AMBASSADOR OF PRIMUS
Mara
Master Sebrian's right hand, Primus's envoy to the Mytes, and the only one on the planet who keeps wondering where Adam goes when He-Man turns up.
Mara is Master Sebrian's assistant in The New Adventures of He-Man (1990), voiced by Venus Terzo. She becomes Primus's envoy on the planet Nekron, where the Mytes crown her their queen.
The record
The facts
WHERE SHE COMES FROM
Master Sebrian's right hand
Mara first appears in the 1990 premiere of The New Adventures of He-Man, the Jetlag Productions series that moves He-Man to the planet Primus, where Master Sebrian and the Inner Council hold out against the Mutants of Denebria behind a failing shield. That puts her outside the classic canon, which on this site begins with the Filmation He-Man.[1]
She is in the first scene of the first episode, "A New Beginning," telling an exhausted Sebrian to rest just before the Mutants attack, and she stays at his elbow for most of the run: in the laboratory, at the Council, and on the ships that keep getting forced down on hostile planets. When Flogg's gift of Zeps turns into Anadroids in "The Gift," Sebrian hands He-Man the key to the shield and sends Mara into the wilderness with him, and in "He-Man in Exile" the two of them help the glassmakers of Zaphor stand up for themselves.[2]
What marks her out is that she asks questions. In "Council of Clones" she is the one who says aloud what the audience is thinking, that He-Man might be right, and from early on she wonders why a simple trader named Adam is always the person who knows where He-Man is. Sebrian, who taught her to be curious, ends up having to cover for Adam with his own pupil.[3]
[1] ^ Wikipedia dates the first six episodes to December 1989, and epguides gives a September to December 1990 window for the series' first run; most episodes have no individual air date.
[2] ^ She also appears in "The Heat," "The Pen Is Mightier Than the Sword, Or Is It?," "Glasnost Schmasnost," "The Festival of Lights," "Skeletor's Victory," "The Battle for Levitan," "Crack in the World," "Escape from Gaolotia," "He-Man Mutant," "Juggernaut," "Fading Star," "The Mind Lens," "Zone of Darkness," "A Plague on Primus," "The Test of Time," "The New Wizard in Town," "He-Fan," "The Dream Zone," "The Power of the Good and the Way of the Magic," "A Time to Leave" and "The Final Invasion."
[3] ^ Her suspicion starts early. In "Attack on Onnor" she asks why she must contact Adam, a simple trader, to find He-Man; in "Adam's Adventure" Sebrian helps hide Adam's change back from her; in "The Tornadoes of Zil" Adam admits to Sebrian that she is growing suspicious, and Sebrian answers that her curiosity comes from his own teaching.
THE SIGNATURE EPISODE
Save Our City
By "Balance of Power" Sebrian has sent her to Nekron as his representative, and she has already made a friend of the Myte ambassador Bimo before the Gleanons force President Pell's ship down. Jack Olesker's "Save Our City" picks up with Mara newly appointed as Primus's ambassador to the Mytes of Nekron, and opens with her doing the job well. When Pell's people intercept a Mutant transmission, she tells him whose it is: Crita, one of Flogg's most important lieutenants, and if Crita is visiting the Gleanons then the hope of peace is already gone.
Then the Gleanons call for help. General Nifel begs the Mytes to save his people from a volcano, and Mara is torn between her suspicion and her conscience; someone in the room doubts the plea, someone else asks whether the Mytes can afford not to answer, and when she is told an ambassador does not have to fly the rescue, she answers, "It's my duty to help the people of this planet." The volcano is Crita's trap, the Myte Space Force is ambushed, and Mara ends up a prisoner in the Norzon Mines of Brom, where Nifel questions her about Sorton's defenses and gets nothing.
The breakout is hers as much as He-Man's, and so is the last word with Crita, who sneers that a weakling from Primus is no match for a Mutant warrior: "More than a match," Mara tells her. The Mytes crown her queen of Sorton. When He-Man remarks that she seems to have found a new home, she answers that she will never forget the home and the friends she left behind.[4]
[4] ^ Venus Terzo is credited as Crita and Mara in IMDb's full credits for "The Seeds of Resistance", and as Mara and the Sorceress in its credits for "Zone of Darkness"; Wikipedia's cast list for the series agrees. That puts both sides of the duel in "Save Our City" in the same voice.
Mara on the 1990 series, holding out against the anadroids.
Clipped from our own copy of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, The Seeds of Resistance (The New Adventures of He-Man, 1990), 6:17 to 8:10, 1 minute 53 seconds. Nothing is added and nothing is sped up. Copyright Mattel.
THE SECOND ANGLE
Once Upon a Time
Misty Taggart's "Once Upon a Time" brings the old cartoon into the new one. A homesick Adam is told by the Sorceress that he cannot go back to Eternia, and then Teela is sent to Primus to cheer him up, for as long as it takes a dragon iris in Grot's garden to bloom. Mara watches He-Man greet this stranger like an old friend and wonders where she came from; when Sebrian asks, "Why, Mara, do I detect a note of jealousy?" she answers, "Jealous? Me?"
She more than earns her place in the finish. Skeletor has found the vaults of Zactus and the rest of his Encyclopedia of Evil, He-Man is held by chains of evil, and it is Mara who picks up the Power Sword and throws it to him. Skeletor and his books go back to Nordor, Teela and Mara thank each other, and Teela goes home before the flower blooms, leaving He-Man to pass on her goodbye.
QUEEN OF SORTON
Queen's Gambit
"Queen's Gambit" returns to Nekron with Mara on the throne. Flogg and Skeletor launch a meteor at Primus to keep the Guardians busy while Crita leads a Gleanon ground army toward Sorton, and when Mara asks He-Man for help he cannot give it. Mara carries the episode: she notices that one of the attacking fighters has nobody in it, works out that the Gleanons have held back their army, and flies down to call Crita's bluff. The bluff is a cloaking screen and a trap, and it takes the Sorceress, opening a tunnel to send the meteor at Mara's enemies, to turn the day.
LATER SERIES AND THE FILMS
Another Mara, and the films
The 2018 Netflix series She-Ra and the Princesses of Power uses the name Mara for a different character, the She-Ra who came before Adora, voiced by Zehra Fazal, and Wikipedia's character list for the show does not connect her to the ambassador from Primus.
She is not in the 1987 film or the 2026 film.
IN PLASTIC
Mara of Primus
Mara was left out of the New Adventures toy line that ran with the show. She reached plastic in 2015 as Mara of Primus, a Masters of the Universe Classics figure sold through Mattel's collector subscription, and that figure is long retired.
IN BRIEF
From Sebrian's lab to the throne of Sorton
A New Beginning
Mara is at Master Sebrian's side as the time portal is opened.
He-Man in Exile
She goes into the wilderness with He-Man and helps the village of Zaphor stand up for itself.
Once Upon a Time
Teela visits from Eternia, and Mara throws He-Man the sword.
Save Our City
Ambassador to the Mytes, captured by Crita's trap, and crowned queen of Sorton.
Masters of the Universe Classics
Mattel's subscription figure, sold as Mara of Primus.
A different Mara
Netflix's She-Ra and the Princesses of Power gives the name to the She-Ra before Adora.
Questions
Mara questions, answered
Who is Mara in He-Man?
Master Sebrian's assistant on the planet Primus in The New Adventures of He-Man, who later represents Primus on Nekron and becomes queen of the Mytes.
Is Mara in the original 1983 He-Man cartoon?
No. The Filmation series has no Primus, and Mara was created for the 1990 show.
Who voices Mara?
Venus Terzo, who also voices Crita and the Sorceress in the same series.
What episode does Mara first appear in?
"A New Beginning," the series premiere.
Does Mara know Adam is He-Man?
No, but she suspects. She keeps asking why Adam always knows where He-Man is, and Sebrian helps keep the secret from her.
Is Mara He-Man's girlfriend?
The series never says so. It hints at an attraction, most clearly when Sebrian teases her about jealousy over Teela in "Once Upon a Time."
How does Mara become a queen?
In "Save Our City" the Mytes crown her after she survives Crita's trap and escapes from the Norzon Mines of Brom.
Does Mara meet Teela?
Yes, in "Once Upon a Time," when the Sorceress sends Teela to Primus for a short visit.
Is Mara in She-Ra and the Princesses of Power?
A character named Mara is, but she is that show's earlier She-Ra, voiced by Zehra Fazal, not the ambassador from Primus.
Was there a Mara action figure?
Only a modern one: Mattel made Mara of Primus for Masters of the Universe Classics in 2015, and it is now retired.
Compiled by the heman.org desk from The New Adventures of He-Man episodes, the episode guides to Save Our City, Once Upon a Time, Queen's Gambit and Balance of Power. The voice credits follow IMDb's episode credits and Wikipedia; air dates and the spelling of the Mytes of Nekron follow epguides and Wikipedia.
Alongside
Characters in the same story
Master Sebrian Inner Council of Primus 
He-Man Heroic Warriors 
Prince Adam House of Miro 
Hydron Galactic Guardians 
Crita Mutants of Denebria 
Teela Heroic Warriors On Screen