DISPATCHES FROM WEIMAR, HOLLYWOOD: Masters of the Universe Review.
Your tolerance for Masters of the Universe will likely depend on how funny you find it for a character called “Fisto”—because he has a giant fist, you see—uttering the following line: “Let’s fist some bad guys! Give him head, Ram Man.”
Now, this sequence is funny for a couple of reasons. For starters, Fisto and Ram-Man are not the real names of these characters: They’re just what Prince Adam (Nicholas Galitzine) calls the two heroes of Eternia. Because of the aforementioned giant fist and Ram-Man’s head, which looks like a battering ram. But it’s also funny because of the double entendre. “Fisting” and “giving head” are sexual acts, as you, the adult reading this, well know. Fisto (again, not his real name) has said that he and Ram-Man (ibid) should commit acts of violence that also sound like phrases commonly associated with physical acts of love. The dissonance here is intended to provoke an uncontrolled guffaw as your brain connects the two ideas.
Ha ha. You get it.
And maybe you will love it! I do not dispute that this is mildly amusing; there were people in my theater who laughed quite heartily at several of these gags. “Fisto” is, objectively, a very funny name for a character based on a children’s toy. But it really gets to the annoying, leering wink at the heart of Masters of the Universe, a movie that seems to exist entirely in the hopes of turning any discrete 45-second chunk of footage into a GIFable, memeable moment, something to amuse people on social media once this thing hits home video in six or seven weeks, if not sooner.
Based on an ’80s children’s toy, and with Mattel gearing up to sell new merchandise off of Fisto and Ram Man: Mattel Unveils Full “Masters of the Universe” Product Line Ahead of Highly Anticipated Live-Action Film.