Kevin Smith celebrates Masters of the Universe: Revelation at Comic-Con

Kevin Smith wanted to have a huge Hall H panel for his new Netflix series, Masters of the Universe: Revelation. In an excited voice, the director of Clerks and Dogma opened his San Diego Comic-Con panel by waxing poetic about the masses finally seeing his sequel to the classic He-Man cartoon in a packed hall. “I’ve been waiting for this day […] the day I can present this and receive my propers!”

That moment didn’t happen, obviously. Still, Smith kept that energy for his newly released series and redirected it to the show’s panel. For much of it, he heaped praise and compliments onto his writing team and the animators over at Powerhouse in a way that came across as charmingly genuine.

Smith is grateful for what the series provided him as a child, but wanted to take things in a new direction rather than just resting on laurels. As Smith put it, he and the writers asked the question of, “‘What if grown ups were writing this show for grown ups instead of for kids?’” The way this is most apparent is when Teela discovers that Adam and He-Man are one of the same, and the show forms around her anger at her best friend’s deception.

To Sarah Michelle Gellar, who voices Teela, that emotional maturity to the writing and Teela specifically is what got her to sign on even though she wasn’t particularly into the series growing up. “This is a story about what it’s like to find out that the people you love haven’t been completely honest with you,” she said, “and what your place in the world is.”

Chris Wood, who voices Prince Adam and He-Man, found the series exciting as a fan of the original series. In getting to say the iconic line of “I have the Power!,” Wood got a small moment to geek out: “I felt like a kid again! I get to say this!”

Another fan of the original show was Tiffany Smith, who voices Andra. Originally a minor character from the comics, and reimagined as a black woman for the series, Andra serves as the audience surrogate; when we first meet her, she’s working as a mercenary alongside Teela.

Image: Netflix

The role was a big deal for Tiffany, who happily presented her old She-Ra figures for the panel and beamed when Kevin called her a star of the show. And while originally having prior experience with the series, Tony Todd — best known for Candyman and the voice actor for Scare Glow in Revelation — took pride in his work for the show … and the eventual toy of his character that’ll be released.

Overall, the panel was more of a celebration for the series thus far rather than providing any retrospective or teases for its second half. (There is a new Skeletor toy coming out, but its appearance is something of a spoiler, so beware.) On that front, all Smith had to say about the second half of the series, yet to be released on Netflix, was that it would bring back all four actors on the panel. Sounds obvious, maybe, but some of their fates were left ambiguous at the end of the show’s first five episodes.

Masters of the Universe: Revelation – Part One is now available on Netflix.