixth watch through. From that, hopefully you can discern that I like this show, even if I'm likely gonna criticize parts of it. We good to go? Good. We start with S01 E01.

RIGHT, THE SWORD PART 1! A zoom in, with an angelic singing being drowned out by digital bloopy fright zone vibes, and then Adora being a fuckin dweeb as her leitmotif plays in a decidedly crystiline synth-y tone.

Now, what do we learn from this? This, aside from one gripe I'll have more to speak on later, is an excellent introduction. With the music alone we're essentially taken from the beauty of the planet, the overwhelming dread of the fright zone, and then into a hopeful tune that isn't FREE from these sort of digital themes in the music, but is very defined and separate FROM them.

This isn't gonna be one of those things where I praise literally every single fuckin thing so keep your panties on, I'm not gonna full-on overanalyzing avatar this shit, but the most important parts of a story are the beginning and the ending.

Now, when I say that, I am speaking pragmatically. Every part of every story is important-- but when it comes to what people remember, what they love, what they never shut up about-- it's the start and the end. You need to nail the take-off and the landing, people will forget the turbulence from the rest of the trip.

Now, what does THIS bitch's intro tell us about her? Well, a lot, honestly. Most of what we know about Adora at this point is she plays by the rules, but she is a notably goofy person. She's goofy, but she's unwilling to goof-OFF too much.

And while we get a taste of the rivalry they have instantly, with "That's low, even for you." "You know nothing's too low for me~"

We instantly see that that is not the CORE of their relationship.

I'd like to praise the voice direction in this show for the first of many times here. The voice actors do amazing work in this, and the direction can be felt throughout.

"Come on, you look stupid hanging there" can obviously be a seen as a strange first line to show the warmth these two share, but the inflection from Catra's voice actor, AJ Mikalcha, makes it read as downright sweet.

Also don't get used to me using names of the crew besides ND Stevenson because I'm so awful with names I was still calling Catra Katara half the time on my second re-watch and I was like 90% of the way to realizing I kinned her at that point

Also don't make fun of me for kinning Catra there's no RESPONSE to people making fun of you for kinning Catra THAT DOESN'T MAKE YOU SEEM MORE LIKE FUCKING CATRA OKAY

Anyway, the following scene makes it clear that this is not a one-way dynamic. The two banter, and it's clear Adora knows how to get under Catra's skin and annoy her as well. This is notable in a few places MUCH further on, but it is a difference worth highlighting NOW.

Once Adora leaves, Catra's primary goal is still to get under her skin. She's angry about it, she's mean about it, but she's still just doing what she's always done. The relationship between the two doesn't actually change as much as the context does. I'd say the relationship itself doesn't change much until the final season, at a scene I'm sure I'll have a lot to say about.

On the flip-side, Adora's goal when it comes to Catra is simply to fight her off. But that's not all there is. At points, it's clear that Adora holds some sort of REVERENCE for Catra, and while Catra is very capable of very mean things, don't get me wrong, Adora sees Catra as more of a threat than she realistically is.

At a few moments I'll point out she also relishes in getting under Catra's skin, but admittedly those are few and far between.

People have gone over this introduction billions of times, so I won't BORE you to death with it, but Shadow weaver's introduction does hint at a lot of what we'll learn later. I think it's very notable that while Shadow weaver brings a dark gloom that encompasses both our leads, her vile tendrils only dare to touch Catra. We learn the specifics of the dynamic these three have later, but it is a very unique and terrible situation to be the least favourite of an abusive guardian. Especially if you are repeatedly reminded of that fact.

I'm not gonna go over all the body language shit I've seen other text posts about it there's plenty of them a lot of focus in this show goes into tiny details where characters are constantly reacting to the world around them, and very rarely do we get lame stretches where anyone's face is just frozen and unflinching while they listen to someone else.

with all due respect to the setting at this point in time the bright moon rebellion is so pathetically anemic it's the two teens, some movie night lesbians, an immortal princess queen, and a bunch of fucking trees.

And you'd think the one carrying the team would be THE IMMORTAL PRINCESS QUEEN, BUT NO, ITS THE FUCKING TREES DOING ALL THE GOD DAMNED WORK

This introduction is fine. I don't particularly like it, nor have any strong feelings about it. It establishes the relationship between glimmer and her mother, but besides that it doesn't honestly do much. And don't come at me with "Uh, all it needs to do is establish that relationship?" Yeah, no shit, but we just had a better introduction to our other lead characters. And yes, those are the MAIN leads, the sort of heart of the show, but that doesn't mean that the other characters are unimportant. Glimmer's development later on is truly interesting, and Bow becomes a massively inspiring character. Fun jokey times are fine or whatever to show that they're immature and don't know the first thing about war, in contrast to our full-blown child soldiers raised from birth in the fright zone, but we really don't learn anything particularly INTERESTING about our best friend squad compadres in their intro, nor do we really see any of it until episode 2, to be frank.

This is something we don't actually see much of-- Catra has this ideal of being a conqueror, but it's very clear that she doesn't want that. Her threats are vapid and aimless-- She can enjoy some chaos, sure, but a shit-stirrer isn't gonna use that feces to build brick shithouses that they never intend to fall.

I think this should have been elaborated on more, personally. Catra is comically terrible with authority, and her plan, as stated later, is to wait it out until her and Adora are the ones calling the shots. But we don't really see what she thinks conquering even looks like, and it's not clear whether that's that she hasn't even imagined it and just likes evil words, or if she genuinely wants to rule with Adora as her Queen.

I gravitate towards the first, but that's partially because I wake up and post shit like "I want to destroy the world and rule its dust" and then forget I posted it when someone likes it 5 minutes later. If she do, in fact, as studies point toward, "be just like me fr," then I fully understand. If not, then I'd like to understand.

aw :(

Fuckin dweeb pulling the "my mom doesn't want me hanging out with you anymore" card

HA! Ah, what a bitch. Anyway, she's lashing out, but it's also quite tragic. A lot of people seem to think Adora IS, in some way, a people pleaser, but in reality she just has such an ingrained and violent sense of justice that she wants to right every wrong she has ever and will ever come across. She believes her validity is tied to what she can provide to the world, and she's got a natural sense of charisma, so it's natural for someone who refuses to blend in and naturally tends to put people off like Catra to have this view of her.

In reality, Adora is just-- a good person. And people LIKE good people. She's not a good person with an asterisk-- a good person with terms and conditions-- someone who falls into the definition of a good person while feeling and being treated like something else. Catra is the "a tomato is a fruit" of good people. Adora is just, like, a 1 dollar costco hotdog of a woman. An inarguable good treading water on this earth, no matter how hard it tries to pull her under.

Imagine falling for a brat with mad hops, like a fucking 50 foot vertical, you say you're too tired to play their favourite board game and they go hang out on your neighbour's roof, couldn't be me. Get fucked I guess

Yeah this is sad. Empathy is very much a learned skill, and people who don't learn empathy don't GET happy FOR people. Catra's not a complete person yet. She's not ready to be. That doesn't happen for a really long time, during an exceptionally long manic spiral. We'll get there, calm down, don't think about how far away that is and how much I've already yammered on.

Anyway, if you find yourself getting jealous or annoyed instead of getting happy for people, consider empathy isn't what you thought it was, and that you might still need to work on yourself.

fucking porno framing. Immensely sexual image, really. These bitches violently gay I suppose, I think I'm picking up on that during this sixth re-watch.

Buddy you got no idea how many problems those two already have you literally lose your little tiara at some point I think it ends up in the middle of a tree in space or something it's kinda unclear

Adora elbows her square in the nose during this so to everyone accusing Catra of physical abuse I just want it to be clear that Adora started it :/

Actually I'd like to retract that joke immediately because I know how people get about these two

My feelings are that they are literally child soldiers who were likely raised sparring each-other.

I was raised sparring other children and I ended up fine! Not for war, for Karate. And I didn't end up fine. And neither did they. Anyway, my point isn't even specifically that because this is sci-fi fantasy it's ridiculous to hold real life standards to it, it's more-so that because it's sci-fi fantasy there's extenuating circumstances that are going to affect how these two characters treat each-other. I'll go into hotter takes later, I'm sure, and get people to send me plenty of death-threats, but I'm gonna go into the nuances of exactly what forms Catra's abuse takes, and how it differs given by the separate circumstances we're shown the two in throughout the show.

my girl when I'm tryna live my best life playing as blue toad in mario 3d world

also holy shit we're only like halfway through this I am an AGONIZING yapper jesus fuck

Okay, what to say about lighthope-- well, their first words are "balance must be restored," far before they say Adora's name, so it somewhat lays out their secret priorities for us there. Besides that, I dunno, they got circuits on them? I don't have particularly strong feelings about lighthope, nor their introduction. I think they serve the setting and are written well, I just subjectively am not a sucker for the way they be. Their friendship with Mara is cute tho

I was gonna point out this is cute and how often I do this exact brat tactic but instead we data moshin, nothin wrong with a little data moshin, I'm down

This is the only reason she even wears a ponytail I'd stake my fuckin life on it

Once she leaves the fright zone that thing's fucking vestigial like a tailbone or having "any pronouns" in your bio when it's pretty clear you're very much a "she/they" type of bitch by now

glimmer why don't your windows have glass

or alternatively

how the fuck do you open and close that window

you can absolutely fucking hear her from this distance what on earth are you trying to pull

you a pillow princess tho how many of those arrows are just hitatchi magic wands attatched to a stick with duct-tape after the series ends do you think

The fuck you mean BOTTOM drawer we lookin at left and right here

or is this similar to my pillow princess comment and she's just addressing him and giving him an order

"Bottom; drawer."

It's established later on that he's a tech wiz but at this point in time they don't really give us much to lead us to the fact that he made that fucking thing

she's a freak

yes it's very sweet that she sleeps this way but I don't think it's some bdsm powerplay thing or anything like that, which would honestly be more tolerable, I think she's just like that

like how the way I'd sit in high school was to get two chairs and face them toward each-other then sit cross-legged across both

even if there weren't enough chairs to go around

people would sit on the FLOOR because I wanted to sit criss-cross-applesauce across two chairs, they wouldn't even ask for one of my chairs

also since I was sitting, again, cross-legged, it would have made more sense for ME to sit on the floor

I mean I think I got asked ONCE for one of the chairs and I just said "fine" but besides that people just let me sit on my fuckin throne

She really is kinda dumb, though. Like I ain't complaining, it's a character trait, but like obviously even if just you get in trouble Catra's gonna get blamed, you've seen it like at least once a month for your whole entire life

Mind you, can't really have Catra for the next part, because Catra's reaction to Bow and Glimmer wouldn't be "just let me have the sword" it'd be murder

oh wow we hit the image limit looks like we're doing TWO SEPARATE POSTS FOR THE VERY FIRST EPISODE YEE-HAW!!!!! THIS IS GOING TO TAKE ME FUCKING FOREVER

[byemambo]

Hey there! Welcome to the Har Tum Show!

JesBible on the Har Tum Show [1/?]

[ducktracy]

I went to see the day the earth blew up bc of your post and I can't believe Daffy Duck is confirmed transgender

YAAAAAY I'M SO HAPPY TO HEAR THIS!!! that's great!!

i've been loving the influx of trans Daffy posts i've been seeing because of this film... he's been laying eggs since at least 1950! this isn't even anything new! always has been!

okay well this is actually incredibly misleading because that is, in fact, not his egg but he took credit for it anyway BUT. he does lay an actual egg at gunpoint ("that just goes ta show ya! you don't know what you're gonna do 'til ya gotta gun against yer head!") . so the point remains the same

also check out this officially licensed trans Daffy fidget cube? or i guess trans Tweety gay Daffy fidget cube? both? i don't know but it makes me laugh out loud every single time i see it

[crynburne]

stw is a tibetan mastiff and in this essay i will share my 13 reasons why (cus this guy's been plaguing my mind lately) (and also cus hyj is canonically a black cat, shj is for some reason a snow leopard (i get it but like how did the community unilaterally agree on this?? it never fails to fascinate me) and stw is? maybe a bear? or a dog? no one decided yet)

anyway some stuff about tibetan mastiffs that fit my agenda perfectly first:

they are huge and look intimidating. i mean look at them.

they were initially bred to protect livestock from wolves, bears and snow leopards (!), not hunt (also it looks like even despite it's large build, a TM is weaker than a snow leopard, and usually just tries to scare or hold them off in an encounter)

they are loyal yet independent, and will not usually look for guidance from their owner

they are surprisingly agile for their huge size

they don't bark much, but their voices are very deep and impressive

they're children friendly (if you teach them properly, that is. but still!)

now onto novel reasons:

shj refers to stw as a shepherd god, mainly in the earlier chapters

stw's whole 'i must protect the weak sheep' thing he got going on

stw and shj are often pit against each other or look something like rivals (like TMs and snow leopards, basically each other's natural enemies). there is also another reason in the novel that I won't spoil, but if you finished it you know.

also yes a TM is weaker than a snow leopard. and stw is weaker than shj (that's also because shj is shj and there aren't many people stronger than him, but you get my point! suspend your disbelief and let me brainwash you!)

stw considers himself a monster, and both he and TMs look intimidating and scary. but both TMs and stw are ultimately like this to protect what's important to them and they don't go out of their way to pick fights or measure strengths.

TMs don't usually attack people out of nowhere, but since they're really territorial they will attack if they consider you an enemy. and s classes had a whole thing about hyj trying to appear as weak and needing protection in stw's eyes so he won't be seen as a threat to stw's little herd that is korea

anyway that's just about it. i kinda just saw a casual geographic vid about dog breeds that could put you to eternal rest and when he was talking about TMs beef with snow leopards i was like. wow hi stw. so now i consider this whole thing canon. uh thank you for coming to my ted talk i have no life!

[13eyond13]

love how every major character tends to instantly humiliate Light whenever they're first introduced. Ryuk makes him scream and land on his ass and then scoffs at him for thinking he's the chosen one, L puts him on blast on live TV in front of millions of viewers for thinking he's divine, and soon enough Misa will be nearly doxing him on TV in front of everybody and then stalking him home... if you want to make Light take you seriously then you have got to humble and maybe also publicly humiliate his arrogant ass, for real

[cchipollo]

had to stop halfway through the second voyager q episode but. why is q genuinely irritating now NOOOO

[sysig]

Time Loops are they/them culture (Patreon)

Bonus of my little guy in ISaT style:

[fantastic-mr-corvid]

Need to kill the part of me that wants to write in a way that isnt open to bad faith readings and so wants to strip away the very point of the fic...

i'm having Rage fic thoughts... None of the character changes since counter whats written in fact they work with the themes perfectly but they do make the deeply uncomfortable well fucking everything even worse soooo. Hm. the question is how far am i willing to go and well really share.

[sorrinslays]

https://www.tumblr.com/sorrinslays/751759492077748224/i-never-understood-why-bronya-doesnt-have-a-voice

if u had to create a voicelina bronya would have about sampo, what would it be? i’d love to hear ur thoughts

I'd probably have her be unsure what to think of him. Like yeah he helped her but there's also a whole ass cabinet just for his scams. So it would probably go something like this:

"He's... an interesting individual, for lack of a better word. He has proven himself helpful, if Wildfire's records are to be believed, but calling him an ally would be too far of a stretch too. From what Seele told me it's better to not engage with him unless it's absolutely necessary."

[aerithisms]

episode ranking i'm feeling at the moment:

73 yards

dot and bubble

boom

the church on ruby road

rogue

the devil's chord

the legend of ruby sunday/empire of death

space babies

[franollie]

baby fran watched nightwing, oracle, and batman interact in The Batman (2004) s4e7 “artifacts” and has been chasing that high ever since

[spatio-rift]

just like how pairing saiko w aren made him funnier i also think aiuras introduction to the manga n position as fellow psychic hanging around kusuo allowed toritsuka to be a lot funnier as well. its good to have more duos that can play off each other really well

[vv-ispy]

thinking about. ships

[clover-the-awesomest]

yey

part 2 of my TMNT 03 AU-ish doodles where i was just kind of playing with some character dynamics

Twitter || Ko-fi || Instagram

[linksconverge]

the Sillies (ft. very little context)

[hyperprosexia]

cw: 18+ | omegaverse; dub-con; gn!reader; poly!alpha!141; a/b/o dynamics

》 previously

bringing you back to base with him is neither hard nor challenging.

you're so docile and content around the captain, your future mate, nearly glued to his side since the night he fucked you properly, that he must constantly keep his chubbed cock tucked up into the waistband of his trouser to be able to get anything done.

there are arrangements to be made, housing contracts to be terminated and stuff of yours to be moved into his flat instead.

the thing he spends most time thinking about, though, must be the moment he will introduce you to his pack.

first, price considers acquainting you to each of his packmates one after the other, not wanting to overwhelm you at once, but he swiftly comes up with a better, way more resourceful idea one evening while he's having a stiff drink and with his fat cock buried deep, warmed and heavenly stimulated by your dripping omega hole.

and captain price, ever the clever leader, brings an armful of your worn, drenched panties to the next briefing with his boys throughly pleased as he lets out a few gravelly chuffs, when the three younger alphas immediately go nuts about your intoxicating, saccharine scent.

johnny is practically shredding the flimsy fabric in his callous hands as he sniffs and laps at the gusset where your scent is the most intense. simon has nearly stuffed a pair under his mask to keep it cupped tightly over his nose while his broad chest rumbles with excited growls, and while kyle tries to stay calm under his pack leaders vigilant eyes, everyone can clearly see how much he's salivating because of your scent, how his pupils have dilated at the first good whiff of you.

it's but the first soft step of your introduction into his pack, knowing that the next will be much more personal.

however, he's still debating about the best point in time.

perhaps before your next heat?

》 continue