He-Man Isn’t a Cartoon… It’s an Ancient Viking Age Story

What if the story of He-Man didn’t originate in the 1980s—but echoes something far older rooted in the Viking Age?

In this episode of Viking Legacy and Lore, we explore the unexpected parallels between He-Man and Norse mythology, revealing how ancient storytelling patterns continue to shape modern heroes. While there is no direct evidence that He-Man was intentionally inspired by Viking culture, the connections become undeniable when viewed through the lens of myth, archetype, and narrative structure.

We begin by examining the origin of He-Man—created by Mattel in the early 1980s as a toy-first concept, later expanded through mini-comics and a groundbreaking daily cartoon format. From there, we move into a cinematic retelling of He-Man’s story, following Prince Adam’s transformation into a warrior tasked with defending Eternia from the ever-present threat of Skeletor.

As the episode unfolds, we draw deeper parallels between He-Man and Norse mythology:

•  Eternia as a central realm comparable to Asgard 
•  He-Man as a figure reflecting aspects of Thor and Baldur 
•  Skeletor as an embodiment of the draugr—an undead force driven by power and control 
•  Supporting characters representing virtues and warnings found in Viking-age storytelling 
•  Teela and She-Ra as reflections of Valkyries and shieldmaidens 

We also explore the Viking understanding of an ongoing battle between order and chaos—a theme that mirrors He-Man’s repeated confrontations with Skeletor, where victory is never final, only maintained.

Finally, we step beyond the Viking Age to examine the idea that all great stories share a common origin. Drawing on the thought of J.R.R. Tolkien, we consider the possibility that myths are not invented but discovered—reflections of a deeper, universal truth expressed across cultures and time.

This episode blends history, storytelling, and cultural analysis to reveal how the Viking Age continues to influence the stories we tell today—and why those stories still resonate.

Transcript

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It's 1983. The 13-inch television is sitting there, beveled gray screen, two sets of round knobs to navigate a limited selection of channels. It's time. Even at a young age, the little boy knows exactly how to navigate such a sophisticated piece of equipment. He pulls the knob, waits for the screen to light up, and turns the dial until it reaches channel 13. He turns and traverses the shag carpet like an adventure through a forest of thread. He's small enough that even the couch feels like a mountain. Although he is big enough to hold a plastic sword like it means something. From the edge of the cushion he leans forward, eyes locked on the screen, muscles he doesn't have yet, tense like he's about to charge into battle himself. And then he hears it. I have the power. It hits like thunder, the sword lifted high, like something ancient has just spoken out loud again after a long silence. Even though his young mind doesn't understand it yet. But he feels it. He thinks he's watching a cartoon, but he's actually watching something much older. Because the story of He-Man, it doesn't begin in 1983. It begins in the Viking Age. If you've been with us for a while and enjoy the content, this might feel like a bit of a departure from the norm. However, episodes like this have been in the works for some time. Most sit on a sideboard of episode ideas, but the reality is that the Viking Age has influenced modern pop culture in many ways that we're aware of, and some that we're not so aware of. Some are overt, easy to identify, others are subtle. And we'll consider this the first episode into Viking influence and pop culture. And it may set the stage for future episodes that dive into the Viking influence in our world. Because it's everywhere. Not just Marvel, but Disney, Pokemon, video games, PC, and mobile. And that's just the beginning. Now, before we go any further, let me set the tone for where we're headed, because this isn't an episode about a cartoon. We're teaching something much deeper. We're following the lineage of power, how the idea moves through time, and it reshapes itself in every generation that it comes into contact with. We're talking about the Vikings, the Northmen, or those that were scattered throughout Scandinavia, Iceland, and Greenland during the Viking Age. Well, they all come from Germanic tribes, which is where we get the barbarian archetype, He-Man included in that. These towering, muscular figures that look like they belong in the Viking Age, rooted in Germanic tribes and Scandinavian people. They're big, they're strong, and they look like they are Vikings. So we'll start by talking about where He-Man actually came from, because if you dig into the origin, into the creators, the design process, and the early concepts, you'll find something surprising. There's zero evidence that He-Man was intentionally inspired by Vikings. There are no runes, there are no sagas, no deliberate connections, but if you look closer, and we will, something else begins to emerge. Because even though it wasn't the creator's intent, the connections are undeniable. It all echoes something far older and very much rooted in the stories of the North. So in this episode, we're going to uncover those parallels and more importantly, why they exist. Because by the end of the episodes, you won't just see He-Man differently, you'll see how the Viking Age still shapes heroes that we create today. But here's the reality about He-Man, the one that most people don't know. He-Man wasn't dreamed up by a lone genius in a lightning storm. There was no moment where a single creator was sitting at a desk pondering, thinking about a superhero figure, and then all of a sudden had an epiphany and said, Oh, I have it. No. He-Man was forged in a boardroom. And then, somehow, accidentally, he became an entire generation's iconic symbol. It's the early 1980s. So picture it. Under fluorescent lights, coffee and styrofoam cups, and endless corporate deadlines. Mattel executives were staring down a problem. The toy world was evolving and fast. Kids didn't just want toys anymore. They wanted entire worlds, stories, characters that feel larger than life, something they could step into. Kerner had Star Wars. Hasbro had G.I. Joe and Transformers. Mattel, it had Barbie and Hot Wheels, but at the time there was no world attached to either. Sales were slipping. Mattel needed a champion, something bold, something muscular and unforgettable. The plan was to create a toy and then build the backstory. In the boardroom, there was a team of three distinct architects. These were not mythmakers, they weren't historians, they were designers, artists, and storytellers. And they were up against fierce competition and trying to hit a deadline. If they failed, Mattel might not exist today. Mark Taylor, the artist, he begins to sketch. He pulls from his imagination. It's instinctual. It's not based on research. He draws out a barbarian physique, places the character in a world that feels ancient yet fit for the gods. Eternia. Eternia takes shape, not as a carefully studied mythology, but as an expression of his imagination. Ruins, beasts, strange technology all fuse the sophisticated ruling class and utopian society. It feels old and idealistic all at the same time. Then comes Roger Sweat. He takes the images and the concepts and begins to mold and shape the character into a visible, tangible representation of possibility. He presents three prototypes. Massive, muscular figures, no backstory, no lore, just larger than life strength. One of those prototypes stands out. With the groups eyeing the possibilities, one is removed and then two are left. They go back and forth, the room is divided, it's fifty-fifty, so they turn to Sweat and say, You choose. You're the tiebreaker. So Sweat picks the figure, plants him like a flag in the middle of the table, and utters the sentence, He Man, the most powerful man in the universe. That begins the story and would influence the direction of everything that comes after. That line doesn't exactly explain anything, but it does declare everything. With that, Donald Glutt is given the task of taking this figure, the concept for his world, the premise for everything, and creating his story. Where did he come from? Where is he going? What obstacles will he face? And what problems is he trying to solve? Who are his guides to help him along his path? And who's the antagonist or the villain? There's only one problem. How does Mattel intend to communicate the story of He-Man, a figure that was created out of thin air? Someone had an idea. What if we include a small comic book with each toy? Someone else says, kids don't read comic books anymore? The response, aha, but they do look at pictures. So we'll add a comic book that tells the story through pictures, with few words and simple dialogue mixed in. But then someone else says that comic book idea is great, but what if we create a cartoon that kids can watch on TV? You mean like Saturday mornings? No, like every day when they come home from school when mom is fixing dinner. Every day? That's awfully ambitious, maybe even impossible. It's never been done. Aha, that's exactly why we should do it. And that right there was the genius of He-Man. That cartoon and world building method, it gave kids a reason to care, a reason to collect, a reason to tune in every single day. It took about a year for the cartoon to appear, so the comics had to do the heavy lifting at first. So Glutt wrote the short stories, many comics tucked into the packaging, origins, battles, the characters, the stakes, and just like that, the toy takes the world by storm. But consider for a second that something strange just happened. They didn't sell a figure. They gave every child a fragment of a story, a piece of a larger narrative, somewhere, somewhere to place their character. It was incomplete and limited, but you don't need every detail when you have imagination. It was like He-Man had his own saga, not overly detailed, but enough to give some imaginative direction. They think about it. In the Viking world, stories weren't handed to you as finished products. Even what we have today often feels short or incomplete, like we want more. We want the proper hero arc and the resolution, but we don't always get it. Sometimes it's up to us to consider the possibilities and the outcomes. Viking age stories were told around fires, passed on with words in an oral society. They expanded in the listener's mind. The gaps weren't flaws, they were the point. And now, without meaning to, accidentally, Mattel recreated the same storytelling structure of the Viking Age. A warrior, a weapon, a world hinted at but never fully explained, a story that lives in the imagination of the one who hears and engages with it. None of these three men set out to create mythology, nor were they drawing from any single source. They were trying to sell toys, trying to keep a long running successful toy company from losing its grip on the industry, but in the process they pulled from something deeper than they realized, which suggests that the influence of the Viking Age isn't just history we learn. The stories actually penetrate deeper into our psyche than we realize. Strong, barbarian berserker imagery, ancient hero archetypes, swords, weapons, sorcery. The culture at the time was already borrowing from the Norris world, flowing through things like Marvel comics with characters like Thor. Then there was Conan the Barbarian, a resurgence of Lord of the Rings, even though it was written in the 1950s, and Dungeons and Dragons was reaching its peak popularity. Though none of these draw exclusively from the Viking world, you can't help but see the connections. They weren't copying Vikings, but they were definitely swimming in the waters of the world that the Vikings helped shape. The final piece of the boardroom is where Glut rises from his chair. The room still buzzing with half formed ideas. He walks to the head of the table, pauses, then he lifts his hand, thumb and forefinger, forming two sharp right angles. He frames an invisible square in the air. He peers through it like a director lining up a shot, lets the moment hang as everyone waits for what he'll say. Picture this. There's a kingdom. Not soft, not fragile, but ancient. A place where towering stones rise out of the earth like it remembers something older than men who walk its halls. A place of order, of strength, of peace. It's called eternia. At the center of it all stands a throne. It's not just power, it's responsibility. There's a king and a queen and a son, Prince Adam. At first glance, Adam is not what you would expect. He's not the strongest, not the most disciplined, not a warrior or a hero that people look at as the next king in a long line of nobles. In fact, he's unassuming, we'll say, mild mannered. Or even less, lacks confidence. But that's the point, because kids can relate to that. Heck, we can all relate to that. Because the story doesn't begin with power, begins with the potential. This is a world where kids can say I can become something if I just tap into the right source of power. And then there's the antagonist, someone who is outside the wall, something evil, a force that wants to destroy, wants to control and take what doesn't belong to it, to claim the source of all power in eternity, to take castle. Castle Grayscal. This is what will force the hero to tap into his power, not for himself, but for others. And from the shadow rises something strong, something old, something that was human but but corrupted and consumed by a lust for power. We'll call him Skeletor. He feels like a man and more like something left behind after a man is gone. He'll stop at nothing to get what he wants. He wants to rule over all of Eternia. So the kingdom's on edge, evil might just win if someone doesn't step up. The stakes are high. All of Eternity and everyone living there will either be free or enslaved by Skeletor. The noblest warriors of the kingdom gather and stand ready. These are allies and guides for He Man. The line between order and chaos is clear, and each hero, which the kids can collect all of them, will embody something good, something that parents will even love. Villains will have them represent the stuff that trips people up, the negative personifications of things to avoid. So Adam is strong, but he lacks confidence, so we'll give him what he lacks by channeling it through a weapon, a special sword, the sword of power. It has the ability to transform him. But the twist is the sword doesn't simply grant He-Man strength. It reveals what's already there, buried in him, waiting. So picture it, Prince Adam raises the sword and he says, By the power of Gray Skull, lightning all around, channeling through the sword, Adam is transformed into He-Man and says, I have the power. Now he's ready to face whatever obstacles stand in his way, because Skeletor is still there and his henchmen are always up to no good. So He-Man will fight, defend, and protect the innocent. Every battle will teach kids a valuable lesson. He-Man will teach honesty and moral responsibility, and how the battle to be good never ends. So he'll have trusted companions, allies, and guides, so all along the way he's not alone. These will all be warriors in their own ways, each approaching the fight from a different angle. Strength, bravery, wisdom. You get the idea. Then every time Adam raises his sword, every time he becomes He-Man, he's choosing to stand for what is right. He may not be ready, but he chooses. Kids will love it. Parents will embrace it for what it teaches. A prince who becomes a warrior, a warrior who faces evil, a bad guy who never fully disappears, the power that must be used but never abused in a battle and a story that goes on and on because the fight is never over. And now that you know the story of the boardroom, the pitch, the concept that created the action figure, the cartoon and the live action adaptations, it's time to look closer at what it resembles. Here's where things get interesting, and maybe there's some unexpected twists in here as well, because when you look at the men who created He-Man, Mark Taylor, Roger Sweet, Donald Glutt, you don't find Viking scholars, you don't find men buried in Norris Tex. No, you find toy designers, artists, storytellers, men trying to build something cool, something powerful, something that would sell. And yet, when we start looking at the connections, we're left with one conclusion. They didn't know exactly what they were creating, but the influence of the Viking Age, it's impossible to resist. So look at what they made. A warrior who could fit right into a Viking saga, a man transformed by power for battle, an evil, greedy, undead villain, with a mythical realm that's home to a godlike man, touching multiple other realms that can be explored, not to mention the link to Earth that comes later from the movies. Then there are the Valkyrie-esque characters along with all the other heroes and villains. That, and just like the sagas of the Viking Age, they're actually teaching something deeper, traits to pursue or distorted virtues to be avoided. They didn't set out to create something Viking, but they couldn't escape it. Because the Viking Age didn't just leave behind artifacts, it left behind patterns, principles, and a path for epic storytelling. Those paradigms are what get told, retold, and reshaped over and over. Eventually, they stop belonging to one specific group of people in a specific geographical location and start belonging to everyone. Once a story takes root deep enough, it becomes part of the imagination itself. It becomes part of narrative DNA. So even if you've never read a saga, never studied a rune, never stood beneath the northern sky, you still feel it. It's impossible to avoid. The threads of storytelling and elements of the Viking Age and their mythology, they permeate deeper than anyone realizes. That pull towards strength and the best version of yourself, the hunger to be more, to be honorable, loyal, and sacrificial for others, the sense that somewhere locked behind courage, sacrifice and trial, there's something in you, a version of you waiting to be awakened. That's not just 1980s marketing, that's ancient. He-Man isn't proof that the Vikings inspired a cartoon. He's proof that the Viking age never completely disappeared from people's hearts and imagination. And once you start seeing it, you can't unsee it. Because He-Man is just one example. You'll find it in our movies, in our games, and modern heroes that we cheer for. So if He-Man wasn't intentionally Viking, why does it feel like it? Because once you stop asking where it came from and start asking what it resembles, the parallels begin to reveal themselves. We've walked through where He-Man came from, so let's now step into what he resembles. Because this is where things stop being coincidence and start feeling like we've heard this before. Eternia is He-Man's world. But it's not just a setting, it's not just terrain. It's not just where the story happens, it's actually the center of power. It's a place where the ancient forces converge. It's where the noble order rules with peace and power. But evil chaos wants to see it all burned to the ground. Not only that, but the fate of more than one world hangs in the balance. Sounds a lot like Asgard, where noble characters look out for the good of all the realms. Eternity is a place where a righteous king and queen sit on the throne where their son and daughter are tasked with the responsibility to save Eternia and everyone in it from perpetual evil. Eternia doesn't feel like a planet, it actually feels like a realm. He-Man isn't just strong, he's strength embodied. Other than the barbarian outfit that he wears, he feels like he could very well be a resident of Asgard himself, maybe even related to Thor or Baldur. And with He-Man, there's no training montage, there's no karate kid waxing on and waxing off for hours or painting the fence. His power is tied to a special weapon and unlocked through transformation. He has the elements of Thor. Molnir, the hammer, the sword of power, or the power sword, or sometimes called the sword of Grayscal. Lightning accompanied by transformation, worthiness to wield the weapon which is tied to the hero's identity. There's even a hint of Baldur in there. A clean, radiant presence, a high moral character, a figure others rally around. Where do those connections come from? There are only a few options. They're either reading Norse mythology, reading issue eighty-three of Marvel's Journey into Mystery, or because they're stories that are buried deep into the creator's subconscious. And I think as we look through this, we realize that storytelling, Norse storytelling, stories from the Viking Age have sunk deep into people's subconscious more than they even realize. Well, how about the evil villain? This one's interesting. Dead guy. He's obsessed with power, drawn to ancient places and secrets, fixated on destroying what is good, the royal family, he man, and ruling forever over Grayskull. That is the energy of a droger all day long. Living dead, greedy for power, not kind to humans or anything that stands in their way. It's as if evil has a way of showing up in multiple stories, in multiple cultures in the same way, alive, but representing death itself, fixated on power and destroying what is good and the peace that others have. The other villains, they're no less interesting because when you look into them, they pair perfectly with the Viking Age and what they deemed as dangerous characteristics. Beast man, he has the instinct without restraint. He was wild and uncontrolled, full of rage and anger. Look, the Viking Age warriors, they feared becoming this. They feared losing control. They fear what happens after the war is over and losing control. Evil Lynn is all about wisdom twisted into manipulation, cunning, crafty, sneaky, attempting to control and gain power. A backstabber, someone who wants to turn your own people against you, and then there's trapjaw, hungry for power, power that corrupted him and made him no longer recognizable as a human. In Viking storytelling, these wouldn't be just enemies, they would be warnings. And you can see the connections and the parallels there. That even in the evil villains, there's a moral lesson to be had, just like we see encoded in the Viking sagas. Well, if that's true, then the heroes, they must possess virtues worth leaning into strength and discipline, wisdom and purpose, power and restraint. The Viking Age was full of virtues and principles that the people of the North sought to live by. Even the Havamal touches on core virtues wisdom, self-control, moderation, courage, hospitality, loyalty, honor, prudence. That's planning ahead, resilience, the ability to endure hardship when life is difficult. And if you look closely, you'll see these virtues in He-Man or his companions. But there are a few specific heroes that are worth mentioning. Tila. She has Valkyrie energy all day. Tila isn't just a female warrior. She carries authority, she leads. She is quietly a secondary protagonist, which is consistent with how the Viking Age viewed Valkyries, the warriors that go into battle, they have their own stories to forge and to be heroes of. But under that, the Valkyrie, the weavers of fate, they choose who lives and who dies. Neither are passive, neither are for decoration. Tila and the Valkyrie have a part to play in every battle. Tila isn't the only female hero from Eternia. Shera is not a supporting character either. She has parallel power. You could link her to Freya, or you could see her as a representation of a famous warrior age shield maiden like Lagertha or Freis Erichstother or Brinhilder. Women who didn't just exist in the story, they shaped it and they became worthy of their own sagas, just like Shera. Not everyone realizes Eternity is not a standalone realm. There are other dimensions, hidden realms, layered existence in He-Man's universe. Hence the title Master of the Universe. Norris cosmology has nine realms. Not all nine realms are given equal attention. And other than knowing that there are nine, many people can't even list them all from memory. But there is one central realm that gets the main focus, Midgard. And Asgard looks over it. Midgard is where the humans dwell. And eventually, for whatever reason, the writers, especially in the movies, they connect Eternia and Midgard, or Earth. We can make more connections. You know, Castle Gray Skull was seen as a sacred place, a sacred threshold. It's where uh there was power stored, that's where the transformation happened, this is where access was restricted. Not just anybody could go there. So similar concepts exist in the north as well. They had sacred places, places that mattered, burial mounds, sacred runestones, Mimir's well of wisdom. Not everybody was invited to these places. They had strict rules because they had power stored within them. Even the ongoing battle between He-Man and Skeletor, it's not a departure of Viking storytelling. Their battles continue as well. They continue all the way up to Ragnarok, of course. No, He-Man doesn't have an apocalyptic ending. But basically both recognize that evil exists and battles will continue. And if good is defeated, then evil wins. And so the stakes are always high for Eternia, for the Viking world, and for us today. Evil enemies, they've had multiple iterations, and there's always an opportunity to stand against evil and to overcome. In that, all universes are connected. So what are we really seeing when we're looking at He-Man? We're not seeing copies, but we're also not seeing coincidence. We are seeing patterns, echoes, structures that feel familiar because they've been told again and again. So let's go deeper for a moment. If it all feels connected, He-Man, the Vikings, the thread of storytelling that all seems to weave together perfectly, the hero that rises, overcomes, falls, and then rises again. There may very well be a reason for that. Not because one copied the other, not because they were all reaching towards the same thing, but because they're all communicating from one singular storytelling route that connects them all. Tolkien is a great place to start because he loves the North and he loves Norse mythology. He didn't shy away from it, even if he had different core beliefs. He leaned in and he wrote. But here's the truth about Tolkien. He didn't believe the myths were random inventions. He believed they were reflections, echoes of something more true, older, deeper than any single culture. To him, stories weren't created out of nothing. They were discovered, rediscovered, or had simply already been written in our hearts. Every story he would say has fragments of a greater reality, told in different languages across different lands through different people at times. So according to Tolkien, what is it that we're seeing? And why do these stories feel so connected? It's not because the creators of He-Man were borrowing from Norse mythology, but because they're not separate at all. What if all stories point back to one true story? Look at the pattern. The hero rises, faces darkness, is tested, broken, reshaped, and returns, changed. Different names, different worlds, same structure, same heartbeat. The Vikings, they didn't invent the pattern, but they made it awesome. They carried the tradition forward. They told it in their way, through sagas, through the gods, through warriors and fate. The Vikings didn't invent the story, they preserved it. And we seek to preserve theirs. Which means when you watch He-Man or any hero rise against the darkness, you're not just watching entertainment, you're watching an echo of something older than Eternia, older than the Viking Age, something that has been told and retold because it's true. That's why we can't stop and will never stop telling that story. Let's travel back to that living room where the screen is glowing. The antenna is adjusted perfectly. A small boy with his hand gripping a plastic sword like it mattered more than anything else in the world. That kid that didn't have the words to articulate what was happening. Good, evil, virtue, and victory. He didn't understand the history behind it, but he could feel it. That moment with the sword raised, it was more than imagination, it was a deep recognition. Something older than a cartoon, older than a toy, older even than the Vikings who carried it forward. A story about becoming something more, that there is a destiny, that we all have an ability. And for some, maybe that ability is just buried deep inside. Maybe it's stuck under self-doubt and lies that we've been told or we tell ourselves. It's a story about tapping into the source of power that exists outside of yourself and leads to a person becoming more alive than they ever could without it. And then once the power is part of you, you use that power to stand against the darkness, to do good, to use strength, not just to win, but to protect others, to lift others up. The Viking Age is part of pop culture. And we'll talk more about the connections and the parallels and the influences and why over a thousand years later, the Western world is so enamored with the Viking Age. But in the meantime, but in the meantime, what I'd like from you is to continue the conversation, to discuss He-Man, the parallels to the Viking Age, the newest movie. Share if you've seen it. The comment section is a great place to unpack all of these things. If you've seen the movie, please tell us what you thought. Thank you for listening to the show. It's such a privilege to be able to do this for you. If you enjoy the show, then I'd appreciate your support. Hit the like button, share an episode, and comment. All of that helps boost engagement and helps us out in the algorithm. There's no cost involved for any of those things. Just a few seconds of your time, and it'll go a long way towards helping this show reach more fans of the Viking Age. So until next time, be bold, be strong, and awaken the Viking in you.