Elena of Avalor S2 E7

## Plot

After another recap, this time of multiple episodes, we hear Elena finish telling Naomi and Carla a story. Avalor is getting ready to celebrate the Sunflower Festival. As the legend goes, an explorer was sent off with a royal decree to explore uncharted lands. His heartbroken wife cried nonstop. Her tears, filled with love, seeped into the barren ground. Carla narrowly avoids a mirror. When the explorer returned, the ground was covered with his wife's favorite flower: The sunflower. Her undying love gave the barren land its first spring. The Sunflower Festival is all about celebrating love and new beginnings. Elena's parents loved the story so much that they used to perform a song and dance inspired by it at every festival. Elena feels a little sad, because this will be their first year doing it without them. Armando comes up to the girls to collect their sunflowers. Carla sees Victor in disguise, motioning for her to come over and talk. Carla whispers not now to him, and tries to get him to go away. Naomi sees that she's distracted, and that her hair is turning black. She claims that the sun makes her hair darker, and runs off. Naomi reminds her that they have to finish setting up the decorations later. The shapeshifting potion is finally wearing off. She meets Victor and Shuriki in the jungle. She hasn't stolen the reversal potion yet, and she's been Rita for weeks. Shuriki refuses to give her more shapeshifting potion. She says that Elena has her busy preparing for the festival, since she invited the whole kingdom. This means that Victor and Shuriki can get in with disguises. They'll sneak in with the citizens tomorrow, and if Carla hasn't stolen the potion by then, Shuriki will do it herself. Victor gives Carla a handkerchief to cover her hair. Everyone is rehearsing for the festival, including Francisco, Marlena, and Julio. Luisa, Elena, and Isabel are practicing the dance. Cristina and her dad are watching them. She feels left out, because she can't dance. Isabel talks to her and invites her to join the dance. Cristina says that it's hard to dance on wheels, especially when there are so many steps. Elena and Luisa are okay with changing the dance to work around that. They'll plan it tonight, and meet them in the morning before the festival to go over it. The next day, in Elena's room, she, Naomi, Isabel, and Cristina are given their festival dresses. There's one for Rita (and Luisa) too, but no one has seen her since yesterday. Naomi says that she never showed up to help her finish setting up the decorations. She decides to find her and give her the dress. She finds her in the library, trying to get into Mateo's workshop. Carla claims that she was looking for him to surprise him with chilaquiles, a real life traditional Mexican dish that he loves. Naomi asks where they are, and Carla claims that she left them in the kitchen. Naomi notices that her hair is turning darker. She tells her that if the painting is shut, it means Mateo isn't there. She gives her the dress, and they leave to go get ready. We never see Carla with the dress, although she technically already got a new design/character model two episodes ago, and this episode probably already necessitated a lot of new asset creation. We have new models for Elena, Isabel, Naomi, Luisa, Cristina, and Shuriki, and we never see them again after this, except for Shuriki's. Speaking of which, she and Victor sneak in. Elena, Luisa, Isabel, and Cristina are practicing the dance in the throne room. Marlena is playing the music. However, Cristina keeps accidentally bumping into everyone, or running over their feet with her wheelchair. She says that she's just getting in the way, and doesn't want to ruin such an important dance for the royal family. Elena tells her that she's not in the way, and she knows all the moves, so she'll be fine. They don't have any more time to practice though. Naomi talks to Elena alone. She says that she caught Rita poking around Mateo's workshop and acting weird. Elena worries that she's being jealous again. Naomi says that this time is different, but she's not sure how. She just has a gut feeling that Rita is up to something, and wants Elena to trust her. She does, but Naomi needs to give her more to go on first. Instead of giving Rita another chance, Naomi decides to get Elena proof. Carla sees Mateo and dances with him. Oh god, the flirting… She asks him how she can open the painting. He shows her the key that he wears around his neck. It used to take three keys, but then Olivia blew the door up. Naomi sees them dancing. Carla drops him on purpose, and uses her pickpocket skills to steal the key. She runs off, and Naomi helps Mateo up. They wonder where she went. Carla gets into the workshop, but she doesn't know which potion is the one she needs. Mateo labeled them all. She breaks the potions that she doesn't need. She steals a Maruvian one that can break spells. Naomi sees her give it to a disguised Shuriki and Victor. She's blocked by a mariachi band, and by the time they get out of her way, they've disappeared. Naomi decides to find Mateo and tell him. She finds him with Gabe. She tells them what she saw, and Mateo realizes that his key is gone. He'll check his workshop to see if anything is missing. Gabe will check the rest of the palace, and Naomi will tell Elena. Wait, if Gabe is the captain of the guard now, then shouldn't he tell the other guards, in order to widen the search and have it go quicker? Why was no one checking the guests or guarding the treasury like they did in season 1? Shuriki uses the potion to restore Fiero. It turns out that they know each other. She says that since she freed him, he owes her. He says that he doesn't owe her anything, because she banished him from Avalor years ago. She says that's all in the past, and he needs to think about his future now. He'll help them break into the treasury, on one condition: After they do that, they have to help him steal the Codex Maru from Mateo. They agree and shake on it. Onstage, Elena dedicates the new dance to her parents. Cristina says that she isn't ready and just can't do it. Elena tells her that the last time she and Isa did this dance, it was with their parents. Cristina knows this, and says that it's too important to them for her to risk messing it up. Elena tells her that the first time she performed the dance, she didn't get all the steps right either, but her father was proud of her for trying. Just like Cristina's father is proud of her now. She agrees to do it. They perform, and as they do so, Shuriki, Fiero, Victor, and Carla break into the treasury. Shuriki wrecks the tiara and uses the jewel to make a new wand. After the dance, Naomi grabs Elena and tells her what happened. Mateo sees that his workshop is a mess, and is attacked by Fiero. He takes the Codex. So, I guess he didn't need the others after all, did he? Mateo casts a spell to get it back, leaving Fiero with only some blank pages he ripped out. He, Shuriki, Victor, and Carla escape. Naomi and Elena see them in the foyer. Elena has a flashback to when Shuriki killed her parents. She almost does the same thing to her, but Naomi pushes her out of the way. They learn that Fiero has been freed, that he, Victor, and Carla are working with Shuriki, and that Carla was Rita. The girls have to get to Elena's room to get her scepter. Shuriki says that there's no amulet to protect her this time. True, but I'd argue that she has something better. No offense to Sofia. Mateo throws her the scepter and she blasts Shuriki with the blaze power. That was so amazingly cathartic! Mateo protects them from a freezing spell Fiero cast. It bounces off his shield and hits a chandelier instead. Elena uses the blaze power to destroy Shuriki's new wand. Well, that was anticlimactic. Gabe shows up with his sword drawn, but Elena takes the lead, and orders Fiero to drop his tamborita. He tells Shuriki that they have to leave, because the scepter is too powerful. He blasts the frozen chandelier, which falls and provides a distraction for them to flee. Elena refuses to let Shuriki get away and goes after them. Shuriki wonders how Elena did that, since the royal scepter couldn't do anything magical before. Fiero says that the blank pages he took will lead them to something even more powerful than the scepter. He casts a spell to reveal what they say. It tells them how they can defeat Elena. Before Fiero tells them though, he wants something in return. Once Shuriki takes over, she has to make him her royal malvago. She agrees, which makes Victor and Carla mad. She says that she'll make them malvagos once they've earned it. They flee in their coach. Elena and the others reach a fork in the road. They can't tell which way they went. Gabe says that he'll assemble the royal guard to track them down. Elena doesn't want to let them to get away, and says that they should split up. The others tell her that it's too dangerous, and they can't just search for them blindly. Elena knows that they're right, and reluctantly turns around to head back to the festival. She tells Gabe to assemble the guard when they get back. She apologizes to Naomi for not listening to her about Carla. Naomi says that she doesn't need to apologize. The Sunflower Festival is all about new beginnings, so maybe they can begin again too, and this time, Elena will trust Naomi more. She realizes what the test Quita Moz told her about is: The darkness is Shuriki, and Elena has to stop her once and for all.

## Review

Oh my gosh, this episode was amazing! The heroes finally learn about Shuriki returning, and now some of my favorite villains are working together! I didn't think I'd like the song, but it's actually pretty good. It becomes dissonant when it's played over Shuriki accomplishing her goal. Her getting a new wand is a new beginning for her. I didn't like how it was destroyed so easily by Elena, but with something like the scepter, that makes sense. My guess is that the villains will look for the Scepter of Night next, a counterpart to the Scepter of Light. Other than the wand, the one thing I didn't like was Elena promising to trust Naomi more at the end. It just felt like a tacked on moral that didn't need to be there for an action packed and suspenseful episode. *Of course* Elena already trusts Naomi with her life, trust that she proved was well founded this very episode! Also, I know some of the main characters are teenagers, and I don't expect them to know everything, but I wish Naomi's suspicions about "Rita" had started at the very beginning of the episode, when she notices her hair turning darker. Naomi, the one with *blond hair*, who spent much of her life before the series traveling, should know that hair turns lighter in the sun. Her and Elena buying Carla's lie just makes them look like idiots, but especially Naomi, who should know better. I think it would've been better if Carla said that she had some sort of rare disease or genetic mutation or something that made her hair darker when exposed to sunlight, which would also garner sympathy from the others. That's just a minor nitpick though. I still enjoyed the episode, including the subplot with Cristina.