REVIEW: ‘She-Ra and The Princesses Of Power’ Season 2

She-Ra and The Princess of Power was one of the best-animated offerings from Netflix last year. Season one had both a charming cast of characters to fall in love with and a surprisingly deep and emotional story. The first season featured Adora (Aimee Carrero) learning how to handle the power of She-Ra and bringing together the Princess Alliance. She did this all while trying to deal with the fact that the organization she had worked for her entire life was actually evil, leading here to fight her best friend, on the opposite side of a war.

She-Ra season 2 is more of the same She-Ra that we’ve come to love even if It doesn’t have quite the same magic of the first season. The story picks right up with Adora and The Princess Alliance fighting against the Evil Horde army. Along the way, Adora has to learn how to be the best She-Ra she can be and deal with her childhood best friend Catra being on the opposite side of a war. This season has the same elements that made season one so great, but now it gets a chance to really play in its universe with all the wordbuilding being fully established.

Like the first season, the animation is top notch here. I love the color palette of the show, everything is bright and the action is always clean and easy to see what is going on. The facial expressions of the characters are also really well animated. With each character being able to convey a full range of emotion with just a look or a smile.

The biggest issue with She-Ra season 2 is that they decided to ditch the overarching storyline for single episode storylines that just don’t have the same depth that season one’s story had. Instead of the characters growing and changing gradually over the course of a few episodes with a narrative through-line tying everything together, they have to wrap up their development in just one episode. This is easily because season two is half the length of season one with seven episodes instead of 13. That’s not to say that they don’t do a great job in those seven episodes, I just wish that there was more time to fully flesh out the characters and the story. 

While this season is mostly a collection of random plots without any real direction, they are all still incredibly entertaining. The show very smartly realizes that the interactions between the characters are the best part of the show. In fact, the best episodes of this season are entirely focused on the characters.

This is specifically highlighted in episode seven ” Reunion,” which showed Adora, Bow, and Glimmer visiting Bow’s homeworld and meeting his Dads. These well-executed character dynamics are also in episode two, “Ties That Bind,” which displayed the relationship between Adora and her pegasus Swiftwind.  

What blew me away more than anything else is the representation. There are so many different types of people on the show and they’re all treated with respect from the creators. Not only do they show a wide group of people of different races, sexual orientations, and upbringings, they never make it feel forced. Each character has their own unique personality and talents they bring to the table and that was amazing to see.

She-Ra and the Princesses Of Power season two is a delight. It is exactly the type of show I would have watched and enjoyed as a kid, but with enough substance that I can still enjoy as an adult. I’m happy young kids today have this show not only because it’s incredibly entertaining, but also because what it is doing in regards representation is really important. It might lack the impact of season one but it’s still an enjoyable time that is well worth watching.