Netflix Retrospective - Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 4 Episodes 4-6

We’re looking at Voltron again, as we wind down season 4, but are they winding up to a good finale?

The Voltron Show

Thanks to the efforts of Voltron and the Blade, they’ve managed to liberate a number of planets, and just like back in episode 1, they’re gonna need to pay them a visit and convince them to join a coalition against the Galra empire.

Coran has an idea, they help provide some repairs to a Hospital and then give a speech but… to small crowd of ‘war veterans.’ Coran has given each of them a script and it goes about as well as you’d expect given that fact. The speech is more a play which is just dumb and none of the ‘war veterans’ stick around, much to Coran’s disappointment. As the others leave, the guy who ran the Uralu swap shop back in season 2 arrives, offering a thing that’s probably a drug allegory to Coran. Coran gets the thing, which he’s gonna slip under his pillow or something

Turns out that hospital debacle caused another problem, they were a day late to another show, set to be on the only clear day in a long year. Now the day is done, the wind conditions mean the inhabitants can’t watch on the surface. They’d been waiting, but they didn’t show and the mayor is not happy with them.

Turns out that thing he got is an egg for some kind of parasite that bites into Coran’s brain, unfortunately it makes him extremely irritating. They head to the space mall, which last I checked was still in Galra territory, with the idea of broadcasting a message across the Galaxy. They get some…. Possibly quite dangerous advice to improve their acting after the disaster at the hospital and it seems to have a positive effect.

And we’re introduced to Bii-Boh-Bi, a stick character that can only say Bii or Boh (not Bi though) also, names apparently. He’s serving as their translator as the arena they’re performing at is filled with the stick characters. He’ll also be serving as a supporting agent for most of the episode. With the arena and several props, they put on quite the show and again it seems successful.

Coran’s ideas continue to work wonders, but when Shiro suggests simply giving a speech, Coran seems to shoot it down. Pidge comes forward annoyed that fake sciency sounding stuff is being used in her scripts rather than the real thing, Coran ignores her, basically. It certainly seems to be working but in the next scene, you can see the red in Coran’s eyes. When Shiro points out they only have one more show, it begins to show on Coran that something’s wrong.

As the paladins begin their next show, Coran lands on the planet they missed the stop from earlier, using a flare to attract the attention of the monsters that come out during the dust storms. I didn’t mention that earlier but yeah… that happened. Anyway, he brings it into the arena and a load of stage lights activate, making the monster pay attention to the audience. The Paladins fight it, but as Coran is thrust off the monster, the drug allegory begins to lose it’s grip on Coran’s brain, this allows Coran to warn Bii-Boh-Bi who removes the critter.

They move the stage lights to move the monster away and there’s a quick and really too quick wrap up. Despite Coran’s weirdness, they essentially did what they set out to do.

This is not one of my favourite episodes. Not much really happens in it, and it feels a little galling to have a comic relief episode this close to the finale. It might’ve worked better earlier on and in a 13-episode season.

Rating 6/10

Begin the Blitz

We open with the Paladins in communication with the Blade, apparently they’re now aware of Zarkon’s return, not sure if that was clear before, but with him mobilising entire fleets to look for Lotor, he’s created an opportunity for them to exploit before he begins posing any real threat for them again.

There’s a line of planets, just go with it here, I know that sounds a bit silly that have been claimed by the coalition. The planet Naxella is the only one they have yet to liberate. If they do so, they can cut off any troops behind the line from Galra command and effectively claim back 1/3 of the Galra empire.

Their plan requires mobilising the coalition and attacking multiple targets. Cutting off communication (Pidge and Hunk), and disabling their long ranged weapons (Matt and coalition forces and the Blade (and Keith)), allowing coalition forces to liberate the remaining planets and buying time for Voltron to launch an attack on Naxella. Naxella is a heavily fortified base, but Voltron will need to be quick to succeed.

Lotor and his generals are en-route somewhere but Ezor is beginning to express doubts over her leader, especially given their current situation. The coalitions rallies up as Lotor takes his team to the ruins of Daibazaal.  Lotor had secretly had a trans-reality gate set up around the area of his mothers experiments, and now plans to use his ships to pass through, so they can harvest the quintessence in the barrier. He infuses his ship with quintessence so he can pass through the rift but it failed.

Princess Allura begins transmitting to the rebel forces, it’s a fairly standard motivational speech. Hunk and Pidge arrive in the cloaked Green Lion and find their way on board the com-station. They just barely manage to take out the guards and hack the station. Unfortunately since at least some of the guards are still alive, I think the 8 hour time limit is a bit generous.

The rebel attack on canon one is lead by the female equivilant of Doggy Krueger from Power Rangers. We also see the return of Rolo, Nymer and Beezer, who took their experience from the first season and became rebels themselves which is nice. I’m guessing they’re going for a star wars vibe here, it’s not bad but… The defences are too hard to penetrate, so the rebels fall back, but not before the Galra obliterate 1/3 of them.

To take that cannon they’ll support from the other, Keith and the Blades are on the planet surface attempting to take it. Thankfully its possible to sneak aboard this one and they quickly capture it. Voltron descends on Naxella in one of the creepiest scenes I’ve seen on this show, but they’ve got work to do. The Coalition forces are struggling against the big cannon, they take cover begin an asteroid, but it isn’t doing them much good as the cannon is capable of cutting through.

Voltron seems to be having more luck, as the Galra forces are going down surprisingly easy. However they’re quickly hit by a series of explosions. It seems they’ve found their way into a mine-field. The mines were cloaked, which is how they got in, they can detect them but with the cruisers covering the exits, there’s no real way out. Allura has an idea to freeze the mines and postpone their detonation. They split up and she does so, allowing them to get out and reform, so we can reuse that animation.

Lotor is clearly devastated by his latest failure, and his generals have had enough, figuring they might be shown mercy if they hand him over. They stun him. Keith works out how to fire the cannon and uses it to deal a blow to the other cannon, allowing the remaining rebel forces to attack it. With both cannons secured the coalition begins their attacks on the Galra occupied planets.

Lotor wakes up cuffed in a ship with Zethrid piloting. Lotor manages to escape easily and ejects her from the ship, before escaping himself. Acxa says they have one option left to earn favour. To be continued next season. The communication tower comes online and word reaches Haggar and her druids. Surprisingly though, she doesn’t seem upset, which means everything is about to go to hell in the next episode.

Rating 8.5/10

A New Defender

Coran gives us an update, every planet the rebels have engaged has been pacified but a Galra ship is heading towards Naxella, at the same time the cannons are shut down remotely. Fortunately it seems like the battle on Naxella is already won, as Voltron finishes the last of their heavy artillery with the shoulder canon.

Lotor sleeps with the ship on auto-pilot but accidentally sets off a beacon alerting Zarkon to his location, he calls the fleet to his position. His sleep is interrupted by some fighters, but he’s able to evade them and eventually destroy them. He sees the fleet heading towards him and sets course for Naveena 5, an unstable star. Zarkon orders the pursuit continued even as their sensors are disrupted by the radiation. With the gravity being too strong for the cruisers to handle, Zarkon forgoes the ‘victory or death’ mantra and orders his fleet pulled back. The ships have sustained enough damage that Lotor gets away and they can’t pursue.

Haggar stops her ship a considerable distance away from Naxella. She heads to perform a ritual with her druid companions, she tells Naxella to ‘awaken’ The planet begins to glow and the ground begins to shake. Towers come out of the ground a project something akin to an energy field around the planet. Allura can feels a wave of darkness as the gravity begins to pull them down. They attempt to fight through and are successful, initially, but soon they fall, now even further down.

It seems that somehow the pull is worse on Voltron than it is on them, so they head out of the Lions and begin exploring on foot. Unfortunately, there are still Galra sentries on the ground blasting at their every move. The make it a tower and hack their way in, descending to the planet’s core and finding a glowing purple orb inside of something looking very similar to a teladuv, it’s Altean, a terraforming plant that’s been activated remotely.

Altea tries to shut it down but it doesn’t work. Hunk finds some powder and finds it contains Hexamite, which is highly explosive. The planet is a bomb, it’s being armed and it’ll take out anything in a range of 10 solar systems when it blows. The paladins rush through the attacking sentries to try and warn everyone.

After getting an update from Coran, Keith decides to head to find Voltron, stealing a Galra fighter. Keith contacts the rebels, telling them they need to attack that ship. Lotor is listening on Galra frequencies, hearing an instruction for Galra ships to stay out of certain sectors, they’re expecting a massive detonation there. With this intel, Lotor is on the move.

They try and make contact but there’s electromagnetic interference keeping them from doing so, they try and stand Voltron up but he ends up falling further down. Lance tells Allura that there’s a good chance she’s the key to getting them out of here, giving an interesting inspirational speech. She infuses her Lion with quintessence, or at least that’s what I think is happening, with that, Voltron is able to break through the barrier.

The rebels approach the Galra cruiser and commence their attack. Allura calls Coran and alerts him to the Naxella problem, telling them to pull out. Unfortunately, the cruiser has a shield around it, that their weapons can’t penetrate it. Keith decides the best way forward is to sacrifice himself, fortunately for him, Lotor arrives and makes the shot with his weapons, which are capable of blasting through the shield.

The bomb is disabled and the Galra ship retreats. Lotor asks to talk with the rebels and paladins.

It’s a satisfying conclusion, with another major blow dealt to the Galra empire. It’s a pity this season is plagued by pacing issues, something that unfortunately will continue into the next seasons.

Rating 8/10