Masters of the Universe
- Ben Pivoz
- Jun 5
- 3 min read
When I was a kid, I loved He-Man. I watched the cartoon (as well as its spin-off, She-Ra), had the action figures and even pretended to be the characters with my father and brother. It wasn’t just me either. This was an extremely popular product in the 80s. Popular enough to spawn a live-action movie in 1987. Though it wasn’t very good, bombing commercially and critically, it is pretty amazing that it has taken nearly forty years for a second try.
The new Masters of the Universe is better than the first. It has a bigger budget, better production values and stays relatively true to the source material, instead of swiping the characters to toss them into something unrelated. It also helps that it is coming out in an era where studios understand the basic appeal of longstanding IPs and feel much more comfortable leaning into spectacle.
If it still isn’t all that good, that is in large part because it tries way too hard to be two things that are at odds with each other. It wants to be a big fantasy action movie, with effects, larger than life heroes, pure evil villains and a complex, if familiar, mythology. It also wants to be a sendup of exactly that kind of movie, mocking the lore and inserting silly humor at theoretically dramatic moments. It turns out that this combination does not work. The characters and lore are lame and the comedy is dumb. It wants to capture the tone of Marvel’s lighter entries (think Guardians of the Galaxy), but fails. It isn’t some epic disaster, just a run of the mill misfire.
Adam, Prince of Eternia, was sent to hide on Earth with the Sword of Power when the evil Skeletor captured his parents. After fifteen years of searching for the sword, and almost everyone he meets thinking he’s a lunatic, Adam finds it, allowing him to return home to fight for his people.
Masters of the Universe (132 minutes, plus mid and post credit scenes) is part sword and sandals epic and part goofy takedown of modern concepts of masculinity. At least that is what I think the screenplay is going for. Adam has always been seen as a weakling, first on Eternia, then on Earth. He works in HR, with a focus on conflict resolution and team building. His attempts to use those skills on the monsters trying to kill him becomes a running gag. He doesn’t succeed by using his brains (to be fair, he is mostly treated as a bit of an idiot); he succeeds by using his magic sword to turn him into a jacked fighting machine. Of course, him talking Skeletor out of destroying the world is less satisfying than a punch to the face, so it was never realistic for the story to take that path.
So what exactly is the movie attempting to say? Ultimately, the answer is probably “nothing.” It is looking for laughs as a family-friendly action comedy based on a once valuable toy line. It wants to draw in nostalgic adults, their kids and fans of the usual summer blockbuster franchise fare. Like a lot of those, it serves too many masters. There are far too many disparate ideas here, turning this into a tonally inconsistent mess.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t cool visuals or the scattered funny moment (though the action is consistently unremarkable). The performers are certainly all game, which keeps things moving. Yet, does the audience for this really exist in big numbers? Sure, it will do okay based on curiosity. But will anyone truly care? Will it do well enough to generate the sequel teased during the end credits? We will see. However, it feels a lot more like something that will be forgotten by the end of the month.
2¼ out of 5
Cast:
Nicholas Galitzine as Adam
Jared Leto as Skeletor
Camila Mendes as Teela
Idris Elba as Duncan
Alison Brie as Evil-Lyn
Morena Baccarin as The Sorceress
Directed by Travis Knight
Screenplay by Chris Butler, Aaron Nee, Adam Nee and Dave Callaham
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