Sunday, June 10, 2012

Season 1 Episode 14 "Colossor Awakes"

I have no idea what to expect from this episode based on the title.  Maybe a one eyed dinosaur?  A retelling of the Odyssey through the lens of the He-Man universe?  I guess we will just have to let it unfold in front of us like the nauseating opera of kitschy 80s  pop-culture that it is.  We open on Skeletor walking into Beast Man’s sleeping chambers where he is, well, sleeping.  Maybe this is the part where Odysseus tells his wife that he’s leaving on an adventure.



Skeletor wakes Beast Man from his whiskey-induced slumber to announce that he is, in fact, leaving on a ship!  Maybe this really is the Odyssey!  So the point of the ship is that it has a huge energy converter which is going to help him execute his plan to rule Eternia.  This sounds promising.  I can’t wait to hear the rest of the plan.


We cut to the palace where the annoying music that plays whenever Orko is fucking something up is playing.  I’m shocked to find out that this is exactly what is going on.  Orko and Man-At-Arms are playing a game of chess with weird little live creatures, and Orko manages to spill a goblet on Man-At-Arms while he’s moving it with magic.  Everyone has a stupid laugh about it until Skeletor flies overhead in his new ship and seriously starts blasting the shit out of everyone, turning them to stone.  Then they aren’t laughing anymore.



Prince Adam runs off with Cringer to turn into He-Man and Battle Cat, respectively, while everyone else is getting turned to stone.  Man-At-Arms stands atop a spire blasting with a pistol ray at Skeletor’s ship while He-Man takes his sweet fucking time with his recycled animation sequence.  Mat-At-Arms gets turned to stone and falls off the spire, sure to smash to bits on the tiles below.  I just hope it’s gory.  Unfortunately, He-Man finishes up with his recycled animation sequence just in time to sprint over and catch him.


He-Man then dives to save Teela from being turned to stone since she is just standing there staring at Skeletor’s ship.  In thanks, she demands that he find a way to turn her “father” back from stone.  I think that’s a bad idea.  The only way He-Man would know how to do that would be to punch Man-At-Arms into a million pieces, which would be counter productive.  Up in the ship, Beast Man looks drunk as ever – probably because Skeletor didn’t let him finish sleeping it off – while Skeletor leans forward in ever increasing excitement as all the denizens of the royal palace get picked off one by one.


But Skeletor has even more tricks up his sleeve!  He pulls a couple of levers and now anything he blasts that was stone now comes to life!  Case-in-point, he blasts a stone statue of a lion, thus bringing it to life so that people can get ripped to shreds and add a little gore to this marble party.  Predictably, it immediately picks a fight with Battle Cat.


Not predictably, Statos shows up with a sword in his hand, and Ram Man comes walking into the frame as well.  Apparently, they just happened to be in the neighborhood.  On top of a fucking plateau.  Skeletor animates more statues, this time humanoid roman warrior type ones, to engage the new guests.  He-Man gets smart and uses one of their army’s flying crafts to rise up and challenge Skeletor’s craft head on.  Skeletor's craft hits He-Man's with some kind of ray, which puts into auto landing mode.  I was hoping it would be more of an EMP-like device and just make them drop to the ground and splatter, that would have been way more fun.


Below, Ram Man and Stratos easily take out the stone army.  It’s a joke, really.  Even Orko manages to best a few of them.  Yes, Orko.  Apparently, there is nothing left to turn from stone to life or something, because Skeletor just takes off for no real reason.  Orko, Ram Man and Stratos all join hands like they won their track meet or something and yell “wah-hoo”, just like you would expect to happen in the 80s.


Later, in the lab, King Randor, the queen, whose name I already forgot because they never use it, and Orko are gathered around the stoned Man-At-Arms, who is strapped to a table.  Maybe if they stare at him hard enough, he will turn back to living flesh again.  Prince Adam comes in and fakes like he doesn’t know what happened.  The queen seriously just starts trying random shit by pushing buttons and using various inventions to try and turn Man-At-Arms back to life.  She could really fuck him up like that!


Elsewhere, Skeletor is forcing Beast Man to carry the energizer somewhere, and it’s gigantic.  I mean, this is far worse that the hair dryer in Space Balls.  Skeletor expects him not to drop it, which is more than anyone could ask considering that Beast Man is soused all the time.  Somehow, Beast man manages not to drop it and to set it up right so that it blasts this diamond which is situated on the face of a stone chair, upon which sits a gigantic stone being, whom I am guessing is Colossor.


At Castle Grayskull, Prince Adam has turned into He-Man and is talking to the Sorceress.  I still don’t understand why he has to bother to turn into He-Man just to talk to her.  Can’t he just stop by as Prince Adam and see what’s up first?  Anyway, he’s trying to see if she knows how to turn Man-At-Arms back.  Also, I don’t understand why he’s standing right in front her now, but other times they have to stand all the way and the bottom of this staircase that leads up to her throne or whatever.  What’s the protocol here?  Is it because he's alone?  I guess she didn’t make him only a harness to wear for no reason.  This way she gets to check him out at close range sometimes.  There doesn't seem to be much to do at Castle Grayskull when she's there alone, so she probably jills off thinking about He-Man a lot.  Anyway, the Sorceress tells He-Man to find the fire jewels and everything will be chill.


An idle Skeletor is amusing himself by flying around and turning the rural Eternians into stone when Evil-Lyn shows up on his monitor.  Skeletor’s all like, “What the fuck do you want, bitch?  I’m busy zapping peasants”!  Evil-Lyn takes the piss by claiming she wants his power and then she laughs hysterically, which is actually pretty funny because Skeletor is impotent and fails at everything, so she's not wrong.  Anyway, she’s just busting his balls, and tells Skeletor that she’s really interrupting him to tattle that He-Man is looking for the fire jewels.  Because Evil-Lyn’s jab wasn’t enough, Beast Man tells Skeletor that He-Man is smarter than he is.


Just after He-Man pulls out of the garage in Attak Trak, Skeletor shows up again and starts turning guards to stone, and even manages to get Ram Man.  You know, if he can manage to tag all the muscle players before He-Man can get the fire jewels, Skeletor just might have a chance!  Apparently, what this thing does is steal the energy out of living things, turning them to stone, then stores that energy until it is used to turn stone in to living things.  I don’t know how he knows this because it’s not like the thing has a battery meter, but Skeletor claims that only one more tank will bring Colossor to life.


As He-Man and Teela cruise trough a gloomy, foggy forest, Teela whines about how scary it looks.  He-Man assures her it’s not dangerous at all.  Then a swamp bat shows up, which is a giant and green and pretty scary looking.  Then He-Man says they won’t attack if you leave them alone, and then it attacks.  To be fair, because sometimes I take a break from being ruthless, Beast Man is manipulating the thing with his Beast Man powers.  But, because he’s drunk, Beast Man shouts his commands at the swamp bat, and totally gives himself away to He-Man, who uses a flash grenade to disable the swamp bat.  Before He-Man can advance on Beast Man, he takes off on a glider.


He-Man continues his quest and arrives at the mouth of the cave where the fire jewels are kept.  He figures he can just walk right in and get them and walk right back out, lickity-split.  So far, according to plan, the fire jewels are indeed just sitting out conveniently like a platter of glowing red-hots.  Because Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom hasn’t been released yet, He-Man doesn’t know any better and just grabs a handful and starts stuffing them in a bag.  Of course, the cavern starts to crumble all around them.  Not only that, but a river of lava begins to flow, blocking the exit and stranding He-Man on a boulder.


While the last tank of energy is unloading into Colossor’s diamond, Beast Man, for the second time this episode, tells Skeletor that He-Man is smarter than he is.  This time, Skeletor has had it and moves to sock Beast Man in the jaw.  I’m pretty sure this would qualify as domestic violence, if Eternia had any such laws.  But, before he can break the bear’s jaw, Clossor rises to life.  Skeletor is pretty sure that, because Colossor is really big, He-Man can’t just punch the damn thing to pieces.


Back at the cave of the fire jewels, the trumpet version of the He-Man song plays signifying that he’s about to overcome the obstacle of the lava river.  He throws the bag of fire jewels out to Teela, then makes us look up his nostrils for several seconds while he pulls down a stalactite from the ceiling and uses it to pole-vault out of the cave to safety. 


Colossor demands to be informed who has woken him, because he was very fucking comfortable sitting on his stone chair, thank you very much.  Skeletor says, “I, Skeletor, Master of the Universe have awakened you”!  Bitch, you almost made me laugh.  Without even carding him, Colossor accepts Skeletor’s authority and is instructed to capture Castle Grayskull.  Skeletor poops a little as he fantasizes about knowing all the secrets of Castle Grayskull.  Beast Man just tries not to drool over the poop smell.


In the palace laboratory, the Sorceress, He-Man and Teela stand around admiring the fire jewels.  The Sorceress instructs He-Man that they need to be crushed for their purposes, so he obliges and crushes them up between his palms because he’s the strongest man in the universe.  I think Teela juices a little when he does it.


While I thought the purpose of the fire jewels was to revive Man-At-Arms, it turns out its actually to use them to defeat Skeletor.  The Sorceress turns them into some Elton John glasses, which I’m sure He-Man won’t mind wearing.  He already runs around in furry hot pants and boots with no shirt on.  Why not go all the way?


He-Man takes off on a glider leaving Teela just enough time to make a suggestive remark to Battle Cat about them being alone together, and that she’s never taken a tiger dick before, when Colossor shows up on his mission to capture Castle Grayskull.  What a buzz kill.  The Sorceress hears the stomping as Colossor approaches and changes to her falcon form and goes to see what’s up.  She runs distraction for a moment so Teela and Battle Cat can get their groove on.  That’s really nice of her.  I guess because she has both an animal form and a human form, she’s into the whole inter-species love thing.  Or at least accommodating of it.


Skeletor is en route in his aircraft and is insulting Beast Man’s drunken driving because they haven’t arrived at Castle Grayskull yet.  What else would you expect?  The guy employs miniscule talent and expects grand results.  Beast Man is right, Skeletor really isn’t very smart.  Turns out, Beast Man has been heading for Snake Mountain instead of Castle Grayskull because he figures he can catch a nap while Colossor is taking over Castle Grayskull autonomously.  Skeletor insists that he be there to watch Colossor take Castle Grayskull, which is one of the smarter super villain things to do; personally see your plans through to fruition.


He-Man shows up and jumps onto the craft and tears his way inside.  Beast Man tries to whip him, but He-Man just cuts the whip with his sword.  Panthor tries to tear his eyes out, but He-Man just bolos him.  Skeletor tries to push him out of the opening he tore in through, but He-Man overpowers him.  He takes the Elton John glasses and slips them over the two levers that operate the life-to-stone and stone-to-life rays, thus joining them magically into one ray.  He jumps from Skeletor’s craft and whistles for the glider to come pick him up in mid air.


He-Man lands at the palace with Skeletor hot on his trail.  Skeletor tries to blast him, not realizing that his ray has been converted, and inadvertently brings all the stone soldiers, Ram Man and Orko (really?  Orko had to come back to life?) back to life.  Um.  OK, so I noticed that Man-At-Arms is out there too.  So, they just gave up trying to bring him back and put him out on the veranda, because, what else are they going to do with him?  I guess he might as well adorn their garden if he’s going to be a statue. 


They all head to Castle Grayskull where Colossor is attacking it.  Teela and Battle Cat have just finished committing unspeakable sexual acts on each other.  While Teela pulls the crotch of her unitard back over her snatch, Man-At-Arms blasts Colossor’s ankles with a regular old bolo rope-shooting gun (what happened to the lasso ray from the last episode?), Orko uses magic to slow Colossor down.  Stratos shoves him forward while He-Man kneels in front of him on all fours, tripping him.  He-Man is used to that position, so it was a pretty solid plan.  It works, and Colossor topples.  They aren’t The Avengers, but they are pretty coordinated, I’ll give them that. 


Colossor may be down, but he’s not out.  He continues (in slow motion) to reach  for Castle Grayskull.  With all the force of a recycled animation sequence, He-Man punches Colossor in the ankle, which fractures it, and causes his whole body to shatter.  I told you He-Man would just punch him to death.  Awwww yeah.  That’s kill number 7, baby.  Colossor is an ancient being, it fucking counts as a murder.  In just a sprinkle of karma, He-Man gets buried beneath the rubble, but then he breaks out and everyone cheers, because murder should be applauded.  If those rocks were blood, he’d be covered in it.  Awwww yeah.


Skeletor shows up and thinks that whatever regular blaster ray his ship is equipped with should do the trick and fires on He-Man.  He-Man easily bats the shot back at the ship, sending it flying into what I’m sure is not quite oblivion.  Echoing my fears, Teela says, “Why do I get the feeling that he’ll be back”?  He-Man ominously assures us that he will.  For some reason, a Disney song just popped into my head.  “Tale as old as time… Beauty and The Beast…”


Anyway, the episode closes with a dumb sequence in which Orko is telling Prince Adam about how he saved the day, and then he shits his pants when Man-At-Arms' shadow overcasts him from the door way, causing Orko to think that Colossor has returned.  Let me tell you, poop escapes one's drawers much faster when there are no legs for it to run down.  Well, it wasn't the Odyssey, but it did have a cyclops monster in it.  I'm not sure Evil-Lyn counts as a siren though.  Her cackle is pretty shrill.  Anyway, I didn't think these guys went on to make O' Brother Where Art Thou or anything (now that was a good re-imagining of the Odyssey), so, I'll take it.


Time for this week’s moral!  I think it’s going to be about how beastiality is A-OK, as long as you are really horny and pent-up, and the animal is a sentient, talking creature that can clearly consent.  In a strange twist of the moral lesson format, we cut to Teela and He-Man running and congratulating themselves on how much fun it is to exercise.  What the fuck does He-Man need to exercise for?  He gets his strength from ancient magic.  Teela is another story, she needs to keep that ass tight, because nobody likes a saggy ass, but He-Man?  He-Man tells us that we should consult a doctor before any heavy exercise.  Really?  This is a kid's show.  Little kids need to check with the doctor before they go running around?  Whatever, the shows over, I’m going to go watch some porn.  Regular people porn, just so we're clear.


He-Man murder count: Its lucky number se7en, baby!  And one attempted murder.

IMDB Cast List:

John Erwin:  He-Man, Prince Adam, Beast Man
Alan Oppenheimer: Skeletor, Man-At-Arms, Cringer
Linda Gary: Teela, Evil-Lyn, The Sorceress, Queen Marlena
Lou Sheimer: Orko, Stratos, Wind Raider computer, Colossor

I guess Ram Man and Attack Trak aren’t important enough characters to include in the cast list this week.  Or King Randor for that matter.  Queen Marlena, whose name I couldn’t remember gets credited and King Randor doesn’t?  What the fuck is going on here?

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