Hundreds of actors have portrayed characters in the Star Trek Universe, and it is common to see them in other roles. Sometimes you’ll find that a show features several actors from Star Trek, often purely by coincidence.

The 1987 film Masters of the Universe has no less than five actors who we would eventually see on Star Trek. I say ‘eventually’ because MotU came out the same year as TNG’s debut. Although that main character is He-Man, this movie is almost unrecognizable for young fans of the cartoon series. I get a kick out of watching it these days, knowing I’ll see these people walking around the Enterprise or Deep Space Nine someday.

Robert Towers

One of Skeletor’s mercenaries, Karg was played by Robert Towers and is one of the characters we got instead of someone we heard of – like Triclops or Lock-Jaw. Mr. Towers was pretty busy at the time, because he was also the Ferengi Rata from the TNG episode The Battle. That’s the one where we first hear about the Stargazer incident from Daimon Bok. You may recognize Robert Towers from The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – has was the 1930’s Benjamin.

Meg Foster

Skeletor’s right-hand woman is Meg Foster’s Evil-Lyn. This character is actually from the cartoon, and those are actually Meg Foster’s natural eyes. Ms. Foster would later play Onaya on the DS9 episode The Muse. This is not her first time appearing in a KellyPlanet article. She was born in Reading Pennsylvania and has been in Rob Zombie’s  Lords of Salem and 31. One more Meg Foster note: she was once married to Stephen McHattie, who appeared as an alien prison camp foreman on Star Trek: Enterprise.

Anthony De Longis

Seems like most of the antagonists from Masters of the Universe would end up on Star Trek. Anthony De Longis portrayed the character Blade, who is kind of like a space pirate version of The Shredder from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. This guy has a resume a mile long because he is also a master swordsman, weapons expert, director and producer. De Longis would play the Kazon First Maje Culluh on five episodes of Voyager.

Robert Duncan McNeill

Who would have thought that the kid from the He-Man movie would be a main cast member for seven years of Star Trek? Robert Duncan McNeill was the (human) male protagonist and Courtney Cox’s love interest in MotU. He would grow up to be Lieutenant Tom Paris and the pilot of the starship Voyager. Those of you who are paying attention are probably screaming that the picture is not of Tom Paris, but of cadet Nick Locarno from TNG. Very good. Both characters were of course played by McNeill and they started off as pretty much the same person with different names.

Frank Langella

Oh yeah! The main antagonist and the best character from He-Man canon, Skeletor was brought to you by none other than Frank Langella. See, pretty much all the baddies from MotU would eventually be on Star Trek. Langella played Bajoran Minister Jaro for three episodes of Deep Space Nine.

If you like Skeletor, Star Trek had TWO of them. That’s right, besides Frank Langella’s live-action portrayal, Alan Oppenheimer was the voice of Skeletor on the original animated series. Oppenheimer played everything from a Klingon to a Galaxy-class Captain.

Sure, Masters of the Universe may be a rough watch, especially today. There’s no Orko, Teela and Duncan are kind of just regular people, none of your favorite bad guys are there – but there are some up-sides. Frank Langella is an awesome Skeletor, Meg Foster is absolutely gorgeous, and there’s a whole bunch of actors that you will find on Star Trek!