Kevin Smith’s He-Man Continuation Is Here, and It’s a Revelation
https://io9.gizmodo.com/kevin-smith-...a-r-1846885399
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It seems like a long time since Kevin Smith first announced he was creating a new He-Man animated series that would be a “continuation” of the original ‘80s cartoon for eight-year-olds. Now, we finally have our first look at Masters of the Universe: Revelation, and I think I finally understand what Smith is doing...and I think I like it.
This is quite a surprise to me. I have repeatedly announced what a He-Man fan I am on io9, but have been constantly annoyed by the Revelation project because it’s been touted as a sequel to the original show, which is bananas because the original show never had an overarching storyline. (It’s also been touted as an anime series, which Netflix has now asked journalists not to call it.) Like almost all cartoons of the time, there was no serialized storytelling; He-Man would just thwart a new plot of Skeletor’s each week. There was never a story to continue.
Furthermore, while Revelation was clearly meant to appeal to adults who grew up in the ‘80s, there are many parts of the classic cartoon made solely to cater to little kids, and continuing the original Masters of the Universe presumably meant it had to bring back annoyances like Cringer, Battlecat’s scaredy-cat alter-ego; magical nitwit Orko, who was comic relief that was never funny; and the fact that Skeletor’s minions were virtually all stone-cold imbeciles.
And then I finally saw the first stills:
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“It’s a really classic, universal action-adventure epic about growth, discovery, magic, and power. This series explores destiny in a fresh way. There’s a lot of reconciling with secrets, betrayal, trust, acceptance, love, and ultimately, loss.”
The show’s official summary is equally as dramatic:
“The war for Eternia culminates in Masters of the Universe: Revelation, an innovative and action-packed animated series that picks up where the iconic characters left off decades ago. After a cataclysmic battle between He-Man and Skeletor, Eternia is fractured and the Guardians of Grayskull are scattered. And after decades of secrets tore them apart, it’s up to Teela to reunite the broken band of heroes, and solve the mystery of the missing Sword of Power in a race against time to restore Eternia and prevent the end of the universe.”
The idea that “decades of secrets” tore the simple-minded, simple-hearted heroes of the original cartoon is ludicrous. Again, if Revelation were a true continuation of the ‘80s cartoon, instead of He-Man finally getting a chance to save the universe, he’d be doing absolutely nonsense, like going to the circus, where we’d get scenes of “love and, ultimately, loss” such as this:
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Chris Wood (Supergirl) is set to play Prince Adam and He-Man alongside Sarah Michelle Gellar (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) as Teela, Liam Cunningham (Game of Thrones) as Man-at Arms, and Griffin Newman (The Tick) as Orko. Mark Hamill will lead the series’ villains as Skeletor with Lena Headey (Game of Thrones) voicing Evil-Lyn, Henry Rollins playing Tri-Klops, and Kevin Conroy voicing Mer-Man. And dont forget Jason Mewes as Stinkor!
