The final season of <\/span>She-Ra<\/span><\/i>, puts a lot of focus on Catra\u2019s redemption. She begins the season a villain–trying to get into the graces of the new Big Bad–only to realize that she\u2019s just as much a prisoner as Glimmer. The two enemies form an unlikely bond and Catra, accepting that her days are limited, decides to do one good thing in her life: save Adora by saving Glimmer–stopping Adora\u2019s ill-conceived rescue attempt before it even gets off the ground. This act of self-sacrifice in turn inspires Adora to rescue Catra and, slowly but surely, Catra becomes accepted as one of the good guys.<\/span><\/p>\n The problem is not that Catra teams up with the heroes. Nor is it that she finally repents, mends her ways, and becomes a stalwart ally of She-Ra. The problem is that Catra is forgiven–seemingly by everyone–and faces no consequences for her multitude of evil actions.<\/span><\/p>\n Adora and Catra were both raised by the Horde and switched to the side of the angels. However, the key difference is that Adora spent literally one mission as a Horde commander before defecting to the rebels. Moreover, until that point, she fully bought into the propaganda that the horde was good and the princesses evil.<\/span><\/p>\n Catra, with her more pessimistic outlook on the world, knew from the start they were the bad guys. However, she decided that the Horde would ultimately win and thus, for her own personal well being, it would be best to side with them.<\/span><\/p>\n But Catra\u2019s true Achilles heel isn\u2019t her pragmatism. It\u2019s her insecurity. Alongside the golden child Adora, Catra would always be second best–no matter how hard she tried. So why try at all? To hide her feelings of inferiority, she simply pretended she didn\u2019t care at all, steering hard into her role of being the team\u2019s \u201ctoo cool for the rules\u201d rebel.<\/span><\/p>\n But when Adora left, Catra was suddenly allowed to shine. She gained the respect of her superiors and subordinates alike and was given ever more responsibility–eventually becoming the second in command of the entire Horde. Her professional life was infinitely better without Adora. Unfortunately, it meant the opposite for her personal life.<\/span><\/p>\n Adora was Catra\u2019s one true personal connection. When Adora defected, to Catra, it felt like being abandoned by the only person she loved–and who she thought loved her in return. Worse yet, when they met up again, Catra had been seemingly replaced by Bo and Glimmer as the person closest to Adora.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Like pretending that always being second best didn\u2019t bother her, Catra became obsessed with proving to others (and herself) that her relationship with Adora never mattered–that she wasn\u2019t hurt by the betrayal. In fact, it was the best thing that ever happened to her–despite the ever growing evidence to the contrary.<\/span><\/p>\n Her jealousy and insecurity built over the seasons, pushing her to more and more evil extremes until she no longer cared about victory for the Horde or getting praise from her superiors\/parental figures. She only cared about hurting Adora as much as Adora hurt her by abandoning her and replacing her. And since Adora had decided that she cared for saving the world and her new friends more than anything else, Catra\u2019s decided to destroy the world itself. With this, she would prove that not only was she better than Adora (erasing that insecurity) but get revenge for Adora\u2019s betrayal as well.<\/span><\/p>\n This is the point where Catra passed the moral event horizon–the point where morally, there is no coming back from. Of her own free will, she activated a reality destruction device–committing to genocide on a planetary scale. And while it was stopped at the last moment–at the cost of Glimmer\u2019s mother\u2019s life–Catra fought till the very end to make its effects permanent.<\/span><\/p>\n During the war with the Princesses, Catra was directly responsible for the deaths of countless people–and the enslavement of more. Even if, in the final season, she regrets these actions and joins the heroes to defeat an even bigger threat, this doesn\u2019t undo all the evil she did.<\/span><\/p>\n But in the end, she receives no punishment whatsoever for her crimes. The most we get is the odd punch to the face and a throwaway sarcastic quip about her being on the side of the angels now. But more than that, she is actually rewarded by getting the thing she actually longed for, deep down, all this time: Adora\u2019s love and the exclusive romantic relationship that goes with it.<\/span><\/p>\n While this builds a happy end for our characters, it also inadvertently creates a terrible moral for the series as a whole: No matter what you do, how horrible you are, and how devastating the fallout of your actions, as long as you\u2019re sorry in the end, all will be forgiven. Moreover, you\u2019ll be rewarded with the thing you most wanted all along.<\/span><\/p>\n This is basically the thought process of most abusers in relationships–and probably not the message the creators were hoping to impart.<\/span><\/p>\n She-Ra<\/span><\/i> Season 5 can be seen on Netflix<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n I just wanted to give out a big thanks to Joshua Ott for sponsoring this review with his\u00a0Patreon<\/a>\u00a0donation. (At the $60 a month tier, you are allowed to pick anything up to an including a 13ish episode series to be reviewed\u2013which is released in addition to the one article a week I normally put out here on BiggestinJapan.com.) So thanks again!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Top image Copyright: \u00a9 2018 DreamWorks Animation LLC.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/biggestinjapan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/SR01.jpg?resize=960%2C540\")
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