Tear Jerker / Voltron: Legendary Defender

Goodbye.

Despite Voltron: Legendary Defender having a lighthearted and humorous tone, there are some moments where it hits very close to the heart.

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Warning: Spoilers Off applies to Tear Jerker pages. Proceed at your own risk.

General

• Although Keith suffers from being the most Out of Focus in season one than the other Paladins, from what we can tell from his limited back story and certain things he says in the show, he might have a very sad tale to tell.
  • The Official Website labeled Keith as an orphan, having been so at a young age.
  • The Official Website's 'Which Paladin are you?' quiz lists Keith's greatest fear as 'feelings'....Ouch.
  • Keith's whole relationship with Shiro. Despite having spats with the other Paladins, Keith follows Shiro whole-heartedly and is the only one he hasn't disobeyed or had conflict with. He already knew Shiro personally before the beginning of the series, evidenced by how he welcomed Shiro back in Episode 1. On the other hand, Keith already had a hard time forming relationships because of his loner attitude. He quickly forgot about Lance when he left the Garrison, but not Shiro after a much longer time. However, this means that when Shiro 'died' on the Kerberos Mission, Keith had lost one of the only, if any, people he connected with.
    • Another thing to consider is that Shiro 'died' before Keith was kicked out of the Garrison. Then could it be that Shiro's 'death' was responsible for Keith to have serious 'disciplinary' issues?
    • It was revealed that the clothes Keith was holding on to all this time actually belonged to his father, which he gave to Shiro to use. However, that jacket that Shiro was wearing perished when he 'died' in Season 2, which means that Keith lost one of the only mementos of his father.
  • Keith lived alone in a cabin out in the middle of the desert like a hermit after his expulsion from the Garrison, likely not engaging in human interaction for who knows how long.
  • Keith treasures a mysterious knife that he always carried on his person. He was even shown admiring it in Episode 2 for a split second before he hailed to Allura's call. Seeing the often angry and no-nonsense Keith so attached to an inanimate is quite an experience.
  • When Pidge wanted to leave Team Voltron, he was genuinely angered and even showed a pained expression. He was clearly bothered by it, most likely connected to his mysterious past. It's almost more painful when Keith starts going on about how everyone in the universe has a family, and from what his Official Profile says, he doesn't.
    • Another thing to consider that since he's an orphan, another reason why Keith might be so worked up in the conversation is because he might have abandonment issues and believed that Pidge was 'abandoning' them.
    • Season two more or less confirms this. In the "Blade of Marmora", he has a dream where he sees his father, showing that he did know his father and a few episodes later states after Zarkon is gone, he can search for his family.
• When Shiro's PTSD acts up, it can be pretty upsetting. He's generally mature and collected, but these moments bring out some serious vulnerability.
  • He has a full on panic attack in episode 9, culminating in him ejecting Sendak's pod into space in a panic. When he explains himself to the others, his voice is shaking.
• Mrs. Holt had to hear on television that her husband and son were presumed dead, it's been a year at least since and pretty clear that she never got answers, and then her daughter vanishes too—and Garrison will probably try to cover that up, plus the fact that Pidge put an alternate last name instead of Holt—Mama Holt may never be notified. She'll just have to wonder what happened to the last member of her family until Pidge is able to get a message to Earth...
  • This also leads into Hunk and Lance's family. How were they told their children had just suddenly vanished and never heard from again? It's hard to imagine the heartbreak they must all be going through.
    • Also, special mention to Lance's family. Judging from how much he misses them, we can assume they're close. Assuming they were notified, they're probably not taking his disappearance very well at all.
    • We know from an early season 1 episode, where Hunk states that he'd like to see his family again, that he does have one (who he presumably cares about). But on this note — four of the paladins have at least mentioned a family, except for Shiro. Does he have one? If not, there may not be anyone to know or care that he disappeared, returned, and then disappeared again. If so, then who knows if they were even notified that he came back at all?
  • Then again, who's to say the Garrison even told their families at all?
• Every time Pidge sees their reflection, is she always reminded of the family she lost to an empire trying to take over the universe?
• During an interview Mitch Iverson stated that he wonders if Slav wasn't Obsessively Organized before he was sent to Beta Traz.
  • Seems to be heavily implied by a season 3 episode, where there's an alternate universe version of Slav, who still goes on about multiple realities, but seems to be far less nervous and paranoid than his main verse counterpart.

Season 1

The Rise of Voltron

• When Keith goes in to rescue Shiro, you can see his eyes waver for a moment as he calls his name. Not only did he sound surprised to find that the one person he cared for was alive, but he also sounded close to tears.
  • Keith gently welcoming Shiro back, looking happy but also confused, no doubt wondering where his friend was for the past year.
    • On Keith's board there are notes tacked onto it, and a fan deciphered one of the papers which says, "It kills me when you're away".
• While Allura claims in the next episode that Alteans believe in peace first, and yet in stark contrast to that belief her and Coran's reactions when seeing Lance was to attack him. This is sadly justified when the last thing they were involved in was Zarkon attacking Altea and Allura imploring her father to form Voltron.
  • Allura coming out of stasis from the pod and her first words are: "Father!"
  • That leaves the question of what happened afterwards? Or an even worse possibility, did Coran have to watch Alfor sacrifice himself before he put himself into a pod to sleep?
• The sound of Allura's voice when she finds out she and Coran have been asleep for over ten thousand years. What's even more painful is when she remembers seeing is her father bidding her farewell as Zarkon attacks their castle.
  • Also another sad moment is when she and Coran realize that they are the last of their kind.
• One has to wonder how painful it was for Alfor to decide and put Allura to sleep, with the vague hope that maybe one day they would be able to defeat Zarkon.
  • As an AI, Alfor had over ten-thousand years to ruminate over his decision to send the Lions away and ignore Allura's advice to form Voltron. The first thing he does when his AI is activated is to apologize to his daughter for the pain he's caused and admit that he should have acted differently.
• Lance's expression when he sees the Galra missiles hitting the cave entrance where Hunk was. He looks so devastated at the possibility that he had lost his friend that he refused to leave the planet.
• Shiro tells Pidge he was going with him to find his family and tells Keith he'd have to find the Red Lion by himself. Keith sadly looks at Shiro and quietly asks: "By myself?" He finally got to see that Shiro was alive after a year, and now it feels like he's leaving again.
• It happens in a split second, but when Coran tells the new Paladins that they would have to get ready to fight battalions of Galra ships, you can see Lance's face shift into one of worry. He probably thought he would be able to go back home after this was done, but now he may never get that chance for a long time.

Some Assembly Required

• Shiro freaks at the mention of being sedated after crashing, then what seems to be at least 24 hours later, isn't asleep or even resting like the others - he's still in uniform, doing pushups. Why? His PTSD comes with night terrors.
• When all the Paladins are training, they take part in a mind molding exercise with caps projecting thoughts and how they must clear their mind. Besides Hunk, who was comically thinking of food, the rest of the Paladins have questionably saddening thoughts.
  • Lance thinks of his large family back on Earth, which he had left behind and clearly missed.
  • Pidge thinks of 'a certain picture'.
  • Keith thinks of his cabin back on Earth, which is located in the middle of nowhere out in the desert. It isn't very clear why this location occupies Keith's mind, but it tugs on your heartstrings when you realize that he had been alone in that cabin for who knows how long. It's technically the only home he's got.
    • Acutally, it's not so bad for him, considering Keith seems to be most content where it is quiet and peaceful, like his cabin.
  • Shiro thinks of the Kerberos rocket and launch pad (the same rocket and launch pad seen in the background of Pidge's picture), which is in effect, where his life on Earth ended.
  • Pidge is so upset he throws the helmet off and wants to stop, and when he says that he's just tired, it briefly sounds as if he's on the verge of tears.
• When they're all facing the Gladiator, Shiro gets a flashback of the Galra and the memory alone leaves him petrified. He did all he could to escape the nightmare he was forced to participate in only to get thrown back into fighting under different circumstances.
  • Even when Keith protects Shiro and asks if he's alright, Shiro is so scared he can't even respond or react when the Gladiator flips Keith into the air and slams him into the older man.

Return of the Gladiator

• Shiro looks visibly shaken when the prisoner recounts the time Shiro had injured Matt when going against the Gladiator. While Pidge's outburst afterwards is understandable, Shiro has amnesia and he can't remember if he had actually hurt his friend or not.
  • Not only that, but Pidge seems to not trust adults, maybe because the Garrison had covered up what happened on the Kerberos mission. So to hear that Shiro, someone they've come to trust had hurt Matt no doubt shattered that trust for Pidge.
• Pidge's scream when Shiro pulls him away from the computer as the Robeast's ship falls to where they were. He had been so close to getting information on his family's location, after searching for so long, and then it was all taken away.
  • Even Shiro understood how much this meant to the younger Paladin, but had to make the decision to pull away or else be killed.
• Shiro momentarily lapses into his PTSD because the Robeast was a monster he fought before during his time as a prisoner.
• Counts as a heartwarming moment, when Shiro finally tells Pidge the full story and how he protected Matt. Pidge cries and hugs Shiro, apologizing for ever doubting him.
  • He also admits to Pidge that he misses their father and brother as well, while noting that they would have been proud to see how far she's come.

Fall of the Castle of Lions

• Even before the Galra forces start their siege on the castle, we have Pidge telling (almost) everyone that he's leaving Team Voltron to search for his brother and father.
  • Allura tries to get him to admit his big secret to her by noting at how the two of them had a lot in common, starting with how they both lost their fathers to Zarkon. Pidge makes an immediate comeback by saying "Yeah, but I'm going to get mine back". Allura visibly flinches at this and Pidge quickly apologizes. However, when Allura tries to persuade Pidge from leaving, he angrily asks, "If you had a chance to get your father back, wouldn't you?!" and then leaves after another quick apology.
  • Lance admits to Coran that he's homesick, while telling him all the things on Earth he misses, especially his mom's hugs. The guy really just wants to go home.
    • Shortly after Lance and Coran muse about their homelands, when the bomb the Galra forces have sneaked into the castle is about to go off mere feet away from them, Lance immediately shoves Coran down so he won't get hit with the brunt of the explosion. Unfortunately, it puts Lance out of commission, since he ended up taking heavy damage instead (from what it looks like when the rest of the team arrives on the scene, Lance is only a few steps away from where the bomb detonated). He gets better, of course, but the look on everyone's face when they see Lance's motionless body is pretty sad.
• Although the scene of Lance trying to teach Keith about a Voltron cheer ("I say Vol, you say tron. Vol?" "Voltron...?") is a pretty funny scene, it's actually really sad in hindsight. Keith had spent his entire life on his own and was definitely not good at socializing. Him being unable to grasp the concept of Lance's simple Team Cheer is heartbreaking when you realize why.

Tears of the Balmera

• Coran excitedly tells Hunk about the Balmera saying how beautiful it was and the times when he came with his grandfather to visit it saying, "You're in for a real treat". When he sees that Galra are basically killing the Balmera, you can hear the disbelief and shock in his voice. Granted, it has been 10,000 years, but it's still a punch to the gut when he realizes everything he had loved has now probably been destroyed by the Galra Empire.
• Hunk hearing Shay talk about the sky and how she can't even fathom being free of the Galra's rule. It really hurts when you wonder how many people like the Balmerans are suffering because of Zarkon.
• In a flashback we see Pidge's family the day before the launch and how happy she was, it only serves to be even more saddening when you know what happens to her brother and father. Then there's Pidge and her mom watching the news of the Kerberos mission and how the whole crew had crashed due to "pilot error". The look on their faces alone is enough to pull at heartstrings.
  • When Pidge gets caught hacking into the computer at the Garrison as she's roughly escorted out they yell, "You can't keep me out! I'll find the truth! I'll never stop!" it only goes to show how far Pidge is willing to go in order to find her family.
• Pidge being upset after she lost Rover probably wasn't just over that. This was the first time she personally took someone's life. Enemy soldier or not, people don't just brush that off.
• When Shay sacrifices herself so Hunk and Coran could escape, you can hear how painful it is for Hunk to force himself to leave her behind; he even goes to promise that he would come back to save her.

Taking Flight

• The look of worry some of the group has when Lance is still inside the healing pod.
• Rolo recounting his reasons for running from the Galra Empire and showing the group his prosthetic leg, claiming that the Empire took something from him. Shiro quietly sympathizes with how Rolo feels.

Return to the Balmera

• The groans of pain you can hear from the Balmera when the Galra destroy the area around them is heartbreaking. It really shows how alive the Balmera is and the careful consideration the group needs to take in order to not make it suffer even more.
• Rax telling Hunk and the others that Shay could possibly be "gone for good" because she helped them escape. All he wanted to do was protect his family, and probably felt guilty that he played a part in getting his sister captured.

Rebirth

• Even though it wasn't their fault, the Balmerans felt they were responsible for their planet slowly dying. They believed there was nothing they could do and were willing to die with the planet that had given them so much.
  • Allura's speech can be this, because she had lost her planet to the Galra and would probably never forgive herself if she couldn't save the Balmerans from the same fate.
• When Allura says she'd do the rejuvenation ceremony in order to restore the Balmera, Coran begs her not to do it. But when she makes her decision, he quietly stands to the side, his expression practically says: "I've already lost so many people, I don't want to lose you too."

Crystal Venom

• The combination of a Galra crystal infecting the power system and Sendak's mind infecting the computer system causes King Alfor's AI to become corrupted. The corrupted Alfor plays with Allura's emotions by showing her holograms of her long lost home, and tempting her with returning. In reality, the AI has tricked her into flying the ship into a star about to go supernova. Once the illusion is broken, she is forced to destroy her father's AI power source, losing the last connection she has to him, in order to save the ship. She puts on a good face when her crewmates offer their condolences, but the emotional trauma of this is unimaginable; she and Coran were already the Last of Their Kind, their home planet destroyed millennia ago. To have that brought into question and exploited in order to put her and her friends in peril, with the only chance to escape being to sacrifice the last vestige of the life she once had... proof the a Heroic Sacrifice doesn't always have to be life or liberty.
  • Watching Alfor's AI flicker back and forth between its corrupted and normal versions is both a Tear Jerker and Nightmare Fuel in a way. At least he and Allura got to have one last goodbye, but him begging her to deactivate him just makes the scene that much worse.
• Shiro's voice as he denies that he's anything like Sendak is guaranteed to have anyone shaken. He's so terrified as he wonders if maybe what Sendak was saying is true and he's afraid to admit it.
  Sendak: Did you really think a monster like you could ever be a Voltron Paladin?!
  Shiro: Stop it! (punches Sendak's pod so hard the glass cracks)

Collection and Extraction

• Allura tossing Shiro into an escape pod just as they were about to be surged by a group of Galra soldiers. Allura smiles at Shiro as the guards swarm her and he is forced to watch helplessly as his pod prepares to take off.
• Shiro's face when the other Paladins ask where Allura was.

The Black Paladin

• When Shiro returns to the castle without Allura, everyone is visibly upset. However, what's shocking is how Coran admonished Shiro for abandoning Allura and saying, "No, Shiro lost Allura!". This is coming from Coran, and him blaming Shiro doesn't help their situation.
  • He does apologize later, but his words had obviously hurt Shiro. Josh Keaton noted in an interview that out of all the things said to Shiro, Coran's words cut him the most.
• When Keith suggests not rescuing Allura because of the chance of Zarkon taking the Lions, Hunk and Lance quickly jump up and berate him for ever suggesting a thing, despite it being a valid suggestion. Lance takes it a step further and calls Keith a selfish coward.
  Keith: Or maybe we shouldn't go on this mission at all. Think about it. We'll be delivering the universe's only hope to the universe's biggest enemy.
  Hunk: Keith, that's cold, even for you. What if it was one of us? What if it was me? You wouldn't leave me, would you? Would you?
  Keith: I'm not saying I like the idea. I'm just thinking like a Paladin.
  Lance: No, you're thinking of yourself because you're too scared to do what's right!
  • It ends with Pidge calming everyone down and Keith staying silent for the rest of the discussion. We don't even get to see Keith's face when Lance says those words. This is one of the few times Keith ever contributes to a discussion over a course of action, and he probably regrets ever opening his mouth.
• Allura channeling all of her anger and hatred at Zarkon for destroying her planet and charging at him. Even though she's quickly subdued by Haggar, her voice shows how broken she is.
• Shiro fighting against Haggar is a direct mirror to when Sven fought Haggar and dies. Some who might have noticed this no doubt were more than worried about Shiro's fate at the end of the battle.
  • He's then held up by throat by an evil doppelganger of himself, pulled into a dark void where all his senses are shut off and is toyed with and mocked by Haggar. It no doubt brought back memories of his time as a prisoner.
• Watching all of the Lions being dragged into different wormholes while the Castle of Lions continues going forward with no way to stop, and effectively throwing the team into different parts of the galaxy. To make matters worse, the episode ends right there.

Season 2

Across the Universe

• Keith starts to desperately call out for Shiro, since his connection has nothing but static.
  • Shiro gets a connection as well once he stumbles out of his Lion and sits down on a nearby wall. While he tells Keith that he's okay, his pained expression is anything but fine.
  • He briefly mentions the wound Haggar gave him and Keith's tone turns to immediate worry, he pretends he didn't mention it.
  • As the creatures on the planet begin to slowly circle Shiro, he looks so tired and helpless as he clutches onto his glowing wound.
• Even though Pidge makes fun of her team by recreating them out of literal junk, when you remember she's all alone and far from her friends, it hurts to realize that this is probably her way of coping.
  • She claimed it was nice that she would have "me time" and "no one to annoy me", but she clearly looks like she'd rather be with her friends than sitting in an unknown world inside her broken lion.
  • It's even worse considering that Pidge was the only one who ended up completely alone; all of the other main characters at least had someone else with them. Her frustrated cries of how she wants to find her friends are also kinda heartwarming, but drive in the fact that she must have been very lonely and scared.
• As Coran continues to get younger and younger until he's a baby Allura is desperately trying to keep it together and find a way out before Coran disappears. She holds baby Coran as they're going to the void again, she cries and admits that Coran was like a second father to her.
• Shiro telling Keith to lead Voltron if anything were to happen to him. He's obviously shaken by the fact that not only Zarkon could control the Black Lion but also Keith and is beginning to doubt his role as the Black Paladin. Keith sees this and tells him to not say that and to hang on until the others found them.
  • Just the painful smile that Shiro gives Keith makes the scene much more heartbreaking. Shiro has been pushing his own feelings and thoughts aside for the good of the team, but now he's just so exhausted and delirious with pain he's willing to believe that he's not worthy of being the Black Paladin anymore and he's confiding this all to Keith who's having none of it.

The Depths

• Lance can be heard yelling for Keith and Shiro before he and Hunk are pulled into a separate wormhole.
• Poor Florona who was the first one to find Lance and Hunk. Made even worse is that she was still under mind control when she swam to her death.
  • Just imagine how many other mermaids were sacrificed to the garden.
• When Lance is forced to face a mind-controlled Hunk, he desperately pleads for his friend to snap out of it, even yelling that he didn't want to hurt him.
• The queen's My God, What Have I Done? face when the brainwashing snaps. She doesn't remember what the garden made her do, but she realizes that it was bad.

Shiro's Escape

• The viewer is reminded of what Shiro went through during his captivity, especially when he yells, "You took my hand, what more do you want?!"
  • Hunk asks if Shiro was alright when they watch him rest in a cryopod in the middle of a nightmare.
• The group talks about Zarkon and Keith rubs the fact that not only does Zarkon have the Bayard, he was the reason when they fought him Voltron was scattered, right in front of Allura's face. Shiro questions why she didn't tell them who the original Black Paladin was and she justifies her reason as protecting them and allowing Shiro to bond with the Black Lion. She sounds hurt by this and no one can deny that her heart was in the right place.
  • However, because of how Keith managed to pilot the Black Lion to save Shiro he bitterly remarks that maybe his lion is having second thoughts.
• Allura's Fantastic Racism towards Ulaz. He's not surprised by it either; he says he cares more about winning the war than winning their trust.
• Ulaz offers to take Team Voltron to the Blade's base, but the team is hesitant. Everyone brings up legitimate points against it, which is reasonable given their past experience with trusting strangers, and Shiro's the only one vouching for Ulaz.
• Zarkon has already made it clear what he does to his people who fail to follow orders until the end. Prorok gets the short end of the stick as he's dragged away to what Haggar calls, "A fate worse than death."
  • The fate worse than death is becoming a Robeast to fight Voltron.
  • Also, while Prorok did have his own agenda, he was still innocent of letting Voltron escape like he'd been accused of doing. It just goes to show how ruthless Zarkon is towards his own men.
• Ulaz has spent decades or maybe even centuries fighting against Zarkon and he decides to make it his last mission to defeat the Robeast by going inside of it and opening a space pocket dimension.

Greening the Cube

• Lance is scared that Keith has his eye on the Blue Lion, and warns him to stay away. Doubles as a Funny Moment.
• When they find out the king has betrayed his people, a Broken Pedestal moment ensues, and they out him to the other Olkari.
• Just like the Balmerans, the Olkari are being treated as slaves on their own planet, forced to work for the Galra Empire or else be destroyed.
• When Pidge gets shot down by one of the cubes, Shiro can be heard yelling her name in a panic as they watch her crash to the ground.
  • The others ask if she's okay and it cuts to the Green Lion lying motionless.

Eye of the Storm

• Allura is the main reason they're able to go into wormholes and warp around the galaxy, but when it focuses on her tired face, it's obvious how much the warping is sapping at her strength. She does all of this and doesn't complain or let the others know.
• Can also be seen as heartwarming, but Shiro gently telling Allura to rest even when she said she couldn't sleep and had to keep an eye out for Zarkon.
• Zarkon trying to split Voltron apart, he did it once and he could do it again. Even Shiro admits that he forgot how powerful the Galra Emperor's control on the Black Lion was.

The Ark of Tajueer

• The aliens on the planet begging the Galra not to take any more of their ship parts or else they wouldn't be able to leave their planet. The commander simply dismisses their pleas.
• Keith's nightmare about the true meaning of his blade and how Red might not accept him as its Paladin anymore. What's worse, is how he's dressed in Galra armor, and when he looks at his blade, he hears Zarkon saying he can track him anywhere. It's honestly the most scared and vulnerable we've seen Keith so far.
  • Allura noted that Keith had all his belongings on him when he tried to sneak off to one of the pods. Keith wholly believed that he was the reason Zarkon could track them, and seemed prepared for the fact that he may never come back to the Paladins.
• Allura continues to express her biased views of the Galra which causes Keith to sound hurt that she wouldn't at least consider that some Galra didn't want to be under Zarkon's rule.
• The two being shot out into space after their ship was destroyed, the way the camera moves in Keith's perspective shows how terrified the two of them are.
• Could be seen as a little sad when Coran approaches Red and tells Alfor that he was finally "following in his footsteps".

Space Mall

• Black showing Shiro its memories of when Alfor created the lion and the planet Zarkon used to inhabit before things went awry.
• Shiro fighting against Zarkon, he knows how outclassed he is and the stakes only get higher when Zarkon explains that if he died in this realm, he would also cease to exist in reality.
• Imagine how long it's been since the Paladins saw something that even resembles their home on Earth like the mall.

The Blade of Marmora

• When the Mamorans ask Shiro to confirm whether or not Keith always had his knife, and even though Keith tells Shiro that he knows him and he had that blade his whole life, Shiro sounds so torn when he admits that he doesn't know.
• The Mamorans dismissive attitude towards Ulaz, this angers both Shiro and Keith.
• How desperate Keith is this episode to find out the truth of his past. He takes on a trial which is essentially super-powered alien ninjas brutally beating him up while he only has a knife until he either gives up or beats them. Each time he loses, more come and by the time he finally passes it, he's barely standing.
• After getting past the Marmorans, Keith sees an illusion of Shiro as Kolivan explains that Keith's suit creates a virtual mindscape that reflects the wearer's hopes and fears. He then tells Shiro that Keith desperately wants to see him.
  Fake Shiro: What is it with you and that thing?
  Keith: It's the only connection I have to my past. It's my chance to learn who I really am.
  Fake Shiro: You know exactly who you are: A Paladin of Voltron. We're all the family you need.
  Keith: Shiro, you're like a brother to me. But I have to do this.
  Fake Shiro: No, you don't. So just give them the knife.
  Keith: I can't do that.
  Fake Shiro: Just give up the knife, Keith! You're only thinking of yourself, as usual!
  Keith: ...I've made my choice.
  Fake Shiro: (Coldly) Then you've chosen to be alone. (Walks away)
  • After hearing him say this, Keith desperately yells for Shiro to stop and chases after him. This proves that, while Keith's greatest hope is to see Shiro, his greatest fear is being all alone.
• Keith makes the decision to turn his back to his "father" and leave the shack in order to save the people outside who were being attacked by the Galra. Even when his father told him his mother gave him the knife and was coming if he chose to stay inside the shack. His main goal until this point was to find out who he was, but when people needed him, he chose to help. That wasn't an easy choice for him to make, especially when he looks at his father one last time and says, "Goodbye, Dad." The poor kid sounds like he's about to cry.
  • Harsher in Hindsight, the shack Keith thought of in the first season during the mind-building exercise is probably connected to his father. No wonder it was something that was so personal to him.
• The sad way Keith's father looks at the knife when talking about Keith's mother. With that one look you can tell how much he misses her.

The Belly of the Weblum

• The reveal that Keith is part-Galra actually causes Allura to treat Keith coldly. Which Keith is pretty hurt by.
• Keith's◊ expression◊ when Allura coldly stares at him in what he believes is hatred. He isn't angry or heartbroken or annoyed by it. The look on his face is just... a tired acceptance. It's like he's thinking, "I know you hate me, and that's fine. I probably deserve it. I'm sorry."
• Keith snapping at Hunk to stop asking questions because it was bad enough that Allura hated him now. Even though Hunk meant no harm, Keith's highly aware of one person on their team who wasn't taking it especially well, and he wanted to avoid anyone else hating him.
• Keith's bitterness towards the Galra he saved after they pull their gun on him and take a bag of scaultrite.
  Keith: So, you're just like the rest of them."

Escape from Beta Traz

• Slav getting electrocuted by the Warden in order to extract information from his brain.
• Pidge's expression when she vows to find Matt as she hacks into the system. She still hasn't forgotten her main mission.
  • When she does finally get a match and a video of rebels rescuing Matt, she looks like she would grab the screen to see if it was actually her brother.
  • Pidge looks like she's going to cry when Shiro comments that Matt would be fine and he was a survivor like her.
• Lance has a moment when he tells what he thinks is Slav about his teammates and their accomplishments and realizes that he doesn't have a unique skill compared to the rest of them. He even briefly wonders if he's just The Load to them.

Stayin' Alive

• Allura returns to the Balmera and Shay asks if Hunk came with her, her face drops a little when Allura says he was elsewhere.
• Lance tells Hunk to get back to the castle and get the Red Lion as he distracts the Robeast. However, the Robeast shoots a beam that Lance dodges and it ends up hitting the Yellow Lion. Lance yells out to Keith and Hunk as he watches them fall towards the Balmera.
  • Hunk panicking at the controls as he tries to get his lion working again.
• At the end of the episode we see that Allura is still cold to Keith. This hits the zenith when she thanks only Hunk for getting the scaultrite. When Hunk points out that Keith helped too, she only gives him a cold look and walks away.

Best Laid Plans

• Thace being tortured after it was discovered that he was the traitor. It's so hard to watch him being electrocuted and screaming with pain.
• Counts as heartwarming, when Allura apologizes for treating Keith coldly because he was revealed to be part Galra and says she thinks of him and the others as her family. Before he leaves, she gives him and hug and makes him promise to come back to them.
• Thace's final moments as the the main hub of the Galra ship is prepared to explode, he completed his mission with a peaceful smile.
• Since the teludav that they use is much bigger than what they normally have, it puts such a strain on Allura that after she opens a wormhole for Zarkon's ship she immediately passes out.

Blackout

• After Haggar and her Druids manage to take the Quintessence from Voltron, the Paladins are knocked out. But by the way their bodies just float up from their seats makes it look like more than them just passing out.
• Allura sacrificing herself and the castle to fight Zarkon off in order to buy the Paladins some time, knowing full well the consequences it could have.
  • Her scream as they're hit by Zarkon's blast causes the Paladins to look on in horror as part of the castle explodes. While this does give them the strength to keep fighting, in that moment they really believed they had lost Allura and Coran, their family.
  • Coran wakes up after the blast and the first thing he does is float towards an unconscious Allura, grabbing her shoulders and asking if she was alright.
• The Paladins protecting Shiro who's out of commission. Even though they're getting beaten up by Zarkon, they still refuse to back down and willingly take the blows just so he can't get the Black Lion.
• Antok gets taken out by Haggar and her Druid in one of the most brutal ways possible.
• Allura is fighting Haggar and manages to get the upper hand on the Druid. When her hood falls off and we finally get to see her full face, Allura is shocked at the revelation and horror that it brings.
  Allura: You're... Altean?!
• The Paladins, get the Black Lion and bring it back to the castle, and when they open the cockpit the Black Bayard is inside... however Shiro is gone.
  • Keith was ahead of the other Paladins as they were running towards the Black Lion, and he was screaming Shiro's name. The look of desperation in his eyes as he runs is heartbreaking, and once they enter the Black Lion to find Shiro isn't there one of Keith's greatest fears is confirmed.
  • Even worse when you remember that during the Trials we learned his greatest fear actually is losing Shiro and that it's come true twice now. The way the camera puts him in the middle during the final shot basically confirms that the realization was exactly what the show was gunning for.
• Knowing that Zarkon has a son and the Paladins had been holding onto the belief that once they defeat Zarkon the whole universe would be saved. Not only are they down one Paladin, they also have another ruler to worry about, which renders all of their previous efforts useless.

Season 3

Changing of the Guard

• Keith desperately searching the last area where they saw Shiro, only to come up empty-handed, and more frustrated than before as he quietly tells Coran he was returning to the castle.
• The locals on the planet Puig thank Hunk and Lance for saving them and Lance points out that the Blade of Marmora also did a lot to help. The faces they make say everything, and shows how little the people of the universe trust people who look like the Galra.
  • Kolivan even notices this reaction, and turns his head away as if to say, "I know you still can't trust us, I'm sorry."
• The group meets up and talk about how more people are rebelling against the empire, and after Hunk points out they couldn't form Voltron anymore Keith angrily says that nobody seems to care that Shiro was missing. Allura suggests they start looking for a replacement pilot for the Black Lion which Keith vehemently rejects.
  Keith: No, I will find him. Shiro is the only person who didn't give up on me. I won't give up on him.
• Keith angrily explodes at the meeting when the alliance asked why they can't form Voltron as he tells them to fight for themselves. You can feel how hard this hits the group as he storms out.
  • Just how uncomfortable and scared the team looks when they have to tell others that they couldn't exactly form Voltron at the moment. Shiro's disappearance is having a huge effect on the team and they all miss him.
• As Haggar leaves Zarkon's chamber, she instructs one of the Druids to not let anyone inside.
• We get to see the Black Lion again, but instead of sitting up proudly like the other lions, it's lying on its side as if its been wounded. Even its eyes are dimmed out.
• The others do their best to comfort Keith, but he still looks scared of the fact that Shiro may never return.

The Red Paladin

• The Puig who believed they had finally been freed from the Galra Empire are now brought back into it. Even Lotor points out that despite Voltron's words of freedom, they were nothing but empty promises.
• Lance yelling at Keith and saying that he won't accept him as their leader. Keith yells back and says if Lance wanted to lead then he could have the job because Shiro was the only who wanted him to lead the team. The second everyone calms down and processes what Keith says he turns away and avoids eye contact with his friends.
• Predictably, the Lion switch is rather traumatic for the three Paladins involved:
  • Keith begs Black not to choose him...to no avail. Black has already decided who her next pilot (and the team leader) is, and his reluctance isn't going to put her off. Keith feared he would do badly, and doesn't want to admit that Shiro might not come back — but Black has chosen, and he has no choice but to deal with it.
  Keith: I know you wanted this for me, Shiro. But I'm not you. I can't lead them like you. (whispering as Black activates) Please, no...
  • Allura pleads with Red to accept her as its pilot, but Red refuses to respond despite Allura's willingness and desperation. Poor Allura is driven to tears over her failure to connect with her father's Lion. We also see that she has a certain amount of guilt at being in the back line and not fighting alongside the Paladins in what she considers her war.
  • Lance is probably hit worst: while Keith leaves Red to pilot Black (albeit very reluctantly) rather than vice-versa, and Red was never Allura's to begin with, Lance is actively rejected (as far as he can see) by his beloved Blue, who refuses to lower her particle barrier. The perceived abandonment and humiliation is one more kick to his self-esteem, and he's ready to meekly accept that he's not cut out to be a Paladin (until Red roars to tell him otherwise). As it turns out, this has long-reaching consequences for Lance and his sense of belonging on the team. When he tried to bond with the Black Lion, he pumps himself up saying, "This is your moment", and sits inside the lion longer than anyone else before giving up in frustration.
    • Lance is visibly frustrated when Blue won't respond to him, and he tries everything he can think of to get her attention again. It clearly hits him hard, and it can be difficult to watch.
    • Sadder still is the ironic Call-Back to the very first episode: in "The Rise of Voltron," Lance is the only one particle-barrier enshrouded Blue will respond to, and it was his one moment of "uniqueness" in a team that he feels constantly outshines him. Now she locks him out in favor of the super-powered Princess...and he ends up getting Keith's vacated spot. Again.
• Lance and Allura hear the Red Lion roar, but Lance refuses to believe it was calling for him. He suggests to Allura that maybe the Red Lion wanted her, however she admits that while she'd like for that to be true she knows what the Red Lion thinks of her.
• Lance notes that he wasn't expecting Allura's Paladin armor to be pink, but she looked good in it. She replied that on Altea, pink was a color they wore to honor fallen warriors. She said she wore it to honor not only the past Paladins, but also Shiro.
• Lance's goodbye to Blue at the end. His farewell has a real weight to it, suggesting that he doesn't expect to reclaim her, and that he's passing the torch to Allura as his permanent replacement. Which makes sense, as even if Shiro returns, and Keith goes back to Red, Lance doesn't know if Blue will let him pilot her anymore. He tells the Lion that he wanted to stay with her, but that we don't always get what we want in life, before quietly turning to Allura, handing over the Blue Bayard and telling her that if he had to lose Blue, he's glad it was to Allura.
• While Lance's Crazy Jealous Guy attitude in Season 2 when he thought Keith wanted to steal Blue from him was funny at the time, it gets tear-jerking here, since he ''actually does'' lose Blue (albeit not to Keith, but still).

The Hunted

• Allura, who finds out flying the Lions is nothing like flying the castle, is almost abandoned a few times by her teammates.
• How stressed Keith becomes after he realizes what his decisions had costed him. Not only could they not see Lotor anywhere on the planet or communicate with each other, he had lost almost everyone and he blamed himself for his rashness. The poor guy sounds like he's on the brink of tears.
  • Once everyone is separated, they're all scared and don't know what to do. Even Pidge admits to Hunk that without the proper equipment and no way of knowing where to find everyone, they were stuck.
• Hunk looking around for the others and asking in a frightened voice if anyone was there. As Pidge stumbles upon him, her voice sounds panicked as she desperately calls out in hopes that she'd find someone.
• Allura yelling at Blue and asking what it wanted from her. She had tried everything, and the Lion still wasn't working with her.
  • Her expression alone when Lotor is stalking around the area where she's hiding. She's never been this terrified, and she's piloting a Lion that she has difficulty controlling.

Hole in the Sky

• The horrible alternate reality of what could have been for the Alteans, and Allura had to make the choice to give all of that up to protect their reality.
  • Then there's how hopeful and excited Allura sounded when she picked up Altean life forces... only for her to find out how ruthless the supposedly peaceful Alteans had become in this reality.
• Sven giving his life to protect Lance. Slav said this was the reality where everything worked out fine... so was Sven getting shot a part of it? Of course, if Sven's comments about getting to a Space Hospital are to be believed, he probably made it.
• From the paladins' point of view, they'd already lost Shiro, and now a guy who looks just like him sacrificed himself for them. That had to hit them a lot harder than what was actually shown.
• Coran's horrified Big "NO!" after the Paladins disappear into a mysterious portal. They were merely transported to another reality, but for all Coran knew at the time, he just lost the only family he had left.
  • He's visibly relieved when they get back, which is kind of a heartwarming Tear Jerker. Coran spent the episode completely alone and stressed out, and now he knows that he didn't lose everyone he cares about.

The Journey

• Being held captive by the Galra again triggers Shiro's PTSD and he quickly escapes.
• Shiro having to survive the ice planet, and even having to heal the wound on his leg with his hand. The way he screams lets you know that it was extremely painful.
  • His entire time on the ice planet is just this. He never seems to catch a break no matter where he goes.
• Just how Shiro tries to keep moving forward and get to the Paladins as quickly as he can. Yet every time it looks like he could reach them, they pass him by.
• The way he slowly begins to log his days, and after a week he looks ready to just give up and let himself drift aimlessly in space forever.
  • It's worse than that. His pilot log has hit day 7, and he says he's had no food, possibly no water, and is running out of oxygen. Humans can last about 3 days without any water, max, and roughly 7 days with no food at all. Humans can only last minutes without any air to breathe before suffocating. Shiro wasn't just going to drift aimlessly in space, he was dying.

Tailing a Comet

• Keith's talk with Shiro feels like it should be pretty heartwarming, but it ends up feeling distant, and scared.
  • Even with Shiro's return, Keith is used to the fact that he was the leader now and he immediately steps down when Shiro started to give orders. The moments the two share become even more awkward and stressed as the episode goes on.
• Lance talking with Keith. He genuinely considers himself to be lower than the others, and since he did the math with all of the others people who can pilot the Lions he should probably stay behind. He even comments that Allura has come a long way in such a short amount of time, and says that if Keith wants a team, he'll need his best while he can stay behind in the Castle.
• Everyone's ready to be back in their Lions and going back to how things were before, but for some reason, the Black Lion won't accept Shiro. Keith almost looks terrified of the fact that he would have to be the leader for a while longer.
  • Shiro's just returned from second time escaping the Galra, being stuck on an ice planet, nearly dying out in space, and yet the lion that he's had such a close bond with suddenly won't recognize him as its pilot. This was probably a huge blow to Shiro even when he stepped down for Keith to be the leader.
• While Keith is the one leading the mission, the other Paladins ultimately listen to what Shiro tells them to do and Keith is left alone.
• Shiro and Keith arguing over what courses of action to take. While Keith does listen to Shiro's advice in the end, it's hard to not feel the strain between the two.
• Even though Lotor was the one who gave the orders, he tells Acxa that her failure was a disappointment to him. When we see Acxa's face, she looks both irritated and a little heartbroken at Lotor's words.
• At the end of the episode, Shiro assures Keith that he's slowly becoming a good leader, but Keith doesn't look enthralled by the compliment.

The Legend Begins

• We get to see the full fallout between Alfor and Zarkon, and as expected, it isn't pretty.
  • Zarkon tricked the other Paladins into widening a rift on the Galran homeworld so that he could gain more Quintessence to save his wife, Honerva. Not only did they fail, but both succumbed to poisoning, and Alfor was forced to destroy the planet after evacuating the citizens. Alfor had a state funeral for both Zarkon and Honerva, but Zarkon came Back from the Dead, fully consumed with a desire for revenge. Honerva also came back, but lost her memories of her husband and took the name Haggar.
• Also watching Honerva's slow descent into madness as she further experiments with Quintessence. From testing it on her cat Cova who had been dying, to become an addict of it herself and literally forgetting who her husband was and who she was.
  • Seeing Zarkon trying his best to keep his wife with him as she lay sick in bed is bound to remind a lot of people of their own loved ones.
    • Honerva dismissively telling Alfor that the gift given to his daughter for her birthday was only 'customary', after he thanked her and seemed happy to see her again. It's a small moment, but he looks legitimately taken aback and rather hurt. This is clearly near the beginning of when Honerva was losing herself to the Quintessence, and it's all downhill from there.
• Becomes a bit Harsher in Hindsight, when Haggar tells Throk that Zarkon needs no one at his bedside when Zarkon stayed by her side while she was bedridden and driven to madness.
  • Unless you take it to mean that Zarkon needs no one by his side other than Haggar herself.
• That all of the horrible things that happened and are currently happening in the series was because of Zarkon's undying love for his wife.
• When Alfor and the other Paladins retrieve Honerva and Zarkon after fleeing the portal, the camera focuses on the couple holding hands.
• Zarkon wakes up after his death and the first thing he does is look for his wife, who is sitting at the side of her bed, wrapping her cloak around her and doesn't seem to recognize him.
  • A Galra soldier walks by their room and Zarkon commands him to take them home. The soldier apologizes, telling Zarkon that Daibazal was gone and everybody had to be evacuated. Not only did Zarkon lose his home planet, he also, in a sense lost his wife.
• Alfor's death, although brief, is still sad to watch.
  • There's a small instance where Trigel is seen carrying an injured Blaytz, Gygren is nowhere to be found, and at the end it's only safe to assume the fates of the former Paladins.
    • The most gut-wrenching thought that comes up with this? The paladins were betrayed not only by their leader, but also by their best friend.
• There should be a special note for Coran. He was there to witness the former Paladins coming together, the forming of Voltron, the years afterwards and then Zarkon's subsequent betrayal. Coran has gone through a lot.
  • It should also be noted that because he is the one who narrates most of the backstory between Zarkon and Alfor, as well as his knowledge on quintessence and what they learned about what lies in the rift beyond the universe, given the story, Coran is probably even aware that Zarkon is not who he originally was and probably has been taken over by something else and that their old friend and ally is now, more or less, an Empty Shell being forced to commit atrocities against his own will that would have appalled the original Zarkon. Sheesh.

Season 4

Code of Honor

• Keith's decision to train alongside the Blade of Marmora is putting a strain on his relationship with the other Paladins.
  • His decision at the end of the episode to leave the team and join the Blade of Marmora full-time so that Shiro can pilot the Black Lion, especially given his pained look once the team can no longer see him.
• When Keith tells Shiro that he and the Blade have intel on Lotor and they should start looking for him so they can take him down, Shiro refuses to listen, telling Keith to join the others and that they'll discuss it later. As Keith tries to argue Shiro literally orders him to meet up with the other Paladins. The small look of shock that crosses Keith's face is incredibly painful, especially when he immediately appears to shrink down after that.
• Keith finally arrives to help move some ship, but gets the coldest greeting from his teammates. Hunk and Pidge regard Keith with disdain and annoyance for his absence, while Lance looks like he's just tired of Keith not taking his Paladin duties as seriously as the Blades.
• Allura is handing out rations to the refugees and catches sight of Keith and Kolivan in the crowd. Keith looks at her for a moment before covering his face with his mask and walking away. The princess eyes follows where Keith leaves, before returning to her work with a look of worry.
• The ship the Blades enter is rigged, while Keith and Kolivan pry open the door, Regris stays behind in order to stop the explosion. Keith yells to him that there was no time, but Regris refuses to move saying to just give him a few ticks. Just as Keith is about to get Regris, Kolivan pulls him away from the control area as it explodes with Regris still at the control panel.
  • After all that, Keith runs into Allura at the castle, and quietly tells her that he knows she's mad, but wasn't in the mood for a lecture from her right now. Allura begins to lecture him on his choice to keep separating himself from the team, and Keith quickly snaps telling her, "I said, I don't want a lecture". Allura is momentarily stunned by this, but takes a moment to compose herself before continuing.
• Shiro sounds like he was going to break down as he begs Black to trust him as her Paladin like she did once so he could help the others. Black slowly accepts Shiro as her pilot once again.
• After his last mission, when Keith returns to the others, he's met with angered and frustrated expressions from his friends. The people Keith cares for the most are now pushing him away because of his choice to focus on his work with the Blade over Voltron.
• While heartwarming, it is sad to see the group give Keith a final group farewell hug.

Reunion

• Pidge finds headstone markers for thousands of fallen rebels at the sight of a mass grave. As she follows Matt's transponder signal deeper into the graveyard, she becomes increasingly desperate until she finds a headstone with her brother's name on it. The poor girl breaks down in tears and lets out a heartwrenching Death Wail. He turns out to still be alive, but it's still a punch in the gut for her at the time.
  Pidge: I'm so sorry! I was too late!
• A happy tearjerker: Pidge and Matt's reunion. Both siblings have tears streaming down their faces as they hug each other after being separated for almost two years.
• In one of Pidge's flashbacks before Matt leaves for the Kerberos mission, he gives her his glasses as a parting gift, and she tells him that if he didn't come back, she would personally go to space herself to get him.
• Pidge getting bullied at school and the teacher doing nothing to stop it. The fact that she was silently tearing up because of it certainly doesn't help!
• When Matt tries to convince Pidge that she should give friendships a chance, she brushes the idea off and instead announces her intention to further isolate herself so she can follow in his footsteps. He just looks so sad at how badly the world has broken his little sister.

Black Site

• The episode begins by showing that Haggar has shifted her face out of its chameleon Galra form as she gazes at her real face for the first time in 10,000 years. She looks more horrified than awed to see her old self again.
• Lotor realizes how Zarkon knew about his comet ship, and he immediately pulls his blade out to kill Narti.
  • As he and the rest of his generals are seen on the ship, Zethrid looks like she's trying to process what had just happened while Ezor is in a Troubled Fetal Position.
• After that, Zarkon declares that Lotor has become an enemy to the Empire, and one of the shots shown is Narti's lifeless hand on the ground while Cova is sitting beside her.

The Voltron Show!

• Coran is desperately trying to get the word of the coalition out to the universe and doesn't want to disappoint the paladins. So after two consecutive negative reactions to their performances, he's understandably stressed and begs the group to give him one more chance to prove he can handle this.

Begin the Blitz

• After Narti's death, Lotor's generals begin to fear that if any of them slip up, they might be next. Acxa remains completely loyal to Lotor, but Ezor is beginning to have her doubts.
  • Even when they arrive on Daibazaal Acxa tells Lotor she never doubted him, almost like she's trying to convince herself that Lotor would never betray them.
  • This culminates in Acxa knocking Lotor unconscious with her blaster, intending to trade him to Zarkon in exchange for her, Ezor's, and Zethrid's lives being spared.
  Acxa: For Narti.
• The look of shock in Lotor's eyes when he realizes that Acxa was going to shoot him, he probably didn't realize his closest comrades were taking Narti's death that hard and never thought they would ever turn on him.
• After Lotor's failed attempt to pass through realities using his ship, Ezor can be heard whispering to her comrades, "I told you it would fail." Lotor has probably heard those words about him his entire life.
• When Lotor regains consciousness, he's not even angry with his generals decision. He does eject Zethrid into space after removing his restrains, but he does tell her that he understands why they were doing this.
• Acxa sounds a little broken as they watch Lotor make off with his part of the comet ship, but she pushes that aside in order to find a safe haven for her and her teammates.

A New Defender

• Lotor all alone in his ship. This is the first time he even looks a bit at peace, but at the same time, it also feels like he's extremely lonely without his generals there with him.
• Keith's decision to perform a Heroic Sacrifice to take down the shields surrounding Haggar's new weapon. There was no guarantee that it would work, and if it hadn't been for Lotor's inexplicable intervention, he would have died for nothing.
  • To add to this, the others wouldn't have known what happened to Keith if he did end up sacrificing himself, and once they congratulate him for his work, he wouldn't have been alive to hear it.

Season 5

The Prisoner

• Matt's face when he realizes that his father isn't in the prison. And then there's Pidge's reaction, Matt has to hold her back as she tries to look for him.
  • When Nyma asks where Matt's father was he initially tries to avoid the subject, as Nyma continues to question him Matt angrily yelled for them to go.
• The end of the episode has the camera zoom in on Pidge's horrified expression as the group looks at Zarkon holding Sam hostage.

Blood Duel

• Haggar's visions as she regains more of her memories and realizes that Lotor is her son.
  • In one of her visions, she finds a baby Lotor in his crib crying alone.
    • Contrast this to the first time we see Allura as a baby where she's in her parents arms and clearly gets a lot of their love and attention.
• The Sam being sent to them turns out to be a hologram to Pidge's despair. Her screams don't help.
  Pidge: NO! NO, WE HAD A DEAL! WE HAD A DEAL! GIVE ME MY FATHER!
  • Beforehand, Pidge tries to run to her father, only to be held back by Shiro.
• Also a Heartwarming Moment: After two years of separation, Pidge and Matt have finally been reunited with their father.
• Even when Lotor finally kills Zarkon, he doesn't look proud. In fact, he looks almost sad that the fight had come to this.

Postmortem

• Lotor is sitting at the stairs of the control area with his hands clasped and head down. Allura asks him if he's alright, and even with him saying he was fine, killing your father isn't something you quickly get over in a day.
  • Becomes even sadder when you realize why Allura tried to offer comfort: It likely reminded her of when she had to destroy her own father's memories back in Season 1.
• Haggar is spying on the paladins this time, however, when she gets a full view of Lotor, she mutters, "My son" and tries to reach out and touch his face.
• Sam telling his kids how proud he is of them, and cheerfully says to "Just wait 'til your mother hears about this!" Matt and Pidge exchange worried looks and they quietly tell their father that they couldn't go back home yet because of their positions in this war.
• Lance suggests that they don't do anything and stay out of Lotor's plans, leading Shiro to yell at him.
  Shiro: Lance, this is not your call. (...) I TOLD YOU TO STAY OUT OF THIS!
  • While he does apologize later the odd vision of Shiro that Lance gets when everyone was mind-melding, leads him to glance worriedly at his leader.
• Allura walking in on Lance and commenting on his bayard upgrade, and Altean broadsword saying she hadn't seen one in ten-thousand years. While she assures Lance that he's capable of great things, Lance sadly noted that Shiro didn't think so, and Allura admits that Shiro had been a bit difficult for them.
• Sam telling his kids that even though he would be sad to leave them behind again, he understands that they all have a part to play in this war.

Kral Zera

• The fight between Shiro and the paladins. Sure, they've all had arguments before and a lot they didn't all agree on, but Shiro makes it adamantly clear that as leader, he gets the final say. Everyone tries to dissuade Shiro from taking Lotor to the Kral Zera in Voltron, but instead of listening to them, Shiro looks angry that no one was taking his side.
  Shiro: (To Allura after she tells him they wouldn't help Lotor) ... I'm sorry to hear that.
  • If you see Lotor's expression in the back, he looks a little heart-broken that the paladins still don't trust him, but even he seems to understand that them bringing Voltron to the Kral Zera was a huge risk.
  • You can only imagine Allura's panic when she finds out nobody had seen Shiro around the castle in a while. She immediately puts two and two together and asks where Lotor was.
• Keith's desperate attempts to save Shiro, who brings Lotor in the Black Lion to Kral Zera, despite the other Blade members objecting before leaving him behind.

Bloodlines

• Hunk gives Sam a drive that has video footage for their families back on earth, and teases that Lance might have said something to a girl named Jenny Shaybon. Lance gets angry at this and when Hunk apologizes, Lance starts listing off his family members who he misses, then dismissing his tears saying that it was just space dust.
  • Even though they've just been reunited, Sam bids farewell to his children, in order to return to earth and warn the Garrison.
• As Lotor sifts through Honerva's logs of information praising his mother's work, Allura cautiously suggests that maybe Honerva and Haggar are the same person because of the quintessence, something Lotor quickly cuts off by telling her "that witch is not my mother". It's possible that Lotor does have an inkling that Honerva and Haggar are the same person, but chooses to only look at the "good" Altean side of Honerva, while denying Haggar's existence.
• Allura admitting to Lotor that she feels like she's failed her father's legacy, and wasn't honoring any of them, even breaking down into tears.
• You have to wonder what thoughts were running through Krolia's mind when she saw Keith holding her blade to her throat, as well as when Trugg held Keith as a hostage and Krolia tells him, "I left you once, I'll never leave you again."
• Keith's expression when he finds out that Krolia is his mother.

White Lion

• As Lotor and Allura converse as they travel towards the temple, Lotor admits that on a planet his father stationed him at, instead of subjugating the people there he befriended them and learned their ways. Displeased at this, Zarkon ordered him to destroy the planet, to which Lotor refused. This resulted in his banishment, and when Allura said that he did the right thing for standing up for those people, Lotor quietly tells her that the planet still got destroyed, killing all the inhabitants.
• Shiro admitting to Lance that he wasn't feeling like himself, and Lance gently tells him that they'll work something out.
• Lotor screams in anguish when he realizes that he failed the temple's Secret Test of Character.
  • While many may see Lotor yelling the Galra chant "Victory or death!" as suspicious to his true goals, you can't help but imagine what kind of environment he has lived in for over ten-thousand years to twist him in such a way. He was raised in a world where it was kill or be killed, and he most certainly is going to do whatever he can to live.

Season 6

Omega Shield

• Shiro sounds like he's having a panic attack when he starts seeing visions of Haggar on Oriande.
  • Even worse when he pretends he's fine when his teammates ask about his condition.
• When you realize Lance freaking died protecting Allura. Sure it may have had been for a few moments, but for those few moments he legitimately was dead.

Razor's Edge

• Lance tagging along with Hunk and Pidge, asking if he could do anything. When the two leave, Lance tries to ask Allura and Lotor if they needed a third wheel. However, with the two so engrossed in their research, Lance looks back sadly before leaving.
  • He later confesses to the mice that he really liked Allura but probably had nothing to offer her since he was just "a boy from Cuba" while Lotor is a space prince. When he looks down, the mice had apparently fallen asleep and he tiredly asks, "Are you guys even listening?"
    • What makes it sadder is that it really looked like the mice wanted to spend time with him at first, only for them to fall asleep when he gets to the most emotional part.
  • It's possible that the mice told Allura about Lance's crush on her, but her faces drops a bit when she hears it and she still goes on to act on her attraction to Lotor.
    • It's very strongly implied that they do, since two of the mice made a heart-shape with their tails. It's clear from her expression that Allura feels guilty about not reciprocating Lance's feelings.
• Pidge and Hunk teasing Lance about Allura and Lotor's growing attraction towards each other, believing that Allura was just another one of Lance's passing crushes. While he is angry at their teasing, he doesn't have the energy to tell them off. He quietly looks down knowing they wouldn't take him seriously that he genuinely likes Allura.
• The flashback sequences caused by the energy bursts of the Quantum Zone allow Keith to experience his mother's memories and gain insight into her past. This also works both ways, and we get a close-up shot of Krolia's face when she learns from her son's memories that his father is dead. What's worse is that Krolia will never have the chance to tell her partner good-bye.
  • Krolia's Little "No" when she thinks the Galra scouts killed her partner. So when they order her to drop her knife, she acts the same way when Trugg threated to harm Keith. But this time, she goes into a fury that allows her to grab her knife midair and hurl it towards the snipers gun. She then grabs the scout next to her and slams him into the ground.
  • One of her final memories when she's telling her family good-bye, giving Keith one last kiss on his head while he sleeps and gives her partner her knife, telling him to give it to Keith some day.
• As Krolia takes off probably using one of the other Galra ships, a shot of Keith's dad shows him standing outside the house watching the ship leave.

Monsters and Mana

• How lonely Lance seems to have become is even more evident here. Hunk used to be his close friend, but has so much more in common and bonded more with Pidge that the two of them have now become close friends. Allura is clearly smitten with Lotor, something Lance doesn't exactly like, but doesn't want to get in the way of her happiness so he keeps to himself. So when the three of them leave, he quietly agrees to play another round of M & M with Coran and Shiro.
• By the end of the season, Shiro's insistence on always having his character be a Paladin becomes very Harsher in Hindsight.
  Shiro: I don't know what's more fulfilling than being a Paladin.
• Shiro's character dying multiple times somehow manages to be both a funny gag and depressing. The poor guy just cannot catch a break, even during a tabletop game.

The Colony

• Bandor's death. He just wanted to help his people, and he died trying to tell his sister the truth.
• Romelle's situation in general. She already had both her parents taken away, and then she loses her little brother, too. The poor girl even breaks down into tears when Bandor leaves.
• Becomes incredibly Harsher in Hindsight when Allura and Lotor share a kiss after returning from the rift, and the others are waiting just a few rooms down to break to Allura of Lotor's true plans.
  Allura: It is a moment that I truly will never forget.
  • After Romelle tells Allura how Lotor enslaved her people and used them to harvest quintessence. You can see the exact moment her heart breaks from this and when Lotor tries to reason with her, Allura grabs his arm and slams him to the ground. What's worse is that the moment before she grabs Lotor's arm and throws him, there are tears in her eyes.
• Pidge has her bayard out ready to fire at "Shiro," but she can't make the shot.
• Keith desperately trying to contact Shiro only for the former to coldly cut off the communications.

The Black Paladins

• The other Paladins' reaction to Shiro's apparent betrayal.
  • Pidge had created a counter-measure for Shiro's virus, admitting she took the data from his arm and made one just in case. She quietly says to the group that she was hoping to never have had to use it.
• Zethrid referring to Shiro as an "it".
• Haggar telling Shiro to use his bond with Keith against him, and when the moment was right to strike him down.
• Lotor finally meeting Honerva, and she admits that her time as Haggar killed any sense of maternal love she should have had for her child and was glad to see that he was carrying on her work. However, Lotor cuts her off, declaring that his mother was dead, and she was a twisted perversion of something that was once good. He also adds that she should watch her back since he was still going to kill her. While Honerva's face is unreadable, it makes you wonder if she wouldn't mind Lotor killing her, just like he had done in previous reincarnations.
• Keith's look of horror when he discovers the cloning facilities with rows of Shiro's clones in tubes.
  • Also the vision of the future Keith received in "Razor's Edge" comes true.
• The entire fight sequence between Keith and "Shiro".
  • Keith trying to tell Shiro that he wasn't going give up on him, but Shiro tells Keith he should have given up on him long ago, just like his parents. Shiro's barb obviously doesn't affect Keith as badly anymore since he now knows what his parents truly thought of him, but it's still a low blow.
    Keith: Shiro, I know you're in there! You made a promise once. You told me you'd never give up on me!
    Shiro: And I should have abandoned you just like your parents did! They saw that you were broken, worthless. I should have seen it, too.
    Keith: I'm not leaving here without you.
  • Even when he's fighting for his life, Keith keeps begging for Shiro to snap out of Haggar's control, and it culminates in this exchange:
    Keith: (struggling in a Blade Lock) Shiro, please! You're my brother. I love you.
  • Keith's heartbreaking expression after cutting Shiro's artificial arm off.◊ He may not have technically been Shiro, but he had Shiro's memories and personality, and for all intents and purposes, he was Shiro, and it still killed Keith inside that he had to fight him, even if he wasn't aware at the time.
• Shiro looking at Keith with such guilt and remorse moments before he passes out, and the platform they're both standing on breaks apart.
• When Keith realizes that he couldn't pull both him and unconscious Shiro up after they were left dangling on the platform, he decides that instead of letting Shiro go and saving himself, that he would rather die with Shiro than to be the sole survivor.
  • It wasn't just Shiro whom he was willing to die with. During the fight, Shiro tells Keith to just give up, saying that "By now, the team's already gone. I saw to it myself." He was ultimately wrong, but Keith likely believed that his closest friends along with his mother, were killed because of Shiro's actions, and he was alone once more. Keith was willing to die so he wouldn't have to continue on by himself without his loved ones.
• The final scene of the episode two of them falling into a bright light after destroying the facility. In his supposed final moments, Keith recalls his precious memories of Shiro while looking at the latter's face before quietly accepting his death and closing his eyes.

All Good Things

• The real Shiro telling Keith that for all intents and purposes, he did die at the end of Season 2.
  Shiro: My physical form was gone. I existed on another realm. ...I died, Keith.
• Lance comforting Allura over her heartbreak and assures her that she wasn't the only one fooled by Lotor.
  • Sadder still: watch Lance's face when Allura hugs him. This isn't the jokester of Season 1 and 2, it's not the guy who looked Keith dead in the eye and told him that he respected Black's choice, and it's not the guy who smiled proudly at Allura at the end of Season 4. Unlike any other time he's had to play cheerleader/therapist, Lance looks tired. Allura hugs him and he takes a moment to respond. He doesn't look at her when he speaks. He can't even comfort her without putting himself down in the process (referring to himself as "someone who's made a million mistakes"). No doubt the previous events have left him drained too, but there are hints that something else is going on here. Even when he's trying to be strong and reassuring for someone else, there's a sense that Lance is burning out.
• Lotor attempting to appease the Paladins, even addressing Allura in how he knew they both had a mutual attraction for the other, and that his feelings for her were true. This snaps Allura as she fires her lion's cannon at Lotor's Sincline ship when he said they were on the same side.
  Allura: NO. WE'RE. NOT!! [...] You betrayed and used me. You're more like Zarkon than I could have ever imagined!
  Lotor: (pupils shrink to pinpricks. long silence. He closes his eyes for a bit before opening them again with cold determination) [...] Destroy the Lions.
  • While he may have had it coming, after Allura compares him to Zarkon, for a moment Lotor looks like she stabbed him straight through the heart. And before that, he even pleaded with his generals not to fire on her even after she tried to attack him, looking and sounding like he's on the verge of tears, in complete contrast to every other time he's ever been on-screen.
  • His last words to her were calling out Alfor, someone he had high praise for, for failing in saving his race and only being able to save a close friend and Allura.
  • Earlier she asks him how many Alteans he had sacrificed for his power and when he tries to rebutt, Allura yells, "HOW MANY?!" Lotor doesn't answer with a specific amount, just "many lives" and a re-tread of his intentions.
  • Also, the fact that Lotor snapping may have been caused by this. If Allura hadn't slammed his Berserk Button with the Zarkon comment, they may have been able to neutralize Lotor much more peacefully. Instead, however, he had become such a monster that she felt it was warranted.
  • Just earlier he was telling Allura how much he loved her but now he's laughing madly and declaring that he would wipe the names of Princess Allura and King Alfor from Altea's history, so one day, no Altean would know they existed and all they knew was him as their sole leader. It shows how much the Quintessence corrupted him.
• Just the fact that Lotor probably meant everything he said about working for the greater good and is so twisted he genuinely can't see why he's wrong. It makes him both more terrifying and more tragic.
• When the generals notice the moment Lotor is too far gone, Acxa tells her group that they were officially cutting ties with Lotor and to leave the fight. Angry that they betrayed him again, Lotor ejects all of them out of their ships as he forms Sincline, and Acxa begs him not to do this before she's shot out as well.
  Acxa: Lotor, don't do this!
• Keith hearing the screams of his teammates over the intercoms as Sincline is kicking the lion's asses.

Defender of All Universes

• The team having to destroy the Castle of Lions in order to close the rifts and prevent reality from Collapsing. One of the items that Allura takes is a holo-photo of her parents while Coran gently runs his hand across the ship's controls and bids farewell to the ship his grandfather created.
  Coran: Good-bye, old friend.
  • Just to really drive this home, we get a series of shots of the interior of the Paladins' former base, now deserted and seconds away from annihilation. It's heartbreaking to see the many locations that were so important to the show — the bridge, the healing pod room, the bedrooms and the lounge — devoid of all life. It has the feeling of doing a final sweep of a home you're about to leave, after you've packed up and are saying goodbye.
    • The final shot lingers on the healing pod room, where the 7 all met for the first time.
  • The Lions and their Paladins can't resist turning back for one last look...whereupon Hunk spots a diamond floating in space. He realizes that this is all that remains of the Castle of Lions, and he and Yellow gently scoop it up and bring it back with them.
• After learning about what was really happening with Shiro and his clone bodies, Lance realizes that the real Shiro had tried to warn him about the impostor when the Paladins were in the mystical realm, and the impostor had also tried to tell him that something was wrong when he confessed to "not feeling like himself." The "Eureka!" Moment drives Lance to tears, as he laments that he probably could have saved the impostor and stopped him from betraying the team.
  • The implication that Shiro's clone was made brain-dead after being freed from Haggar's control.
    • However, Word of God confirmed that the clone's consciousness, memories, and knowledge merged with the real Shiro's soul, so in a way, he's still with them.
• When Lotor is lost in the Quintessence field, Allura still tries to save him. Lotor is completely insane at this point, and even before that, it's revealed he killed countless, and yet Allura still wants to save him. The Paladins tell her it's a lost cause, and Lotor is left in the vortex, still mad with power.
  • Keith also wanted to save Lotor, no doubt he still had some lingering sense of gratitude from when Lotor saved his life back during "A New Defender".
• In a way, Lotor's entire character arc is like this. He was disgusted by what his parents had become, determined to undo the damage they'd caused and to redeem the Galra Empire, wanted to succeed at protecting the Alteans when King Alfor failed, and even seemed to genuinely bond with Allura and the Paladins. Unfortunately, his Utopia Justifies the Means belief leads him to use the same kinds of tactics Zarkon and Honerva would have, becoming so obsessed with his goal that he turns on his most faithful followers, and so crazed with obtaining power that he crosses the Moral Event Horizon and jumps off the slippery slope all at once. Ultimately, everything he worked and suffered for his entire 10,000 year life collapsed around him due to his own villainy, almost making him an evil Shoot the Shaggy Dog character.

Season 7

A Little Adventure

• Keith choosing to stay behind to wait for Shiro to wake up, because the clone body was rejecting his soul. Even Allura admits that with all of her alchemic knowledge from Oriande, there's very little she could do.
  Keith: (On the verge of tears) Shiro, please! Fight...! You can't do this to me again...
• Keith's past. Even from an early age he had a lot of potential, but not only was he given little opportunity, adults simply wrote him off as a problem child who wouldn't amount to anything.
  • When James started to push Keith's buttons on how he was an orphan, Keith punches him in the face.
  Keith: (after James says he's only here because of Shiro) I can outfly anyone in this building.
  James: Oh, yeah? Is that what mommy and daddy told you before they-? (Keith punches him)
• Shiro and Adam's breakup. Anyone who's been in a relationship for a long time and broken it off, has experienced this kind of fighting, and would understand how painful this is for the two of them.
  Adam: Takashi. How important am I to you? [...] If you go, don't expect me to be here when you come back.
  • This line gets even worse after it comes true, as Adam dies before Shiro returns to Earth.
• The fact that the reason why Shiro was so adamant about going on the Kerberos mission? He had a chronic illness that was deteriorating his muscles, and in a few more years, he wouldn't be in his "peak condition" anymore.
  • Keith's face after Shiro tells him this looks so heartbroken. Especially when he angrily walks up to him and asks what he wasn't telling him, and says that he could handle it because he wasn't "a little kid".
    Shiro: They [the Garrison] don't want me to go up into space... and neither does Adam.

The Road Home

• Pidge trying to get a signal out to earth and contact her parents. When she doesn't get anything, she sadly curls up, hugging her legs and resting her head against her knees.

The Way Forward

• Zethrid walking into find Ezor sitting quietly on a couch looking worried. She asks Zethrid about whether or not Lotor is alive, and is afraid of what he would do to them if he were. While Zethrid does manage to calm Ezor's fears, that incident when he went mad and declared that he would eradicate the Galra along with Voltron left Ezor terrified of what would happen if he had been allowed to move on with his plans.
• The look of fear in Pidge's eyes when Ezor chooses to torture her, because Lance proved that they're more likely to talk if something happened to "the small one" over everyone else.
• Lotor's generals. They used to be so close when we first met them in season 3, so seeing how Acxa's split it off from Ezor and Zethrid who are openly antagonistic towards her can be a little sad.

The Feud

• The fact that the fake Zarkon, Haggar and Lotor could have been a somewhat loving family with each other had Zarkon and Haggar not have been corrupted by the quintessence.
• While treated as a joke for the episode, you can't help but wonder how frustrated Lance was becoming with Bob and Zarkon telling him how he's "the dumb one" and trying so hard to prove them wrong. At the end of the episode, he even yells through the intercoms, "I'm not that dumb!"
  • Worse, his teammates agree, or at least concede the point. Given Lance's track record of throwing himself directly in harm's way on their behalf, and how he constantly cheerleads for the others, he must have been hurt that nobody would speak up on his behalf.

The Ruins

• The paladins find out through Macidus that most of the Blades are dead, fighting against the druids that Haggar had sent to eradicate them. What's even sadder was that it took at least a handful of Blades to kill one druid before another took their place.
• Krolia's reaction when she sees a wall with knives from the Blades, especially Kolivan's. She sadly glides her fingers over some and quietly says how she had helped train some of these people who are now dead.
• The parting between Keith and Krolia. While it's sad to see Krolia has to leave him again, Keith gives her their blade and reassures her that they will see each other again. The two embrace and tell the other they love them, and Keith even calls Krolia "mom".

The Journey Within

• When the Paladins are stranded out in open space without their Lions, slowly succumbing to space madness. It's almost painful to watch as they start to lose their faith in each other; Keith in particular questions how they're even still here as a team, and says some very cruel things that he normally wouldn't, including calling Hunk a coward and accusing Allura's father of being a poor leader.
• When defending Allura from Keith's hurtful remark against King Alfor, Lance calls out Keith's loner tendencies and his choice to leave the group back in season 4, telling him to "just go drift off by [your]self"; this only worsens the tension between the three of them further, and Keith almost does storm off in anger and hurt before Hunk holds him back.
  Hunk: We have to stay together!
  Keith: Why, Hunk? Are we really even friends? Is there anything holding us together besides some... messed up series of coincidences? I mean, what are we? Some "chosen saviors"?! Do you really believe that?! WHAT ARE WE EVEN DOING OUT HERE?!
  Hunk: (With quiet resolve) ...We're doing what we have to.

The Last Stand, Part I

• Colleen. This poor woman who lost her entire family and when we see her again, her hair has gotten longer and she's gained a few wrinkles. She obviously hasn't been taking very good care of herself, with stress and worry just making it even worse. So when she's finally allowed to reunite with her husband, she cries and holds him tight enough that has him saying that if the Galra didn't kill him, her hug just might.
  • However, when Matt ominously tells them that the Coalition can't contact Earth at the moment and how they haven't heard from Voltron for a long time, she nearly breaks again. She sounds on the verge of tears when she begs for her daughter Katie to answer her during Sam's first meeting with the Garrison when they get no response. This, and Sanda telling her she shouldn't try to communicate with her children sends Colleen over the edge and she decides to leak the information about the Galra and Voltron to the world.

The Last Stand, Part II

• One of the pilots first sent out to fight against the Galra attack was Adam, cutting off any possibility of clearing the air between him and Shiro.
• James and the rest of the MFE fighters having to leave Veronica behind, and when Sam asks where she was, all James can do is sadly tell him that she sacrificed herself to save them.
  • Even worse when they were driving back, James can be seen sitting with his head downcast, unable to look at the rest of his teammates. Nadia and the others try to stay professional, but this is the first time they've experienced what it was like to lose someone on the battlefield.
  • A bit of Fridge Sadness here: Ina is able to perfectly recite the directions when Nadia asks if anyone remembers how to get back. It's clear that they wanted to check and see if Veronica was okay, and they very easily could thanks to Ina's memory. However, since Veronica doesn't come back until later (and with other people), the cadets either never got the chance or didn't find her even if they did, so they probably spent a little while feeling guilty over it.

Know Your Enemy

• A mix of Tear Jerker and Nightmare Fuel, but when the Paladins are looking around the ruined city, they're all clearly horrified, with Hunk even commenting that he recognizes some of the places. What makes it especially sad is that there's a shot of a damaged car that has a teddy bear hanging out of the window, which probably belonged to some kid who is now either dead or in forced labor.
• Pidge and Lance reuniting with their families, each of them getting tight hugs and plenty of tears.
• Shiro finds a wall of the fallen in GG Headquarters, and finds Adam's name on it. Iverson can only console him that Adam fought bravely, and his sacrifice bought them much needed time. Even so, part of that statement is arguably a lie.
  • All Shiro can manage to say is how sorry he was and he seems close to breaking down into tears.
• Hunk is genuinely happy that Lance and Pidge are reunited with their families on Earth, but you can still see the sadness in his face as he remembers his own family, who had been captured and revealed to have been put in a highly guarded labor camp, rendering a rescue attempt all but impossible, especially with the Garrison's limited resources.
• Allura having to leave the room where they were speaking with a holo-Sendak, admitting to Shiro that hearing about the one planet who stood up to the Galra, her home Altea, was destroyed.

Heart of the Lion

• All of the Paladins calling for Lance over their coms after his transport gets blown up by Galra fighters.
  • Just like the Garrison fighters in the first Galra invasion wave, the Garrison watches Lance's monitor wave for a few seconds before falling dead.
• Lance desperately trying to protect himself and Veronica. He doesn't even look like he's focusing on aiming, just shooting his targets in a desperate attempt to survive. When the Galra fighter approaches and Lance's shots have no effect, you can see the fear and cold realization setting in as he closes his eyes, fully believing he was going to die in that moment.
  • Earlier in the episode, he tells Veronica how he didn't want her out in the field because he was worried she'd get hurt. Later after their car is totaled, he immediately searches for his sister and runs to her unconscious body, trying to see if she was still alive. The thing he was worried about happening was coming true in front of his own eyes.

Trial By Fire

• Keith waking up in his cell and runs to one of the walls in terror, banging on it with his fist and asking if his friends were there.
• Sanda sacrificing herself to buy the paladins more time, and uses her final breath to ask them to save earth where she had failed.

Lion's Pride, Part 1

• Allura noticing Lance struggling and she flies over to help him, probably afraid of what happened to him not too long ago.
• While mostly played for laughs, Shiro telling Sam as he hacks into his brain to disrupt Sendak's crystal that it "wouldn't be the first time" can be pretty painful.

Lion's Pride, Part 2

• Keith telling the others that it was an honor flying with them as they lift the Altean mech into the atmosphere and as it explodes, each of the paladins screens Fade to White.
• The memorial for the fallen Garrison soldiers with Shiro giving a Rousing Speech to a crowd of humans and aliens alike. It just shows how many people sacrificed themselves in the war.
  • Doesn't help that it then cuts to the memorial wall for the people who had died in the first Galra invasion wave.
• While more heartwarming, there are still plenty of tears shed with each paladin getting a visit from family and friends. Hunk's parents are with him as Shay and Rax enter with Shay walking over to give Hunk a hug. Pidge getting to see Rover, Nyma, Matt and his new girlfriend. Lance is with his family. Allura is happily holding the mice while Coran and Romelle look after her. When Keith wakes up, he sees Krolia and Kolivan smiling at him.
• Keith taking Krolia to see his dad's grave.

Season 8

Shadows

• When baby Lotor is presented to his mother for the first time, Honerva, her memory of wanting a child gone, only turns her face away. The baby begins to cry but Honerva is completely unmoved.
  • Likewise, when the doctor tries to present baby Lotor to his father, Zarkon coldly orders the infant to be taken away. The once hoped-for child is now unwanted by both his parents.
• When a young Lotor asks his father what happened to his mother, Zarkon gives an answer that may at first sound cold. But to anyone who knows the truth, it sounds more like his way of lamenting what she has become and her loss of self.
  Zarkon: Your mother was my greatest weakness. And now she is gone.
• Lotor's backstory shows a more optimistic Lotor that really did once believe in equality between races and who wanted to prove himself to his father. Then Zarkon responded to his defiance by destroying the planet and people he befriended.
• Honerva's reaction to finding out Lotor has been killed.

Genesis

• Allura's reaction to Lotor's apparent return. It's not just rage and horror, she turns her head away and closes her eyes, seemingly pained. It's a harrowing reminder that while she's gotten over him and moved on, she never really had time to process her conflicting feelings for him, and his betrayal is likely still an open wound.

Knights of Light, Part 2

• The sudden appearance of the real Zarkon. He appears to wake up, as if from a dream. But once he looks into the faces of his friends, all he sees is their hatred. Then Allura uses her powers to show him exactly what kind of monster he became after his Quintessence poisoning. The poor man is left crying at the realization of what he became.

The Zenith

• There's something kind of depressing in the fact that the only reality where both Zarkon and Lotor are alive and heroic is the one where Honerva is dead.
  • This may have been a conscious choice on Honerva's part so that A) she would not have to 'replace' an existing living version of herself and B) would be welcomed more readily by family that would remember her too fondly to question why she had 'returned' so inexplicably. Too bad for her that that universe's Lotor saw right through her.
  • It also makes sense in another depressing way: if it weren't for Honerva's experiments with Quintessence, Zarkon never would have become what he did, and that in turn led to Lotor's Start of Darkness. So indeed, the only way they could both be alive and heroic...is without her.

The End is the Beginning

• The montage of Honerva's past as a pretty and eager young scientist who was genuinely friends with Alfor.
• Blink and you'll miss it, but Honerva sheds a few tears after seeing Allura's memories of Lotor.
• The series ends on a bittersweet note with the death of Allura. Of all people, fans thought she would be safe, with her blossoming romance with Lance as proof of that. Unfortunately, she had to sacrifice herself, along with Honerva, to restore all the realities that Honerva destroyed in her omnicidal rampage. If there's a bright side to any of this, it's that Allura and Honvera are together with their families again.
  • The exchange between Allura and Shiro. She thanks him for teaching her about selflessness and self-sacrifice, and as they embrace, Shiro tells her with a somber voice: "You never have to thank me for anything". He is referring to the Season 6 finale when Allura extracted his life essence that Black Lion has preserved, and merged it with his clone body, thus effectively bringing him Back from the Dead. He considers it a debt that he will never be able to repay to her.
  • The resultant shot of the empty Blue Lion, drifting in space. This is the third Paladin that Blue has had to say goodbye to, and the second to die.
  • Though the series ends up sort of glossing over it, there's one very important person who doesn't get the chance to say goodbye to Allura: Coran, who's been with her from the very beginning and was family to her in all but name. The fact that this happens not too long after the absolutely heart-crushing flashback to him promising Alfor he'll watch out for her made it worse.
• When everyone returns to their own reality again, what do they find? Not only is Daibazaal back again, so is Altea and its people. Allura didn't just make her sacrifice for all realities, she did it for her own people, and for the Galra.
• The effect that the finale has on one particular character: Lance. Compare the bouncy, fun loving and competitive boy who jumps into Blue's pilot seat, and the melancholy young man who's apparently content to give up piloting, take up farming and watch the world go peacefully by in the finale, and it's hard not to feel at least a twinge of regret. He's the only original Paladin to end up sadder than when they started, and the show gives us no sign that he ever really gets over Allura's sacrifice.
• The farewell of the Lions. Blue roars to summon Lance one final time, and the other Paladins quickly follow. Each Lion gazes a silent goodbye to their Paladin before the quintet head off into space, pilotless. We have no idea if the Paladins will ever see their bonded Lions again. Heartwarming points to the fact that Black, Red, and Blue make contact with their original pre-swap Paladins (Shiro, Keith and Lance respectively), especially as Blue, who locked out Lance, clearly fixes her gaze firmly on him and gives the longest goodbye.
• The final shot of the Lions in space with the nebula that resembles Allura (and the hints of Lotor nearby as well) is quite the bittersweet knife twist as well.

Comics

Issue 4

• After defeating the Sphinx, it comments on the group being pathetic and Lance murmurs, "I'll say." The Sphinx picks up on this and asks Lance if they were going to be talking about who's more pathetic. Lance quickly drops the subject.

Issue 5

• Hunk naming a small alien creature after his father. There are hints that his father either left, or passed away.
• While Hunk is panicking over two alien girls asking him to marry them, Lance tries to cheer him up and adds that he's had experience with rejection. A lot of experience.

Other

Voltron Vlogs

• Coran wistfully talking about Alfor's memories and how he tried to protect them, even when he was asleep for ten-thousand years.
• Keith's Vlog, unlike Coran who was pretty chipper throughout the video, Keith talks somberly about his Galran lineage and how it's possibly had an affect on his life; like how it lead to his mother abandoning him. He even sadly notes that he's aware of his temper and how he doesn't excel in socializing with others. After he talks about the reasons why he acts the way he does, he pauses for a long time, tries to cover his face and then angrily storms out of the vlog. You can practically hear his voice crack as he hurries away from the screen. He even takes a moment to quickly apologize after he furiously rants about Lance's Voltron chant, and how it would be easier to just say "Voltron" without it being complicated. It doesn't help that the Dreamworks channel's thumbnail for the vlog has a tear emoji under one of Keith's eye.
  Keith: I don't know why I'm that way. Maybe I'm naturally untrusting because my mom left me? And so instead of accepting people into my life, I push them away before... they reject me. I guess I have some walls up... (Sad music plays in the background) I-I'm out of here! Get me out of here! I'M OUT OF HERE!!! I said I wouldn't cry!!
• Lance greets the viewers by saying he was the Red Paladin. Even though he looks like he's adjusted to his new role, one can't help wondering if he still misses Blue a little bit.
• Hunk admitting that he should have stayed home after all of the dangerous experiences he had in space.

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