Before Friends, Courteney Cox Starred In A Goofy Fantasy Flop

These days, Courteney Cox is a globally-known actor with several leading roles in sitcoms under her belt and an established place in the "Scream" universe as reporter Gale Weathers, but in the mid 1980s, she was just an unknown who had danced onstage with Bruce Springsteen in his music video for "Dancing in the Dark." Other than a few appearances in shows like "Murder, She Wrote" and "The Love Boat," she didn't have many credits to her name, but in 1987 she got a fairly major role in a movie that had the potential to be a huge blockbuster: "Masters of the Universe." 

"Masters of the Universe" was a wildly popular franchise that originally started as a line of toys, and in 1987, there was a cartoon series and animated movies about the adventures of Prince Adam, known better as He-Man, so a live-action "Masters of the Universe" movie seemed like a sure thing. Starring Dolph Lundgren as the muscular He-Man and Frank Langella as his sworn enemy Skeletor, "Masters of the Universe" was unfortunately not the hit Mattel and Cannon Films had hoped for. 

In the film, directed by Gary Goddard, the evil Skeletor takes over Castle Grayskull and captures the Sorceress of Grayskull, hoping to use her immense powers for his own. He-Man and his friends rescue a master smith named Gwildor (Billy Barty), who fashions a magical key that can open a portal to anywhere in the universe using musical tones. They lose the key, however, and a teenager named Julie (Cox) and her boyfriend Kevin (Robert Duncan McNeill) find it, which drags them into the whole interstellar adventure. Julie has a lot going on, as she's just lost both of her parents in a plane crash, and now she has a magical key and Skeletor's henchmen after her, too. 

Long before she was one of the most successful sitcom actors of all time, known globally as Monica Gellar on "Friends," Cox played poor Julie Winston in the truly dire "Masters of the Universe" adaptation. There have been numerous adaptations since, including more cartoon shows and an upcoming live-action movie starring Nicholas Galitzine as He-Man, and they're pretty much all better than this goofy riff with some truly questionable choices and cheesy acting. (Seriously, the only thing this movie's got going for it is Langella as Skeletor, because he's giving it his all for some reason and it rules.) This is one for "Masters of the Universe" and Cox completionists only, honestly, unless you just really love cheeseball '80s fantasy flicks.