The He-Man Thread [*really* merged] (1 Viewer)

[Morgan Jolley]

Maybe they're planning a DVD release of it like they did with the new Justice League.

 

[teapot2001]

It's been a long time since I've seen the original He-Man, but I thought this movie was okay. It's obviously better animated, and I like some of the characters' looks more. The way He-Man says "I have the power!" sounded a lot better, and more like the original, than in the commercial. As for the negatives, the music wasn't memorable and, as Joe mentioned, the picture is cropped.

~T

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Just wanted to point out, as I noticed in another He-Man thread, that the preview that I saw on the internet was in widescreen, but the movie was shown cropped on Cartoon Network. And yes, I am sure it was cropped. There were some shots that I can easily remember where significant picture on the sides was missing when compared to the previews.

Interesting. I didn't know that animation was done in widescreen. Justice League, for instance, is simply matted for the widescreen broadcasts, cutting off legs and the top of heads. Still, good news for the DVD release.

 

[nolesrule]

In the scene where Adam and Teela are jousting on their hoverboards, they show a profile view of each character with horizontal jousting sticks.
On the preview I saw, you could see the entire stick with a good chunk of open space on the left and right. In the aired movie, it was cropped so tight that the tip and tail end of the jousting sticks were offscreen.
I know these are out of focus, but these screengrabs were taken from the preview. The cropped version is modified to approximate what I saw on TV when watching the movie:

Note: aspect ratio is ~ 2:1

Pretty obvious cropping (yeah, I know, technically, you'll have to take my word for it if you didn't record the movie), but there were plenty of other shots that felt cropped with either poor composition or "talking noses".
EDIT: The 2:1 aspect ratio seems a little unusual, so maybe it is matted widescreen. But if that is the case, what they aired was a cropped version of the matted aspect ratio instead of opening it up.

 

[Michael Allred]

Big He-man fan as a kid and just wanted to say I LOVED LOVED LOVED the new shw on Cartoon Network. Totally destroys the 80's series in every way (except the theme song.)

 

[Heath Phillips]

The series begins Friday, August 30th at 6PM. It starts with the movie broken into three parts and then 23 all new episodes.
And for the record, it's Trapjaw not Lockjaw.
-Heath
EDIT: Oops, sorry Mike.:b I didn't see your post on this.

 

[DeathStar1]

Here's an idea that might make the transformation sequence a bit more interesting...

Why not somehow incorporate a REAL LIFE lightning bolt striking the sword, with tons of mini bolts and sparks flying off in all directions, rather than just weak looking shafts of light?

They also need a more memorable theme song to match it. Maby some type of 2002 update to the original...

 

[ChrisLee]

I'm just glad that Adam and He-Man look distinctively different. From what I remember of the original He-Man was merely Adam with a tan... Lots of fun tho. I forgot all the names for things and when they started being mentioned I got goose bumps...
Its never too early to say this:
BRING ON THE DVD SEASON SETS!

 

[Morgan Jolley]

I watched a good half of this tonight when it was on.

You could tell that some of it was cropped. People being out of frame when you know they should, the screen moving in a weird way (like in pan and scan movies).

If this is better than the original series, then the original series must have been REALLY bad. I thought this was hokey, cheesy, and the action was kind of dull. I would have liked to feel that the bad guys were truly evil, but I just felt like the good guys were really weak. Oh well, time will tell if I feel the same through the first season.

 

[CameronS]

I just finished watching the first episode, and I loved it.
Did you see how powerful Evil Lyn and Skeletor were!? The new magic animations, anime style, were great. I thought it was obvious they were putting over the strength of the bad guys to emphasize the pure need for He-Man. There was a good balance of screentime for all the characters so we were able to see a little of what everyone could do (pretty much the same powers as the old series ) We were even shown that He-Man can't do it all on his own (Saving King Randor).
Morgan, did you ever see the original series? It's been along time since I've watched any of the old shows but the original is definitely cheesy, at least by today's standards. Cartoons were so different back then anywaay, always ended with a "message" and such, which I later learned was a legal requirement so the shows like MOTU would not be considered a 30-minute commercial!
One of the reasons I am enjoying this so much is I'm practically reliving my childhood. When I was around the ages 5-10, He-Man was everything to me and opened the door for other Toys/Cartoon shows like Transformers, Thundercats, etc. Sitting here now and watching these charaters, essentially from my past, is unreal.
The other day when I was in Target, I stopped by the section with the action figures to see if they had any Masters of the Universe. They did, and I walked home with He-Man and Skeletor. That was an awesome day.

 

[Dave E H]

Rats - missed it (painting bathroom :frowning: ) Anyone know when/if they are going to re-show it?

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Dave: TVGuide.com has it down for an encore Sunday (well, today now really) at 10:00 AM Eastern. Pacific stuff is usually timeshifted, so look for it around that time in your neck of the woods.

 

[CaptDS9E]

Cameron I feel the same exact way.When he-man was originally on i had every single action figure of the show i could get my hands on. I still have some stored down in our storage room with my voltron, thundercats, centurians, silverhawks, transformers and gi-joe. I dropped in Kay-bee yesterday and they had he-man and skeletor. I didnt pick them up because i didnt have $$ on me, but i plan on it today. Speaking of today im goign to clean that storage room. Time to see what i have down there. I know i have he-man and Battlecat

capt

 

[teapot2001]

The villains aren't truly evil, they are a bit wussy, but that's one of the things I like about them. Other cartoons in the 80s similar bad guys too, like Cobra Commander and Star Scream.

~T

 

[DeathStar1]

Are you listening, CN? Have the folks at Adult Swim, Team up with what's left of Filmation to produce this Space Ghost SpinOff .
Someone suggested this over at the rec.arts.animation newsgroup. Definetly not a bad idea..

 

[Jack Briggs]

I always seem to merge the larger thread into the smaller thread. At any rate, the larger thread was merged into Neil V's much shorter one. It should've been the other way around. Sorry. Please continue.

 

[Chris Rock]

One of the reasons I am enjoying this so much is I'm practically reliving my childhood. When I was around the ages 5-10, He-Man was everything to me and opened the door for other Toys/Cartoon shows like Transformers, Thundercats, etc. Sitting here now and watching these charaters, essentially from my past, is unreal.

This is exactly how I feel!

I can't wait for the DVD sets.

 

[Mike Miskulin]

No prob. Loved the new show. Some of the voices will take some getting used to since I'm so used to the old series, but I thinks they'll grow on me. My one real complaint is the lack of 'hummable' music. The original series was loaded with it (I even programmed the 'evil horde' theme into my cell phone). But enjoyable, none-the less.
I hope this show is massively successful and will shake things up over at Hasbro. Maybe then they'll make a new, cool, re-invisioned version of Transformers: Generation One and not the crap they've been peddling as of late. (who knows, maybe Armada will be cool, but I'm not holding my breath)
mike.

 

[Wayne Bundrick]

I watched it and quickly grew tired of the endless cliched anime-style fight sequences. The bad guy and good guy exchange insults and comebacks. Good guy jumps high into the air, makes a menacing pose, the background becomes a bunch of flashing streaks, the bad guy jumps and makes his best pose against a different abstract streaking background. They hold their mid-air poses for what seems like forever, and then their weapons clang together with a bright flash. Repeat ad nauseum. Boring.

 

[Dome Vongvises]

Morgan Jolley said:

If this is better than the original series, then the original series must have been REALLY bad. I thought this was hokey, cheesy, and the action was kind of dull. I would have liked to feel that the bad guys were truly evil, but I just felt like the good guys were really weak. Oh well, time will tell if I feel the same through the first season.

You're probably too young to remember the joys of He-Man.
One of the main reasons us "old folks" love this show was because it actually had an extremely cool toy line to go with it. I remember ooing and awing everytime I saw that one toy commericial with the old dude showing off the entire toy line.
Needless to say, I'm getting the new toyline stuff. I already have Skeletor, and he rules. The detailing is remarkable.
Sad to say, I only have one person agree with me on this: is is just my imagination or did animators of the old series have some strange obession with "butt" shots of Teela? I would remember specific animations where Teela would walk towards the camera, and their would be a reverse shot of her walking away with the focus being on her hind end. Those perverted cartoonists.....