Season Seven’s Corrected Cliffhanger

Slides Transcript

[Slide 1]

Welcome to Team Purple Lion’s reconstruction of Voltron Legendary Defender Season 7. We are educators, researchers, and analysts using our knowledge of literary analysis to reconstruct Seasons 7 and 8 of Voltron Legendary Defender. This project aims to reconstruct a cogent, thematically appropriate story for all ages and educate viewers on the nuts and bolts of creative writing and literary analysis.

This episode is Season 7 Episode 13 The Lion’s Pride Part 2. In our reconstruction, we combine scenes from Season 8 Episode 2 Shadows to create better narrative flow and sustained dramatic tension in the last half of Season 7.

[Slide 2]

Summary: The released version of S7 ended with the reveal of an Altean as the power source of a new mech defeated by Voltron. The surprise ending falls flat due to lack of dramatic buildup toward the mech’s arrival. The corrected S7 builds dramatic tension toward Lotor’s ultimate fate and Honerva’s response, but the corrected “The Last Stand” episodes lead the audience to believe Lotor is dead and Honerva has determined to use any means necessary to avenge his death. When the new mech arrives we can already infer it came from Honerva. The true plot twist to S7 comes with the final flashback of Lotor’s past. It solidifies our growing sympathy by revealing a) he was telling Allura the truth on Oriande and b) he walked away with a moral compass intact. The reveal creates dramatic irony after Allura’s line in S7E2 about having fallen for Lotor’s lies, and links the Altean mech’s “power source” with Lotor’s line on Oriande about “only taking as much energy as could be replenished”. Finally, we learn Honerva’s plan is not only to destroy Voltron — a task for which she has amassed an army of mechs — but to resurrect her son, suggesting we may soon see that some fates are worse than death.

[Slide 3]

Color and Theme: Of special note is the color scheme of Ven’tar’s planet: yellow, yellow-green, and green, suggesting that at that point of the story Lotor had come from a place of darkness into a place of love, light, and life, connecting his love for the planet with the love we associate with the Holt family.

[Slide 4]

Say: Remember, be on the lookout for scene connectors. Without further ado, we present the corrected cliffhanger to S7E13 The Lion’s Pride Part 2.

[episode plays]

[Slide 5]

Did you find all the scene connectors?

Allura’s line “an Altean?” connects to the next scenes containing Alteans. The bathelm shape of Lotor’s helmet from Voltron: Defender of the Universe appears in the hangar with the Altean mech, then appears in the shape of Zarkon’s unfinished ship that hovers above Ventar’s planet. The Altean mechs visually connect across several scenes. Luca is referred to as the mech’s power source, connecting with Ventar’s planet, where Lotor described “only taking as much Quintessence as could be replenished”. Sam Holt’s mention of it taking months to find all the mech’s parts implies the Altean Luca survived in the mech for those months, connecting with Merla’s statement “We’ll do anything to bring Lotor back” to imply a possibility of Lotor having survived in Sincline.

Thank you for joining us for The Lion’s Pride Part 2 Restructured Cliffhanger Sequence. Our reconstruction efforts will continue with Season 8.