‘Masters of the Universe’ is set to get its second live-action movie in 2026
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Amazon MGM Studios is sparing no expense on its big screen adaptation of classic 1980s cartoon and Mattel toy line Masters of the Universe.
The movie stars British actor Nicholas Galitzine as Adam Glenn, a prince from the planet Eternia who crash-lands on Earth, separating him from the Power Sword of Grayskull which transforms him into the muscle-bound He-Man.
Galitzine’s biggest role so far was in 2020 supernatural horror film The Craft: Legacy. He is joined by an A List cast on Masters of the Universe including Morena Baccarin, Kristen Wiig, Idris Elba and Jared Leto who plays He-Man’s arch-enemy Skeletor.
It is a reboot of the 1987 live action movie with the same name which starred Dolph Lundgren and bombed at the box office grossing just $17.3 million. Interest in the rights was reignited in 2007 following the runaway success of Michael Bay first movie about Transformers, another beloved ’80s toy line.
Jared Leto will play He-Man’s nemesis Skeletor
COURTESY OF NETFLIX © 2021
After that, the He-Man rights went through a revolving door of studios including Sony, Warner Bros. and Netflix which had significant success producing modern versions of the classic cartoons. According to Variety, Netflix spent nearly $30 million on developing a live action He-Man movie but canceled it in July 2023 citing budget concerns. It left Mattel looking for a new studio and Amazon became its real life white knight.
Seeing parallels with Marvel’s hugely-successful Thor films, Amazon picked up the rights and threw its weight behind them.
Despite being partially set in space, Masters of the Universe is being made in the United Kingdom and this shines a spotlight on its costs. Studios filming in the U.K. get a reimbursement of up to 25.5% of the money they spend in the country provided that at least 10% of their core costs are incurred there. In order to demonstrate this to the authorities, studios set up separate companies to produce each film in the U.K. and they are obliged to file legally-binding earnings releases.
The Amazon subsidiary behind Masters of the Universe is called Regal Leo UK Productions in a nod to He-Man’s royal lineage and MGM’s roaring lion logo. The company filed its first earnings release today which revealed that the over the almost 11-month period to December 31, 2024, $52.1 million (£41.5 million) was spent on the production which “was in line with the budget.”
Principal photography began in London a week after the date on the filings so the spending covers the pre-production period. One of the biggest single costs during this time was the $3.2 million (£2.5 million) spent on staff with the company having a monthly average of 55 employees.
Mattel is hoping to replicate the success of ‘Barbie’
Warner Bros
That doesn’t include freelancers, contractors and temporary workers as they aren’t listed as employees on the books of U.K. companies but often represent the majority of the crew on a film shoot. That’s not the end of the story as the government reimbursement gave Amazon a helping hand.
The filings reveal that the company banked an $11.8 million (£9.4 million) reimbursement bringing its net spending down to $40.3 million. However, this is set to surge in its next earnings release as it will cover the year to the end of 2025 which will include the cost of filming and a lot of post-production which is when the majority of the costly visual effects will be added.
On June 15 2025, Galitzine confirmed on his Instagram that filming had officially wrapped and the movie is expected to be released around a year after that. The movie about Mattel’s other major toy franchise, Barbie, grossed a whopping $1.4 billion in 2023 and even won the newly-invented award for cinematic box office achievement at the Oscars so He-Man has big boots to fill.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/carolinereid/2025/09/02/he-man-movie-cost-revealed-by-amazon/
