Open Letter to Justin Marks - Plus Details on The Masters of the Universe! PDF Print E-mail
Written by Robert Sanchez
Monday, 03 September 2007
Hey Justin, long time fan of He-Man here and I just heard some news that is scaring the crap out of me.
Recently, the powers that be felt that you (being of the right age) would have the pulse of the so-called “Generation X” and would be the perfect person to bring some of the greatest 80’s geek franchises to the big screen.
You’ve been hired to write Voltron, Street Fighter, He-Man and most recently Super-Max (the Green Arrow goes to jail storyline).
I’ll touch up a bit on Voltron. Sure our guys gave your script a good review, you can read it here, but I couldn’t care less for it and it’s for the same reason you’re starting to scare me in regards to the Masters of the Universe.
A good friend of mine called a few days ago and we started talking about He-Man. I was telling him about how I truly believe that He-Man can easily be another Lord of the Rings franchise if done right (I am completely serious on this). Unfortunately, he gave me some very disappointing news. Not good Justin, not good.
Sure the 80’s cartoon was a little (ok a lot) corny and Prince Adam was a bit on the gay side (not homosexual gay, but gay, you know what I mean) but there is truly a great universe there waiting to be explored!
He-Man fans want to see Skeletor, Beastman, Evil Lyn, Mer-Man, He-Man, Man-at-Arms, Teela, Orko, Panthor, Battle Cat, The Sorceress, Castle Grayskull, Snake Mountain and other of our favorite MOTU villains and heroes (ok maybe not Orko so much but definitely everyone else) but most importantly we want to see them on Eternia. Not a special magical place on Earth a la Skull Island called Eternia but a separate planet that has nothing to do with Earth.
Why am I bringing this up right now? Well because I was told the current idea is to make Eternia here on Earth, kind of like a modern day Middle Earth. I don’t like this man and I am sure that fans of the franchise are not going to care for this either. As a matter of fact, I have been told that you are keeping a very similar template when comparing He-Man to your Voltron script…I am telling you, this is destined for failure.
I know the Hollywood spiel, since Voltron is taking place in a futuristic and post-apocalyptic Earth, the movie going audience is going to relate more to the material because the danger is “relatable.” This is the reason you are following the same approach to He-Man and the Eternia universe. Bad call, Ripley, bad call.
It looks like you are trying to be creative and artistic with these properties when you don’t have to be. You don’t have re-invent the wheel and fuck it up doing so.
30 so years ago George Lucas created a universe that had nothing to do with Earth or today, instead it took place a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. Guess what? It worked, we cared for our heroes and we loved the villains and we loved the different planets that we visited.
Am I wrong? Is it not true that the current storyline sets Eternia here on Earth and not as its own planet? Let me know and I will gladly recant.
Justin, let’s just talk about this, send me an email at
robert@iesb.net I would love to hear from you. This could really be a great film with some interesting characters. Just, talk to some fans or check out some fan message boards see what they think a He-Man movie should be.
So what do He-Man fans want from a new Masters of the Universe movie? IESB Readers let me know! Are you for or against me? What’s your opinion? Email me directly
robert@iesb.net, hopefully we can get your ideas to Justin before it’s too late!
Or you can post on our forums and chat with other IESB Members!
By the way, to our readers, if you guys think that this Eternia on Earth stuff is disturbing, you should hear what the plan for Skeletor is!