The Legend of Zelda TV series retrospective: Episode 2, ‘Cold Spells’

With the personalities, motivations, amd intricacies of the characters now established in the first episode, it’s time for The Legend of Zelda TV series to show us some adventure.

In “Cold Spells,” Zelda orders Link and Spryte to help her clean the castle. Our hero isn’t too pleased about the idea and decides to fake a cold to excuse himself from the chores. Ganon catches wind of the situation and, as you’d expect, is plotting his next attempt at stealing the Triforce of Wisdom.

There are some enjoyable aspects to be found in “Cold Spells,” but while the initial setup of the story is interesting, it ultimately fails to follow through.

Gohma-head, make my day

Sweet ride, Ganon.

First, let’s start things on a positive note with the best aspect of this episode: the monsters.

After ordering Link to help her clean the castle, Zelda enters his room and bemoans the messy state he has left it in. As she opens a window to let in some air, a Moby (a hawk-like creature from Zelda II: The Adventure of Link) swoops in to attack, and Zelda responds by shoving its face into Link’s dirty laundry pile. Disgusted, the Moby flies away in a daze. It’s only a brief encounter, but it’s a treat seeing an enemy that has otherwise only canonically appeared once in the game series.

Another creature from The Adventure of Link also makes an appearance, this time a Lowder. Ganon rides on this giant, beetle-like monster in order to travel to and from Hyrule in his bid to steal the Triforce of Wisdom. He even uses it to scale the side of the tower to reach Link’s room while Link and Zelda are distracted.

Neither of these enemies put up much of a fight for our heroes, but fortunately Gohma arrives in the final sequence to finally provide some action. Trapped in Ganon’s “holding jar,” Link and Zelda are about to become a snack for Ganon’s huge, crab-like pet. It’s an intimidating encounter as it crawls out from the darkness, snapping its claws as it tries to pull out Link from the jar. It’s not around for very long before it is accidentally barbecued by one of Ganon’s fire blasts (which was meant for Link, of course), but considering the previous episode’s big bad wasn’t a recognizable Zelda enemy, it’s nice to have a first true “boss battle” lifted from the games here.

Ganon summons his pet, Gohma, to eat Link and Zelda alive while they are trapped in his impenetrable “holding jar.”

Spryte tooth and claw

Spryte is determined to help Link in any way she can.

While it’s Link and Zelda that descend directly into danger, it’s all thanks to Spryte that they are able to defeat Gohma and Ganon.

Determined to take care of Link earlier in the episode, Spryte visits the market in Hyrule and buys him an orange. A nearby prying Ganon sneakily casts a spell on Spryte, causing her to become hyperactive. When she later attempts to use a spell to get her chores done, she also discovers that her magic has become “too powerful” to keep under her control, and her spell causes complete havoc: mops and cloths come to life and start attacking Spryte, while buckets sprout wings and begin flooding the castle.

The flood pushes Spryte, Link and Zelda out of the castle, and the Triforce of Wisdom is left unguarded, allowing Ganon to make his way back to the Underworld with it. As Link and Zelda take pursuit, Spryte is overcome with guilt, feeling responsible for what happened to the castle and worrying about her friends’ safety.

After a relatively minimal role in the first episode, Spryte is by far the most developed character in “Cold Spells.”

Spryte decides to tail Link and Zelda as the duo enter an Underworld entrance, watching as they inevitably fall into Ganon’s trap and present themselves as Gohma’s dinner. As the beast grabs Link from the top of the holding jar, Spryte unleashes a blast of her boosted magic right at Gohma, loosening its grasp on Link. Spryte also zaps the holding jar to release Zelda, allowing the princess to join the fight too.

Spryte readies a mighty blast of magic to save Link and Zelda from Gohma.

After a relatively minimal role in the first episode, Spryte is by far the most developed character in “Cold Spells,” going from being an unwilling vessel in Ganon’s dastardly plan to using the evil wizard’s spell against him. She does everything she can for Link as he pretends to be sick, and she helps with the cleaning without resistance (though she does stick her tongue out at Zelda after taking orders from her, showing a cheeky side to Spryte), and yet she blames herself for the ensuing chaos and decides to go a step further by joining the fight against Ganon.

“Cold Spells” is effective at making us care about a non-canon character in the Zelda universe, but whether it’s enough to save the episode from flawed writing is another matter.

Misdirection and missed opportunities

The Moby tries to attack Zelda and eavesdrops on her to report to Ganon.

The problem with this episode is that it doesn’t make any significant use of its premise.

When the Moby reports to Ganon about what’s happening at the castle, it somehow fails to mention that Link appears to be sick. This is very odd because this seemed to me like it was going to be the crux of the story as well as a perfect opportunity for Ganon to perceive a weakness in the hero, thus giving him a perfect motivation to launch an assault. It would also have meant that Link’s lies put himself and his friends in danger, but he never faces any consequences in the episode — not even a scolding from Zelda.

It also surprised me that the writers didn’t go this route as an opportunity to implement a lesson into the cartoon. Given the intended young audience, I was really expecting the story to demonstrate why telling lies can cause problems. Then again, there aren’t too many morals to be found here as the Triforce of Wisdom also defends Link’s messy room (“Orderly ways do not make one brave, and neatness does not a kingdom save”). Not that I’d level this as a criticism towards the show per se, but it’s surprising considering the messages from other cartoons of the same era.

Anyway, back to Ganon and the Moby. The only thing the swooping snitch informs its master is that North Castle is undergoing a big spring clean. For whatever reason, this is what stirs Ganon into making his move, though it’s not clear what about this is getting him excited besides giving him the opportunity to make a bad pun: “Cleaning? Time for me to clean out the castle!”

Ganon zaps Spryte, giving her more powerful magic. Nope, I don’t see how this could backfire.

You could argue that Ganon planned to use Spryte all along, but, if that’s the case, the dialogue contradicts it. “Hmm, that fairy could be just the distraction that I need,” he says, implying the decision is impromptu. I also expected Ganon, at this point, to poison or curse the orange in Spryte’s hands in order to attack Link indirectly as this could have made him sick for real, leading to a Boy Who Cried Wolf situation between Link and Zelda. Instead, somehow he thinks that gifting his enemy with more powerful magic is the best way to go. Spoiler: It wasn’t.

There was an opportunity here for the cartoon to show some self-awareness and make light of the incoherence of Ganon’s plans — and it could have worked, considering how goofy Ganon is depicted in this show — but instead his motivation and strategy feels flawed due to the writing. The events in the story feel loosely connected, and the basis of “Cold” in the episode’s title seems quickly forgotten. The “Spells” part feels justified, however.

There’s plenty of magic, but no magic touch

Zelda is handy with a boomerang as well as her bow.

When it comes to action, most of the combat Link and Zelda are engaged in are against inanimate objects that have sprung to life through magic.

Upon hearing Spryte’s screams, Link and Zelda rush to her aid and fight off the possessed mops, brooms, and blankets. As the duo first enter the Underworld via Link’s shortcut, they are also grabbed by possessed tree branches.

Both of these scenes are quite dull, though there is the show’s first appearance of the boomerang to keep Zelda fans awake. The episode also demonstrates how Link and Zelda are able to carry around their large assortment of weapons and items, as Link pulls out shrunken bows and boomerangs from his magic pouch. This is a cool touch, as the NES games never explained just how Link carries so much in his pockets.

Considering how the appearances of all of Ganon’s monsters felt so fleeting, centering two of the episode’s action sequences around cursed objects feels like a waste. I would much rather have seen Link and Zelda use those sword zaps and weapons on more of Ganon’s army. Speaking of Ganon, at the end of the episode there is at least a brief deadly dance with him shooting fire blasts at Link and receiving the end of Zelda’s arrow.

At least this scene feels like a fun homage to the “Sorcerer’s Apprentice” sequence in Disney’s Fantasia.

Not cold, but not so hot either

Link shrinks many of his and Zelda’s weapons with magic, storing them in a magic pouch.

Due to the lack of direction and the nonsensical story beats, “Cold Spells” isn’t quite up there with the best episodes in The Legend of Zelda TV series. It’s a shame that the show hasn’t yet hit its stride as it may put off fans from watching further, but the good news is that the show only gets better from here with a string of great stories in a row.

Despite its issues, this is still a great episode for The Adventure of Link fans, with appearances from the Moby and Lowder enemies. These haven’t returned in any of the games since (unless you want to play the CD-i “classic” Zelda’s Adventure — yeah, didn’t think so), so seeing them in animated form here is a real treat.

the good news is that the show only gets better from here.

I also really appreciated the idea of Link shrinking items in order to carry a big assortment of weapons at once, as it shows the writers took some care into considering details like this to explain the “video game” aspects when translating them into the television format.

Where the plot may fumble in places, the dialogue makes up for it. There’s a particularly funny moment where Spryte defends Link from Zelda, saying, “Don’t pick on Link, he’s sick!”, Zelda sharply responds, “I’ll say,” not long after he tried kissing her.

All that aside, you want to know the real sin that this episode commits? Not once does Link say, “Excuse me, princess!” No wonder this story feels so out of touch.