{"id":455213,"date":"2026-05-18T17:25:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-18T17:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/455213\/"},"modified":"2026-05-18T17:25:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T17:25:10","slug":"travis-knight-sounds-like-he-just-gets-masters-of-the-universe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/455213\/","title":{"rendered":"Travis Knight Sounds Like He Just Gets ‘Masters of the Universe’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Imagine how impossible it is<\/a> to make a movie about Masters of the Universe. You\u2019ve got decades of toys, comics, and TV shows at your disposal, then you have to distill it all down and make a movie about a super buff dude with a sword who fights a living skeleton, along with a bunch of other wacky-ass characters<\/a>. Then, if the movie is going to be successful, it also has to be something not only a fan of the franchise could watch, but their kids, parents, and grandparents, too.<\/p>\n

History has shown us that, with most franchises, it\u2019s not an easy task. And yet, if there\u2019s one person who seems like they can bring all that together, it\u2019s director Travis Knight. As the CEO of the stop-motion animation studio Laika, he helped create incredible films that blend<\/a> childlike wonder and adult-focused emotions. He then made the jump to live action with Bumblebee, a criminally underrated Transformers spinoff<\/a> that captured the magic of that franchise in a way Michael Bay never could. It was like watching the classic cartoons on the big screen<\/a>, but with big-budget Hollywood magic.<\/p>\n

Now, Knight is attempting that again with a live-action Masters of the Universe film. And, speaking with Knight last month in Las Vegas, you just got the sense that he, above all others, has the power when it comes to this franchise. Or so we hope.<\/p>\n

\"MastersTravis Knight on the set of Masters of the Universe \u2013 MGM <\/p>\n

\u201cI was a fan long before I was a filmmaker,\u201d Knight told the press about Masters of the Universe. \u201cAnd so for those things I\u2019ve been lucky enough to be a part of that I had that kind of emotional connection with when I was younger, it was crucial for me to try to tap into what made those things special to begin with, why I fell in love with those things in the first place, and to make sure that that stuff is honored and how we\u2019re bringing that stuff to the screen.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019ve all seen a number of these properties that are made by people who we think maybe don\u2019t necessarily understand them, appreciate them, love them,\u201d Knight continued. \u201cAnd to me, I think the most important thing for any filmmaker\u2026 is that they have to love it. They really sincerely have to believe in it and love it and put everything they have into it. And I\u2019ve said this many, many times, but I sincerely love He-Man. That\u2019s generally not something you shout from the rooftops, but I do. And so when this thing came my way, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it\u2026 this has been a dream come true for me to be able to breathe life into these characters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before he officially signed on to do the film, Knight had a very clear vision of how he wanted to bring He-Man, Skeletor, Castle Grayskull, Eternia, and more to the big screen.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew what this movie needed to be, and tone was probably the most critical thing to get right,\u201d he said. \u201cIn my experience, Masters of the Universe is something that\u2019s fun. It\u2019s playful. There is a degree of camp. There are aspects of it that are utterly ridiculous and silly. And yet I loved it when I was a kid, and I still love it. And so we took the world seriously, even though some aspects of it are patently ridiculous. It was important to have a foot in each world so that we are telling a story that means something.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MastersTrap Jaw in Masters of the Universe \u2013 MGM <\/p>\n

The story he and screenwriters Chris Butler, Aaron Nee, Adam Nee, and David Callaham landed on will tell the origins of He-Man (Nicholas Galitzine), a prince named Adam who is separated from his family and, years later, returns home to save it and reclaim his throne. \u201cAs he journeys from the Adam that we knew from the cartoon to become He-Man, what is that like?\u201d Knight explained. \u201cWhat is that process like? What drove him in certain areas of his life? How did he arrive there? There is a duality to Adam and He-Man. Adam essentially represents empathy, He-Man represents strength, and the movie is about trying to find ways to reconcile those things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Knight also tried to find ways to get all of his favorite characters into the film, though he was not successful. \u201cFilm is a time-based art,\u201d he said. \u201cYou only have so much time to tell the story that you want to tell. And it does have to be focused. I believe in the adage of \u2018The trimmer the vessel, the more it can carry.\u2019 You want to have a really focused point of view on the story that you\u2019re trying to tell\u2026 and then everything is built around that. And so, because this really was Adam\u2019s story, it meant that all the other things had to be in service of his story. You find nuance, you find depth, you find complexity in all those other characters. But it\u2019s obvious, the more people, the more characters you stack in there, the less you can do with them. And so at some point I felt like it was just I was just being a ridiculously irresponsible fan boy as a filmmaker.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the thing about this universe and these characters is that it\u2019s so rich, it\u2019s dense, it\u2019s got over 40 years of history and mythology, and so we really just scratch the surface of the kind of things you could do in this world,\u201d Knight continued. \u201cAnd it was incredibly fun. I\u2019m lucky. I feel very fortunate that I was able to get some of my favorites in there. Ram Man, Fisto, and Mekaneck. I really wanted to get Mer-Man in there. I couldn\u2019t make it work. But if you look in the background, my prosthetics guy did me a solid. There\u2019s a dude who looks exactly like Mer-Man wandering around in the crowd. So there are a few of those things in there just because we weren\u2019t able to properly get them in the movie. But for the keen-eyed fan, they\u2019ll see some cool stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MastersKnight with his stars Nicholas Galitzine and Camila Mendes \u2013 MGM <\/p>\n

But will that cool stuff continue beyond this film? Fans of the franchise will notice almost immediately that Adam\u2019s sister Adora, who becomes She-Ra, exists in this world, for example. But Knight knows to be realistic about expectations.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook, I always approach these things as if you only get one shot at it,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd so, if that\u2019s the case, we make this movie, and there are no more stories to follow, we put everything we had into it, and I\u2019m incredibly proud of the film. I think it\u2019s fun. I think it\u2019s exciting. I think it has an incredible heart. I think it tells an emotional story. And I\u2019m just really proud of the crew who did exceptional work, the actors who brought everything they had in the movie. I\u2019m just really proud of the work that everybody put into it and what we got out of the other side.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn terms of where we could go from here, of course, you are always imagining,\u201d Knight continued. \u201cThere are things that I wanted to put in this movie that we weren\u2019t able to do. Things I\u2019d like to explore, and deeper aspects of some of these characters I\u2019d like to explore. I think about what\u2019s next for Adam. Where does the next stage of his life take him? Now he\u2019s properly He-Man, what does that mean? And the essence of it is relationships. It\u2019s all about relationships for me. So, how do those relationships evolve moving forward? Ultimately, this stuff is not in our hands. As much as we would like to tell more of these stories, if the world doesn\u2019t want them, we won\u2019t tell them. But if the world demands more of them, we\u2019d be very lucky to be able to tell more stories in this universe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Masters of the Universe opens in theaters on June 5.<\/p>\n

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel<\/a>, Star Wars<\/a>, and Star Trek<\/a> releases, what\u2019s next for the DC Universe on film and TV<\/a>, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Imagine how impossible it is to make a movie about Masters of the Universe. You\u2019ve got decades of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":455214,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[93,61,60,42073,270,61058],"class_list":["post-455213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-masters-of-the-universe","tag-movies","tag-travis-knight"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=455213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/455214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=455213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=455213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=455213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}