No Power of 'Grayskull': WB Drops He-Man Movie

The He-Man movie, alternately called Grayskull and Masters of the Universe, has been shelved by Warner Bros., meaning this is likely the last time I can use the photo below. It's a very sad day for me. However, I am pretty happy that the movie's dead, or at least mostly dead. Mattel vows that it will shop for a new home, but Warners and Joel Silver couldn't reach a consensus with the toy manufacturer on the direction of the project, which had been in development for a couple of years. Mattel still has the even harder-to-imagine Hot Wheels movie set up at Warner Bros. The toy craze can, of course, be traced back to Transformers, but I think G.I. Joe kind of proved that it can't just be a familiar toy from our collective youth that sells tickets. That movie had a much stronger brand awareness, dating back half a century, and it may not be one of the top 20 grossing films of the year. That probably had nothing to do with this decision, but if there was hesitation about the way the movie was developing, then the G.I. Joe experiment indicates you had better have a strong story if you're going to dump a couple hundred million bucks into one of these adaptations. The most recent attempt at a new script came in May, but apparently, He-Man is still off the mark. Plus, with Warner Bros. recently solidifying its dealings with DC Comics, there will be a greater push to develop films within that brand, so some of this external stuff will probably fall away as a matter of course. If you had just opened the vault to hundreds of potential movies you'd probably want to focus on those over outside properties, especially if you can't get a script hammered out in 24 months.

Comments

[Shell]

I am surprised this even had the legs to get a serious script review. I watched He-man for the unintentional comedic value and only for a few episodes. I can't believe this had a very large, serious following.

[Skafetar]

Yeah well you didn't grow up on it. So who cares what you think.