There is a moment late in Masters of the Universe when Skeletor looks at Prince Adam and describes him as a muscular man wielding a powerful sword between his thighs. By then, the movie has already delivered jokes about Fisto “fisting” villains and Ram-Man giving enemies “head.”
Which raises the question that hangs over nearly every scene of this confused, exhausting adaptation:
Who exactly is this movie for?
Children discovering He-Man for the first time? Adults who grew up watching the animated series and smashing the action figures together on the living room floor? Fans hoping for an earnest fantasy adventure? Viewers looking for a self-aware superhero comedy?
Director Travis Knight and the movie’s collection of screenwriters never arrive at an answer. And we, the audience, end up losing and wasting our money on this adaptation from Prime.
That is a genuine disappointment because Knight previously pulled off something deceptively difficult with Bumblebee. He took a toy-based franchise that had become loud, mechanical and emotionally hollow and gave it warmth, personality and a human center.
With Masters of the Universe, however, Knight appears stranded between tones. One minute, the film delivers goofy jokes and knowingly mocks its own mythology. The next, it wants audiences to take a death, betrayal or massive fantasy battle seriously.
The result is not a clever balancing act. It is tonal whiplash.
From Eternia to Human Resources
The film opens in Eternos, the capital of Eternia, where young Prince Adam and Teela train under Duncan, better known to fans as Man-At-Arms.
When Skeletor’s forces attack, Adam’s parents, King Randor and Queen Marlena, are captured. Duncan is gravely wounded, and the Sorceress sends Adam through a portal to Earth – Oklahoma City for whatever reason – with the Sword of Power. Adam escapes but loses the sword in the process.
That setup should provide the emotional foundation for everything that follows.
Instead, young Adam, played by Artie Wilkinson-Hunt, barely exists as a character before the movie rushes him off the planet.
Fifteen years later, Adam has grown into Nicholas Galitzine, an extraordinarily muscular office worker employed in human resources in Oklahoma City. He lives with his goofy – this has become a trope which needs to end – roommate Hussein, played by Christian Vunipola, and remains obsessed with finding the Sword of Power.
After receiving an anonymous message, Adam locates the sword inside a comic book store. His discovery alerts the people of Eternia, including Teela, now played by Camila Mendes, as well as Skeletor’s forces.
Adam is eventually brought back to a conquered Eternia, where its surviving warriors live in hiding. Duncan, played by Idris Elba, has become an alcoholic. Roboto has been reduced to a household servant, and the heroes initially dismiss Adam as a nobody.
From there, the film becomes an extended race to recover the power of Grayskull, rescue Adam’s parents, and overthrow Skeletor.
The climax brings Adam, Teela, and Duncan to Castle Grayskull, where He-Man battles Skeletor, Teela confronts Evil-Lyn, and Cringer faces Beast Man.
Skeletor destroys the Sword of Power and forces Adam into his memories of Earth. The Sorceress then reveals that the power of Grayskull was never truly contained within the sword. It was inside Adam.
Adam reconstitutes the weapon, transforms again, and defeats Skeletor.
That revelation should complete Adam’s emotional journey.
But because the film has never clearly established what Adam believes about himself, what he lacks, or what he must overcome internally, the moment lands as a familiar screenwriting lesson rather than a moving discovery.
Six months later, Queen Marlena rules Eternos once more. Adam finally embraces the name He-Man, Cringer becomes Battle Cat, Hussein visits Eternia, and a restored Roboto returns.
The movie then teases Adam’s missing twin sister Adora, better known as She-Ra, while Evil-Lyn retrieves Skeletor’s skull and his laughter promises another installment.
Naturally, Orko also appears to deliver the moral. The film ends not with satisfaction but with franchise planning.
It is a perfectly serviceable fantasy-adventure framework. The problem is that the movie never gives us enough reason to care about the man at its center.
Prince Adam Remains a Stranger
Stories about an apparent misfit discovering that he is “the one” are hardly new.
The Matrix did it. Harry Potter did it. Countless fantasy and superhero movies have done it.
Those stories work because they allow audiences to understand the hero before destiny arrives. We experience Neo’s dissatisfaction. We live inside Harry’s loneliness. Their transformations matter because we know who they were before the world changed.
Masters of the Universe gives Adam one childhood scene, sends him to Earth, and then introduces him as a fully grown, physically perfect man with an unremarkable job.
We learn that he feels displaced and that other people do not believe his stories about Eternia, but those ideas are never explored with enough depth to make Adam emotionally compelling.
He is not exactly an outsider because Galitzine looks as though he could bench-press the entire HR department. He is not particularly awkward, damaged or isolated. He simply waits for the plot to retrieve him.
The screenplay comes from Chris Butler, Aaron Nee, Adam Nee, Alex Litvak and Michael Finch, and that crowded writing credit may explain why the movie feels as though several incompatible versions were stitched together.
One version wants to be sincere fantasy.
Another wants to parody He-Man.
Another wants to resemble a modern Marvel adventure.
Another seems primarily interested in juvenile double entendres.
None wins the fight.
A Franchise Afraid of Its Own World
The larger failure is that the filmmakers never fully embrace Eternia.
The animated He-Man and the Masters of the Universe was ridiculous, colorful and unapologetically imaginative. It featured skull fortresses, giant cats, sorcerers, warriors with mechanical necks and characters named Fisto, Ram-Man and Moss Man.
You cannot approach that world with embarrassment.
You have to commit.
Instead, this film repeatedly undercuts its mythology with jokes, as though everyone involved worries audiences might laugh at the material unless the movie laughs first. That self-consciousness drains the fantasy of wonder.
Why should we invest and care about these characters?
Fisto, played by Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson, becomes the centerpiece of a painfully obvious joke about his name and signature weapon. Ram-Man, played by Jon Xue Zhang, gets similarly crude material. Skeletor’s dialogue repeatedly punctures scenes that should carry genuine menace.
A little humor would not be the problem. The problem is that the jokes expose the filmmakers’ lack of confidence in the world.
Why Is Man-At-Arms a Drunk?
The decision to turn Duncan into a broken alcoholic is another example of the screenplay manufacturing a familiar character arc rather than developing one organically.
Idris Elba brings weight and authority to Man-At-Arms, but the film sidelines him by transforming the legendary warrior into a defeated drunk who miraculously regains his courage when Adam returns.
Why was this necessary?
Duncan could have been burdened by guilt, injured, emotionally shattered, or divided over Adam’s return without reaching for the most obvious version of a fallen-mentor storyline.
His recovery feels less like an earned transformation and more like the screenplay checking a box.
Teela fares slightly better. Camila Mendes gives the film some urgency, and her history with Adam creates the foundation for a relationship. But like nearly everyone else, she remains trapped inside a story moving too quickly to develop meaningful emotional connections.
Roboto Feels Assembled From Spare Parts
Kristen Wiig voices Roboto, and the character comes across as an imitation of other, more successful screen robots.
Her deadpan delivery and combat abilities recall K-2SO from Rogue One, while the sentimental effort to turn a machine into an emotional companion brings The Wild Robot to mind.
Those are not bad influences, but Roboto never develops a personality distinct enough to escape them.
The film wants his eventual destruction to carry emotional weight. It does not, largely because Roboto feels like another borrowed device in a movie already borrowing its tone, structure and humor from better franchises.
Pop Songs Are Not a Substitute for Excitement
The movie also continues an increasingly tiresome blockbuster habit: blasting familiar pop music over action sequences. Looking at you, James Gunn.
Used well, a recognizable song can energize a scene or create an ironic counterpoint. Used constantly, it becomes a crutch.
Here, the music strips battles of scale and danger. Instead of allowing the score, sound design and performances to create genuine tension, the film reaches for a playlist designed to tell viewers when they should be having fun.
The effect is especially damaging in a fantasy epic.
He-Man raising the Sword of Power should feel mythic.
It should not feel like the beginning of a streaming-service commercial.
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Jared Leto Almost Finds the Movie
Jared Leto is one of the film’s brighter spots as Skeletor. Hidden beneath the skull-faced design, Leto gives the villain theatrical menace and seems to understand that Skeletor should be enormous, operatic, and just slightly absurd.
When the screenplay allows him to play the character straight, he is genuinely threatening.
Unfortunately, the movie keeps saddling him with self-aware comedy. Skeletor rejecting Adam’s appeal for peace because he simply enjoys being evil could have been delightfully villainous, but even that moment is delivered with the movie’s relentless wink toward the audience.
Alison Brie plays Evil-Lyn with appropriate calculation, and the film wisely leaves the door open for her return. James Purefoy and Charlotte Riley appear as King Randor and Queen Marlena, while Morena Baccarin brings presence to the Sorceress.
Dolph Lundgren, who played He-Man in the 1987 film, also makes a cameo as a gym-going “Macho Man.” It is one of several moments designed to prompt recognition rather than emotion.
Maybe Some Cartoons Should Remain Cartoons
I grew up watching He-Man.
I played with the action figures. I knew the characters. I understood the appeal of holding up that plastic sword and imagining that the power of Grayskull was suddenly yours.
My daughter had Castle Grayskull and Battle Cat.
This film did nothing for me. That does not mean every adaptation must replicate childhood nostalgia or preserve an animated series exactly as it was. But it should understand why people loved the property in the first place.
Masters of the Universe has the characters, costumes, weapons and catchphrases.
What it lacks is conviction.
The movie is embarrassed by its silliness but too dependent on that silliness to become serious fantasy. It wants children, nostalgic adults, superhero audiences and comedy fans, but its attempts to please all of them leave it with no distinct identity.
Maybe some cartoons really should remain cartoons.
Or maybe they simply deserve filmmakers willing to believe in them.
Masters of the Universe is currently streaming on Prime.
BOTTOM LINE: Masters of the Universe struggles to balance fantasy, action and crude comedy, wasting Nicholas Galitzine, Idris Elba and a promising Jared Leto performance in a confused He-Man reboot. It’s a REEL SKIP.
The Geek is a working screenwriter, director and screenwriting instructor.
