Saturday Morning Cult-TV Blogging: BraveStarr: "BraveStarr and the Medallion"

In “BraveStarr and the Medallion,” a stranger lands in Fort Kerium wearing the same medallion that the marshal keeps close to his chest.

BraveStarr wonders if the stranger could be the Shaman’s only living relative, and plans to take the new denizen to Star Peak to find out.

Unfortunately, the stranger is in cahoots with Tex Hex, and planning to squelch the Shaman’s mystical fire, the source of all his power. Fortunately, the Shaman knows a way to test the stranger’s honesty.

Suddenly, BraveStarr seems to be featuring a clutch of episodes that involve the Shaman and Star Peak. A very close-corollary is from Filmation’s He-Man and the Masters of the Universe: The Sorceress and Castle Grayskull.  

Both the individual and her home were often coveted by Skeletor, just as Tex-Hex covets Star Peak and the Shaman here. For me, these stories are among the most uninteresting and uninspiring to appear on BraveStarr. The best stories, by my estimation, have been those that explore the characters, even Tex-Hex, rather than focusing on evil plans to take over Star Peak.

Here, the plot involves a fake medallion that fools BraveStarr. It is a little baffling why he is taken in by the ruse, and why he fails to remember, as the Shaman reports, that there is only one medallion in existence. It may be, simply, that BraveStarr is so desperate to find some connection to Shaman and his people that he is taken in. But he should be more wary, or the writers should do a better job of explaining why he is so easily misled.

The message at the end of this episode is what is beautiful may also be dangerous, which is appropriate given the fake medallion, but not particularly deep in terms of text. 

Next week's episode, “Sherlock Holmes in the 23^rd Century Part I,” -- a pilot for a cartoon series that never was produced -- is actually much more interesting than the recent BraveStarr episodes have been...