Elena of Avalor S1 E22

## Plot

Luisa, Francisco, Elena, and Isabel are on a vacation at Ophidan Island, and Gabe is with them. Isabel likes being prepared for anything, so she packed just about everything she owns. Luisa and Francisco go on a hike to a mountain while Elena and Isabel practice diving. We see their swimsuits for the first time, and they look great! We also see Isabel's hair in some sort of ponytail braid for the first time too, and it also looks great. Elena just dives right in (literally), but Isabel wants to calculate the best dive angle for a smooth entry. Gabe assures her that he's a certified life guard, so there's nothing to be afraid of. It turns out that he's scared of lizards. They find a literal message in a bottle. It's a page from someone's journal. After searching for years, said someone discovered a temple with a great treasure inside. It's signed by Antonio Agama. He's a famous Avaloran explorer and Gabe's hero. After searching for a priceless statue called the Golden Gecko, he disappeared, and no one has heard from him since. Legend has it that those who try to take the statue will be cursed. There's a map on the back of Ophidan Island. This means that Antonio Agama is there. He must have tried to send a message to get help, but the tides brought it back. They change into their adventure clothes. I loved seeing Isabel's for the first time. They follow the map to his ship. On the way, Elena and Gabe have to wait for Isabel because she takes time to calculate her jumps. She's also a lot smaller. Her math makes her slower though. They find Señor Agama's ship, but he's not there. They discover paw prints of something. They look like gecko tracks, but geckos are supposed to be tiny. It doesn't make sense. Elena eagerly follows the tracks, but Isabel points out that they don't know what this creature is. They can't just rush in after it. Elena points out that it might've taken Señor Agama. They find the creature, and it is a gecko. A giant one. They run away, but Isabel falls off a cliff. However, the gecko saves her. Gabe wants Elena and Isabel to hide in a tent while he fights it. Isabel notices a book with Antonio's crest on it and starts reading it. Elena runs after Gabe and points out that it saved Isabel. Isabel tells them that the giant gecko is Antonio Agama. The curse is real, and it turned him into a giant gecko. He wants them to undo the curse. They can lower themselves down in a basket. Antonio, being a gecko, can just climb down with his feet. Elena pulls the rope too hard though, and they start free falling for a few seconds. The Ophidans built secret temples on their islands to worship the majesty of the gecko. There are booby traps everywhere to protect the statue. If they follow Señor Agama, they can avoid the traps, since he's been there before. However, Elena triggers one when she leans her hand against a pressure plate on the wall. They're almost run over by a rock carved into a giant lizard. It caves in the other two passages, so they're forced to take one that even Señor Agama isn't familiar with. Isabel wanted Elena to be more careful and slow down. When they're on a bridge, the way back is sealed, and the bridge starts retracting. They need to find the right key to open the door. Gabe wants to try each one, but pulling the wrong one just speeds up the bridge. Isabel needs to solve an Ophidan color pattern puzzle to find the right key. It's the red one. Before anyone can grab it, Isabel has them wait so she can double check her work. However, this makes the bridge retract too much, and now they can't get to the red key. Elena uses Isabel's book to jam the gears, which works. They can't get through the door though. Isabel says that the Ophidans had secret tunnels that they used to get in and out without triggering their own traps. It's pretty far down though. Luckily, Isabel came prepared and brought some rope in her go-pack. However, as the centuries passed, the floor started to cave in. It's not very far though, so they can just jump across the gap. Isabel calculates her jump again though, even after Elena tells her that it's not that far and to just jump. Elena gets impatient, jumps back, grabs Isabel, and jumps with her. However, the rest of the area starts caving in. Once again, thanks to Elena, they can't go back the way they came. Elena asks Isabel why she didn't jump when she told her to. She wanted to make sure she could clear it. Elena tells her that sometimes, you just need to trust yourself and go for it. They find the heart of the temple. Antonio dropped the statue in a crack, and because his hands are that of a gecko's, he isn't able to reach it. Elena grabs it, but she triggers another trap on the floor. She tells Isabel to run, but she takes too long to listen again and Elena runs to her. They're cut off from Gabe and Señor Agama and are trapped in a small area together. The wall is too strong to break through. Isabel didn't run because she was worried about stepping on another trap. She blames Elena, saying that if she had taken her time, she wouldn't have set the traps off. It was an accident, but Isabel points out that she wouldn't have so many accidents if she wasn't always in a hurry. She reminds her of the age old mantra, "Look before you leap." Elena thinks that it's better than stopping and double checking every little thing. It's been slowing them down all day, and she claims that it's the reason they're stuck in that small room. Isabel is mad at her, but this also hurt her feelings, and she starts crying. Elena realizes her mistake and says that she didn't mean it. They just have different ways of doing things. No one way is better though. Sometimes Elena's way is better, and sometimes Isabel's is. But the two of them arguing won't solve anything. They apologize to each other and make up. They push against each other's backs and climb up the wall to get out. They give the statue to Señor Agama, who puts it back on the pedestal. This breaks the curse and resets the trap, and they reunite with Gabe. Who winds up tripping and triggering a final trap. The temple is sealing itself shut. They run back to the tunnel. Elena needs to retrieve Isabel's go-pack, and she barely makes it through in time, in a deliberate homage to Indiana Jones. The tunnel leads them to a trap door, back where they started with the three tunnels. They run across the bridge to the basket, but it starts rolling itself up. They have to jump. Antonio, Gabe, and Elena make it. Isabel can't stop and do math though, since that would just give the bridge more time to roll up, and she'd have to jump farther. She trusts herself and just does it. She makes the jump, but just barely. Antonio admits that some treasures aren't meant to be taken. Back on the beach, Luisa and Francisco return from their hike, and claim that they went on an adventure. They meet Antonio Agama. The group finds another message in a bottle, but Gabe throws it away, even if it's someone else who needs help. Antonio decides to take it and make it his next adventure.

## Review

I liked this episode, even if it didn't have a song. According to Craig Gerber, there was one, but it was cut because it didn't match the tone of the episode, and for time constraints. If this episode reminded you of Indiana Jones, I can assure that it was very deliberate. Of course, another solution to that one trap towards the end would be to have Antonio come around and grab them all, since he can walk on walls as a gecko. Maybe he could only carry Isabel's weight, but if that's the case, then they could've just given him the idol and have him place it back on the pedestal. Of course, they didn't know that doing so would undo the trap, and given how big he is, he might not have been able to fit in the small rooms. Still, they could've at least tried it.