The first thing youâll notice about the new Masters of the Universe show is that âHe-Manâ isnât in the title. The original â80s cartoon was called He-Man and the Masters of the Universe and this new Netflix version was named Masters of the Universe: Revelation. Thatâs not because He-Man isnât in itâof course, he isâbut it speaks to how the Kevin Smith-led series will be more team orientated than it originally was and more inclusive for 2021.
Last month, io9 spoke with Revelation showrunner and executive producer Kevin Smith about his new coffee table book, Secret Stash, and snuck in a few Masters of the Universe questions. We asked him if making a show about, and starring, someone thatâs so hyper-masculine he literally has two man-names posed any challenges in a more inclusive, understanding society. âGood news about He-Man and the Masters of the Universe,â Smith said. âYes, of course, He-Man was [the] main character, but every episode it was He -Man and the Masters of the Universe. It was a team-oriented show that was not just He-Man.â
He continued, âYou got Teela, you got your Man-at-Arms, you got your Orko, you got your Cringer, your Sorceress. So they were always fairly widely cast in terms of gender. One of your top villains was Evil-Lyn. He-Man is the Sorceressâ champion technicallyâhe serves the Sorceress and the power of Grayskull. Teela was there to protect him as Adam and of course, doesnât know that heâs He-Man and whatnot. So we didnât feel going in like, âOh, man. Now we got to explain what these cats did in the â80s.â They actually did a pretty good job of explaining it themselves or making it at least boy and girl friendly.â
Smith obviously had thought about this a lot and realized while the gender representation was actually pretty good, especially for the early â80s, it wasnât 100% on the up and up in other areas. âNow the difference is it was an awfully white show back then and thatâs something we felt like we needed to update a bit,â Smith said. âMasters of the Universe had one black character in Clamp Champ, who naturally evolved in our show as well. But we felt like we were able to diversify the world of Masters of the Universe a bit more than the original was.â
One of the main ways they did that, according to Smith, was to give more prominence Andra, a Black character in Revelation. In the larger mythology of Masters of the Universe, Andra wasnât super famousâshe doesnât even get her own link on the Wiki page. She was also white in the original series, something thatâs already causing certain areas of fandomâyou know the onesâto cry foul. But Smith and the team have given the character a massive, important role this time around. Sheâs voiced by Tiffany Smith who is a woman of color and identifies as multiracial, an important distinction with all the discussions in recent years about white actors voicing animated characters of color.
âSheâs our way into the show for the people who donât know the show,â Smith said. âIn the show itself, sheâs the one thatâs kind of outside of the previous mythology a little bit⊠She represents the wide-eyed wonder of the audience in as much as sheâs the character that has not dealt with the mythology of Eternia. Sheâs never met He-Man or Skeletor or been to Castle Grayskull. Sheâs just somebody who lives on Planet Eternia outside of Eternos. So, by way of our story, sheâs our audienceâs eyes into that world. She reacts with the same amount of wonder that we hope our audience reacts with as they watch the show. So, there are moments like that where we get to diversify more than they did in the â80s.â
Masters of the Universe: Revelation debuts on Netflix July 23 and weâll have more on it soon.
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