Masters of the Universe is playing at the Morris Theatre right now, and I was lured in. It’s terrible. It’s two hours of pointless reiteration of an intellectual property that was contrived in the 1980s as a tool to sell toys — it had a poorly animated cartoon show, a glorified advertisement, that played every afternoon in that sweet spot when kids were getting home from school. It was repetitive noise. Every episode had roughly the same structure: a squad of freakishly weird characters, led by a bad guy with a skull for a face, would try to take over a castle guarded by a squad of mostly human, muscle-bound leaders, and be inevitably defeated. The same characters fought each other over and over again, and each one was for sale at Toys’R’Us as an action figure. Mattel cleaned up. Every 8-12 year old boy wanted a set of action figures they could play with as they watched the cartoon, and they would bring them to the playground to battle with their friends’ toys.
I know because my kids grew up in the 1980s, and we had to buy all the toys. On their demands, we had He-Man and Beast Man and Moss Man and Man-At-Arms and Skeletor and Orko and others, and we also had the Castle Grayskull play set and various vehicles. This was also the time in my career when we were frequently moving to various places around the country, and one of the sadder things about that was frequently packing up everything we owned into a truck and driving to a different state, a different apartment. One of my memories was the final step in moving out, and that was going through the rooms and sweeping up the detritus and throwing it into one last box. It was always an assortment of He-Man figures and accessories that I had to rescue lest the kids yell at me.
So I had to go see this movie. It was my mental equivalent of tidying up the garbage in the corners of my brain.
It is a competently made movie. It’s got some good actors, Idris Elba and Alison Brie, and some new (to me) players, who did a good job, although I wish all of them were acting in good movies. I normally detest Jared Leto, but in this movie he’s unrecognizable behind a skull face and a comically affected accent, which is the only way to see Leto in anything. The plot is familiar: Skeletor and his weird pack of freaks take over the world of Eternia, He-Man shows up with a magic sword and beats everyone up (there is a lot more killing of bit players in the movie than in the old TV series), and the status quo is restored. Ho hum.
I kept wondering why this movie was made. It wasn’t for Art, because it’s entirely derivative and lacking in novelty. It wasn’t to tell a story that would resonate with viewers, because it could have been a cheap 20 minute cartoon rather than an expensive 2 hour movie. It wasn’t to provide moral instruction, although it did include an appearance by Orko at the end to briefly summarize the lesson taught by the show, just like the old cartoon. I don’t even recall what the message was, it was so perfunctory and so irrelevant to the movie I’d just watched. No, this was clearly the product of a thought by a marketing executive at Mattel. Let’s take another pass at the wallets of the 1980s generation that we successfully bilked 40 years ago! It’s a naked attempt to milk nostalgia.
They got me. I contributed to their $54 million box office on a movie that cost $200 million to make. Be smarter than me and don’t fall for it. The movie is not good enough to outweigh the bad faith premise behind its creation.
I never really liked the He-Man cartoon. Overgendered title? I’m an early X-er. Didn’t get sucked into the Dolph movie either. Despite his dumb movies, Dolph was a smart fellow with a degree in chemistry I think.
One cartoon I kinda liked in my childhood was Battle of the Planets. It might have been my uncritical gaze at the time not having been yet familiar with Horkheimer and Adorno. It was ripped off from Japan as would be the Ringu series decades later. Oh well.
I love you PZ and I’ll never tire of your “old man goes to see a movie that there’s no chance he’ll ever enjoy and is surprised that he doesn’t enjoy it” posts.
By contrast, the Captain Powers And The Soldiers of the Future live-action TV series of thr 1980s at least had some effort to make a good story. And this was despite the main motivation behind it was to sell toys.
Things are even more cynical today.
.
If you have small grandchildren, try get them DVDs or Blue-Rays about Moomin Valley, well-made Japanese TV/film based on Tove Janssons children’s books.
.
Myself I grew up with Swedish translations of Enid Blyton’s very jingoistic ‘The Five’ stories. Later the Brits would make the parody ‘Five Go Mad In Dorset’, a highly recommended film with a young Stephen Fry.
I hate to break it to you, but probably 90% of movies released (probably higher) are just to make money. Art for art’s sake is dead, at least in movie-making.
Some of the Monty Python gang made a live-action version of wossname, The wind in the willows, the story with Mr Toad etc. It is a cultural thing in Britain, not well known here. Might be worth a try to hunt down a DVD.
.
I think “Caroline” was a film aimed at a younger audience.
.
Several excellent animated films by Miyagi; My Friend Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service et al.
.
And several good films made in Scandinavia but I am pretty sure there are no subtitled versions available.
He-Man wasn’t my thing either. I was more into badly re-dubbed anime like Robotech and Voltron.
Found a nice piece about the original series a while ago:
https://wearethemutants.com/2018/04/02/crooked-masters-how-he-man-colonized-a-generations-imagination/
As to the movie, well, haven’t seen it, not planning to, sounds like every other movie recently released by the Hollywood clone labs.
I know that most movies are made to make money, but this one was only made to make money, with absolutely no other intent.
I never was exposed to the Masters of the Universe stuff, and I don’t recall my kids getting into it either. But I lived in Seattle in the 1980s when Washington’s Republican senator Slade Gordon was given the nickname Skeletor, which fit him perfectly.
Never watched “He-Man,” but Daughters #1 and #2 really enjoyed The Power Puff Girls.
.
.
Who could we get to play Ms. Sarah Bellum?
fusilier
James 2:24
Whoopsie, forgot to mention that the ONLY villain worth seeing is The Boogie Man.
fusilier
James 2:24
@2 — Never once have I gotten a vibe from PZ’s reviews that he’s surprised he didn’t enjoy a particular movie. He knows exactly what he’s getting into. That’s what makes his snarky write-ups so much fun.
I never spent a penny or a second on any of this drek. Can’t image why anyone over the age of seven would.
@12 – I enjoy them even more imagining PZ is all excited to see it, and then afterwards imagining he’s shaking his fist at the theater, saying “damn you all, you fooled me again!” And then just getting all excited for the next empty CGI actioner.
I had to occasionally sneak He-Man as a kid. I wasn’t allowed to watch it by my parents because they fell for the satanic ritual abuse panic paranoia which included He-Man. I will probably watch the movie.
A commentator I enjoy on YouTube said, basically, “It wasn’t art, but it was fun, and couldn’t we all use more ‘diverse group of heros band together to defeat fascism’?”.
The Dolph Lundgren Masters of the Universe wasn’t that good mostly, but there was a moment it was brilliant, maybe even subversive. It is when Skeletor, at the peak of his powers, asks He-Man “Tell me about the loneliness of good, He-Man. Is it equal to the loneliness of evil?”. Here is a guy that has no comrades or allies, only underlings he treats as pets at best. He has no plans or goals beyond getting power. And once he has it, he feels an overwhelming emptiness.
I can’t say I never liked He-Man, cause I did (watched the show, subscribed to the magazine(!), and had a small collection of the toys), but He-Man was always third place for me in the 80s toys with shows (and comics) universe. G.I. Joe, then Transformers, then He-Man. I’m sure if I were to watch one of those shows today I’d be incredibly underwhelmed. Or perhaps whelmed.
I am fascinated by Dolph Lundgren‘s life trajectory and would not have guessed at his intellectual acumen and credentials:
I mean I guess pursuing a glamorous life and acting career beats going to MIT hands down. If he we to MIT he would have missed out on He-Man! Or co-starring with Sly and then JCVD in movies. Smart guy in dumb movies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolph_Lundgren
Is he a national hero in Sweden?
I spent my time at the theatre catching the brief run of the final instalment of the Amazing Digital Circus so I could pay to see on the big screen what will be released for free on Youtube in two weeks. It was bittersweet and emotionally devastating. And I’m sure I was picking up a very strong trans or trans-adjacent subtext.
I guess you didn’t like that movie where Ed Norton destroyed something beautiful?
@11 What about… Him?
The Boogeyman did have a sweet ride though.
I wonder how long before there’s a She-Ra sequel or companion movie to this new He-Man one?
Was she in it?
From the commercials, it looked like a Thor ripoff from the blond, muscled white guy superhero to the techno-fantasy world.
I lost interest in the Marvel/DC worlds after Green Lantern when I was kid. I enjoyed the Stargate SG1/Atlantis shows for the way that the Egyptian and Greek gods and Arthurian legends were explained away as caused by advanced aliens. They stopped short of explaining Christianity away by Jesus being a Go’auld but I thought it was implied nonetheless.
Dr. McCoy: “Once, just once, I’d like to be able to land someplace and say, ‘Behold, I am the Archangel Gabriel!'”
— Bread and Circuses ST:TOS S2E43
How the hell did they get Idris Elba to appear in this dreck? Doesn’t he have an agent of some kind who was saying, “I’m begging you man, don’t do it”!
@1. Hemidactylus :
That was the first SF / anime /manga /cartoon I ever saw as I kid back inprimary school. It absolutley blew me away and I loved that old show Recently stumnbled on this youtube clip here – discusing it which brought back a few memories and few insights on what we weren’;t told about it or got tosee in it too. (22 mins long.)
Used to be the highlight of my day watching that then animated Flash Gordon, Starblazers, Mysterious Cities of Gold , Ulysses 31, Spartakus & the Sun beneath the Sea, Astroboy and more such cartoons as a boy.
Did see some episodes of He-Man and She-Ra too but neveras impressed by them as the aforementioned ones and quite a few others.
Sue me for wanting to escape into something that, flawed as it was, filled me with joy as a child.
I liked it, with its warts and all. I laughed when Skeletor says, “You are all but worms beneath me,” and Idris Elba says, “Butt worms?”
So, I had a moment of joy as a 50 year old man. Sorry your night was ruined.
(PS, I think my son’s (18) night was also ruined. But I watched a lot of Jurrassic World drek with this kid. He owed me one).
Wow, thanks StevoR @27! Watching the video. I had forgotten how good, but oddly fragmented, the show actually was. Would have liked to have seen the Japanese original, dark themes and all. That would not have gone over well in the late 70s US (or maybe Oz). Back then nobody died on the A-Team show. Weird that the show we early Xers watched inspired a Millennial favorite called Power Rangers!
The way the Battle of the Planets show was edited is so weird. Totally destroyed context, kinda like removing the Buddhist elements of Ringu and replacing that with…horses. Also they totally chopped up the gender fluidity of the villain and that resulted in multiple characters instead of the one.
But now I realize why He-Man was a snore for me. How do you transition from the epic quality of Battle of the Planets to the toy selling silliness of He-Man and take it seriously? Plus I was a bit older.
I was never into the Transformers stuff in the 80s either. Maybe too old for it at the time. But I did like some of the blockbuster movies. Quite emotional actually. Maybe not quite “male weepies”, but still!
I was today years old when I learned Idris Elba was knighted last month and is actually Sir Idris Elba if you please.
(All the more reason his agent should have been clinging to his ankles saying, “no, really, you don’t want to be in this shit movie, sir.)
Elba doesn’t seem to be picky about his roles.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0252961/
Personally, I’m waiting for the Thundarr the Barbarian movie. And waiting…
PZ: The theory behind movies like this is rather simple: movies based on old comic-book or cartoon characters look like a relatively safe bet (and safety is important to people who are making $100M+ movies); and they’re running out of old comic-book/cartoon characters to use. I figured it was inevitable that someone in the business would get around to He-Man (especially after they’d got to Transformers); the only question was who, and when.
And yes, of course people with that kind of money to burn could make much better movies from much better material than this, but they’re much less inclined to do so because success and popularity are far less likely than with old and well-known characters.
@33 Raging Bee.
Nostalgiamaxxing, if you will. I won’t, but people in general will.
About time for a Roger Ramjet movie.
(That was the shittiest cartoon I can recall)
I’m sure that this was just an effort to keep their copyright intact. They did a similar thing last year for video games with He-man a free gacha for Raid Shadow Legends.
My boomer version of the He Man Movie was Speed Racer. While Speed Racer was a third or fourth rate TV anime ( from before the term was invented ), the anime further up the scale were generally from Ozamu Tezuka, the movie version managed to disappoint. While the anime told it’s stories during the titular races and all the characterisation and plot development , such as it was , happened during the race, the movie in typical Hollywood adaptation fashion brings the story to regular halts to have sit com scenes in interior sets. The writers do not know how to let action tell the story or do not trust the US audience not to have their hand held in the story telling. It slows a story with speed in the title to a crawl and makes the races only spectale rather then dramatic set pieces.