I grew up right in the middle of the unregulated toy commercial action figure boom of the 1980s. From roughly 1982 through 1988, my interests bounced between Star Wars, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, ThunderCats, Transformers, G.I. Joe, and eventually Nintendo. Some toy lines came and went, while others stuck around longer, but they all played a role in my childhood.
I spent plenty of time with He-Man, Skeletor, and their friends, watching the cartoon and playing with the toys. I was also right in the target age range when the 1987 Masters of the Universe movie was released. Even as a kid, I was disappointed that the film mostly took place on Earth instead of Eternia, and the little bit of Eternia we saw was not like the cartoon.
Ironically, part of my criticism of the new film is similar. Thankfully, the 2026 movie only spends about 15 to 20 minutes on Earth instead of almost the entire running time. I would have preferred the film to focus solely on Eternia and embrace the world that made me interested in He-Man in the first place.
With that in mind, here are my thoughts on Masters of the Universe (2026).
Masters of the Universe was mostly a fun adventure and origin story. In many ways, this felt like the movie I imagined we would get when I was a child. Eternia was beautiful. The CGI was excellent and looked far better than the lazy, unfinished look of some of the latter Marvel movies.
As a fan from many years ago, I enjoyed how, for the most part, the characters were portrayed and designed in ways that were accurate to, or at least in the neighborhood of, the classic characters. There were a few divergent designs, but that was not really an issue for me. I also enjoyed several references to the 1987 film, which for some reason I was not expecting.
The cast was good, and the humor worked more often than not. I have seen some comparisons to Thor: Ragnarok, and that feels pretty accurate. That said, I prefer the Chris Hemsworth-led film to this one.
My biggest issue was how meta the movie was. Instead of simply embracing the toys and cartoon, the film explains that many of the names and ideas came from the imagination of Adam as an 8-to-10-year-old boy after he was banished to Earth for his protection. That may be clever to some people, but to me it felt like the movie was making fun of the source material.
On top of that, I did not care for the innuendo and language in what I expected to be more of a kids' adventure movie. It always takes me out of fantasy or science fiction when characters from other worlds use modern human profanity.
My last criticism was the heroes killing Skeletor's minions rather frequently. In the animated series, He-Man went out of his way to save everyone, even if they would most likely betray him once they were out of danger. I did not care for He-Man blasting away random nameless characters or throwing one character into the lava.
Overall, I enjoyed Masters of the Universe, but I wish it had trusted the original material a little more.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Thanks for following along,
J. Allen Tucker
Featured image: Original He-Man fan art by J. Allen Tucker.
Character © Mattel. Artwork © 2026 J. Allen Tucker.