Netflix Retrospective: Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2 Episodes 4-6

We continue our retrospective on Voltron: Legendary Defender

Greening the Cube

We open with Team Voltron outside making repairs to the castle, most are bit overwhelmed by the technobabble but Pidge is intoxicated with it, they enter a field of squishy asteroids… just go with it and have a snowball fight in space where there’s no gravity to stop them being thrust away from any impact, sounds like a great idea. Pidge is interested and concludes that she doesn’t think they’re asteroids and believes one should be analysed. It’s some sort of spore but also a programme of sorts, something they need to make sense of.

They all come and are decontaminated, Keith looks at his knife but hides it when Coran comes around, he asks if the Galra ever went to Earth, which Coran mocks, and Lance interrupts for I guess it’s supposed to be comedic effect, honestly Lance’s shtick is irritating as hell, Lance says he’s happy with the Blue Lion, something we’ll come back to later.

Anyway, Pidge has managed to the crack the, ahm, ‘sporse code’ It’s a distress call, a planet called Olkarion is under attack by the Galrans, the *sigh* Olkarians are engineers that could build giant cities and control metal with a wave of their hand, so they’re magneto. Pidge is excited to see the city, but the signal is coming from the forest. They head out in their lions, and they’re soon hit by arrows that bring them down.

The leader soon recognises the Lions as part of Voltron, I’m pretty sure she’s voiced by Andrea Romano, a voice director who handled the DCAU and the Avatar series (Aang and Korra) she’s also the vocal director of this show and a god in the industry. I’m pretty sure she announced her retirement and she will be sorely missed if I’m correct. [Edit - as it happens, she's voiced by Mindy Sterling, who among other things, was Lin Beifong in Korra]

With the Galra having attacked the cities, many of the Olkarians fled and adapted their skills to work with trees, creating similar cities in the forest. Shiro talks about an attack on the Galra but it’s revealed their leader, Lubos, has been captured, so the next objective is his rescue.

So the Galra commander in the cities is telling the Olkarians to build a super-weapon for him, using the torture of Lubos to keep them building. Ryner, the I guess leader of the tree-bound Olkarians provides each of them with headsets to communicate with the trees, despite her lack of interest in anything nature, she is successful, whilst the others are not. But the Galra commander has completed his weapon, he intends to leave with the top Olkari scientists, and destroy Olkarion, and hopefully be welcomed back to Zarkon’s fleet.

So, team Voltron and Ryner analyse the site, they might be able to get in through the roof if they can get there undetected, it would give them full access to the building pretty quickly. The sight of the cube alarms them, they have to hurry. Pidge use the Green Lion and it’s cloaking to drop the others in and if you’re thinking this is too easy, you’re right. They use a sensor to find Lubos, where they got this sensor from without returning to the castle is anyone’s guess. But they discover he’s living in relative comfort with his cuffed aide, watching holovision.

When he realises their intent, he sets off the alarm, quickly alerting the Galra guards. Lubos believed the Galra too powerful to fight and whilst they’re enslaved they at least live. Keith thinks fast and puts a sword to his throat, threatening to kill him if the Galra don’t back off. Unfortunately, the weapon is already built so they don’t really care. The Green Lion provides evac but they launch the cube. Shiro manages to persuade the Olkari to fight anyway, and cue stock transformation effect.

They start blasting it but the cube absorbs their fire, and creates a version of the same weapon to use against them. They try and slice it open but that divides it and now they form 4 cubes, unable to flank it, they divide into Lions and try and evade but the Green Lion is shot down. Ryner helps Pidge connect with the Lion and comes up with a new weapon to take the cubes down. It’s a vine based weapon, when the cubes try and replicate it, they end up entangled in vines, destroying them.

With the Olkari leading an assault on the ground, the Galra are forced to evacuate. Ryner agrees to be of help to them when they come to taking on Zarkon. The group are celebrating but soon Zarkon’s ship and a fleet of I count 40 Galra ships are upon them.

It’s an interesting episode, and I’m glad to see them introduce a few new species given how few we have so far.

Rating 8/10

Eye of the Storm

We’re back with the attack, they decide to wormhole out but they need to get some distance else something will follow them through. Fighters are launched and team Voltron now have drones to fight them off with, Keith and Lance are Keith and Lance in the fight. Hunk is tired and barely able to read his monitor. Allura shows off her fancy flying by using a moon’s gravity to gain more speed and wormhole. Unfortunately, the teleduv that they use encounters issues and they’re force to leave the wormhole early. Allura is exhausted from such a big battle, right… and Coran has a sudden and plot convenient case of the slipperies, he didn’t have it 5 minutes ago, just sayin’

Coran reports that several of the lenses in the teleduv are cracked, he’ll have to remove them and readjust the wormhole trajectory. It’s gonna take time so Shiro suggests they rest, since they’re all tired anyway. Keith and Lance are about to head down to the pool but the power is cut out. Hunk is baking ‘cookies’ and Pidge is frustrated about not knowing the Altean language, Keith and Lance work together, mostly but find the pool is on the ceiling because stupid. Pidge begins a course to learn Altean, with a programme that prepares to attack every time she does it wrong. Pidge will have perfect knowledge of Altean from this moment on.

Just as Shiro is persuading Allura to rest, Zarkon is upon them again, they raise the particle barrier and activate the drones but they’re unable to wormhole. Coran resigns to the fact he has a case of the slipperies and asks Pidge for help. Together they manage to allow to wormhole (despite having little distance between them and the fighters again) but it breaks the system even further and they’re soon back out again.

They hide in the eye on an electric storm, hoping that might stop whatever Zarkon is tracking them with but it doesn’t work, Zarkon is quickly on top of them. Allura believes she may be what Zarkon is tracking but if you’ve paid close attention you’ve probably already worked out what they’re doing. They form Voltron and the stock transition makes less sense that usual given they’re stuck between 2 ships but whatever.

They draw the attention of the fighters, drawing them into the storm and destroying them, they head out, Zarkon demands they be brought closer to the Black Lion despite Haggarth protesting that they have Allura trapped and can finish her. With her way clear, Allura clears the storm, and provides cover fire to allow Voltron to escape when Zarkon tries to control the Black Lion again.

They fall back but they’re still unable to wormhole, since now several Scaultrite lenses are destroyed. Pidge remembers that Hunk was using scaultrite whilst baking earlier. Coran confirms they can be used for a single jump, if people physically hold them, which puts them in serious peril. Coran puts them in position but it doesn’t work, the scaultrite cookies aren’t reflecting the beam, so time for Coran’s conveniently timed illness to have a use outside of comic relief. They manage to wormhole away, making a full jump this time but Zarkon isn’t worried, he’s still able to track them and will find them eventually.

It’s another decent episode, even if Coran’s illness is conveniently timed

Rating 8/10

The Ark of Taujeer

We open on presumably Taujeer, an acid planet. Because of Galra activity, their planet is pretty much doomed, they’ve created a means of escape but commander Morvok has destroyed one of their engines

Allura seems convinced the Galra are tracking them through here, since the Galra only showed up on Arus after she awoke. Keith for some reason thinks they’re tracking him, which is really stupid. You think they’re tracking your blade? The guy from the Blade of Marmora had one of those and managed to infiltrate a fleet undetected, and even if it was the knife. Just ditch the knife! He gives the excuse that Zarkon ‘imprinted on me during our fight’

I… I…, here’s a twilight meme

Now I want to never think of that idea ever again, Pidge suggests it’s through the Black Lion and she’s right, of course it’s through the Black Lion you big bunch of dumbasses. Coran says he can only do it at close range, which… it’s through the Black Lion. Pidge has been looking through Data and believes she’s created a Galra ‘finder’ and the nearest ones are on Taujeer, which conveniently is close by.

Keith keeps looking at his pointy stick and has a weird dream about him and the knife, he is about to head off in a shuttle when he spots Allura about to do the exact same thing. This is a really dumb idea, without Keith they can’t form Voltron, without Allura they can’t wormhole away (not that that’s an issue with the damaged teleduv but still) so they’re sitting ducks without them. Either way they head off together.

The others come into contact with Taujeer, which is tearing itself apart, creating a debris field in orbit. They soon lose contact with Allura and Keith. Basically this planet is able to shed its layers, which has been accelerated by the mining, but the layer underneath is boiling acid. They plan to evacuate to a nearby moon until the process is complete. So the planet isn’t completely doomed, that’s nice.

Time to play the racism thing up again… This ultimately goes nowhere so why even bother at this point. Zarkon has located Voltron again and sends the co-ordinates to Morvok. Team Voltron use Pidge’s vines and Lance’s ice to delay the shedding, but it won’t buy them much time. They fix the ship but just as it’s about to take off Morvok arrives, destroying their other engine. Coran alerts Allura and Keith to this, and they try and use the booster fuel. You remember that Coran said it could cause the entire pod to explode, well the entire pod explodes. Keith and Allura are flung from the ship before it explodes.

The battle isn’t going well, Morvok aims his cannon at the Ark, forcing the Lions to defend it and keeping them in the line of fire. Shiro manages to stop them being able to aim the cannon briefly, as Coran comes down providing some extra cover fire, but the others are being overwhelmed and could do with forming Voltron. Coran tries to pilot the Lion but… nope. The Red Lion instead flies out of the ship. Hunk’s having trouble supporting the ship, until he gets armoured claws and new booster rockets that he can use. I guess you can call it convenient but part of the parcel with the Lions is the bond between the Lion and the user, and the fact that the Lion can see the needs of the user and unveil new weapons appropriately.

Anyway, the Lions all gather to heave the ship back up but the cannon’s back online, thankfully Keith arrives to save them just in time. With the ship upright, cue stock transformation sequence. With their weapon destroyed, Morvok orders the entire ship be used to ram at as he evacuates, thankfully Voltron is able to form a sword capable of slicing straight through the ship. They then carry the Taljeerians to safety.

With the idea that Keith was able to connect with his Lion long distance what we’ve always known is confirmed, they’re tracking the group through the Black Lion.

It’s a lot of build up for a revelation that is kinda obvious, we get some foreshadowing of things to come and it’s always nice to see a new alien race but it’s ultimately skippable

Rating 7/10