Masters Of The Universe Reminds Us Of What He-Man Has Always Been
Director Travis Knight reveals why a hero like He-Man is more important than ever.
For anyone born after Masters of the Universe’s dominance in the 1980s, it’s impossible to watch the new Masters of the Universe without thinking, “Who exactly is this for?” The easy answer (and perhaps the most cynical) is that the audience matters less than Mattel’s desire to sell more He-Man toys, or at the very least, remind us that these were, and are, objectively, great toys. There’s a very good reason the star of the ‘80s cartoon looked like an action figure come to life, because that’s exactly what He-Man was before he became the subject of a Saturday morning classic. And so, Amazon MGM’s Masters of the Universe often grinds to a halt to remind us that these characters also exist in toy form.
Admittedly, it does find a clever way to do it, as its hero, Prince Adam (Nicholas Galitzine), associates the warriors of Eternia with the silly nicknames he gave them in his youth. When he reunites with them after years displaced on Earth, it’s with that same childlike wonder: “You’re Ram-Man! And you’re Mekaneck!” And yes, it can still be cringey — the links to tie-in action figures would be hovering in a corner of the screen if the film had premiered on Prime Video and not in theaters — but Masters is fortunately more than a marketing ploy. Director Travis Knight owes about as much to the toys as he does to the cartoon that spun off from them, and the latter allegiance infuses this colorful origin story with a vintage charm, delivering the kind of hero that’s long gone out of fashion but is just as overdue for a return.
Masters of the Universe’s ending, explained
Prince Adam easily transforms into He-Man — but that’s just half the battle for our hero.
Masters of the Universe follows Adam, the exiled prince of Eternia, in his quest to return home and defeat the evil Skeletor (Jared Leto), the demon who conquered the realm when Adam was just a boy. Adam managed to escape with the Sword of Power, the mythical weapon that transforms worthy wielders into nigh-immortal warriors and also serves as his ticket home. Unfortunately, he also lost it during the interdimensional journey between Eternia and Earth, leaving him stranded on the latter for years.
After a big time jump, which reintroduces Adam as a young man still dreaming of Eternia, Masters doesn’t waste much time reuniting him with the sword. From there, it’s full speed ahead to the battle still raging on Eternia. Unlocking the Power of Grayskull comes just as quickly to the hero. But gaining the muscles is really only half the battle for Adam: though he finally has the tools to free his planet from Skeletor’s evil forces, Adam’s struggles are largely internal. He wants desperately to be the kind of man that his father, King Randor (James Purefoy), and his Man-At-Arms (Idris Elba) tried to raise him to be, a beacon of strength who takes no prisoners and never fails to protect what’s important to him.
But the prodigal prince fails to live up to those standards at every turn: his attempts to rescue Randor from imprisonment end with the king’s demise, and Adam is eventually imprisoned himself alongside everyone who’s stood against Skeletor. Even when he rallies these troops for one last battle, Skeletor shatters his sword, what he believes to be the source of his strength. It takes a brief trip to the afterlife to realize that the sword is nothing more than a tool. The true vessel for the Power, as explained by the all-knowing Sorceress (Morena Baccarin), is actually Adam himself. His empathy makes him the Chosen One, and his reluctance to fight — even when he’s capable of winning — makes him the ultimate leader.
Masters of the Universe brings He-Man back to his roots.
It’s an unusual choice for a character who has more in common (physique-wise, anyway) with the ruthless Conan the Barbarian, but that dissonance is exactly what made Knight so keen on the character.
“It was always a part of the core character of the He-Man that I fell in love with in the ‘80s,” Knight tells Inverse. “I mean, here was a guy who looked like... the mold for what an action superhero was supposed to be, with those giant boulder shoulders and those biceps that looked like glazed hams. He was absolutely jacked.”
Surprisingly, though, the He-Man of the 1980s cartoon is almost loath to put those muscles to use, at least as the first line of defense. “Instead of the first thing he does [being] throwing a punch at a warlock’s face, he was trying to find common ground,” Knight continues. “He was talking about kindness and empathy and talking to one another.” That was huge for the filmmaker, who describes himself in hindsight as a “sensitive,” “lonely” kid: watching He-Man solve his issues in new ways gave Knight a new model of masculinity to live up to.
“This very notion that one could be mighty and also empathetic, that one could be strong and decent, it was very unusual,” Knight reveals. It was a seismic thing. It was like discovering you could own both a tank and a diary: these things didn’t feel like they went together.”
Knight on the set of Masters of the Universe with Nicholas Galitzine and Camila Mendes.
Yet go together they do, as Masters of the Universe reveals when Adam comes back to life, his shattered sword is magically reforged, and he effortlessly defeats Skeletor. It’s not that Adam can’t use his Power for brutality; as he tells his adversary, “I just prefer not to.” And once he accepts that as a virtue, not a flaw, he’s more powerful than ever, freeing Eternia without breaking much of a sweat.
That combination of kindness and strength was a “critical component” for Knight’s version of He-Man. “I felt like it offered us an opportunity to talk about something that I think is worth discussing in our modern world and our society,” the director says. In an era that valorizes savagery and revenge, it’s admittedly surprising when a film focuses on a hero taking a different path. In the years since he was at the top of the zeitgeist, He-Man has been dismissed as a dour, hypermasculine power fantasy, but the soul of his story couldn’t be further from it.
The moral here is a refreshingly earnest one, Knight says: “Being nice is a good thing... being kind is underrated.” By that logic, it wouldn’t hurt to see more He-Man action figures out in the world.
