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Masters of the Universe Review
Back in 1987, Masters of the Universe hit theaters with Dolph Lundgren playing He-Man without Prince Adam. Almost 40 years later, Dolph is back, giving Nicholas Galitzine advice on how to pick up the mantle. In Mattel’s new Masters of the Universe, Galitzine plays Prince Adam, sent to Earth to protect him and the Power Sword from Skeletor and his Evil Masters, and the hero of Eternia after holding the sword aloft and saying, “By the Power of Grayskull!”(Photo Courtesy: IMDb.com)It’s been a long road to bring Eternia back to the big screen. Mattel, after the tremendous success of Barbie, finally pushed He-Man to theaters, joining with Amazon Video. Travis Knight, after his success with Transformers’ Bumblebee, was attached as director to revive another nostalgic brand. So how did he do? Personally, I really enjoyed the film. I didn’t think it was perfect, but it’s something I’d gladly watch again. (Photo Courtesy: IMDb.com)I think the best part of the film is the cast. Galitzine does the double character really well, having the awkward goofiness of Adam after being lost on Earth for years, and the physicality to pull off He-Man’s shows of strength with confidence. Edris Alba as Man at Arms does a good job in the beginning, leading the royal guard, and even though I think he’s played a little too humorously through the rest of the film, he does a decent job in the serious spots. Camila Mendes does a fantastic job as Teela and looks great doing it. Lastly, and I never thought I’d say this in my life, but Jared Leto is great here. He gives Skeletor a lot of darkness, but also the humor you’d expect from the original cartoon. (Photo Courtesy: IMDb.com)Eternia itself is another high point of the movie; Eternos and Castle Grayskull look wonderful, and all the different locations on the planet are beautiful and lifelike. Many of the special effects fall into this as well, with Skeletor’s powers and He-Man’s transformation. I liked a lot of the costumes, with Skeletor’s warriors being the more visually interesting, even though I could not look at Trapjaw without seeing Ivan Ooze from the first Power Rangers movie.(Photos courtesy: Ivan Ooze image via Facebook, Trapjaw image via IMDb.com)Everything isn’t great in Eternia, though. I’ve got a couple of small nitpicks. I was disappointed with the amount of screen time some characters got. My man, Tri-clops, didn’t even get a namedrop, and we never saw his eyes rotate. Some of the other evil warriors had the same problem. I think the humor was a little too much sometimes. It fit well with Adam on Earth and his problems at his job, but once they hit Eternia, I would have preferred it not to try so hard to be funny. The sheer number of Fisto jokes got to be a little too much by the end. It was really weird to hear them say "s*&%" when they made up a word to call Adam when he was a kid; why doesn’t Eternia have its own curse words?My biggest peeves with the movie, unfortunately, fall into spoiler territory, so quit now if you haven’t seen it. I really think they kinda muddled Adam’s desire for peaceful conflict resolution. I liked how Adam tried talking it out with Trapjaw and how he was upset with ripping a man’s arm off, but then he switched right to wanting to kill Skeletor. It happens at the end of the movie too, trying to talk with Skeletor, and then, “The time for talk is over.” I understand that Skeletor provoked him each time, but I would have liked them to do something different, to make the conflict resolution always happen when he’s just Adam, and then when he’s He-Man, he can be more aggressive. It could be something Adam isn’t too thrilled about, like having all that power makes him want to use it too much. Maybe it’s a message on toxic masculinity or that real strength doesn’t require big muscles. I would have preferred Adam to take over in the end and spare Skeletor, locking him up instead of destroying him.(Photo Courtesy: IMDb.com)My wife also had a big problem with King Randor, calling his death later “emotional whiplash,” and I agree. Honestly, I thought the stuff with Randor in the beginning and the awkward talk as he dies is completely pointless. There was no reason for him to be so dismissive and mean to Adam as a child, then turn around as he’s dying and say he wasn’t being mean. Not to mention it’s hard to imagine Skeletor and Evil-Lyn just watching the entire scene. Overall, I think the movie is too long, and removing those scenes would have helped cut down the runtime.(Photo Courtesy: IMDb.com)However, even with those faults, I enjoyed the movie and am really looking forward to what it teased at the end. My wife was practically ecstatic watching the mid-credit scene. While box office numbers have been disappointing – its second weekend had a huge drop at the box office – I’m hopeful that we still get another movie, even if it just goes to streaming. This cast deserves to come back at the very least, and Orko needs to do more than give a PSA at the end.