History WesternAnimation / HeManAndTheMastersOfTheUniverse2002

''He-Man and the Masters of the Universe'' (also known as ''Masters of the Universe vs. The Snake Men'') is a 2002 ContinuityReboot to the ''Franchise/MastersOfTheUniverse'' franchise, and particularly [[WesternAnimation/HeManAndTheMastersOfTheUniverse1983 the 1980's cartoon]]; it's the first animated adaptation since 1990's ill-fated ''WesternAnimation/TheNewAdventuresOfHeMan''. However, this series was similarly short-lived, and only lasted one and a half seasons before getting cancelled owing to a lack of promotion and poor toy distribution.

** Kobra Khan, unlike the rest of the Snake Men, really does not like the concept of eating their enemies, and he strives to avoid having to do so.

* DoesNotLikeShoes: Nearly all of the villains and a few of the heroes. Most, yet not all of the cases are characters who had clawed feet in the original toyline. Keldor starts off wearing boots but loses them when he is transformed into Skeletor since the transformation gave him clawed hands and feet.

* {{Bishonen}}: Poor Keldor.

* MagicSkirt: Teela fights in a very acrobatic style with flips, spins, and kicks, yet manages to maintain her modesty. However, "Awaken The Serpent" averts this; When she is lifted up by her ankle by Tongue-Lashor, her skirt drops down, resulting in a brief panty shot.

* MagicSkirt: Teela fights in a very acrobatic style with flips, spins, and kicks, yet manages to maintain her modesty. However, "Awaken The Serpent" averts this; When she is lifted up by her ankle by Tongue-Lashor, her skirt drops down, resulting in a brief PantyShot.

* {{Bishounen}}: Poor Keldor.

* SnakeVersusMongoose: Rattlor--a [[SnakePeople Snake Person]]--has a crippling fear of mongooses that Orko is more than happy to use against him.

-->'''Hssss:''' You know, He-Man, I ''knew'' King Greyskull. I ''fought'' King Greyskull. And ''YOU'RE '''NO''''' King Greyskull.

* ShootTheMessenger: Calix, one of Hordak's generals, advises against attacking Castle Grayskull, saying their forces were depleted from fighting the Snake Men. Hordak thanks him for his council before saying he really hates getting bad news.

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: The tide quickly turns in "The Last Stand" when the Masters arrive. While most of the villains at least try to put up a fight, the three giants agree working for Skeletor just isn't worth the trouble and walk off.

* RewardedAsATraitorDeserves: After betraying Skeletor to the Snake Men, Evil-Lyn found that King Hssss was going to eat her. Of course, from the Snake Men's perspective, that's considered a great honor. She avoids this fate, though, by telling King Hiss where the power of the Elders is.

* PutOnABus: After "The Last Stand," the Council of Evil characters drop out of sight. Webstor returns in "Web of Evil" and Count Marzo in "History," but Evilseed and the giants never appeared again.

'''King Hiss:''' That Hordak ''never'' return!

** Hordak is shown to be pure evil, but when the Spell of Seperation risked destroying the planet, he stopped it and had the ArtifactOfDoom used to cast it separated into three pieces to ensure the spell couldn't be used again.

* NotQuiteDead: "Rise of the Snake Men, Part 2" ends with Zodak besting King Hiss and throwing him into the abyss around Castle Grayskull. Viewers quickly learn he survived, but it's not until "Second Skin" that the protagonists do.

** Hordak is shown to be pure evil, but when the Spell of Seperation risked destroying the planet, he stopped it and had the ArtifactOfDoom used to cast it seperated into three pieces to ensure the spell couldn't be used again.

* TheManBehindTheMan: In this version, Hordak saved Keldor's life by remaking him as Skeletor.

* {{Mooks}}: Hordak is shown having four generals: three of which were name characters and a one-shot guy named Calix that he can kill.

* MadeOfIron: Characters regularly have hugs rocks thrown at them, or a smashed through large stone formations and are back to fighting in a minute or two.

* PragmaticVillainy: In the last few episodes, King Hiss seeks to revive Serpos in order to conquer Eternia. However, when he learns Evil-Lyn is plotting to free Hordak in "History," he puts all of his plans on hold to deal with that.

* UnwittingPawn: In "Orko's Garden," [[HorribleJudgeOfCharacter Orko]] tries to contact Mossman for help gardening and bumps into Evilseed, who tricks him into planting seeds that free him from his prison. The rest of the episode is He-man and Mossman trying to put Evilseed back.
* VillainExclusivityClause: Skelethor has this role.

* LoopholeAbuse: Zodak would never open the Snake Men's prison in order to get revenge on King Hiss, but if someone just happened to steal his staff and open the prison themselves...

* MonsterShapedMountain: Snake Mountain, it was eventually revealed to actually ''be'' a giant snake frozen in place when King Hiss and the Snake Men take over.

* AVillainNamedKhan: Kobra Khan. Ironically, while most races of Eternia are afraid of him, given [[TheDreaded the reputation of his species]], the [[SnakePeople Snake Men]], his own species doesn't respect him much, thinking he's grown soft living so long without others of his kind around.

* IKnowYoureInThereSomewhereFight: King Hiss uses an artifact in "Second Skin" to turn Man-At-Arms, Teela, and Mekaneck into Snake People obedient to him.

* ItsTheJourneyThatCounts / MagicFeather: King Grayskull seeks the power to defeat Hordak, and is told by a seer to give up his sword and journey to find a new magic sword. When he does, he finds the seer, who returns Grayskull's sword and tells Grayskull he always had the power, he just needed the trip to focus his abilities.

** In Count Marzo's backstory, he was foiled and subdued by forces led by Captain Nero (Adam's grandfather).
* HeroicSacrifice: King Grayskull gave his life to banish Hordak.

* GreaterScopeVillain: Skeletor may be dangerous ''now'', but long ago Hordak was the greatest threat to Eternia, and he's far worse than Skeletor, being responsible for [[spoiler:the death of King Grayskull]] and the transformation of Keldor into Skeletor. If he is ever released from Despondos, death and destruction will surely follow.

* FacialHorror: In the pilot episode, the flashback to Randor's fight with Keldor ended with the latter getting acid burned all of his face, and by the present, all that's left of his head is a skull. In "The Price of Deceit" we see that wasn't the reason Keldor became Skeletor, the acid burn was killing him and he survived by cutting a deal with Hordak.

* FacialHorror: In the pilot episode, the flashback to Randor's fight with Keldor ended with the latter getting acid burned all of his face, and by the present, all that's left of his head is a skull. In "The Price of Deciet" we see that wasn't the reason Keldor became Skeletor, the acid burn was killing him and he survived by cutting a deal with Hordak.

* EvilerThanThou: Both Skeletor and King Hiss are intimidated by Hordak--feeling it'd be impossible to conquer Eternia if he were around.

* PunnyName: Skeletor coins "Two-Bad" based on Tuvar and Baddrha's actual names.

* RewardedAsATraitorDeserves: After betraying Skeletor to the Snake Men, Evil-Lyn found that King Hiss was going to eat her. Of course, from the Snake Men's perspective, that's considered a great honor. She avoids this fate, though, by telling King Hiss where the power of the Elders is.

* SecurityCling: Orko does this to Adam, then later Man-at-arms in different episodes.

* ShoutOut: A taunt that King Hiss makes at He-Man, based off a taunt targeted at UsefulNotes/DanQuayle:
-->'''Hiss:''' You know, He-Man, I ''knew'' King Greyskull. I ''fought'' King Greyskull. And ''YOU'RE '''NO''''' King Greyskull.

** Rattlor ends up being this to Evil-Lyn in "History." He sends Kobra Khan on a mission to distract the Masters in the hopes that he would be captured. However, Khan stumbles upon Evil-Lyn approaching Count Marzo about freeing Hordak. King Hiss decides to stop them, which ends up causing He-Man to be alerted to what's going on.
* TheStarscream: Evil-Lyn primarily. Tri-Klops has a brush with this in "Roboto's Gambit" when his new army proves quite unstoppable. Kobra Khan is completely loyal to King Hiss, but he often tries to undermine Rattlor.

* WhatTheHellHero: Zodak deliberately allows the key to the Snake Men's prison to be stolen so that King Hiss can be released and Zodak can settle his personal vendetta against him.

** Subverted with King Hiss, who actually cares for his servants, and is never seen abusing them. Note that this only applies to actual Snake Men, as Evil-Lyn finds out the hard way.

* AlienSky: Gold-coloured sky with a gas giant and two moons, yup, definitely not Earth.

* EvilIsNotAToy: Evil-Lyn helps release King Hiss and the rest of the Snake Men in hopes of a reward. This nearly gets her eaten until she tells him about the power of the Elders in Castle Grayskull.

** Evil-Lyn is willing to help Skeletor in his attempt for world domination, but she will not betray her father and returns his magical Ramstone back to him when Skeletor loses it. Also, Evil-Lyn wouldn't betray Skeletor to the Snake Men until Kobra Khan revealed to her that Skeletor had set her (and his other allies) up to be captured so the heroes would be lured into a false sense of security. Even then, she demanded the one telling her to prove it.
** Count Marzo is prepared to work with a monster like Skeletor when it suits him, but he is horrified by Evil-Lyn trying to free Hordak. Based [[BadBoss how Hordak treats his followers]], his fears appear well founded.
** Hordak had one moment in the flashbacks when he used the Spell of Seperation to divid the world between the light and dark hemisphere. [[GoneHorriblyRight He spell worked too well]] and nearly ripped the entire planet in half, forcing him to stop it so he wouldn't die along with the rest of the planet.