No Surrender Cinema: Masters of the Universe: Revolution
By the power of Grayskull, I HAVE THE POWER…to bring you a bonus edition of No Surrender Cinema! All 5 episodes of the latest chapter in the Masters of the Universe saga dropped on Netflix today, and yours truly wasted no time in binge-watching it all! Join me for my coverage of Masters of the Universe: Revolution!
(SPOILER WARNING: Since this just premiered, I like to keep major spoilers to a minimum, but there might be a few things mentioned that will come as a surprise to others. Read on if you wish, or come back after you’ve seen every episode!)
Revolution wastes no time in getting right to the action, as the opening (somewhat reminiscent of the beginning of Revelation) features a mysterious wanderer journeying into the depths of Eternia’s version of Hell, Subternia. That’s where Scare Glow, who we last saw getting his ass handed to him by Orko, resides over all of the tortured souls. When this mysterious figure approaches, we see that it’s not one person but two…Prince Adam and Orko himself! The pair have come to seek the return of Fisto and Clamp Champ’s souls, because with the destruction of Preternia (Heaven) in Revelation, their souls have nowhere to go. Scare Glow isn’t about to barter with his enemies, so the negotiations fail, leading into the first big battle of the season as Adam turns into He-Man and wipes out Scare Glow’s forces with a little help from Buzz Off, Snout Spout, Rio Blast, Andra (now Eternia’s Man-At-Arms) and King Randor, who was all too happy to try out some of the new weaponry and give his son a helping hand. Unbeknownst to many, including Adam, the King was fighting another battle, one that he would soon succumb to, as illness caused his organs to fail. That’s right, King Randor, a core character in the world of MOTU, would be deceased mere minutes into the first episode of the season! This was something that was somewhat obvious from the promotional trailers for the show, but there was no time wasted in putting the King to rest.
The King’s passing and the reclaiming of Fisto and Clamp Champ’s souls tie together, because this has motivated our heroes, but especially Teela (the new Sorceress) to find a way to rebuild Preternia so that worthy souls have a destination in the afterlife. Teela is having a bit of trouble honing her skills, but some advice from her mother (The Sorceress), who is still living within the walls of Grayskull as an apparition, sends her on a journey to acquire the necessary magic in order for Preternia to return. The quest to provide a safe place for the spirits of Eternia’s fallen heroes sends Teela to Darksmoke, where she encounters the exiled Evil-Lyn. Lyn is serving out her sentence for what she did in Revelation and trying to atone for her sins by caring for Granamyr, a dragon elder who wields the very magic that Teela desperately wants to learn. Due to Granamyr’s distrust of humans, he turns Teela down, until a little prompting from Lyn (in her typical snide fashion) encourages him to aid Teela.
For as much magical mumbo-jumbo as we get, there’s a contingent of people who have disavowed magic in favor of technology. Skeletor is now under the full control of Motherboard, who serves as the right hand of Hordak. Now technofied just as several of his subordinates were in the previous series, Skeletor gleefully carries out the evil orders of Hordak, turning henchmen like Two-Bad into cyber-servants of their cause. When word of Randor’s death reaches them, Hordak formulates a master plan that, with Skeletor and Motherboard’s assistance, throws a huge curveball into He-Man’s world. I won’t say what it is here, but it involves a character that I did not expect to see brought into the series, at least not in the fashion in which they were.
While the evildoers deception plays out exactly as you’d expect it would, so does the love story between Teela and Adam/He-Man. What was once an “unofficial” part of MOTU lore (since the original Masters of the Universe never dealt with romance aside from Orko’s crush on fellow Trollan Dree-Elle) gets tackled head-on here. It’s done with a lot of emotion and even one unexpected bit of humor that got an audible chuckle from me. It’s also not something that takes away from the main crux of the story, as both Teela and Adam have matured and are growing into their new roles, only to find that they still remain each other’s shoulder to lean on in trying times.
Being an abbreviated season (these five episodes are not said to be a part of a larger season, and instead will stand on their own as one story), the action approaches fast and furious. There are plenty of battles, all of them epic in scale. That means that our heroes get plenty of time to shine, but it was disappointing that not all of the villains got as much exposure. Characters like Tri-Klops were relegated to cameos here, and even new characters like Horde members Grizzlor, Mantenna, and Leech have a short amount of time on screen. Villain-wise, it’s pretty much the Skeletor and Hordak show, and Keith David (of They Live and Marked For Death fame) gave Hordak an appropriately sinister voice. It’s a nice counter to Mark Hamill’s Skeletor, which comes off as more flamboyant villainy a la Hamill’s Joker portrayal in DC animated fare.
There’s plenty of Easter eggs to look for, cameos of beloved characters that weren’t shown the first time around, and an ending that both wraps up everything from here with a neat little bow and still manages to keep the door open for the next chapter in the saga of Eternia’s greatest warriors. Stonedar and Rokkon, the two 1980’s Masters figures that could morph into rocks, were two of my favorite toys as a kid, so I loved seeing Stonedar show up, though he ended up as a punching bag for the Horde. There was also an appearance from one of the original MOTU characters as part of the Revolution cliffhanger, and their appearance led to a huge shift in the direction for one major character in a development that I definitely could not have predicted. Oh, and how can I forget Kevin Smith’s excellent job of utilizing the world of my beloved Cannon Films’ Masters of the Universe, this time by bringing Gwildor (Orko’s “replacement” in the film) into this ever-expanding world…and by having he and Orko constantly snipping at each other as “frenemies”. There’s even a Cosmic Key mention, but still no Detective Lubic in sight.
How does He-Man handle the honor of becoming king while battling the re-emerging threat of Skeletor and the added danger of Motherboard and Hordak’s Horde? Will Teela be a worthy Sorceress who can complete the task of putting Preternia back for the worthy souls? Will Evil-Lyn commit another self-serving act that puts her on the fast track back to Skeletor’s side? Will my good friend and fellow Bulletproof Action contributor Chris the Brain continue to hate Orko? The answer to one of those questions is a definitive “YES”, but for the rest, you’ll have to pop on your Netflix app and find out by watching Masters of the Universe: Revolution! Each episode is electrifying in some form, crafting a smaller piece of the puzzle laid out in front of us over the course of these five episodes. It’s an electrifying series with action that makes the run time go by in the blink of an eye, and something that longtime fans of Masters of the Universe might appreciate even more than Smith’s initial entry into the franchise.
All five episodes of Masters of the Universe: Revolution are now streaming on Netflix