I agree. I love Hordak, but can accept that he did terrible things and should help rebuild what he destroyed - eg. assist with Beast Island like in canon.
What I cannot stand is when people let Catra get off scott-free because of her trauma, only to damn Hordak for the same reasons! If Hordak goes free, then of course so does Catra - that’s fair. But if Catra is immediately accepted into the rebellion with only a couple of glares, but Hordak supposedly deserves to burn in Etherian Hell, you have a case of favouritism.
I don’t even hate Catra! I can enjoy her quips and believe her to be fun. But I do draw the line at calling her a ‘girlboss’ when she exploits his disabilities while she manipulates him. While this is typical villain behaviour, no one seems to be able to critique her actions while liking her - she’s a traumatised child (unless she’s being hot, in which case she’s most certainly an adult), incapable of intentionally causing harm, no matter how gleefully she does it.
The fact that the writers take Hordak’s trauma and give it to Catra to illustrate its horrific consequences - which Catra fans will use to enable her - while condemning Hordak, is so very frustrating.
It is a bizarre way to view the show, considering how similar the two characters are.
Starting from now on, everytime someone says they can’t forgive Hordak and his background is no excuse, I will be like
“Oh so you think Catra has to suffer for her crimes too, right?”
Or even “Oh so you must want Catra to apologize for the things she said while chipped, right?”
Because I still can’t believe there are people in the fandom who completely excuse Catra’s actions but the moment Hordak does the same thing he has to suffer and doesn’t deserve redemption.
Anybody else ever think about how convenient it was that Micah, Scorpia, and Mermista were chipped in S5? You know, before the Best Friend Squad, Best Girl Entrapta, and Catra landed back on Etheria?
No seriously, how CONVENIENT that it was those three specifically that couldn’t interact freely one-on-one with Catra once she, the Best Friend Squad, and Best Girl Entrapta touched back down on Etheria. Catra caused Angella to be trapped between two dimensions, treated Scorpia like sh*t, and conquered Mermista’s kingdom. And yet Micah and Mermista never got to interact with her, and Scorpia just seemed to insta-forgive at the end of S5. Well, that’s not TOTALLY true, after being de-chipped Mermista looks around and sees Hordak and Catra and is like “So we’re just ok with this?”. The most reasonable question EVER.
So much was lost because Catra was not able to properly interact with these three (not to mention Glimmer only got to really interact with the father she lost at a young age RIGHT at the end). We see Catra apologizing to both Adora and Entrapta (not GOOD apologies where she acknowledges all she’s done against them and sincere remorse for her actions, but apologies nonetheless), but she never really does this with anybody else. She kind of tries with a chipped Scorpia, but the latter is chipped so that doesn’t go anywhere, and by the end she never even finished he apology before Scorpia hugged her.
No complicated feelings, no confrontations, no visible grudges being held (except for Perfuma in that one episode). But why, you ask, am I insisting upon this? Catra still apologized, or at least tried to, in Adora, Entrapta, and Scorpia’s cases. She doesn’t even really know Micah and Mermista anyway!
That’s kind of the point.
Catra only tries to apologize to those who she personally knew, she doesn’t actually acknowledge to harm she’s done to people outside of them. She never apologized for Angella, never apologized to Bow for all the things she did to him, heck she didn’t even try to apologize to Frosta for “ruining Princess Prom”. She just let Adora tell the others that she jumped sides and that she was cool now. And nobody really batted an eye (except for Perfuma in that one episode). Part of why Catra’s so-called redemption arcs sucks is because she’s barely made to really be confronted with all the bad she’s done, and try to atone for it.
Because she hurt EVERYBODY in the Princess Alliance in some way, and she doesn’t even offer a small apology? I know why Mermista and Micah especially were chipped, it’s because those two could hold a GRUDGE. We saw it with Mermista and Entrapta, and we saw it when Micah just glared at Shadow Weaver when he was saved by her. But of course, Catra’s “redemption arc” mostly revolves around ADORA, as does everything with her, especially because Catradora was shoved into S5 and they were sprinting to make that goal. You know, despite how that goal made no narrative sense, especially because before S5 Adora didn’t seem to have any romantic feelings for Catra, but that’s something for another time.
Anyway, Catra was barely made to acknowledge any wrong she had done to the supposed love of her life and the only two allies she had in the Horde. So it really doesn’t surprise me that she wasn’t made to acknowledge the wrong she did to everybody else (except Shadow Weaver, Catra didn’t have anything to apologize about there) by the writers. Catra was handled with kid gloves, and meanwhile Entrapta did NOT get that luxury.
I’m not saying Entrapta didn’t do anything wrong, but geez did the princesses hold more of a grudge for her than Catra. With some ableism splashed in there too, yikes. And yet, Entrapta actually worked on herself and did her best to atone. She risked her safety trying to get the location of Horde Prime’s ship, she tried to be more sensitive to other’s feelings. She fixed Mara’s ship so they could travel to space, she found a way to de-program the chips, she even visibly reined in her love and fascination for tech in order to get those chips off. Meanwhile, what did Catra do that showed that she was making a change to the Rebelion? To prove she was trying to atone?
The most she does is let them slip by without detection from HP’s forces, and that’s not even her doing, it’s MELOG’S!
Tl;Dr: Catra’s redemption was hastily done and poorly written. Nowhere can that be more found than the fact Micah, Scorpia, and Mermista were not able to confront her with their grievances and make her realize the affects she had on other people BESIDES those in her personal life