She-Ra and the Princesses of Power is about to come to an end. While this is a sad time for fans of the show, we also must prepare for the final season! If you don’t have time to do the full rewatch right now, don’t worry. We’ve got you covered.
Season One
Adora lives in the Fright Zone as a cadet of the Horde, led by Lord Hordak on the planet of Etheria. She is promoted to force captain. Her best friend Catra is not promoted or allowed to participate in an upcoming attack, so Adora tries to cheer her friend up by sneaking into the Whispering Woods together. Once there she stumbles across the Sword of Protection and has strange visions after she touches it. She returns to the woods when she can’t shake the visions and encounters two members of the Rebellion force—Princess Glimmer and her best friend Bow. Adora learns that when she takes up the sword, it transforms her into a large warrior named She-Ra. She finds a temple built by the Forgotten Ones called the Crystal Castle (she refers to it as “the Beacon”), and finds that she can read their ancient language. She gradually befriends Glimmer and Bow, and realizes that the Horde is evil. Catra is sent by Shadow Weaver (the sorcerer who trained them) to retrieve Adora, and admits that she’s always known the truth about the Horde. Adora refuses to return with her and runs away to Bright Moon, Glimmer’s kingdom and the rebel capital.
Adora accidentally transforms a horse into a winged talking unicorn while trying to learn how her powers work, and he calls himself Swift Wind. She comes across an old woman named Razz who refers to her as “Mara”, a woman who was apparently the last to inhabit the mantle of She-Ra when something terrible happened. Adora pledges her service to the Rebellion and Bright Moon, while Glimmer wants to rebuild the Princess Alliance of old. They slowly begin to meet and befriend the other princesses while Catra is promoted to force captain in the Fright Zone and tasked with bringing Adora home. Glimmer, Adora, and Bow manage to recruit princesses Perfuma, Entrapta, and Mermista, and they visit Glimmer’s aunt Castaspella in her kingdom of Mystacor. There, they learn that Shadow Weaver was once one of their sorcerers before darker powers corrupted her. She trained Glimmer’s father for a time, a man who is believed to be dead.
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There is a Princess Prom in Princess Frosta’s kingdom, and the Bright Moon trio head there to recruit more princesses to their cause. Unbeknownst to them, Catra also got an invitation because the Fright Zone has a princess of their own: Scorpia, who is very eager to please Catra. They kidnap Glimmer and Bow, and head back to the Fright Zone, where Shadow Weaver promptly takes credit for Catra’s accomplishments. Adora bands together with Perfuma, Mermista, Sea Hawk (Mermista’s pirate buddy), and Entrapta to rescue their friends, but the plan goes awry and they wind up believing that Entrapta is dead. Entrapta believes she was left behind in the Fright Zone and begins doing work for the Horde because they’re fans of technology, and that’s very much her beat (she is the only princess not connected to a runestone). Glimmer’s time at Shadow Weaver’s hands cause her powers of teleportation to start “glitching”, a fact that she refuses to tell her mother about.
Adora goes to the Beacon to get information, feeling responsible for Entrapta’s death. Catra follows her and steals a data crystal, which results in the two of them being trapped there amidst projections of their memories. Adora learns that Catra always felt second best to her their whole lives, and Catra realizes that she doesn’t want Adora to come back to the Horde, leaving her for dead. Adora finds Light Hope, the fully actualized version of the Beacon hologram program that means to train her as She-Ra—but she doesn’t currently have the time to devote to that training.
Entrapta works to decode the data crystal Catra stole from the Beacon, learning the First Ones tech is somehow integrated into the planet itself, and that the princess’s runestones allow them to tap into that power. Shadow Weaver is currently using the Black Garnet runestone meant to be used by Scorpia, so Catra gets permission from Hordak to let Entrapta experiment on it. This throws Shadow Weaver into a rage, leading she and Catra to fight and disrupting her powers. Entrapta’s experiments on the Black Garnet cause planetary imbalances, giving the Horde the perfect opportunity to attack Bright Moon.
The battle does not go well at first, with Adora losing her sword, and the Horde’s forces gunning for the Moonstone that Glimmer and her mother are connected to. Eventually, the other princesses (and Sea Hawk) show up to be a part of the alliance, helping Adora to defend Bright Moon. This helps to restore Glimmer’s powers, and they drive the Horde back. Despite the loss, Hordak is pleased enough with Catra that he promotes her to his second in command while Shadow Weaver is confined to a cell.
Season Two
The newly reformed Princess Alliance is already having difficulty working together as they try to rid their woods of Horde-bots. Entrapta is using First Ones tech to try and make an even better brand of bot. Adora reminds the princesses that they have more strength when they work as a team, and they manage to stop Entrapta’s first wave of special bots, but Bow finds out that she is alive and working for their enemy in the process. Light Hope encourages She-Ra to form a bond with Swift Wind and sends them searching for the Watchtower, a relay station left by the Old Ones that the last She-Ra (Mara) destroyed. Once repaired, it helps Light Hope to function better. In the meantime, Glimmer and Bow try to rescue Entrapta, fail, and end up with Catra instead, who toys with them before informing them that Entrapta is helping the Horde of her own free will.
Catra is falling out of favor with Hordak, prompting her to seek out Shadow Weaver’s help—at the same time, Entrapta begins to bond with Hordak over their fascination with technology. Adora accidentally activates a transmission from a shipwreck when she tries to switch off a First Ones holographic projection. The Princess Alliance has a hard time planning battle strategies against the Horde, and Adora is afraid to face Catra again (while Scorpia is desperate to impress her), but they manage to retake a fortress. Entrapta restores a First Ones virus disk that briefly infects Adora through her sword, but Scorpia destroys it when the disk puts them all in danger. Hordak wants to exile Shadow Weaver (who thinks back to her time as Light Spinner, training Glimmer’s father Micah), but Catra still has tender feelings toward her despite being mistreated by her in the past. Shadow Weaver exploits that bond and ends up escaping. Hordak finds out and punishes Catra.
Bow deciphers the First Ones message that Adora triggered and wants more information about what it contains, so he goes home to see his dads and their giant library. Both of his fathers believe that he became an academic like everyone else in the family, instead of a freedom fighter. They learn the truth and accept the path their son has chosen for himself, helping him to decide the message—it relates to a constellation named Serinia that will soon appear above the Crimson Wastes. Shadow Weaver infiltrates Bright Moon and appears at Adora’s bedside.
Season Three
Shadow Weaver is near death, but Adora uses her powers to heal the sorcerer. In return, she tells them of Hordak’s plan—he is trying to open a portal in order to bring through the rest of the Horde armies and conquer Etheria. She also reveals that in the first experiment to create a portal, Adora came through as an infant: She is a First One. Light Hope confirms this, and Adora and friends decide to head to the Crimson Waste to track Mara’s message. At the same time, Entrapta discovers that a component she needs for the portal is also in the Wastes. She has been bonding further with Hordak, learning that he is a failed clone of Horde Prime. Hordak send Catra and Scorpia to retrieve the item Entrapta needs for the portal.
Adora, Glimmer, and Bow meet Huntara in the Wastes and hire her as a guide, but she betrays them and steal Adora’s sword. The Bright Moon trio recover it, learning in the process that Hunter is also a former Horde soldier who defected and ran. She decides to join them, and leads them to Mara’s ship. They find a message from Mara, revealing that she used the sword to transport Etheria to another dimension to hide it. The group is confronted by Catra and Scorpia, who kidnap Adora. Scorpia suggests that she and Catra defect and stay in the Crimson Wastes together, but Catra learns about Shadow Weaver’s move to Bright Moon, and she heads back to the Fright Zone and presents the sword as the needed component to open the portal. Glimmer seeks out Shadow Weaver’s help in strengthening her powers so she can save Adora, and manages to teleport herself and her friends to Hordak’s base.
Entrapta learns that opening the portal would destroy reality, but rather than let her warn Hordak, Catra knocks her out and exiles her to Beast Island, threatening Scorpia with the same if she doesn’t fall in line. Catra then lies to Hordak and tells him that Entrapta betrayed them and ran off. The portal is activated and fractures reality—Adora’s life reverts to a version where she never left the Horde, and she struggles to focus on the reality she knows and restore it. She learns that the only way to fix the problem is to close the portal by removing her sword. Glimmer’s mother, Queen Angella, manages this, destroying the portal and sacrificing her own life in the process. Unfortunately, the creation of the portal alerts Horde Prime, and they begin to track Hordak down.
Season Four
Glimmer, still grieving her mother, is crowned queen of Bright Moon. She sends her friends into the Crimson Waste to bring back Mara’s ship, but the Horde already beat them to it. Huntara decides to stay there in order to reclaim her home from the Horde. While the group is fighting there, Catra meets a shapeshifting agent named Double Trouble, and hires them once they effectively prove how skilled they are at mimicking others.
After a fight to save the village of Elberon, the Rebellion picks up a new member, a girl named Flutterina—this happens to be Double Trouble in disguise. Glimmer is sad that she is too busy being queen to help her friends on the frontlines of the fight, and begins turning to Shadow Weaver even more for guidance in using her powers. This strains her friendships with Adora and Bow, as she begins to take on missions by herself, and Flutterina encourages the discord. Adora learns that Light Hope used to be friends with Mara, something that the holographic interface is determined not to remember. Her former Horde teammates Kyle, Lonnie, and Rogelio are getting tired of the way the Horde operates, and eventually flee the whole operation, tired of being abused. Scorpia finally comes to terms with the fact that Catra is a bad friend, and leaves the Fright Zone to find Entrapta.
The Rebellion eventually realizes that there’s a spy amongst them, and the princesses organize an elaborate ruse to trap them. They trap Double Trouble, who reveals that they were only acting as a distraction while Hordak conquered Mermista’s kingdom. Sea Hawk gets himself, Bow, and Swift Wind captured to cheer the princess up, giving her the opportunity to rescue them. Adora goes to Razz for more information on Mara and learns about the Heart of Etheria Project, a weapon that stores magic at the planet’s core. When Mara found out about it, she stopped the weapon and exiled the planet. She left a message for Adora, warning her not to trust Light Hope, who was reprogrammed by the First Ones to trigger the Heart, even though firing the weapon will destroy the planet. The Adora brings this information to the Rebellion, and a fight breaks out over whether or not to use the Heart.
Scorpia arrives at Bright Moon to ask for help going to Beast Island to retrieve Entrapta. Glimmer isn’t interested in performing a rescue mission, but Adora and Bow disobey her and mount the rescue themselves. They use Mara’s ship to head over to Beast Island, and Adora learns that she cannot transform into She-Ra. On the island, they discover that Glimmer’s father, King Micah, was exiled there ages ago by the Horde. Entrapta has also been doing well on the island, finding out that it was a dumping ground for First Ones tech. She explains how the Heart works to Adora: When it activates, all the magic channels through She-Ra, the only being powerful enough to contain all that energy, firing the weapon through the Sword of Protection. Adora is determined to stop the weapon, and heads to the Crystal Castle after dropping Bow, Entrapta, and King Micah off at Bright Moon.
Glimmer is furious with her friends for disobeying her, and she asks Light Hope about the Heart of Etheria. Light Hope explains that the weapon can only be activated if the planet is balanced, and that requires connecting each princess with their runestones—Scorpia must reconnect with the Black Garnet for it to work. Double Trouble agrees to help Glimmer get into the Fright Zone to realign Scorpia with her runestone, and tells Hordak that Catra lied to him about Entrapta’s betrayal. This prompts a fight between Catra and Hordak, which Catra wins. Scorpia connects with the Black Garnet, bringing the Heart of Etheria online and transporting the planet back to its original dimension. Adora begs Light Hope to stop the process, but Light Hope cannot fight her programming. Adora ends up using the magic that is channeling through her to break the Sword of Protection, destroying the weapon’s ability to fire.
Horde Prime’s fleet arrives, and Glimmer, Hordak, and Catra are taken aboard the flagship. Hordak is taken away to be reconditioned, while Catra tries to convince Horde Prime to spare Etheria by telling him about the superweapon in the planet. Adora can no longer transform into She-Ra, but she still plans to fight.
And that’s where we left off! The finale season of She-Ra and the Princesses of Power will drop on May 15th, on Netflix.
Emmet Asher-Perrin is gonna sing the Sea Hawk song now. You can bug them on Twitter, and read more of their work here and elsewhere.
