So, if there’s one thing I’ve noticed throughout the week that has been heavily discussed, debated, and downright argued, it’s Kevin Smith’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation. Why is this series so damm controversial?
Big note here, I am not a He-Man fan. I may have watched the series as a kid because there was nothing on at the time, but I am not a He-man. That being said, I have listened to both sides of the aisle and their opinion of Kevin Smith’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation and it’s hard to figure out what holds truth.
On one side, you have fans who enjoyed Kevin Smith’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation. They acknowledged the “bait & switch” that took place, replacing He-man with some other character, and didn’t care. I’ve even seen some fans point that the original He-man series had a similar trope of He-man being distracted while the story focused on the other character.
Then there’s the other side, the more vocal and active side that absolutely hates Kevin Smith’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation, saying that Kevin Smith doesn’t care about this series and is just doing it to either spite the fans or to make a quick buck. One of the biggest issues fans have with this series boils down to a number of things:
- A important main/side characters killed off for no reason
- Fans weren’t happy with the bait and switch
- Kevin Smith lied apperantly
- He-Man is emasculated
That’s the gist of it from what I was able to gather from the ruckus. Many YouTubers spent their time dissecting the series, some giving it a fair shake, while others…well they did what you’d expect them to do, tell you how shit the Kevin Smith’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation had been handled. Even on reviews like IGN, the dislike ratio to like ratio is insane. People just weren’t happy at all, yet the critic praised this series. On Rotten Tomatoes, it’s sitting on a 97% critic while the audience is sitting at a whopping 26% last time I checked.
It’s odd too because the animation from what I peeped looked really good! So what’s going on? Honestly, if I were to take a guess, I’d say it’s a good all classic fan disservice. Fan’s wanted He-man to kick ass, but instead, they got Teela.
Kevin Smith says this about Teela and why she took most of the focus:
“Teela, who was there in every episode, side-by-side with He-Man, and also there to protect [Prince Adam] was the one person left out of the secret,” Smith said during the panel. “Based on that, Teela was basically the center of the story that we were going to tell. It’s a He-Man story, it’s a Masters Of The Universe story, but it’s watching Teela’s journey.”
So in short, had Masters Of The Universe: Revelation marketing just been honest from the start and made it clear that Teela was going to be the new lead, maybe fans would’ve warmed up to the idea. Maybe! But I can understand fans been led to believe Prince Adam was going to be the lead, only to have him “killed” in the first episode. Now, people who may not like this new direction are being labeled as “misogynic”! You know the usual! Not saying that some of these comments are sexist in nature, however, we can’t assume ALL of them aren’t!
We’ll have to wait and see how this whole thing ends, but I would probably accept the fact that Teela will become the new She-man…She-ra? I dunno but she’s the new face I guess! Let me know what you people think!
