Welcome back to yet another cartoon rewatch! We’re up to Episode 19 already! My goodness these rewatches grow up so quick.
So when we last left, Skeletor was still trying to find mystical weapons that will put his power over the top (like Lincoln Hawk) before he takes another crack at Castle Grayskull. Which is fine and all, but it has me wondering…
…just how many of these ancient stones and artifacts exist that are so powerful that the Elders feel the need to have banished and hidden them in the furthers reaches of Eternia to ensure that nobody was able to use the power for evil?
Furthermore, is it the Elders’ own talents that power these icons? Because, what fucking power is gonna be left if He-Man keeps destroying these fucking things or throwing them into goddamn space at the end of each episode?!
Seriously, where did all these things fucking come from?! How many sorcerers (good or evil) were there in ancient Eternia who just dedicated their lives to developing some kind of runestone that acted as a kind of nuclear missile for the day?! This shit is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S.
I’m ranting, but it’s conversation worthy. Why do all these overpowering artifacts exist? And if there’s so many, made and forged by so many old wizards, why can’t Skeletor and Evil-Lyn just combine their magic to make their own? I mean, it sounds like it should be easy enough if you’re like a Level 7 Magic Guy which Skeletor seems to be. He may be Level 8. I don’t know. We haven’t seen Horde Prime in this series yet to get his opinion.
OK, let me breath for a moment. Whew.
We’ve got an episode to watch today and maybe I’m ranting because I saw “Orko” in the title and I just hate Orko. As a kid I didn’t mind him, I was more indifferent to him than anything, but I’ve just grown to hate him in my more advanced age.
They’ve actually done a good job of limiting Orko’s involvement to this point which is very appreciated, but I suppose we were due to get an Orko-centric episode sooner or later. Maybe I should go in with a positive attitude and think, “hey, ya know, this series has been pretty good so far…maybe they’ll surprise me,” but I don’t think that. I don’t trust Orko. He hasn’t earned it. Anyway, take my hand and let’s get through this…together.
S01E19: Orko’s Garden
Original Air Date: March 15, 2003
Hold up…in that freeze frame…is that…is that…MOSS MAN?!
OK, haven’t clicked play yet, but now I’m in. Let’s do this.
We open in the palace dining room where Man-At-Arms is giving out tasks for the day. Orko immediately starts annoying everyone by begging for a job because he wants to be involved, but everybody knows he’s just going to fuck things up. Finally, Duncan just gets fed up and tells him to clean up the palace gardens as they’ve fallen into disrepair.
Orko proves Man-At-Arms’ doubts correct by quickly flooding the garden with his shitty fucking magic. Ram Man sees this buffoon just making things worse and tell Orko to go visit Moss Man. Orko has no clue who Moss Man is, but he jumps at the chance to talk to someone named after a plant.
Orko heads to the Evergreen Forest and stumbles into a hole where he finds another plant man who is obviously not Moss Man tied up by an ankle vine. The obvious bad guy becomes aware of Orko’s standing in the royal family and tells him to take a bag of “special seeds” to plant in the garden. I’ve planted some special seeds before. It worked out really well for me, but for Orko? Not so much.
The special seeds instantly grow into wild vines attacking the inhabitants of the palace and then even reaching back into the forest to free the evil plant humanoid from his vine entrapment.
Of course, Orko is too fucking stupid to realize what he’s done and he’s just waiting on his single plant to hurry up and grow when a very pleasant looking plant man walks into frame. This is obviously Moss Man and he’s got the cool, soothing voice of a country crooner. He sensed an upheaval in the plant universe and came to check it out. Orko’s all, “I’ve met Moss Man and you’re not Moss Man,” and Moss Man is like, “My man, you’re a fucking dunce. That was Evil Seed and he’s a real bad dude and you done fucked everything up, asshole.”
Evil Seed has all the good guys entangled in some pretty high quality vines and it looks as if he’s fixin’ to feed them to plant monsters who are shaped like T-Rexes. Fortunately, Moss Man pops in to stop Evil Seed who is his obvious archnemesis seeing as how he’s the bad plant man. Speaking of plant men, does anyone else remember this song from Beavis & Butthead? It was one of the most absurd videos they ever did and I never saw or heard it anywhere else.
I went and found it for you so you could refresh your memory. I’m good like that.
Moss Man appears to have Evil Seed dead to rights, but of course, Orko begins talking shit and says the Masters are gonna have a field day with Evil Seed using their magical powers that are kept in Castle Grayskull. What a fucking piece of shit Orko is.
Of course, Evil Seed takes off and heads to Grayskull while everybody is left wondering why they haven’t seen this buffoon jester of theirs back to Trolla.
He-Man and Moss Man catch up to Evil Seed rather quickly and think they’ve got things under control, but apparently E-S’s vines are like Hydra: cut off one head and two more shall appear!
After some give and take, Moss Man defeats Evil Seed by…covering him in nice grass, I think, while He-Man destroys the vine by tearing it out by the root. This is some real wild shit. Someone was high as fuck writing this episode. So I guess today’s battle has been won.
He-Man offers Moss Man a spot in the Masters and they shake on it…with their left hands and that just fucking infuriates me. Bush league shit.
PSA: Do your fucking job and don’t plant poison vine seeds.
Final Thoughts:
I have no fucking idea what just went on. Evil Seed was imprisoned when Orko stumbled upon him, yet still had a handy (el) dandy satchel of poison seeds ten feet away. And these plant guys can just make grass and shit grow from their fingertips so I don’t know why Evil Seed couldn’t just free himself. Like why couldn’t he summon a fucking venus flytrap to bite him free from his garden shackle?
And why the fuck do we let Orko do anything? Even family can fucking wear you out and, at some point, you have to say, “Listen, Mom, I ain’t dealing with your nonsense until you get your shit together!” Should be no different with Orko. Either learn how to do magic right or get the fuck out, you putz. We don’t need you telling all the bad guys about the power kept within Castle Grayskull.
Seriously, did we just defeat Evil Seed by covering him with nice-guy grass?! I mean…what fucking goes on? I just…sigh…maybe I need to take a nap. I can’t with this anymore. We’ll watch another episode tomorrow.
Joe
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