2 min readMay 1, 2026 06:01 AM IST First published on: May 1, 2026 at 06:01 AM ISTIn 1977, ahead of the release of what would become the phenomenon that is Star Wars, filmmaker George Lucas approached Mattel for a tie-up to produce licensed franchise toys. It refused, the deal went to Kenner, and the rest became history. Mattel’s resurrection was engineered three years later by a toy designer, Roger Sweet, and his brainchild, He-Man, a broad-shouldered action figurine with a power sword, on a mission to defend Castle Grayskull and the planet, Eternia, from the evil forces of his uncle and archenemy, Skeletor. His inception story might have rested on a missed opportunity, but with his bulging biceps and ripped abs, He-Man turned out to be “the most powerful man in the universe” through the 1980s. “I always wanted to be a He-Man and never could… I knew almost every guy in the world would love to be a He-Man,” Sweet, who died on April 28, at 91, had said in a 2019 interview. Turns out, he was right.Inevitably, comparisons to Star Wars followed but He-Man was gloriously, almost brazenly, a commercial artefact that wore its purpose lightly, moving from toy to television to comics, a hero conjured in the image of what a toy might demand rather than what a tale might require. For entire generations, He-Man defined heroism, even as it circumscribed the emotional vocabulary available to boys, insisting that power lay in invulnerability rather than complexity, that men didn’t cry or experience fear.AdvertisementThat idea of masculinity might have been dented, but He-Man’s appeal, it seems, is not entirely lost. A new film is slated for this summer, a slice of nostalgia for old acolytes and, perhaps, a question for the uninitiated: In a strife-torn world, what does it mean to be powerful, once the old certainties have worn thin?