Masters of The Universe – Movie Review

Masters of the Universe Movie Review: A Film That Would Have Worked Better in 1984

Synopsis: 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.

Starring Nicholas Galitzine, Camila Mendes, Alison Brie, James Purefoy, Morena Baccarin, Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson, Charlotte Riley, Featuring Kristen Wiig as the voice of “Roboto” with Jared Leto and Idris Elba

Directed by Travis Knight

Where to begin?

Let’s sum this up quickly before getting into the details: Masters of the Universe would have been a fantastic movie in 1984. My 14-year-old self probably would have held this thing right up there with E.T., maybe even higher in certain moments because, let’s be honest, this movie has a lot more punching, lasers, swords, and fantasy action flying around.
The obvious glaring issue is that it is 2026, and I am not 14 anymore.
This comedic fantasy action adventure falls flat. Very flat.

The first glaring takeaway is the music score. Brian May is highly regarded as a fantastic guitarist among musicians, best known as the lead guitarist of the legendary band Queen. He plays the theme for our hero, He-Man, throughout the film, and wow, does it get tired fast. I am not entirely sure if Brian May handled the electric guitar soundtrack throughout the entire movie, but it certainly felt like it. The result was dated, loud, irritating, and completely out of sync with the moving pictures on the screen. Every fight scene seemed to call for another electric guitar squeal that came blasting in as if volume alone could create excitement. It did not. The anticipation of that music kicking in every other scene was honestly starting to give me anxiety.
The movie itself is an absolute mess. From the amateur dialogue to the fight scenes, nothing was engaging enough to make me care about character development. Which brings up another major issue: the character development was so weak that I found myself wondering whether I was being punked.
This became especially obvious whenever the movie attempted to shift into serious emotional territory. Every dialogue-heavy scene seemed to turn into someone needing to talk about feelings, open up, or explain the obvious. The scene between He-Man and his father, more than midway through the film, was especially guilty of this. It dragged into an overbearing emotional exchange that felt less like character depth and more like the movie begging us to care.
Meanwhile, the only question running through my mind was: where is Skeletor? I am guessing I was not the only person in the packed theater asking that during this touching father-and-son moment.
Later, during the next-to-last act in the jail, He-Man rallies the masses as some sort of general and starts regurgitating the names of characters we already know because he already named them earlier. Yet we still have to sit through the scene as though this is new information. It was cringe. As bad as the score, and that is saying something.

Idris Elba plays Duncan, father of Teela, who is played by Camila Mendes. Let me say this clearly: I absolutely adore Idris Elba as an actor. Now comes the bitter pill. He is atrocious in this film. Not because he suddenly forgot how to act, but because the character and script are so off-kilter that he never had a chance. This was not a role Idris Elba should have been associated with. He is much better than this material. His character is just as annoying as everyone else, which is almost impressive considering how much talent Elba usually brings to the screen. Before the big battle, Duncan and Teela have to stop and have their big emotional talk. You could feel the collective sigh coming because the movie telegraphed it from miles away. The predictability here was off the charts.
In fact, the person I brought with me to the screener (Hi Cosmo!), he and I both literally predicted the two post-credit scenes before the movie even began. We were just looking at the still image of the movie poster on the screen and called both of them. After the first extra scene played, which was my prediction, we looked at each other in disbelief, but also in that sad, expectant way because we knew what was coming next. Once the credits finished, his prediction hit right on cue. It is kind of sad when you are sitting there waiting for a movie to begin and you have already figured out the two extra scenes at the end.

The two main characters do not fare much better. Adam, also known as He-Man, is played by Nicholas Galitzine, while Skeletor is played by Jared Leto. Both are very forgettable.
Galitzine clearly tries to make this work. You can feel the effort. Unfortunately, that effort falls short every time. This is not the same feeling I had watching Dolph Lundgren in the 1987 Masters of the Universe film. Back then, even if the movie had its own problems, I could still see Lundgren’s potential as an action star. I wanted to see him in something else. That eventually came to fruition with The Punisher two years later and later with Universal Soldier. None of it was Academy Award-winning material, but it was memorable enough to make him more than just the guy who played Drago. I am not saying Nicholas Galitzine will not have a successful Hollywood career. He might. But based on this film, I would not exactly miss him if he never played this type of role again.
Jared Leto, meanwhile, gives an effort that is mediocre at best. Once again, there is almost no meaningful character development. We are given very little understanding of where Skeletor really comes from or why he is so angry all the time. Yes, he is the villain, but villains still need something. Andrew Scott, the Dolph Lundgren character in Universal Soldier, was a villain too, but we knew exactly why he was such an angry guy. Here, Skeletor is mostly just angry because the script says he is angry.
Leto also appears to recycle a bit of his Joker laugh for Skeletor, which is wild once you hear it. To be fair, he was not given much to work with. But let’s also be honest: Jared Leto is not exactly running an acting clinic at this stage either. Maybe someday. Not right now. A little word of advice for Leto: step into some serious civilian roles. Play the jaded lover, the try-hard dad, the husband barely holding it together. Something grounded. Something human. That might be the path that pushes him to the next level. Just a thought.

The supporting cast is as mediocre as the rest of the film. A bad script really shines here, and not in a good way. Nothing works. The jokes fall flat. The fight sequences fall flat. The drama falls flat. The character development falls flat. The pacing is off from beginning to end.

Overall, Masters of the Universe is a disappointing live-action fantasy adventure that does no justice to the original 1983 animated series. I thoroughly enjoyed that show as a 13-year-old boy, and I know for sure that version of me probably would have loved this movie too. The 17-year-old version of me even enjoyed the original 1987 Masters of the Universe film more than this new remake.

That really says it all.

This film feels like something built for a younger version of the audience while forgetting that much of the audience grew up. Nostalgia can get people into the theater, but it cannot carry a weak script, dated execution, poor pacing, forgettable performances, and a score that feels like it is attacking the movie instead of supporting it.

Masters of the Universe had the tools, the characters, and the built-in recognition to deliver something bigger, sharper, and more memorable. Instead, it gives us a film that feels stuck between eras, trying to pull in old fans while never truly understanding what those fans might expect from a modern version of Eternia.

The 13-year-old in me wanted to love it. The adult watching it in 2026 knew better.

-Jay Katz