During the 1980s, Saturday morning cartoons were a staple of the weekend.  Some of the shows were geared towards boys, some for girls, though there were a few upon which everyone could agree.  In thinking back on those series, it should not be surprising how many of them have been made into feature length films.  A large portion of these are more of the male variety, like GI Joe (1985-1986) and Transformers (1984-1987).  There are some other titles.  For instance, Smurfs (1981-1989) has had several cinematic iterations, for better or worse.  Of all the choices from back in the day, there is one that was as popular as any of them, yet has never received its due on the silver screen.  I am referring to He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983-1985).  Its fantastical tales of the muscle-bound title character and his battles with the nefarious Skeletor were the stuff of many boys’ dreams.  I can think of few kids my age who did not at least once raise a stick above their head ala He-Man’s famous Sword of Power and proclaim, “By the Power of Grayskull!  I have the power!”  As a practicing Catholic, I think of these matters differently, but it was fun in those days.  Forgive me, but I am burying the lead here.  There is a movie based on this animated saga called Masters of the Universe (1987) and it is . . . interesting.

What I believe the makers of Masters of the Universe were hoping was that interest in the cartoon would help fill in the plot holes that are present from the beginning.  On the planet Eternia, somewhere in the galaxy, a rebellion is ongoing between the usurper Skeletor (Frank Langella) and the forces led by He-Man (Dolph Lundgren).  In case you cannot tell good guys from bad guys from those names, Skeletor has toppled the ruling government, centered on Castle Grayskull.  The ruler, the Sorceress (Christina Pickels), has been captured and Skeletor is trying to steal her magic for himself.  This will be completed when the moon rises and opens a kind of cosmic eye that will channel the power from her into him.  There is, of course, one fly in the ointment, and that is He-Man.  It is a bit aggrandizing to refer to his actions as a “rebellion” as you only ever see him and two of his comrades, Man-At-Arms (Jon Cypher) and his daughter, Teela (Chelsea Field).  Despite their small numbers, they do their best to disrupt Skeletor’s plans.  To this end, we witness them attack a convoy that is transporting a prisoner, the diminutive Gwildor (Billy Barty).  In appreciation for their help, Gwildor takes He-Man and company to his home to show them his invention, the Cosmic Key.  It is a device that can transport people anywhere.  Though they soon figure out that it had been Gwildor that had gotten Skeletor’s soldiers into Castle Grayskull, Gwildor protests to being duped and pledges to help them free the Sorceress.  Unfortunately, they are attacked as they are attempting to do so.  Punching random buttons on his device, Gwildor opens a portal that takes them to the United States in 1986.  However, the Cosmic Key gets lost in the jump, and they have to now split up to find it.  The people who locate it first are Julie Winston (Courtney Cox, yes, that Courtney Cox) and her boyfriend, Kevin Corrigan (Robert Duncan MacMcNeill).  It is the last day for Julie in town, who is leaving that night to go to school on the East Coast.  Before going to the airport, she asks Kevin to take her to the cemetery to visit the graves of her dead parents.  It is there that they stumble across the Cosmic Key, which Kevin takes for a Japanese synthesizer.  Being the musician that he is, he attempts to incorporate it into his band for the concert they are to give that night.  Fiddling with the keys on the contraption allows Skeletor to zero in on its location and send a bunch of goons to retrieve it, he having a Cosmic Key of his own.  Kevin leaves Julie at the venue in order to show the machine to his friend Charlie (Barry Livingston), and it is at that moment that Skeletor’s thugs arrive.  A panicked Julie takes off down an alleyway where she runs into He-Man, who, along with his compatriots, defeat Skeletor’s men.  She is also remarkably receptive to the insane situation at hand as described by He-Man, and willing to help.  Thus, the hunt is on for the Cosmic Key.  After consulting with Charlie, Kevin returns to where he left Julie to find the fire department and a suspicious Detective Hugh Lubic (James Tolkan).  Wanting to question Kevin further, Detective Lubic takes the young man back to Julie’s house, but leaves with the Cosmic Key before He-Man and Julie get to the house.  In the intervening time, more of Skeletor’s henchmen enter the fray, particularly his chief lieutenant, Evil-Lyn (Meg Foster).  She coerces Kevin into revealing where the device went to, and thus is also gone prior to He-Man getting to him.  It all comes down to a battle on Main Street, Wherever, between He-Man and Skeletor, the latter of whom comes to oversee the capture of He-Man and the retrieval of the other Cosmic Key.  He-Man gives up in exchange for the lives of his compatriots, and Skeletor fries the other portal.  The rest are stranded on Earth, which is made more dire by a wound inflicted on Julie by Skeletor that only the Sorceress can heal.  Yet, with a little 1980s teenage ingenuity, Kevin and Gwildor are able to cobble together enough power to return to Eternia.  They get there after Skeletor has already powered-up and is torturing He-Man.  Nonetheless, their appearance provides enough of a distraction for He-Man to slip his bonds, retrieve the Sword of Power, and defeat Skeletor.  As Julie and Kevin are sent back by a grateful Eternia, Julie calls out a request to be put to a time just before her parents died.  Thus, she is able to prevent them from getting into the airplane crash that killed them.  We conclude with Julie and Kevin meeting in the street with a tale only the two of them can remember.

If you remember the cartoon on which Masters of the Universe is based, you will note the absurdity of having a massive, sword-wielding warrior running around suburban America.  There are a lot of questionable insertions in the movie, but they are part and parcel for the production company that made it.  It was called The Cannon Group, and if that name means anything to you, then you will understand the content better.  As with so many of these cheesy action films, it is often the villain who appears to have the most fun, which is a difficult statement for a Catholic to make.  At the same time, Skeletor says something that actually has gravitas in terms of a Catholic analysis.  As he is overseeing He-Man’s torture, Skeletor notes that the hero is by himself.  In the moment, Skeletor asks which is more powerful, the loneliness of good or the loneliness of bad.  The implication is that the latter is the better option since he seems to be the one in control and about to impose his will on Eternia and the universe.  I had a different take on the idea.  The first is that it is only evil that is lonely in these situations.  Those who try to seize control of people and nations, as history shows and Faith corroborates, often die alone and in a gruesome fashion.  Conversely, good has friends.  The ultimate good person, Jesus, had His Twelve Apostles and many other disciples and followers.  Although the majority of them abandoned Him at his time of greatest need, many of them returned.  Indeed, there would be no Catholicism if not for this fact.  I do not wish to make a comparison between He-Man and Jesus because that would be silly.  However, He-Man would not have been able to triumph without the help of his friends.  As Scripture says in Genesis 2:18, “It is not good . . . to be alone.”  As bizarre as it is to say, this film confirms this fact.

It is also a fact that Master of the Universe is a bad movie.  It is not terrible in the sense that it is full of foul language, gore, or sexually explicitness.  It is somewhat violent, though that should be expected given the material.  Its problem is that it comes off as hokey, and can be relegated to a different time.