MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE I
PLASTIC PANTHEON

MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE I
PLASTIC PANTHEON

[INTRO]

By the power of shelf space.

By the power of licensing.

By the power of market research.

I had the power.

Or so they told me.

[VERSE]

Masters of the Universe, say it slowly now, childhood thunder in a plastic crown, bright sword lifted in a Saturday glow, little boys kneeling where the toy shelves grow, I thought it was myth, I thought it was war, Eternia burning behind my door, Skeletor laughing with a skull for a face, He-Man flexing in a cosmic place,

but years get sharp when the curtain gets torn, and the thing that discipled you looks factory-born, Mattel had figures, Filmation had flame, thirty-minute myth to baptise the name, sell the warrior, sell the beast, sell the castle, sell the feast, sell the child a universe boxed in card, make the lore feel deep while the checkout works hard,

who were the masters, was it Skeletor’s throne, was it He-Man’s sword, was it Castle Grayskull stone, was it cosmic virtue, was it muscle and light, was it evil blue-faced in the television night, or was it the boardroom, the licence, the plan, the shareholder grin behind the heroic man, was it Wall Street wearing a wizard’s hood, turning wonder into quarterly good,

and I am not laughing at the child who loved it, I was that child with the bright spell above it, eyes wide open, cereal bowl near, cartoon morality drilling the ear, good versus evil with a toy in the hand, simple little sermons from a retail land, but the spell gets bitter when the grown mind sees, gods were being minted by companies,

plastic pantheon, blister-pack Zeus, thunderbolt sold with a safety-use, Skeletor Hades with a skull-blue grin, He-Man Hercules with gym-built skin, Teela Athena with a warrior pose, Man-At-Arms Hephaestus where the weapons get chose, Orko the trickster, Beast Man the beast, old pagan echoes at a syndicated feast,

then cinema repeats it with cleaner chrome, every hero needs armour, a lab and home, Tony Stark forge with a billionaire spark, weapon-maker priest in a comic-book ark, Batman in shadow, Diana from myth, Aquaman Neptune with oceanic drift, Thor still Thor with a hammer in hand, and we call it fresh when the old gods stand,

directors became priests of the digital shrine, animators making small gods shine, writers rebuilding Olympus in frames, composers giving brass to the ancient names, toy men, film men, stock men too, selling us pantheons painted new, and the child keeps asking through decades of dust, who mastered the universe, who mastered us,

because stories are not neutral when they train desire, they teach what to fear, what to love, what to admire, who gets a cape, who gets a sword, who gets worship without being Lord, who saves the day, who dies, who returns, who owns the myth while the market earns, who gets canon, who gets reboot, who gets buried under franchise loot,

we watched castles, lasers, swords and beasts, but behind the veil were commercial priests, no incense smoke, just focus groups, no altar lambs, just product loops, no oracle bones, just sales forecast, no sacred text, just contracts cast, and yet the spell felt larger than earth, because children are hungry for transcendent worth,

that is the ache they rented from God, the longing for glory in dust and sod, the dream of a champion, power, name, the battle against evil, the cleansing flame, the secret identity, chosen blood, the warrior rising against the flood, but every toy-shelf gospel bends at the shelf, because the saviour is purchased by self,

By the power of Grayskull, they taught me to cry, but Grayskull cannot answer when relatives die, cannot open blind eyes, cannot cleanse the stain, cannot command dead Lazarus up again, cannot tell the storm to kneel and be still, cannot forgive the rebel will, cannot carry wrath, cannot crush the grave, cannot make the plastic warrior save,

Masters of the Universe, what a title to sell, while the true universe rings like a temple bell, galaxies burning where no toy line trades, atoms obeying what His wisdom made, stars declaring without cartoon speech, oceans bowing where His limits reach, gravity pulling, light taking flight, all things held by the Son’s own might,

Christ is not a brand extension, not a franchise reboot, not a hero with a focus-group suit, not a mythic archetype polished for screens, not an old god dressed in marketing sheen, He is the Word through whom matter was made, the Lord before Adam, before stock was traded, before plastic, before pixels, before childhood dreams, before every fake master rented His beams,

so keep your nostalgia, but burn the throne, love the craft, but do not call it home, enjoy the story, but test the spell, ask who profits when your worship sells, ask why old gods keep wearing new clothes, why Mars, Marvel, myth and money compose, why every age builds its toy-store heaven, then wonders why the soul stays leavened,

repent from the altar of manufactured awe, repent from the pantheon behind the law, repent from the spell that makes products sing, repent from the lie that a toy can be king, come to the Master no company owns, the Christ who reigns over markets and thrones, the Lord who took nails, not licensing fees, and rose with scars that make death bend knees,

the real Master of the Universe is not found in a box, not sealed in plastic, not traded as stock, not written by men who need sequels to eat, not rebooted whenever the profits deplete, He is Alpha and Omega, Creator and Judge, mercy with wounds and a robe dipped in blood, and when every franchise fades into dust, Jesus Christ remains Lord over us.