Masters of the Universe (2026)

As a guy who had a somewhat intense He-Man phase in his childhood, I hardly know what to say about this sad attempt at nostalgia baiting by Travis Knight, the director of the only good live action Transformers film – Bumblebee.

Unfortunately, this ain’t no Bumblebee, kids. For a film that has less plot than many a short film, this somehow manages to be nearly two and a half hours (too) long. It’s so slow, we get our first He-Man transformation an hour into the non-proceedings. But then, how else to fit all of the “jokes” in, and that’s why we’re here, right?

And with jokes I mean the sort of winking, no actual jokes included awkward bullshit every movie that didn’t understand why the Guardians of the Galaxy movies worked now uses to undercut every single moment in a nerdcore movie an audience member might actually think is awesome (which really is what this should be all about, even Cannon knew this much about pulp filmmaking), and to destroy every single emotional beat this bloated monstrosity otherwise might have had. Hell, Masters of the Universe doesn’t even manage to utilize a needle drop of Queen’s “Princes of the Universe” properly, because it does of course need to make exactly the “joke” you’ll expect it to make at this point.

For a film that really wants to get my nostalgia money, the tone feels eternally (see what I did there, I’m just as funny as the script) embarrassed by the toy line and cartoons it is based off, always going for the easiest joke (Fisto, anyone?). Consequently, the whole film shows no actual appreciation of what could be fun about all of this.

The actors mostly show themselves equally unenthusiastic (in a way the now much belittled Marvel would never let anyone get away with in one of their films not directed by Waititi), apart from Idris Elba and Alison Brie, who make actual acting choices and have actual screen presence. Jared Leto’s Skeletor is even worse than his Exxxtreme Joker was (at least you could understand all of what he said there), and Nicholas Galitzine and Camila Mendes are less expressive than the action figures they portray.

Man, do I suddenly feel old and grumpy.