Premiering on Netflix in September of 2021, the CG animated reboot of He-man and the masters of the universe as a brand companion to Kevin Smith's Revelation series aimed at a younger audience while Revelation turned out to be incredibly polarizing...
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If I had a nickel for every time the female childhood best friend of a blond-haired hero with a magic sword turned into a villain out of trauma and abandonment issues, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.
THIS is reason why I'm so mad at y'all for SLEEPING on the CGI he-man series, because my girl Krass/Ram Ma'am/Rampage has an arc that is EASILY one of the best hero-to-villain-and-back-to-hero arcs I've seen from western non-adult animation in recent memory. When we are first introduced to Krass at the beginning of the series she and Adam have grown up together living in the tiger tribe the two being raised by Cringer as adopted brother and sister, however when their lives get turned upside-down by Teela showing up in the village to deliver the sword to its champion leading to Adam becoming He-man, we start to learn that Krass has a deep-seeded fear of Adam leaving her and the village if he were to be reunited with his real family as Adam is the only thing close to family that Krass has since her parents died in a crass which she was the sole survivor of due to wearing her dad's helmet. this is why Krass at first agrees to accompany Adam on his quest to find out about his magical destiny eventually becoming Ram Ma'am one of the core five masters of the universe alongside Teela, Duncan, and Cringer after Adam gets the idea to share the power of Grayskull with his teammates to fight back against Keldor and his cronies. flash-forward to the episode "He-man the hunted" where we get our first hint toward her eventual fall: Adam and Krass have a run-in with the poacher who took Cringer's claws (R'Qazz, who eventually becomes Beast Man) and through Cringer discovering his inner strength our heroes discover that they have the ability to transform independently of each other. at the end of that episode, Krass insists that she and Adam stay at the village to protect it from poachers, however Adam being the reasonable one here disagrees saying that as He-Man it is his duty to protect everyone, not just the village (And he's right, protecting the entire planet is more important than protecting just a single, small village in the jungle) leading to Krass going off on her own, granted she does come back in the season 1 finale to rescue the other masters from Snake Mountain but that brief falling out between the two adopted siblings was already planting the seeds for what would come at the end of season 2. not only that, but Krass was always the odd one out of the core five. notice how each of the masters has a nemesis (He-man has Skeletor, Teela has Evil-lyn, Man-at-arms has Trap-jaw, Battle Cat has beast man) but Krass doesn't have one. In the first season this was just a minor curiosity, but becomes a major plot point in the second season where finally get the answer: she is her own nemesis. in the season 2 finale aptly titled "the fifth nemesis" Adam and the other masters after seemingly destroying Skeletor are allowed to live with Adam's father King Randor in the royal palace, Randor giving each of them roles in his court: Teela as the royal mage, Duncan as royal engineer, even Cringer has a job as Royal Archivist (even the tiger has a job!) all the while Krass is being haunted by the ghost of Skeletor who's spirit managed to survive by latching onto the gem on Krass's helmet which is actually a ram stone (which is a DEEP CUT reference to the 2002 series) Skeletor manipulating her into stealing the sigil of Hiss (the magic Macguffin that our heroes spent the entire second season trying to keep out of Skeletor's hands) with the promise of using it to bring her dead parents back to life to manipulate her into raising the snakemen from the dead. initially Krass doesn't believe him, but when she sees Adam bonding with his father and having traded out his old tiger tribe garb for some fancy new royal rags, it was enough to make her snap as all of her aforementioned deep-seeded fears were starting to come true in that very moment, Skeletor's ghost taking advantage of Krass now being in such an emotionally vulnerable state to further drive a wedge between her and Adam with some more of that good-ol' emotional manipulation leading to her embracing Havoc becoming Rampage: dark master of destruction and using the sigil to raise the snakes on behalf of skelly leading into the story arc of season 3 where we see the great lengths Adam will go just to get his best friend back. when I first that moment when Adam confronts Krass after her heel-turn, my heart sank (especially after hearing the "you've made your choice prince Adam, now I've made mine" line) It felt sad seeing these two who spent the first two seasons as best friends and teammates now become enemies which made me feel sorry for He-Man and desperately wanted to see Krass redeemed (which she obviously does at the end of season 3) knowing deep down that Skeletor wasn't going to keep his end of the bargain, once he gets what he wants from her he's gonna toss her by the wayside, almost like an allegory for making a deal with the devil. It's such a brilliant piece of character work with gripping drama and complexity (while still giving her a happy ending because kid's show) that I wish would get more attention. don't believe me? check out this amazing tribute by Awesome AMV (one of the only good CGI he-man tribute videos I could find on YouTube):
