- Good versus evil stories are built into my DNA,
'cause I was raised Catholic.
And so before you even get to comic books
they give you the Bible,
and they're like look at these stories of adventure.
Who's a bigger hero than the son of God, for heaven's sake.
When I was a kid,
the first thing I geeked out about was "Batman,"
'cause I watched Adam West's "Batman" '66 series every day.
Comics came into my life
when I would say I was about five years old.
My father took me for my first hair cut
at Vinny the Barber's,
and before I got my hair cut
my dad was getting his hair cut,
and Vinny the barber was like
"There's comic books under the TV over there
"if you wanna read them and stuff."
And there's a stack of comic books.
And there they were.
There was Batman, there was Spiderman,
all the characters that I had watched cartoons for
literally in printed form.
And that started a lifelong obsession with these characters.
Mostly at home is where geekdom begins
because you can watch a thing over and over,
and then you meet like-minded individuals
who know about that thing as well,
and then you crate families based
and predicated on fictions for heaven's sake.
And there were no terms for it in the 70's.
I was born in 1970.
People weren't like oh he's a geek,
or oh, he's a nerd.
You just liked a thing very much,
and you became known by that thing.
I've always loved stories of daring do.
Person least likely who steps up
and becomes that person who saves one or all,
or makes the big difference.
And all of the best superhero stories
are about the same thing.
The whole world is running from the worst thing
that ever happened.
And then there's one individual racing at it.
That's a way to live,
a code to live by.
Heman is absolutely no differently,
he's a superhero,
and he's a superhero down to his genetic level
in as much as he has a secret identity.
That appealed to me as a kid
when I was watching "Heman and the Masters of the Universe,"
age 11 and 12, I loved the world of heroics,
bigger than life characters,
loud, gaudy costumes and what not,
very simple black and white themes
of good verses evil.
So given the chance to
play with those characters as an adult,
I always love to do it.
I don't do it in the movies
'cause I don't think I'm talented enough
to make movies like that.
But I've done it in comics for years.
I write "Daredevil."
I wrote "Green Arrow," I've written "Batman."
So leaning into that,
the affection that I had
for that type of storytelling as a kid
that stayed with me throughout my entire life,
I'm 50 years old and I still get choked up
when I see people do the right thing,
fictional people.
Good verses evil stories are built into my DNA
'cause I was raised Catholic.
So before you even get to comic books
they give you the Bible.
Like look at these stories of adventure.
I'm very familiar with mythical art types
and stories of good versus evil and whatnot.
So when I discovered comic books
and cartoons and superheros,
I didn't get much morality out of
sitting in church for an hour once a week,
I got my mortality out of watching "Batman,"
out of watching "Heman."
These were the characters that instilled in me
a better reason to be good
other than like you're gonna go to hell
if you're not good, kid.
And that led to what I became.
I didn't become a hero.
But I started making choices
that others don't make
because of the things that I watched.
And it led to me being a filmmaker,
which is a dream job for me.
Kids, I've been in this game now
going on 27 years.
Early on I just kind of put geek culture,
comic book culture into everything I did.
If you go watch "Mall Rats,"
the second movie I ever made,
Stan Lee's in it for heaven's sake.
- Holy shit.
Aren't you-
- Oh, Stan Lee, hi.
- I put into my movies
the things that made me happy in life.
I watched geekdom grow,
grow up if you will
from something that like,
I remember when we did "Mall Rats"
people were like "Who's Stan Lee?"
To now everybody knows who Stan Lee is.
Your mom knows who Stan Lee is
because pop culture shifted
and become the culture.
You'd get beat up for telling people
you like comic books back in the day,
now they pay you millions of dollars.
Those cartoons man,
and those characters informed me
throughout most of my life.
I just felt like as I brought them into the present,
if I could give a little of that back to the audience,
to be able to give it like a gift,
and be like this is what made me who I am,
I hope you like it too,
and that's how we find out
in many ways who are parents are.
I was a kid sitting there next to my dad,
watching him watch
"Raiders of the Lost Ark" excitedly,
and he would tell me very excitedly
"This is the kind of movie I grew up watching."
That was a moment for me.
Watching your parents watch things
that mean something to them
is an important legacy that we hand down
generation to generation.
And I've had that same experience
with my wife and "Masters of the Universe Revelation,"
'cause she was like "Oh, I remember this cartoon."
And I was like "Wait till you see what we did."
And she was blown away by the story arches.
She's like "This is the first time
"I can watch a cartoon like this and enjoy it."
Nothing I do speaks to my wife, nothing.
So the idea of this of all things,
"Masters of the Universe Revelation" speaking to her,
thank God I got to have that in my lifetime,
otherwise what would me and my wife talk about?
(upbeat music)