Speaking as someone who's earliest Christmas memory is tearing the wrapping off of the Castle Greyskull box, I enjoyed this show WAY more than I expected (and I expected it to be at least "good".)
Clearly everyone behind this had a huge amount of affection and respect for the source material. I really like how instead of making a slavishly accurate continuation of the old show, they went and made the version of it that previously only existed in our young impressionable imaginations.
I've gone back and looked at the original show over the years and while I'll always get a sense of nostalgia from that opening theme, anyone that thinks it's anything but a cheaply made, poorly animated toy advert is deluding themselves (see also: Transformers, Thundercats, etc) It's no 'Batman: the Animated Series', or even a 'The Real Ghostbusters'. Not even close.
What they've made is a combination of that amazing box art that looked like a Boris Vallejo painting mixed with a Richard Corben album cover, an armload of deepcut lore from both the show and the mini-comics, and actually *advanced* the larger narrative into an "end times" tale that the old show never could.
For those whinging about Teela being given too much focus as a main character and a heroes journey arc: 1) she was ALWAYS a main character, second only He-Man on the show in terms of agency. 2) her backstory and ultimate destiny were set up on one of the show's earliest episodes! Like seriously; episode # 6 'Teela's Quest', look it up! So it was baked in from the get go, they're just now finally getting around to paying it off.
As for characters staying dead or not: they're clearly operating on the level of mythic storytelling here. We're talking ancient Greek myths, Journey into the West, that whole vibe. So people dying, going to the next world and coming back is all part and parcel of it, especially when you get into the apocalyptic, ragnarokian phase of storytelling.
It's been a wild ride for these first five episodes and I look forward to seeing how the next 5 play out.
Kevin Smith himself made that analogy. Filmation He-Man did the Superman / Clark thing, 2002 and Revelation went the Shazam route.
I don't know for a fact, but I'd put money on the Big Red Cheese being exactly what DC was pulling from when they introduced the concept into the mix. I mean what other hero says a magic phrase, is hit by lighting and transformed into a jacked-up circus performer looking motherfucker?
The only element of that which didn't track is they made Adam look exactly the same, but with even more questionable fashion sense, so it's better that they've gone and leaned more into Adam and Teela as teens who grew up together than a 30-something manchild and his minder.
