In Masters of the Universe, director Travis Knight brings the legendary franchise back to the big screen in this epic live-action adventure. After being separated for 15 years, the Sword of Power leads Prince Adam (Nicholas Galitzine) back to Eternia, where he discovers his home shattered under the fiendish rule of Skeletor (Jared Leto). To save his family and his world, Adam must join forces with his closest allies, Teela (Camila Mendes) and Duncan/Man-At-Arms (Idris Elba), and embrace his true destiny as He-Man—the most powerful man in the universe.
While it is a few weeks before Father’s Day, Masters of the Universe set itself up for a nice Father’s Day movie to bring your dad to the theatre. It has action, adventure, and full masculine energy. That is not to say that this was exclusively a Father’s Day action flick, but a great time for the family. In a certain sense, it was a decent family ride you would experience at Disney World or Universal Studios.
Knight has a knack for building great character relationships; however, it was not between the lead characters. Somehow, the most emotional acting arc was between Duncan and Roboto—and Kristin Wiig was voice acting as a robot. In terms of a standout solo performance, Leto has repaired his relationship with me with this Skeletor depiction. Leto should stick with voice acting because this was by far one of his better recent roles. Most of the time, the Skeletor jokes were unhinged in a good way—only some of the jokes were a bit cringey.
The issue was not that Galitzine and Mendes did not have any romantic chemistry, but that their friendship chemistry seemed off too. In a way, Masters of the Universe felt like Thor where they had Thor play the straight man for comedy. The only difference was that Thor was not depicted as completely an airhead when he lost his powers. Galitzine’s Adam was not the worst thing, but the character writing made him seem a little too much of a dumb-dumb. However, I did appreciate this story’s take on what it means to be a man because of how Adam is written for this modern take. To put it simply, the time of all brawn is over.
One of the other abnormalities with Adam’s character writing could also be attributed to the fact that the fish-out-of-water character trope has been overdone at this point. Although…the self-aware jokes mostly hit! Something about Knight’s movies, such as Kubo and the Two Strings and Bumblebee, brings a higher level of emotional payoff with CGI/animated characters than with human actors. All in all, this movie was no Thor: The Dark World.
“For those true He-Man fans, the suit in Masters of the Universe looked great on Galitzine.”
The story arc followed Thor too, in some ways better, but the tone of dialogue threw off some of the vibes. Funnily, Elba was also in Thor, but I liked that we got to see more of an arc for his character as Duncan—compared to his role as Heimdall. Elba and Mendes’ chemistry was a bit better, playing father and daughter—containing some great banter between parent and child. Ultimately, Galitzine did not look like he organically meshed with his co-stars, who he should have looked like he got along with for plot reasons.
The animation and CGI teams deserve praise for their work on making Skeletor look cool, too. The digital red light eyes, or lens flare eyes, were menacing. Cringer’s animation reminded me of the animation of the lions in Mufasa, so not the worst-looking. Most of the foreground production designs and set decorations of Eternia are amazing, but sadly, the blue screen to fake out the scale was a bit rough. As for Richard Sale’s costume design and the makeup department, I loved the attention to detail on everyone’s costumes—from Adam, Evil-Lyn, all the way down to Mekaneck.
For those true He-Man fans, the suit in Masters of the Universe looked great on Galitzine. From a story beat perspective, I enjoyed the journey leading up to earning the suit. The modernization and references all took me back. Again, the fact that these characters do not take the absurdities of Eternia’s lore in the most super serious manner worked with how certain characters’ looks played for comedy.
This was one of composer Daniel Pemberton’s (Project Hail Mary, The Drama) lesser creative and memorable scores, but that was only because he had to play within the IP’s original score. It was a combination of the original He-Man and the Masters of the Universe theme by Shuki Levy and Haim Saban, mixed with the Masters of the Universe (1987) theme by Bill Conti. The co-music production with Queen lead guitarist and backing vocalist Brian May was a very strong touch, though.
One of the film’s few saving graces was how well the fight choreography looked. If a movie is listed as an action movie, there better be good action. While the story shifted to a “less violent” take, I loved the cinematography of the fights—especially for the fights and final showdown between Adam and Skeletor. It honestly felt like a video game with some of the slow-motion shots in the fight.
I would definitely recommend Masters of the Universe for a fun time. I thought the first act was okay, leaning heavily on some humour that hits and some that does not; act two was a bit of a slog, as the exposition and emotions halted the action’s steam; and then the third act came back with some heavy action and some good humour. Despite some slow-moving story parts and an obscene Amazon advertising placement, the balance of silliness and action provided entertainment for the whole family. Definitely stay for the one mid-credit scene!
