Netflix Retrospective: Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2 episodes 1-3

We continue our retrospective on Voltron: Legendary defender with season 2, which would be the last for a while to be a full 13 episodes, seasons 3-6 would be 6-7 episodes each (without about half the originally planned season in each new season) with the recently teased season 7 going back to 13 episodes again. But to the content of season 2 itself.

Across the Universe

We open with basically the ending of the last episode, see my last review for that. We cut to a dusty desert area where Shiro and Keith crash, Shiro is still suffering from the wouldn’t inflicted on him by Haggar. Keith finds his lion isn’t functioning and goes off in search of Shiro. Good thing those helmets provide air despite their odd design, with the mouth exposed.

Pidge meanwhile lands in a space junkpile. Her Lion is also non-functional so she decides to wait for help.

And time for the comic relief of the episode, Coran and Allura are still in the rift, approaching an unknown exit, every time they go through, they repeat the process with Allura staying herself for some reason whilst Coran de-ages and the mice devolve (I think) Allura has no control over the castle, Allura seems to have full memories whilst Coran forgets each time.

We cut back to Shiro, he wakes up and finds he has trouble getting a signal to Keith, he tries to aim for higher ground, but he’s having trouble thanks to the wound. He’s successful eventually, but Shiro isn’t able to be much help, as his Lion is set upon by some strange creatures

At least Pidge’s mask covers her whole face, and we meet the furballs for kids to buy. They’re adorable. Back to the castle, Coran is a teenager and the mice are now slugs, I have no idea. Allura believes she can get them out of the rift if they can lock onto the Lions. When that fails she tries blasting but that fails too.

Keith is closing in but finds there’s a lot of boiling water beneath him, making things worse, the creatures have no got their eyes on Shiro. Geysers begin sprouting and Keith has to out-run them. Shiro hides in a cave which collapses behind him. Somehow he can get a signal through but Keith has a new problem, a massive yawning chasm, and his jetpack can only provide limited boost.

Pidge has gotten board and made trash duplicates of her allies and makes some funny impersonations. The Green Lion activates and she notices she’s on top of an old satellite, which she might be able to use to contact the rest of the team. I do like how the physics work in this show when it comes to zero-g environments.

Keith activates a geyser and uses it to propel himself across, using his jetpack to propel him the last of the way. Unfortunately the creatures have started digging. Keith is in range of the Black Lion as the creatures get Shiro out. Shiro tries to fight them, but he loses his helmet and is losing the fight thanks to the wound.

Back at the castle, things aren’t looking good, Coran is a toddler now, don’t know about the mice. Keith gets a good look at what’s going on and begs the Black Lion to come and help, with Shiro in a dire state, the Black Lion, piloted by Keith, provides a rescue and scares them off.

Pidge assembles the satellite atop the Green Lion and with its help, sends out a powerful enough signal to reach the castle. They’re able to lock on and get out of the void. Shiro is trying to keep himself sane, Shiro tells Keith that if he doesn’t make it, he wants Keith to lead Voltron, the castle and Pidge arrive.

Zarkon demands an explanation of how Voltron escaped. Prorok tries to blame Haggar but she tells him it was sabotage, and given his actions in previous episodes, he’s taken away, protesting his innocence. Lieutenant Thace is promoted to commander and put in charge of the investigation, he’s the saboteur.

It’s a great opening episode, with intrigue and comedy

Rating 8/10

The Depths

Time to check back with Hunk and Lance. Both their Lions are down, and the crash to the bottom of the water. In literally seconds the Blue Lion is active again, and Lance sees an underwater inhabitant who’s female and of course he’s chasing after her.

With Hunk eventually persuaded to join they follow her to a village. The girl’s name is Florona and ‘here all is safe and warm’ she wants to take them to meet Queen Luxia. I don’t know, this city looks painted, not very 3-dimensional. Anyway, Queen Luxia tells them they can solve all of their problems, ‘here all is safe and warm’ and if you’re getting the mantra, you’ve probably already realised something is wrong.

They provide them with air bubbles, to preserve the air in their masks, which they immediately take off? And have transported the Lions, looks like the yellow Lion is working again, since its force-field is active. We see a big purple forest painting called the Baku Garden, the ‘giver of life’

The planet froze over long ago, which is why they’re not a prime Galra target, the garden provides them with warmth and food ‘here all is safe and warm.’ Hunk is eating his weight in food as per usual. We also see their entertainment, some kind of light show involving an octopus and a squid, both Lance and Hunk seem to be entranced.

Meanwhile some guests wearing jellyfish on their heads or something attempt to rescue our heroes but Hunk is too big for them to take without alerting the guards so they stick with Lance, they subject him to… squid fart. To undo his mind control, he immediately thinks they’re hostile and tries to escape but doesn’t have much luck

Who are our intrepid rescuers, Plaxum, Blamfump and Swirn…. Sound alien enough. They believe the Queen is responsible for the mind control stuff, they call it mind swishing and that Lance can save them. Hunk wakes up but he’s given more food and soon is mind swished again. The Queen says they need to exterminate the cave dwellers and for her failings, Florona needs to ‘take a swim in the garden’

Back to Plaxum, Blamfum and Sworn, they believe that thermal vents being blocked is what lead to the surface freezing over. They also know hundreds of ‘mermaids’ have disappeared and never come back, just as Florona is right now. Their plan is to have Lance sneak to the Blue Lion, grab the queen whilst the 3 of them free the people. They give Lance a fish antidote thing in case his crap acting doesn’t work. What a shock, his crap acting doesn’t work, he’s captured and brought to the Queen, who orders Hunk to take him to the garden. Lance tries to use the antidote but Hunk knocks it out of his hands.

A fight emerges as Lance has to fight Hunk and 2 of the Queen’s guards, he eventually gives Hunk the antidote but then they have more of the Queen’s guards to contend with. Thankfully Plally, Blaffy and F*** provide them some aid, allowing them into to get into their Lions. They use more antidote grenades near the queen and capture her, when it’s revealed she’s under the mind control too.

The Baku is an alien who fell from space, the Queen was the first under its control and it eats the ‘mermaids,’ a theory which is soon confirmed as the Baku rises and begins to attack. Lance seems to have the edge when it comes to speed and agility as Hunk’s Lion struggles with the added pressure, he’s still able to assist but the Blue Lion unveils a new sonic cannon which ultimately defeats the monster. Bit of a deus ex-machina but we’re near the end of the episode.

With the Queen now on the right side, they activate an energy beacon which the Green Lion detects and comes to their rescue.

Another very good episode showcasing Lance in particular and doing some much needed world-building. Zarkon is not the only evil in the universe

Rating 8/10

Shiro’s Escape

Lance is in the healing tube, recovering from the alien wound and the creature attack, he remembers being helped by a Galra insider to escape and given a set of co-ordinates. His name is Ulaz, and he’s part of the Blade of Marmora.

Meanwhile Haggar is busy turning Prorok into her latest machine. Pidge begins analysing Shiro’s arm for the co-ordinates Ulaz planted there but is finding nothing and Allura is distrustful of the Galra. This is something they bring up occasionally but don’t fully explore. Pidge eventually does find a set of co-ordinates with Shiro pointing out that gather allies is essential and having ones inside the empire would be beneficial.

They arrive in the middle of a load of floating ‘xanthorium chunks,’ highly explosive crystals. They decide to wait but Zarkon has found a way to track them down. Alarms sound at the castle, telling them there’s an intruder on board. After an entertaining fight with Coran providing running commentary, it’s revealed the intruder is Ulaz.

Allura can be busy being racist to the Galra, the blade of Marmora have a base hidden in the centre of the Xanthorium cluster, none of the paladins are happy to proceed, not trusting the Galra, but Shiro overrides them and they proceed through, finding the base. Ulaz needs to make communication so they all proceed except Lance and Allura.

The gravity generator that creates the pocket dimension they’re in is called Slav, we’ll get to him later on. Pidge asks about her family and as it turns out, Ulaz has some records he’ll transmit to the ship, Keith displays interest in the blade for a subplot later on but soon Haggar’s monster arrives. Ulaz is certain they were tracked, he gives Shiro the co-ordinates of the Blade of Marmora’s base, but tells them first to find out how they were being tracked, since leading Zarkon to the Blade of Marmora is a very bad idea.

The monster draws in the Xanthorium clusters and converts them into a giant laser based weapon, it soon finds them in the cluster and fire upon them, the team launch and for a change don’t use the transformation sequence to form Voltron. Ulaz makes his ‘escape’ with Allura unhappy that he didn’t sacrifice his life to defeat the monster in a tiny ship. 

Voltron’s lasers do no damage to the machine, and soon the machine begins trying to suck in Voltron too. A trick from Keith and a blast from the castle protect them but the machine is still undamaged. Now, it tries to drag in the castle but Voltron blocks the tractor beam with his shield and pushes it into a giant Xanthorium cluster, it doesn’t work and soon the laser breaks the shield. 

Voltron is being sucked in again but Ulaz comes back to save the day, piloting inside the machine and opening the space pocket from within, crashing the monster out of existence, he sacrificed his life to do it, much to Shiro’s despair.

Keith too seems upset about what happened and flares up when Allura suggests again that Ulaz may have given them up. In his room we see that Keith too has a blade of Marmora blade on his person.

It’s an intriguing episode, Allura’s attitude can get a little annoying, but dealing with her problems is not something they were going for here.

Rating 7.5/10