Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Of all the great things about television, the greatest is that it’s on every single day. TV history is being made, day in and day out, in ways big and small. In an effort to better appreciate this history, we’re taking a look back, every day, at one particular TV milestone.
IMPORTANT DATE IN TV HISTORY: September 5, 1983
PROGRAM ORIGINALLY AIRED ON THIS DATE: He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, “Diamond Ray of Disappearance” (Season 1, Episode 1). [Stream on Netflix]
WHY IT’S IMPORTANT: There were a few staples of children’s cartoon programming in the 1980s, and boy were they ever gendered. If you were a girl, you got Rainbow Brite, Strawberry Shortcake, and Jem and the Holograms, while the boys were given G.I. Joe, Transformers, and He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. Now, we can tackle the problem of gender conformity in children’s programming at a later date, says this boy who was INTO Jem and the Holograms, but for the moment, let’s talk about He-Man, which premiered 34 years ago today, with an episode that saw Skeletor use the titular Diamond of Disappearance to send all of his enemies in Eternia into a different dimension.
He-Man had all the trappings of a show for boys: there were swords and battles and a rogue’s gallery of enemies. He-Man himself was basically defined as the ultimate boy character: strong and principled and ready to take on evil Skeletor at a moment’s notice. He even transformed from a mild-mannered prince into a Conan the Barbarian-looking warrior whenever it was time to get all fighty. (And that was nothing compared to his cowardly pet tiger “Cringer,” who transformed into the fearless Battle Cat, trading in his voice, weak and quavering as it was, for armor and a growl. These are the messages we sent kids back then!)
Which isn’t to say that He-Man and the Masters of the Universe wasn’t a ton of fun, because it was. Any TV show that delivers this many characters as allies and foes was going to be great. Especially ones are bizarrely characterized as these. A few examples, once you got past the Man-at-Arms and Teela regulars:
- Ram-Man, who was stout but good at butting into things with his head.
- Buzz-Off, who was basically a giant bee person.
- Fisto who, yes, had a giant silver fist.
- Evil-Lyn, who was evil sorceress and the closest thing the show had to an interest for differently-oriented boys.
- Beast-Man and Mer-Man, who were basically exactly what they sounded like.
- Trap-Jaw, a cyborg with a clanky metal jaw.
- Clawful, an anthropomorphic crab.
If you haven’t already caught on by now, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe was a fun TV show because it made for fun toys, and what boy doesn’t want a show that basically gives him more and more toys to ask his parents for?
He-Man also gave us the live-action Masters of the Universe movie, starring Dolph Lundgren and his limited American vocabulary, future Oscar nominee Frank Langella under eight pounds of white plaster as Skeletor, and a pre-Friends Courteney Cox as an Earth girl who encounters the dimension-hopping Eternians. And also a weird plot about a key that is mistaken for a synthesizer, because this was the ’80s.
Truly, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe gave us so much. The least we can do is go on a nostalgia binge on Netflix some time today.
