The complexity of Catra’s inner struggle: an analysis of the character of “She-ra” throughout the five seasons
Catra and Adora were both raised by the Horde under unfavorable circumstances. They used to be best friends and were each other’s only support, but along the show they take opposite paths and turn into nemesis. There are multiple reasons that led to this, most of them being Catra’s conflicted feelings about Adora and herself.
At the beginning of the show Adora becomes Force Captain (S01E01). Catra, as her friend, shows to be supportive and happy for her being promoted, but inside she is feeling like a failure. Catra presents herself as the tough guy when she is actually terribly insecure. If she hadn’t been raised in an environment where you cannot show weakness and you’re always stimulated to try to be better than others, and, mostly, if she hadn’t been always deprecated by Shadow Weaver in favor of Adora, she would probably be glad by staying side by side with her friend. But have been raised at these conditions made her believe that if someone is winning someone is mandatorily being defeated.
Despite these issues, Adora is her best friend. She protects Catra and she is the only person in the world that really loves her. So, when Adora lefts (S01E02) Catra has multiple and conflicted feelings: (1) she misses her only friend and (2) she feels terrible betrayed for being left behind. (3) She sees an opportunity to win, once, at her point of view, she has been always losing for Adora. And (4) she starts to think that Adora was trying to hold her back to be the first (S01E11).
Opposite worldviews, common upbringing
So, Catra has a lot of reasons to be angry with Adora. But it is also important to say: there are huge differences between them. Catra is individualist. She cares about herself and those who are most important to her (which means Adora and Shadow Weaver). She doesn’t have a sense of community and that’s why she doesn’t care if the Horde is right or wrong and why she’ll never understand why Adora left her. She wouldn’t ever do it. In her point of view, the ones she loves are the important thing, she doesn’t care about the rest of the world or something like morality. Who could blame her anyway? She never learned it. Adora is the opposite. She is idealistic. She is fighting for the Horde because she believes in it and when she finds out what they were doing, she has no doubt. She quits it (S01E02). These differences are what make things so irreconcilable between them.
However, there are some similarities too. They grow up together and were both raised by the Horde. They had learned to fight their feelings and hide it as much as possible, since they’re a weakness. They were taught that anyone cares about them and they must look out for themselves (and for each other, in this case), because if they don’t, no one will. They learned to work against each other and try to be the best one, instead of working together. They both matters to other people only as fighters or weapons, not as people or friends. Have been raised by the Horde has wrought them in many ways.
As soon as Adora quits the Horde she starts to learn how to trust other people, to show and talk about her feelings, and that people could care about her and like her for real, not because what she can gives to them. Catra, on the other hand, just go deeper in her feelings of rejection, failure, and anger. So, she grabs the opportunity to prove herself worthy and strong — the values she was taught to be the most important ones. She needs to prove it to everyone: to Shadow Weaver, to Adora, but most of all, to herself. Yet she will use the power she conquered to get revenge on them, to hurt them, but still, be noticed by them.
The Shadow Weaver element
At the Horde, Shadow Weaver were responsible to grow and train the young cadets, so she is, in many ways, a maternal figure for Catra and Adora. She has always shown to be an abusive person and is an important pivot for conflict between them. However, her approach was different with each girl. With Adora she was lovely and kind, but manipulative. Shadow Weaver raised Adora to be a great soldier, she has driven Adora’s wishes and put hard expectations over her.
With Catra she is quite more explicit. Shadow Weaver is frequently saying that she is a failure, a nuisance, unmotivated, a distraction for Adora, a delay. Sometimes, she is even physically abusive by paralyzing and terrifying her (S01E11). Catra has always wanted to prove herself to Shadow Weaver, but she was never allowed the chance. Thus, she apparently gives up. She is sloppy, get late to the training and wear her own clothes instead of the uniform (S01E01). When Catra and Adora get locked at the Cristal Castle (S01E11) is shown in flashbacks she striving to be the best fighter, but she never got it or were never recognized for that. Thereby she wears a mask and makes up a persona for herself: that flippant chaotic girl who shrugs all the time and doesn’t care about this bullshit. Surely, that’s only a shield to protect herself of those feelings of being a failure or a second best. At the end of first season, Catra finally defeats Shadow Weaver and takes her place (S01E12), but she never gets over her, she still depends emotionally too much of her maternal figure and end up being manipulated and getting hurt again (S02E06).
The messed evolution of Catra’s feelings about Adora
As illustrated, the relationship between Adora and Catra was never perfect. At the surface they were best friends that would ever be there for each other, but deep down there was a lot of unsolved things. Adora’s desertion was a turning-point for all those feelings to come out.
At first, when Adora lefts, Catra believes she is just having a phase (S01E05) and seeks the moment when she’ll be back. However, Hordak makes her Force Captain (S01E03), and, for the first time in her life she has an opportunity to be important and recognized. But when Catra finally gets Adora captured (S01E09), Shadow Weaver just discard her saying she was useless now that Adora was back. Even knowing how Shadow Weaver had always being negligent to her, she was expecting it could be different this time. Yet, Adora was chosen again, even after defecting. So, this creates an evident conflict: when Adora is out, she has a chance. Will she prioritize her only friend or the opportunity of being powerful and respected?
When Catra gives the sword back to Adora (S01E09), she does that under two different feelings: she wants to help her, because she still cares about her, but she actually wants her to stay far. After just seeing that Adora’s return would mean she would get back to be rejected, disrespected, irrelevant and disregarded, Catra really doesn’t want her back. Although, she does, because Adora is important to her!
When Adora and Catra get locked at the Cristal Castle (S01E11) they are targeted by memories of their past. At first, the good memories of companionship and mutual support put their guards down. But while the memories get harder and start showing losing situations for Catra, she becomes increasingly aggressive. Simultaneously, they’re being attacked by spiders and Catra is gotten by one. Having been smoothed by the warm memories, she calls out for Adora’s help, but then she remembers that she is now for her own and she’s strong enough to defeat anything by herself. And she does. At this moment Adora shows up to “save” her, but Catra doesn’t need protection and it just makes her more indisposed and hostile to the other.
Adora cannot understand the complexity of Catra’s feelings because she has never been in her place and wasn’t abused by Shadow Weaver in the way Catra was. She wants to convince Catra to come with her, but Catra is too pride for that. She wants to grab her chance to get revenge of everyone who has hurt her, which includes Adora. Her Adora, who had made so many promises and broke then all. As much as she relives her experiences as child, surer she is about one thing: Adora had causes her more pain them good. She was the reason, directly or not, of most of the bad things in her life. And once she recognizes it, she makes her choice: Adora is officially her enemy and she doesn’t want her back.
The whole experience was terribly exhaustive to her. Being forced to face herself and her own vulnerabilities, and still, to expose it. Her natural reaction was to close herself even more. Maybe she believes this effort will eventually make her immune to those feelings. She’ll keep investing in this strategy, closing herself more and more, getting anger and anger, pushing everyone away. She’ll take that beyond her own limits as person, until the point she breaks.
A line is crossed
At the end of third season Catra is getting to the edge. She is determined to open a portal (S03E04) even knowing this is going to make the reality fall apart. She had shown before that she isn’t inclined to retreat even when her own life is in dangerous (S02E05). But knowing that she lost Shadow Weaver to the “good side” makes her cross a line. The idea of letting Adora win is just too unacceptable to her. She betrays Entrapta and sends her to the Beast Island even after the princess has interceded to Hordak in her favor. She threats Scorpia with the same fate. And, finally, she pulls the switch to activate the Portal.
Once it’s opened, the reality starts to crash down and, suddenly, Adora is back to the Fright Zone as a Force Captain (S03E05). Catra is still her best friend and everyone is celebrating their recent success under Adora’s command. But Adora can feel something is wrong, she has flashes of her time with the rebellion and the only other person who gets it is Scorpia. That’s probably because the memories of this time aren’t the best for them, they prefer their currently lives. Catra, on the other hand, was far happier in this alternative reality where Adora never left her, and she wants to believe it’s real. Again, she doesn’t understand why Adora must leave, why she cannot just stay along with her.
Adora wants Catra to come, she makes promises once more: “I won’t leave you behind again”. But Catra starts to remember of all the broken promises, all the pain that Adora caused to her and she cannot simply go: “I am never going to go with you […] I rather see the whole world end then let you win”. Catra keeps blaming her for everything that happened and accuses Adora of having broken reality. Thus, Adora must leave her. There’s nothing she can do to save Catra, she made her choice and must face it. If she is going to change, it’s up to her to take that step. It doesn’t matter how harmed she was at the past, Catra must take responsibilities for her acts. Only this way she’ll be able to take control and change things on her life. Keep blaming others and playing the victim will just hold her being driven by outside forces. At the end of the episode the look in Adora’s face it definitive: Catra has crossed a line and she won’t fight of suffer for her anymore.
Catra’s journey down hill
As deeper Catra goes in anger and rejection, further she goes in her attempts of crushing Adora, and more she closes herself like a shall. At the fourth season, Catra goes darker them ever before and she is giving everything of herself to defeat Adora. But the things she had done are starting to crash over her. Catra is having trouble dealing with the guilty of sending Entrapta to Beast Island and almost putting the whole world apart (S04E03). She reacts aggressively to these feelings, of course. At this path, she ends up shutting out everyone who left, including her last anchor, Scorpia (S04E06).
Even with this twirl going within, Catra is able to elaborate the most sophisticated of her plans: to infilter a spy, Double Trouble, into the rebellion to put them apart from inside (S04E03). She is focusing all her energies to make it work. Catra is authoritarian with Scorpia and with everyone, replicating the abusive attitude of Shadow Weaver quite well. She pushes them, demanding double work, driving them crazy under her control. She doesn’t give a shit about their lives; she’s just moving them like pieces in a board in other to win her sick game.
And she really gets to win. The Horde took the Sea Gate (S04E07), but Hordak send her back to the Fright Zone to wait (S04E08). With nothing to work for and just finding out that Scorpia left her, Catra is pretty much freaking out. She hasn’t been sleeping, she gets obsessed and paranoid, thinking people are laughing by her back (S04E10). Even though, the Horde is closer than ever to conquer Etheria, Adora and Glimmer have turned against each other, Catra is getting everything she has dreamed for, she beats even Hordak and gets the higher position (S04E13). However, she is lonelier than ever, and she is exhausted. She seeks for Scorpia compulsively, but she is not there anymore. Lonnie and the others who Catra grows up with were never her friends and now she just scares them. Double Trouble, who she came to think that could be a support, is just there for the money, they make it clear. There is no one left, no one to cover for her or share her victory.
Just at this point she realizes that win was never what she really wanted. This was just what was told to her by the Horde and by Shadow Weaver. What she really wanted was Adora. What she has always needed was real friends, trust, and love. All her life she believed that she must be the best to be liked by others, although that wasn’t the reason Adora was liked by people, but because she was nice to them. The reasons why Catra only had Adora as friend was that she was a difficult person and couldn’t let anyone else in. She had to get all those things she thought were the important ones to be aware of that and to start opening herself to deeper and honest relationships. Now, she must learn that showing vulnerability and talk about feelings aren’t weaknesses and this may be her hardest journey.
The redemption
At season five Catra is stuck with Glimmer at Horde Prime’s ship. She comes to think she could make her way up at this new place, but since the start she was aware that this would be different. Horde Prime isn’t Hordak, he is heartless, smart and doesn’t need the help of others beyond himself. Catra knows she has no chance. Besides that, she has no energy or wish for it. She is free to walk through the ship and doesn’t have much to do, so she has a lot of free time to think. When she was fighting, she could keep her mind and effort on that. With nothing to focus on, she is forced to face herself. Catra is so alone and aimless that she keeps visiting Glimmer even having nothing to tell her just to have some company (S05E01). She has lost all her life meaning.
That’s when Adora comes to her mind. She has been thinking a lot about her. With all that hate gone she can see clearly now. Adora wanted to have other friends, but Catra was too insecure to be okay with this (S05E03). She was jealous and channeled these feelings through violence, she was too proud to say sorry. But even though, Adora wouldn’t left her. She was always there… Until she wasn’t. Only when Adora gives up on her is Catra able to come back. She had to do it by herself. Glimmer put things clear to her (S05E03): Catra has no options, if she keeps trying to run away, Horde Prime will destroy everything and, even if she escapes, what would be the meaning of this? What would she live for? So, she chooses to help the only one that still matter, Adora, by sending Glimmer to her so she doesn’t have to come and face death.
Obviously, Adora comes anyway. After saving Catra (S05E05) they are officially on the same side again. Their relationship, however, isn’t the same, and they must figure out how this new dynamic works for them. Furthermore, is all new for Catra, she is learning the dynamics of the group as a whole and building personal connection with each member — as much as with magic, by the way (S05E08). It’s still too hard for her to hand over, to recognize her mistakes and to put down her defenses. But she made the decision to take responsibility over her choices and she really is willing to become a better person.
The bigger challenge happens when Shadow Weaver comes to stay between Adora and Catra again. Her presence itself is plenty to let Catra alert. But she is leading a mission to Mystacore and Adora is following her (S05E11). Catra deals good enough with Adora being chosen by Shadow Weaver, but not so good with Adora “choosing” Shadow Weaver — not that she had any better option. Along the path Shadow Weaver whispers at Adora’s ear, saying she must focus on saving the world. She tries to put Adora away from Catra, as she always did. Adora doesn’t completely fall for that, but she end-up doing everything Shadow Weaver wanted, since it was what was needed to stop Horde Prime. Although, Catra takes it personally. Again, Adora is choosing to be the hero instead of staying with her. Catra resents of never being Adora’s priority. Thus, she lefts.
It’s hard to say in which point she realizes the nature of her feelings for Adora, but at this moment she’s aware of it. When she finds out that Adora is in danger she grudgingly seeks Shadow Weaver’s help to save her (S05E12). This is a decisive moment: she puts her pride and traumas aside in favor of Adora. At the Heart of Etheria she is able to accept Adora’s need to put the sake of everyone first and she stays there being supportive. At the end, Catra is finally able to say that she loves her.
The fifth season shows Catra learning how to face her issues instead of running away from them as she used to do. Things doesn’t get solved at the moment she takes the decision to sacrifice herself to save Glimmer. That was just the first step. She still has relapses; she must work on her anger problems and make a big effort to say sorry. She didn’t get over Shadow Weaver and all the traumas the Horde has inflicted to her. But she did make the choice to change. Saying she loves Adora was an important move in the path to become a more authentic person, and this will probably be a lifetime quest.