King Randor speaks to an alien in the He-Man episode "The Arena."
King Randor speaks to an alien in the He-Man episode "The Arena."

Episode 52: The Arena

The concept for this episode – Skeletor and He-Man fight in an epic duel – sounds pretty straightforward. From the title and summary alone, we might expect about 20 minutes of punching, poorly aimed lasers and corny one-liners from He-Man. But what we got instead was the orchestration of a realistic siege on the Royal Palace of Eternia!

Presumably tired of ordering magic artifacts from Amazon, Skeletor allies with a goblin army to assault Eternos, and the logistical planning of this attack is a real treat (soldier salaries, jet packs and dinosaurs!). Meanwhile, a visiting alien is horrified by the ensuing battle and decides that the world is his personal wrestling match editor. That’s how we get the He-Man and Skeletor showdown – which is also great and hilarious.

Plus, we’ll discuss kid fighting and the famous Star Trek story that inspired this episode.

This was a fun one, and we’d love to hear what you think about it.

Show Notes:
0:00:00 – Episode Start
0:00:28 – Introductions and Setup
0:01:10 – He-Man in Space
0:03:30 – Good Job, New Writer
0:05:50 – Fightin’
0:14:08 – Act One
0:14:30 – Duncan’s Been Busy Again
0:15:30 – Is This Thing On?
0:16:35 – Where’s Home, Om?
0:17:51 – Skeletor’s Oddly Detailed Plan
0:19:25 – The Goblins Get Comfortable
0:20:30 – Act Two
0:20:58 – Om at the Laser Dome
0:22:53 – The Army Moves
0:24:22 – Whoa, It’s Getting Real at the Palace
0:25:38 – Bummer Villager Alert
0:26:15 – The Chaotic Siege
0:27:40 – Enough
0:29:22 – Act Three
0:29:40 – Wrestleternia
0:31:37 – Enough Again
0:33:09 – Everyone Loves Orko
0:33:30 – The Moral
0:33:50 – Ratings
0:35:36 – Closing Thoughts
0:37:09 – Episode End