#*in parts

About villainism for dummies

Catra

is for a majority of the show the antagonist. However she doesn't start off as one, her descend into villainy is gradual. The show rather treats her as a deuteragonist.and that's interesting about this character there's a gray area to her. But because she's such a very complex character people will write off as inherently evil when the narrative doesn't treat her that but it doesn't absolve her of anything either. Catra in her descend starts off very young she's said to be around seventeen, eighteen in season 1 At the end of the show she's still a very young adolescent.

Shadow weaver is an antagonist along side (Catra, H*rdak)

Even during her days as a teacher in Mystacor. She displayed manipulative behavior over and over on Micah. The spell of obtaintment curses her but grants her a new power, the power of shadows. Which allows her to sap magic from all over the world would explain why she was able to gain power of the black garnet and drain Glimmer. She retains most of her personality as shown when she recognizes and spares Micah. Shadow weaver is the Horde's second in command she takes Adora in as a baby and takes Catra in as a child . Troughout the show we see the unfair treatment she puts them trough.Shadow weaver abuses Adora and Catra. And is responsible for their trauma. Note that the writers didn't write the episode light spinner as some kind of backstory to sympathize with ,it's to show that she has always been the same.

Shadow weaver pits Adora and Catra against themselves troughout their entire lives. Which not even the show is subtle about.

S1- Shadows of Mystacor.

Shadow spy impersonating Catra: What do you think, shadow weaver controls us both. She always has

Really puts the emphasis on how strong Shadow weaver's grip is over these two girls. Even Glimmer and Bow come to learn this and witness Adora's meltdown "seems like this shadow weaver person did a number on you"

Adora after defeating Shadow Blight G-I mean shadow weaver: "This is what Shadow weaver does, she manipulates people, she pushes them apart"

S3

Angella : No, you've put this girl trough enough already

Told from the good guy's perspective. The narrative is meant to tell you Adora good! Shadow weaver bad. And the narrative treats Catra with this same courtesy .So why don't we apply this to her? , the same victim of abuse sharing that same abuser for her whole life. Because Catra is a bad guy on paper and isn't a meak victim ? Therefore she isn't deserving of the same sympathy? Which is even more weird to me since Catra's abuse is shown trough text more often than Adora's I'm not comparing their abuse, Adora had it just as bad. but one thing is Adora leaves, gets a good support system while Catra remains behind in a toxic environment with Shadow weaver and we get to spend more time between those two. We see the hold shadow weaver has over Catra . i want to talk about the body languages in these interactions between them Catra's stiff shoulders, self hugging .When Shadow weaver asks her to come closer she scoots over with dread . Catra decides to show some vulnerability and it's exploited she helps shadow weaver and is deceived by her. i find it funny to say that Catra dubs Adora as naive,easy to manipulate when she perfectly plays into the hands of her abuser .

Catra isn't entirely selfish as people make her out to be, she is also loyal .

When Adora defects she's send to retrieve her back, to which Catra refuses. It isn't until Shadow weaver threatens her and paralyzes her that she complies. Catra after Adora's defection even considered her to be right in leaving and thought of doing the same, (she wasn't exactly safe in the Horde and was left alone with her abuser and without Adora there's not much for her.) Catra : Adora is gone, she defected, and I'm starting to think she had the right idea. Before she was presented with an opportunity, a sliver of recognition that got her reeled back in for validation. Which ended up with H*rdak pitting Catra against Adora. And even after Adora's defection Catra still got her back in the shadows.She refuses to give away her whereabouts her identity as She-Ra, refusing to sell her Ex-Bestfriend out despite being deeply hurt.

Shadow weaver: You are going to bring her back

Catra: I don't think so

Shadow weaver: For the last time ,where is Adora ?

Catra: For the last time i don't know

Shadow weaver : pathetic you're still trying to protect her.

Which then follows by a Catra, reluctantly going to seaworthy to bring her back. Under the command of Shadow weaver.

She even does this with Shadow weaver Catra doesn't owe her a single thing. Yet she still shows concern over her even when Shadow weaver was about to mentally screw her before she hunches over in pain. She tries to bargain with Hordak so she can stay longer before being transported she is empathetic of Shadow weaver and returns her old sorcerers badge only for that kindness to be exploited.

When Scorpia tries to bust her out of the cell she lashes out at her In a very Catra manner . But she does it for Scorpia's own sake, as she doesn't want to drag her into her own mess.

Motives and motivation

We all know Shadow weaver goes where Power is. Back in her days as light spinner she was a manipulative woman and knew exactly how to get around the gifted Micah and get him to perform the spell of obtaintment with her while framing it as a good cause. But the head master/sorcerer Norwyn stops her and outright says that's she's always been after power. This proves that even before light spinner becomes shadow weaver that she's always been power hungry. She kills? absorbs him with her new found power and it's like all her morals are off the table. With Micah as exception since some part did care for him. It's funny how it's followed with her swiftly taking out a horde soldier.

Catra is layered she has various motivations for her actions and often vocalizes these. We can tell her prime motives are survival, validation and a need to prove her self-worth.

Before she orcestates Princess prom she states that if she doesn't capture Adora shadow weaver will demote her. And if H*rdak finds about Shadow weaver disobeying him he will get rid of them both. .Her safety becomes endangered this way and this leads to her possibly endangering others for self preservation ,this is entirely selfish but motivated trough ensuring that safety. Not malice. "I'm after something bigger and no one will stop me" a.k.a ensure her spot as the new shadow weaver and get free of her clutches and abuse.

In Promise Light hope in order for Adora to "let go" and become a She-Ra free of attachments. She throws the two girls into simulations based of their memories and Catra gets reminded of her cause before she betrays Adora. She sees her younger self crying under a blanket, the child looks up to her and her gaze stays on the child her face hardens with a new resolve.As she stands over the cliff the tides have turned from this point on they're enemies and Catra is no longer acting out as one. Before that she did have moments of good as well she and Adora remain mostly civil. Catra doesn't attack her, she even catches her falling from the cliff and brushes her tail over her hand and the two share playful silly banter momentarily.

Moment of truth

It's a controversial thought maybe but I don't blame Catra fully for the portal activation actually ,from hindsight she definitely is complicit for Angella. Blaming her for something she was driven into a corner for doesn't feel ethical to me personally. Not with the way that whole scene was presented. And let me remind you what set of the chains of events

Who was it that deceived her by taking advantage of her vulnerability and desperate need for validation, which ended up with her being choked, publicly humiliated, before being send off to a mission which her survival wasn't guaranteed off and then who's name set her over the edge sending her into a panic attack leaving her with tunnel vision. She couldn't hear the cacophony of cheers or even hear Scorpia anymore. Shadow weaver according to her from what Adora tells her, has joined the good guys, she thinks their abuser joined the good guys. those same people infiltrate what she knows as her only home, tortures her with magic to the point I mask my emotions Catra breaks down crying in front of her enemies, and these particular lines always get me "So what? You're on the side of good now? You made me this way and you get to be the good guy? " Catra being rightfully angry spits back with just as much venom ofcourse which follows with anguish screams of her being tormented. It's so extremely hypocritical after the things she's done, ruining Adora and her, messing them up ? She out of all people has the audacity to mockingly ask Catra to join them?

Also what would've happened if Bow didn't step in and stop her. For taking too much instead of saying "That's taking it too far" Shadow weaver part of good guys now could've simply knocked her out but seemed to be taking her sweet time in hurting Catra as she stated before "Don't make me destroy you too" (she nearly drains Glimmer ,using up so much limited power just to hurt her or worse).The person who said this didn't care what would've overcome Catra after she escaped and left her for the wolves. The narrative stays sympathetic over Catra during these scenes it's clear who holds the power here and who's the victim, the victim in question an 18 years teenager, being abused by her abuser. who sides with the good guys that allow it to happen.

I think that's also, why she becomes so obsessed in beating the rebellion with no regard of her own health . While she experiences terrible guilt over pulling the switch. Because that's where she and shadow weaver again differentiate . Catra after zapping Entrapta looks at shock at her own hand, at what she did, Entrapta's face haunts her dreams,the mention of her name or the portal triggers her, because unlike Shadow weaver Catra shows remorse, and feels guilt over her actions. she does feel safe on the top with all the authority and power that comes with it.

But it doesn't bring her happiness because Catra did all of that in order for survival at first, to prove her worth, to prove someone else's narrative wrong the narrative bestowed on her by shadow weaver.She's reactive as ND describes but doesn't stop her to think about what she really wants.Just like with Adora it tells me she has a destiny complex just as much. Catra is instilled with the idea of being interior being told her entire life she won't amount to anything, due to the abuse, which is realistic.children that have trauma tend to feel this way,it leaves you with an inferiority complex. She fights these idea's imposed to her by shadow weaver who's called her an nuisance, insolent, worthless creature, who controlled and made her feel weak for her entire life .And the one enforcing this idea is to which not her fault is Adora. Adora is related to her trauma, she was the one she was pitted against since they were kids, which created this power Imbalance between and after gaining the power of She-Ra that gap of the power Imbalance gets bigger which is why she's someone that she needs to beat, to win against, her entire worth had been defined around her, by Shadow weaver , Catra fights to prove her independence , to prove herself . But this takes the blame off of the actual puppeteer who was responsible for this unhealthy dynamic .This is also why Adora calling finally Shadow weaver out in fail-safe was so cathartic "You ruin people, you take any chance they could ever be be happy" Adora seeing her best friend's, Glimmer's change under Shadow weaver's bad influence. Hears from Scorpia how Catra's been acting the way she has and finds out it's related to shadow weaver and seeing again how the sorceress causes a rift between them. She knows exactly who to turn against and she doesn't hold back.

Double trouble

The actor themselves completely exposes Catra and calls her out on her villainy act.

"You try so hard playing the big bad villain, but your heart's been never in it has it?" Catra's initial reaction to the horde squadrons being obliterated by the rebellion isn't her being upset by the loss she suffered but by the realization that she had been betrayed by whom she thought to be a friend, we've already seen that conquering Salineas didn't make her happy. Her being in the operation room and watching the horde gaining territory over over didn't make her happy, DT transforms into all of these people that hurt her then into the people she has hurt. "people have hurt you? Haven't they" "they didn't believe in you, didn't trust you"

"didn't need you, left you" "you drive them away wild cat"

Trough Scorpia leaving she could slowly come to terms that this time maybe she had been the problem she can't blame anyone but herself for Scorpia's defection. And so she learns about accountability for her own actions. And DT makes sure she gets the message.

It's for your own good darling, we both know this was never what you really wanted

Melog