I give unto you the evidence, and let every man judge for himself. Here is my dread charge: I suspect, my friends, that Lion-O, Lord of the Thundercats, Guardian of the Sword of Omens and the Eye of Thundera, is totally making up his abilities in the “sight-beyond-sight” department. Maybe he’s not culpable. Maybe the other Thundercats forced him into it. Whatever the case, just take a look at the following screen captures, and you’ll soon be just as convinced as I am.
The captures in question are from the early episode entitled “The Unholy Alliance”. And yes, to answer your unasked question, I could have provided a video of this; and again yes, it would have been much easier to understand what the hell is going on had I done so. But the lack of Thundercats videos anywhere else on the net would seem to suggest one of two things. Either no one cares about putting Thundercats online, which seems entirely reasonable, but given the level of tat already available also somewhat unlikely; or, given the recent release of prodigiously expensive Thundercats DVDs, someone somewhere is keeping a close eye on copyright issues. I’m not going to be the one who has to explain how proving that Lion-O is a liar counts as “fair use”, but I might just get away with some crafty screen-grabs.
Anyway. In the episode under discussion, Lion-O is off exploring in the woods, and has just been roundly told off by Jaga (his ghostly mentor-figure) for something or other fairly unimportant. To be honest, Lion-O gets told off by Jaga every other episode - so many times, in fact, that one wonders why Lion-O hasn’t tried putting the dead guy out of his misery once and for all (Jaga: 'The Sword of Omens cannot be used for evil, Lion-O'. Lion-O: 'Well, lucky for me that euthanasia is no longer considered evil, depending on the circumstances'). So anywho, Jaga finishes off his uplifting moral teaching for the episode, leaving a chastened Lord Thundercat to consider the wise words proffered. But then, suddenly, the Sword of Omens senses danger…
In the above photo, the Sword of Omens senses danger! You can tell, because it goes all neon. Lion-O had better use his sight-beyond-sight power to find out what’s going down. See below.
You can see above how, in order to use the sight-beyond sight power, Lion-O carefully gazes through the special holes made by the hilt of the sword. The sword lets him see the nature of the danger, no matter where it might be on Third Earth. See below.
Look above, and you can see the nature of the danger which the sword shows unto Lion-O. Oh no! It’s the evil mutants: Slythe, Jackalman and Monkeon! They’re the archenemies of the Thundercats, and are undoubtedly up to something nefarious! But where on Third Earth could they be? Thank goodness I have this sight-beyond-sight thing that can show me the enemy, no matter where they are! See below.
Oh, there they are, Lion-O. Right in front of you.
Let me just re-state what seems to have happened here. Lion-O has held up his sword, peeked through the holes, and seen the mutants standing directly opposite him. Somehow, he has then inferred that just because he can see someone not two feet away, he must have access to some sort of magic power. Well, I for one am not convinced. This is not sight-beyond-sight, Lord Lion-O. It’s just plain old sight.