Masters of the Universe Is No Masterpiece, but It Wasn’t Trying to Be

I did not grow up watching the Masters of the Universe cartoon or playing with any of the toys. It was a series and toy line that was very much before my time. However, my first memory of McDonald’s Happy Meals toys was for the Masters of the Universe 2003 line. In particular, I remember we had Beast Man and Orko, and I can’t remember if we had any others (potentially Skeletor?). My point in sharing this childhood memory is simply to say that my experience with He-Man and Masters of the Universe is very limited. I was interested enough in the movie, and I went and saw it last weekend. I honestly thought that it was pretty good, though there are a few details I found kind of strange.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

Regarding the plot, I found it solid enough. The movie opens with Prince Adam narrating about his home planet of Eternia and describing its fall to Skeletor and his forces, which led to him being sent to Earth as a child with the Sword of Power. The movie then cuts to Adam on a date, revealing that he had been explaining his whole backstory to a girl, who promptly makes an excuse to leave. It’s honestly a really funny way to open the movie. Since Adam lost the sword during his arrival to Earth, his driving motivation is tracking it down, which causes his work to suffer. Adam is employed in HR at a company, and I found the toxic positivity and various HRisms to be a pretty funny jab at modern cultural practices, though I’ll touch on some of this again later. Eventually, Adam receives a lead on the sword and he tracks it down to a comic shop where he has to steal it. He gets away until the next day when he’s arrested. While being transported back by the police, Beast Man attacks, trying to track down the sword for Skeletor. Adam is rescued by Teela, his childhood friend and training buddy. She brings him and the sword back to Eternia, and the resistance against Skeletor. The resistance leadership, heroes who Adam admired ever since he was a child, don’t really believe that he’s who he claims to be, so they imprison him while they debate on what to do with the sword. In the jail cell, Adam reunites with Duncan–the king’s Man-At-Arms and Teela’s father. Adam convinces the serving robot, named Roboto, to join them, and the four escape as Skeletor’s forces attack the base in search of the sword. While escaping, Adam reclaims the sword, and uses it to transform while facing off against Trap Jaw. The heroes escape, but are pursued by more of Skeletor’s forces. After an aerial battle that results in them crashing, the heroes make camp for the night until Skeletor appears as a projection and tells Adam to bring the sword to his castle at Snake Mountain if he wants to see his father again. Adam walks into the trap, fully prepared to defeat Skeletor there, but is ultimately defeated himself, loses the sword and his father, and is imprisoned. Skeletor and his second-in-command Evil-Lyn take their forces back to Greyskull, Adam’s home and the origin of the sword, so Skeletor can bond with the sword to become a god and cement his rule over the universe. Meanwhile, Adam reunites with the resistance and his friends in the prison. He gives a speech and wins them all over to his side, and they break out. They launch an attack on Greyskull and Skeletor’s forces, eventually emerging victorious. After having reclaimed Eternia and claimed the the sword’s power as He-Man, Adam and his friends go about defending the realm.

The story is solid. I don’t have too many complaints with the actual narrative beats or plot points, aside from Adam’s frequent desire to open a dialogue with everyone he finds himself in conflict with. The part that confuses me here is once he’s back on Eternia, Adam tries to use his HR conflict resolution background to solve his problems with words. He tries it with Trap Jaw, the resistance, and even Skeletor. It completely falls apart with Trap Jaw and Skeletor, and honestly barely works with the resistance. The reason I don’t like these character choices is because these choices feel out of character. Whenever we see Adam on Earth, he’s bored and disinterested with his job. The implication I get is that he hates the work he does, even if he is good at it. He’s also dissuaded from doing it at every turn because the bad guys are BAD GUYS. My favorite quote about Skeletor in that regard is something along the lines of, “he has a skull for a face. Of course he’s evil.” As a result, we get a hero who seems to double back on something we the audience were led to believe he doesn’t care about, then behaves incompetently in doing so. Adam wants to teach the audience that you can solve conflict with words, but then almost every conflict has to be solved with violence. It’s a strange incompatibility that I don’t understand. It’s not a subversion and deconstruction of Adam as a character because he ultimately triumphs through might. It’s not an exhortation to solve conflict with words because it falls apart in the face of actual conflict. So that leaves me to believe that it’s a critique of trying to solve conflict with words because the act of doing so appears ridiculous almost every time it happens. I do not know if that is the case, and frankly I cannot tell. It wouldn’t be the first movie I’ve seen where I latch onto a lesson or theme and come to the conclusion that in trying to prove a claim and tear down another, all it does is present its claim as absurd while strengthening the other.

Moving to the art design, I think that it’s pretty good for the most part. Don’t get me wrong, this movie is 90% green screen and special effects. It’s more animated than it isn’t because there’s just so much CGI. Sometimes the CGI looks… pretty blatantly CGI in the modern sense where there’s this slight uncanniness to it but it also looks fine from a technical perspective. Sometimes the CGI actually looks really, really good. There are some shots in the movie that are quite cinematic and impressive. In a similar vein, the costuming is perfect. Masters of the Universe embraces the absurd, campy clothing of the original series and it is glorious. It doesn’t try and modernize or change much, but remains faithful to the classic character designs, and I love the movie for doing that. It just works. Masters of the Universe isn’t supposed to be this incredibly deep, thought provoking cinematic masterpiece. It’s a fun, goofy love letter to a toy line made for kids. Children’s toys have goofy designs and even sillier names. Masters of the Universe embraces that origin wholeheartedly. Hands down one of my favorite little details is that Adam named some of these characters as a kid, and the names just stick. The main ones that come to mind are Ram-Man, Fisto, and Mekaneck. These names are ridiculous, but that’s the point. They’re exactly the kinds of nicknames that a ten year would come up with when describing his favorite superheroes.

The movie is also just fun and funny. It doesn’t take itself too seriously. Sure, there are some serious moments, but there are just as many ridiculous ones. One of my favorite occurs during the final showdown between He-Man and Skeletor. Skeletor is absolutely wiping the floor with Adam at first, even going so far as to destroy the Sword of Power. He uses his magic to try and psychologically destroy Adam, going into his mind to see and understand his memories. This scene leads to the glorious image of Skeletor in a sleeveless hoodie doing bicep curls in the gym. It’s just as funny as it sounds, but it works within the confines of the movie. Yes, it’s ridiculous and lighthearted, yet it doesn’t tonally disrupt the gravity of the scene. The same sentiment applies to a lot of the dialogue. There are some really funny lines in the movie, including ones that are definitely aimed at an adult audience. It’s also self-aware of itself and He-Man in the culture zeitgeist. There is a scene using the iconic “What’s Up?”/”HEYYEYAAEYAAAEYAEYAA” meme, complete with Adam wearing a pink shirt. The movie is genuinely funny, and I think the humor tends to land every time.

The action is also surprisingly good. The fight scenes and choreography are way more impressive than they have any right to be. The action sequences are spectacles that are just super fun to watch. I was expecting there to be solid action, but it honestly exceeded my expectations.

The music is also phenomenal. The soundtrack uses a lot of power metal/speed metal/80s metal riffs and aesthetics and it just works so unbelievably well. It perfectly matches the movie’s chosen aesthetics and art direction, and there are a bunch of scenes that look to me like they’re straight off of an album cover. The movie feels nostalgic for the 80s, and I think it does a good job encapsulating its essence. That being said, I wasn’t alive during the 80s, so I’m going purely off of my perceived vibes.

The acting is solid all around. I didn’t notice any scenes or performances that really took me out of the movie. In fact, I wanted to address one of the performances in particular: Jared Leto as Skeletor. Now, it’s no secret that Jared Leto is a rather controversial actor skewing towards disdained and ridiculed. However, he genuinely kills it as Skeletor. He nails the line between goofy, over-the-top Saturday morning cartoon villain and being a genuinely competent threat. My only critique is that some of his lines do end up a little muddled and hard to understand, but I still think I understood the bulk of his dialogue and I do still think his vocally delivery was top tier.

SPOILERS END

Masters of the Universe was a good movie. I thoroughly enjoyed the plot, action, music, acting, and effects. It’s not groundbreaking cinema by any means, but it wasn’t trying to be. It’s a fun, campy movie about a line of toys that’s 40 years old. It’s a solid 7/10 movie that’s perfect for watching regularly with the family. It knew what it was trying to be and set out to do, and it did it. And in this day and age, it’s really refreshing to see those kinds of movies. If you haven’t seen the movie yet, I’d encourage you to give it a shot. It’s a great popcorn flick you can sit back and just enjoy watching.