Rating 6/10
Masters of the Universe has ornate costumes, synth-rock, and plenty of camp. That is both its charm and its problem. He-Man lives somewhere in the middle of a heroic fantasy and a Mattel toy. Director Travis Knight embraces that with real affection. However, there is a difference between welcoming absurdity and drowning in it. For a while, this thing is a blast. After 140 minutes of wisecracks, even the Power of Grayskull starts to wane.
Fifteen years after escaping Eternia during Skeletor’s (Jared Leto) invasion, Prince Adam (Nicholas Galitzine) is living a surprisingly ordinary life on Earth. He works a dull HR job in Oklahoma City, shares an apartment with his friend Hussein (Christian Vunipola), and spends his free time sketching the fragmented people and places he remembers from a childhood that seems like a distant memory.
When Adam finally recovers the long-lost Sword of Power, he is reunited with his childhood friend Teela (Camila Mendes), now a battle-hardened warrior who has spent years resisting Skeletor’s rule. Together they return to Eternia and find a kingdom in ruins. Its heroes have been scattered, and Skeletor sits firmly on the throne. With his parents, King Randor (James Purefoy) and Queen Marlena (Charlotte Riley), still trapped and the fate of Eternia hanging in the balance, Adam must rally a band of unlikely allies and reclaim the destiny he abandoned as a child.
This live-action reimagining has all the ingredients for an entertaining adventure, but it keeps adding more. We live in an age where movies with flimsy screenplays try to excuse themselves by pretending the bad writing is part of the joke. Sometimes that works. Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians of the Galaxy proved that a fantasy can be self-aware, without sacrificing its emotional footing.
This interpretation of Mattel’s property is reaching for that same balance, but it gets the recipe backward. It keeps nudging the audience until the whole production feels weightless. It took six credited writers to figure out how to get Adam back to Eternia: Chris Butler, Aaron Nee, Adam Nee, and Dave Callaham, with story credit to Alex Litvak and Michael Finch. The result is a textbook case of too many cooks.
To the film’s credit, it fully commits to the camp. The costumes are terrific. The score is even better. Daniel Pemberton’s theme, “Eternia,” features guitar work from Brian May of Queen and mixes synths that recall ABBA’s “Lay All Your Love on Me”. The needle-drop use of Queen’s “Princes of the Universe” further underscores the film’s affection for Dino De Laurentiis’s cult classic Flash Gordon, which famously featured a soundtrack by the band. The homage makes sense. After all, this saga also centers on a muscle-bound hero sporting a blond bob.
The cast is operating on the same wavelength. Jared Leto is Skeletor, though you’d never know it. Buried under a heavy prosthetic muscle suit and a CG-enhanced skull face with glowing red eyes, Leto is unrecognizable. It’s a genuinely compelling performance. Leto draws from the grand, flamboyant tradition of personalities like Dr. Frank-N-Furter from The Rocky Horror Picture Show or Scar from The Lion King. Matching him is Alison Brie as Evil-Lyn, who is having fun punctuating nearly every line reading with a perfectly timed eye roll, smirk, or arched eyebrow.
Thank goodness, too, for Idris Elba, who brings some much-needed dignity as Duncan, the trusted general of King Randor and adoptive father of Teela. Elba imparts some actual sincerity. Kristen Wiig adds humor as the voice of Roboto, turning a mechanical warrior built for strength into an endearing supporting player. Nicholas Galitzine also does well as Prince Adam, playing him as a likable guy bewildered by his muscular transformation. Interestingly, Adam spends most of the film without ever being called He-Man. The eventual payoff is a funny bit.
The problem is that the screenplay can’t stop undercutting itself. The PG-13 script leans heavily into innuendo and adult humor. A little of that goes a long way. For example, the writers turn classic character names like Fisto (Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson) and Ram-Man (Jon Xue Zhang) into dirty jokes. The sword-related double entendres grow exasperating as well. Fans hoping for the straightforward heroic spirit of the 1980s cartoon will find wink-wink punchlines instead. Parents looking for a colorful spectacle for their tykes should probably look elsewhere. The film’s use of 4 Non Blondes’ “What’s Up?” is a nod to the famous He-Man meme. That’s cute for a few seconds. Unfortunately, the movie never stops chasing that energy.
Not every adaptation needs to be an epic. The production runs a throne-testing 140 minutes. The length hurts it. Cut 45 minutes out of this distended saga, and the whole thing might actually move. There is a crowd-pleasing adventure buried somewhere underneath all the excess. When the movie champions the sincerity of the cartoon, it’s a good time. Masters of the Universe has enough power; it just needed more discipline.
06-04-26