Ninjago S14 E2

## Plot

The Island was basically just a fun side adventure romp to set up this season, which focuses on Nya, her elemental powers, her relationship with her mother Maya, and with Jay. There are a lot of callbacks to past seasons and events, in the dialogue, certain events, and even the score, which is appropriately epic. Episode 1 starts with three trucks full of common thugs arriving in the countryside by a remote village, with farmers harvesting rice. Their boss is Miss Demeanor, a new flamethrower villain whose name is a pun on the word misdemeanor. She's voiced by Erin Matthews! I hope we see more of her in the future. Anyways, she hates it there, since she's a city girl, and wonders why their buyer, who is paying them triple price, wanted to meet way out here, and one of the thugs suggests that it's because they didn't want to run into the ninja… who disguised themselves as rice farmers to ambush them. Or rather, Kai, Lloyd, and Jay did. When Miss Demeanor tries to get away with the trucks, Cole tries to stop her with his bike. He's able to topple two of the trucks, but his bike also falls, and Miss Demeanor keeps heading down the road on top of the last truck. Cole sees that the trucks were carrying vengestone, building on that one mention from season 13. This means that either the ninja set up the meeting themselves to catch Miss Demeanor without knowing what her cargo was, or by ambushing the thugs before the meeting even started, they blew a chance to finally learn who the buyer is. Maybe it's Pythor, or even Garmadon? Lloyd tells Nya and Zane to cut Miss Demeanor off while he and the others catch up. Nya will douse the truck with water, and once she does, Zane will flash freeze everything. However, when Nya creates a water tornado, it goes out of control and doesn't obey her, which lets Miss Demeanor get away. Zane tries to freeze the tornado, but it doesn't work, and Nya can't put the water back down. They evacuate the village before the water drops back down, flooding it. No one is hurt, but Nya's confidence has taken a massive hit. Back at the monastery, Wu is disappointed that they didn't stop the criminals and learn why they were smuggling vengestone, and Nya takes the blame for it. When she gets angry, she accidentally sets off the sprinklers, which damages the computers. I thought this season would be about her coping with completely losing her elemental powers, which the guys have been through a bunch of times before, but they're just fluctuating. In the library, Wu finds a list of every elemental power… except wind or water. When he was a boy, his father would tell him about how he mastered every elemental power, except those two. He said they weren't his to command. They belonged to Wojira, the mythical sea serpent mentioned once in season 8, and who was shown to be very real at the end of The Island. When she combined wind and water, they became a force of destruction called the fury of the storm. Wu shows the guys a scroll of Wojira. All it says is that the first spinjitzu master conquered her with the help of the Merlopians. The others have never heard that word before. The Merlopians were a sea folk. They lived here before the first spinjitzu master came and created the landmass of Ninjago. This proves that when he fled from the first realm, this one already existed, but it was just endless ocean until he used the Golden Weapons to create land, which humans and other species then inhabited. This doesn't explain how he forged the weapons at the Temple of Light, or got the gold for them from the Golden Peaks, but whatever. Anyway, in the midst of the battle, a Merlopian warrior with a trident and a helmet rose from the depths and pried two amulets from Wojira's head: The Storm Amulet previously seen that's now being kept on the island of the Keepers, and a Wave Amulet. Wojira and the seas have been asleep and calm since then, respectively. It's possible that Nya's powers are linked to Wojira or the amulets, but Wu doesn't know, and suggests asking Maya, Kai and Nya's mother, since she was the previous master of water. So, I guess once an elemental master has a child, they lose their powers, because… reasons? Kai says that Nya isn't close with their mom. After all, they barely know each other. Ray and Maya were imprisoned by Krux, and they don't blame them for that, but it doesn't change the fact that Kai and Nya were left alone for most of their childhood and had to raise themselves. Yeah, I wasn't a fan that after making such a big deal out of it, Ray and Maya just disappeared after season 7, probably because of the retool in season 8 due to the stupid movie. They weren't even mentioned, even though they were finally free and could reunite with their now grown up children, which would have definitely resulted in some mixed feelings and attempts at bonding and connecting with them. Nya is pretty independent. She's currently training extremely hard, and gets mad and annoyed when Kai suggests she call their mom for help with her "little problem." I love the cinematography of this scene. After her powers cause more mayhem, Nya considers leaving the monastery, but before she can, her parents show up. Jillian Michaels is finally back! Yes! Maya smothers Nya, who gets mad at Kai for calling their parents and telling them what was going on anyways. The next episode starts with Maya waking Nya up at six in the morning and cleaning her messy room. Nya tells her mom that her life doesn't need fixing. She never had a problem controlling her element when she was the master of water. She made seaweed bacon and tofu pancakes for breakfast to get Nya in tune with her element, and she's critical of her stance. Nya tells her mother that her stance is fine, and she's not having problems. It was a one time mistake and it won't happen again, but then she gets herself wet with water from a bucket. Wu tells Nya that he can't ask her mother to leave, because she may be their best option. There isn't much information on the elemental power of water in the library. Misako tells Nya that Maya just wants to help. She's been gone a long time. She just wants to be a mom and take care of her kid. They suggest that she talk to Kai, but he likes being waited on by his mom and playing video games with his dad. Cole has finally fixed the computer in the HQ. Nya asks where Zane and Pixal are. They went on a mission without her… because it was a water rescue. Zane is in his helicopter, and Pixal is in her Samurai X mech suit. A giant octopus is attacking a boat. They're normally peaceful creatures that rarely venture to the surface. Something has clearly agitated it. It grabs Pixal's mech. She tells Zane to attend to the sailors while she tries to reason with the octopus. Zane creates an iceberg for the sailors. Suddenly, his and Pixal's vehicles lose power due to a pulse. When it hits Nya, she causes the water in the hot tub/Bell of Divinity to fly out of it. The sink and the toilet also go nuts. The octopus suddenly leaves and releases Pixal's mech, which sinks into the ocean. Zane tells her to eject from the mech, but comms are down. He sends down a line, but it doesn't reach her. She needs to reboot her primary ignition. She's approaching crush depth, and the glass starts cracking. She's able to power up the mech by hitting the console. The pulse originated from out at sea, deep below the surface. It's what affected the octopus, and it could also be causing Nya's powers to fluctuate. Speaking of which, she apologizes to the others for all the trouble. She doesn't know what's going on with her, but this is all her fault. Pixal and Zane arrive at the monastery and tell them what they've learned. It's not Nya's fault that she's unable to control her powers. An energy signal is coming from the Tartarus Trench, the deepest part of the Endless Sea. Pixal created a deep sea submersible that could reach those kinds of depths a number of years ago, called the Hydro Bounty, but it was never fully tested. Wu tells the ninja that regardless of that, they're going diving.