Princess Joins Up is the fifth episode of the lion series of Voltron: Defender of the Universe.
Plot Summary
News of the return of Voltron has reached Planet Doom. In order to destroy Voltron and the Castle of Lions, King Zarkon has several robeasts duke it out in the arena in Castle Doom. One of the robeasts emerges victorious, and through the use of Haggar's sorcery, is made giant sized and placed in a flying coffin to travel to Planet Arus.
Meanwhile, on Planet Arus, Keith, Lance, Pidge, and Hunk travel about near Arus' capitol to look for survivors and recruit them into the military to fight Doom. None of the survivors take the offer. (Perhaps they should have borrowed material from TV recruitment commercials for the past millennium or so.) They return to the castle, where Sven and Allura are fixing some sort of communications device.
One of the Space Mice warns Allura about an impending Doom attack. Doom fighters soon arrive and fire at the castle. Keith and company head into the lions to do battle.
Get down! ...And move it all around. Sven saves his replacement.
A fierce dogfight ensues between the Voltron Force and the fighter squadron, but that was just the appetizer. Yurak orders the deployment of the robeast. In response, Keith orders the activation of interlocks, connection of dynotherms, and raising of infracells, and the lions form Voltron and engage the robeast.
This robeast is much tougher than the robeast in "The Missing Key". The robeast's claw pierces Yellow Lion, nearly skewering Hunk. (Good thing they were not in space, otherwise this episode would be called "Death of Hunk the Hero".)
They form the blazing sword, expecting to slice the robeast into chili. Surprisingly, they fail to do so within ten seconds, and the sword is knocked out of their hand. While this is going on, Yurak decides to deploy the rest of his forces in attacking the castle. The robeast keeps Voltron from coming to the castle's rescue.
Allura and Coran rush down to the royal tomb in the castle underground. King Alfor appears, as dead as ever, and instructs Allura to press a button. Suddenly, engines activate, and a brand, shiny new metal keep arises from the ground to replace the bombed-out brick keep. The Voltron Force can only stare in amazement.
The new keep is fully armed, and Allura comes and uses the guns to fire at the robeast.
Great shooting, Tex.
With the princess covering for it, Voltron slices the robeast in half.
Featured Characters
Voltron Force
Other Arusians
Planet Doom
Quotes
*Cova screeches*
"I don't need your opinion!"
— You tell that cat who's boss, Zarkon
*****
"Voltron doesn't attack anyone; he's the Defender!"
— Princess Allura outlines her overarching strategy
Notes and Goofs
- This is the first appearance of the new castle.
- How far underground was the new castle?
- This is the first episode where Voltron's Blazing Sword was knocked out of its hand.
- And this was the first episode where the robeast was a serious threat to Voltron.
- Voltron's being thusly clobbered inspired a desperate Princess Allura to advise the use of his "isotopic missiles". While this scientific terminology could be interpreted a variety of ways, it does suggest the possibility that Voltron's ordnance includes nuclear weaponry.