Oh, happy day! I’m finally caught up on my Masters Classics figures! Sure, I’m opening last month’s figure today, but I’m doing it before this month’s figures have shipped out and I call that progress! Today’s offering is actually the first release for the 2015 Club Eternia Sub and it is Lizard Man. I have very little memory of the episodes this guy appeared in, but back in 2011 that once great site Topless Robot (I miss ya Rob) gave him 1-20 Odds that he’d ever get an action figure. It was a good call and the author’s reasoning was certainly sound. Lizard Man just didn’t conform to the standard Matty Buck and his release would be contrary to the entire MOTUC money-saving business model. And afterall, it did take almost four years to happen, who even could have guessed the Matty Collector Train would still be chugging along for such a long while?

The only thing I have to say about the packaging is DAMN YOU MEKANECK FOR BEING THE ONLY FIGURE ON THE BACK THAT I DON’T HAVE!!! There’s also an intriguing sticker on the top corner of the cardback that tries to teach me how to get the best performance out of my glow-in-the-dark accessory. GITD? I had no idea! Anyway, Lizard Man’s tagline is “Heroic Cold Blooded Ally” and the bio laments the fact that being a good lizard causes him to deal with discrimination, because most of the lizard people on Eternia are assholes. Maybe it would help if people didn’t call him “Lizard Man” because that right there is some racist shit. That’s it. I got nothing else… let’s pop this guy out and take a look at him.

Holy crap, I love this guy! Everything about him really shouts the Filmation aesthetic. Yeah, he’s just a lizard guy in a blue two-piece, but for a C-level character, T4H did a beautiful job on him. His lean stature makes him stand out in a sea of MOTUC bucks and I do believe most everything on this figure is brand new. Liz is mostly cast in a pleasing, deep green plastic and his belt and clothes are all sculpted right onto his body. There’s no real flexibility to the tail, but it is positioned to help the figure stand more easily, although he’s well balanced enough that he doesn’t need to rely on it. And check out the awesome webbing between his fingers! It’s done with a really thin plastic that’s semi-transparent and looks amazing.

The head sculpt is chock full of personality. Lizard Man is sort of wearing a smile, although its hard to tell whether he’s happy or just being a lizard. The eyes are painted yellow with black slits for pupils and he has a blue hood sculpted on his head. It’s definitely Filmation through and through, maybe with a little bit of Don Bluth mixed in and that ain’t a bad thing at all. I think if I had one gripe about the figure as a whole it’s that he seems a little too tall. What little memory I have of him makes me think he should be significantly shorter than He-Man, but maybe that’s because he’s often seen hunched over.

Despite the new buck, the articulation here remains pretty close to what we usually see in the line. Lizard Man’s arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders, hinges in the elbows, and swivels at the biceps and wrists. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have rotating hinges at the knees, hinges in the ankles and swivels at the hips. The neck is ball jointed and the figure can swivel at the waist, but there is no ab-crunch hinge. So we lose an ab-crunch but gain a little extra movement in the knees. What’s really fun about Lizard Man’s articulation is not so much found in the individual points, but rather that the lean body allows for a wider range of motion than the bulky, beefed-out MOTUC bucks. He’s certainly fun to play with!

You get two accessories with Lizard Man, both of which are just random Filmation pieces bundled with the figure. Matty promised they were going to be doing this whenever possible and they have indeed delivered some neat stuff. The Diamond Ray of Disappearance comes from the very first episode of the series that bears the same name. It’s a permanently opened box with a GITD diamond inside that exiles your figures to another dimension. Actually, you may need to use your imagination for that to work. The bottom of the box has intended room for Skeletor’s fingers to help him hold it, which was a good idea in theory but has mixed results.

The other piece is the Filmation version of Skeletor’s sword with the crossed bone hilt. It’s a nicely sculpted piece, but the fact that it’s left unpainted in bare gray plastic really makes it uninteresting to me. Why not cast the thing in purple? I think it would have looked better. As it is it just looks like an unfinished, prototype accessory. Still, I give Matty props for continuing to get us the Filmation accessories and so far the good have far outweighed the flubs. If I had some customizing skills, I’d probably try to paint it, but that’s never going to happen.

As a character, I don’t know how many people were clamoring for a Lizard Man figure, but keep in mind, I collect MOTUC for the figures themselves and not so much the fiction or the characters. Yes, I started collecting the line largely based off of nostalgia for characters like He-Man and Skeletor, but the majority of the figures I get could have no fiction at all behind them and I’d still love them. Taking that into consideration, I couldn’t be happier with how Mattel has kicked off the final year for Club Eternia because Lizard Man is just a great figure. 2015 is going to be interesting as they’ll be bringing in a lot of lesser known names to the table, but again seeing as how the characters are secondary to me, I think I’m going to find a lot to love this year, possibly more so than most.

I’m continuing to make my way through the large stack of MOTUC figures that sits in the corner waiting to be opened. I’ve gone through three New Adventures themed figures in the last couple weeks, but now I’m pulling it back to something more conventional. And nothing says conventional like an evil purple rabbit. I seem to remember a lot of complaining on the He-Man boards when this guy was revealed and I can’t for the life of me understand why. First of all, he was a prominent Filmation villain, at least in one episode, and secondly if the idea of an evil purple rabbit-man is too bizarre for you, then why are you even bothering with this action figure line? It frightens me to think that there are people out there saying, “Woah! I’ll take a crab man and a guy with a robot elephant head, but rabbit people is where I draw the line. That’s just stupid!”

Here he is in all his packaged glory. Please note the greatest tag line for any Masters figure, ever… “Evil Rabbit Seeking Riches.” It sounds like a personal listing on Craig’s List. I love it! The bio on the back recounts “The Quest for He-Man” an episode that I can actually remember quite well probably because it was batshit crazy even by Masters standards. It was also a thinly veiled PSA about how evil corporations are trying to destroy the environment in search of the almighty dollar. I’d like to know what the gang at Filmation was smoking that made them decide that the personification of corporate greed is a purple bunny rabbit. And those of you still complaining that we got this figure should just thank the Gods of Eternia that Matty didn’t give us a Gleedal figure, which was basically a woman with a smoking hot body and a bird’s head. As an adolescent boy a the time, I don’t mind admitting that chick confused the hell out of me and certain parts of my anatomy. I think I should open the figure now.

On a lot of levels, Plundor is a very simple figure. You get a hairy sculpted buck with boots and gloves. He isn’t wearing the traditional hairy barbarian diaper either. Instead you just get a smooth set of undies with a belt. The bulk of his outfit is the single piece that rests on his shoulders and protrudes down to his belt, and yes if you pop off his head it is removable. Of course, the fact that this lavendar man-rabbit is just wearing a little leather and shows off so much of his ‘roided out physique makes him all the more unsettling in my eyes, but if you want to go for the bare chested look, have at it.

Of course, most of Plundor’s personality rests in that delightful head sculpt, which I think is up there with some of the MOTUC series’ best work. It straddles a creepy line between cartoon lunacy and pure evil. The yellow soul-piercing eyes, buried under that furry, disapproving brow is pure poetry. I also love the evil smile punctuated by those two glimmering white buck teeth. The hair on his head is a little tostled and I love the way his one ear is bent down. In terms of scary looking rabbits, he’s not quite up there with the Hat Trick Rabbit from the Twilight Zone movie, but he’s certainly memorable. This is most definitely the visage of a rabbit who is going to rape your planet’s ecosystem just to make a few bucks so he can buy the finest things in life. Or probably rabbit-hookers.

Articulation here is standard for the MOTUC line. The arms have rotating hinges at the shoulders, hinges in the elbows, and swivels at the biceps and wrists. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have hinges at the knees and ankles, and there are swivels near the hips and again at the boots. Plundor features a swivel at the waist, ab crunch hinge in the torso, and a ball jointed neck.

Plundor comes with a couple of cool weapons. First off we get this double-bladed battle axe thing with a crystal ball on the top. I don’t remember this thing from the episode, and a little research tells me it’s actually intended to be one of Skeletor’s weapons, which makes sense. I like it, as the crystal ball can be used for gazing or shooting magic beams while the axe is still plenty functional. It’s kind of a fantasty multi-tool. Not only is it a decent sculpt, but I appreciate the metallic paint on the edges, especially when a lot of the more recent weapons in this line could have used more paint hits.

For me, the real star of the accessories is Plundor’s awesome little laser-sub-machine-gun. This thing has a great retro sci-fi flavor and I really dig that it can be held in both hands. It’s exactly the kind of weapon I would imagine a purple man-rabbit-gangsta would be toting around. The sculpt features decent detail for what is supposed to be an animated style Filmation weapon and we actually get some silver paint hits, which once again are greatly appreciated. I may put a strap on it so that he can sling it across his back.

And so you can love him or hate him, but eitehr way I count myself among the members of Team Plundor. This release gives us one of the more memorable one-off villains from the show for the first time in figure form and I think T4H did a marvelous job with him. The sculpting and coloring here is top notch and while he’s relatively simple, I think he’s undeniably fun and looks fantastic among the other freaks and weirdos on my beloved MOTUC shelves. I’m particularly glad that Matty included him in the Cyber Monday Sale, because otherwise I would have most definitely wound up paying a lot more for him from the secondary market.

Myaaah! Give me that you buck-toothed jack-a-nape! It’s mine!!!!

Silly rabbit! Axes are for Skeletor! 

Overall, the Filmation Sub seems to have been quite positively received by collectors. That is until we got to Nepthu. At that point it was like Matty personally took a dump in every subscriber’s breakfast cereal. Everybody poured on the hate and I didn’t get it, because the figure looked plenty cool to me. I thought an Egyptian themed wizard would look great on my shelf of Eternian weirdos and thus he was yet another figure in this sub that I was excited to see land on my doorstep.

There’s the packaging and I have very little new to say about it. It’s as awesome as ever. There’s no sticker or anything to distinguish this as part of the Filmation Sub, so if you’re a MOC collector, it’ll fit right in with the rest of your packages. The insert in the bubble dubs Nepthu as the “Wicked Sun Sorcerer” although in the cartoon he’s referred to as a wizard. Please submit your dissertations outlining the differences between sorcerers and wizards. The winner will receive a genuine Tribble action figure made out of FigureFeline’s shedded cat hair. *Void where prohibited. Offer not valid on Earth.  If you flip the package over you can see that the cruel bastards at Matty put Ram Man as one of the other figures you can collect, knowing full well that if you don’t have him in your collection already, buying him second hand will be like getting financially raped.

Ok, so up until this point I’ve had at least a vague recollection of all the Filmation Sub characters. Batros, Shokoti, Icer… I may not have remembered much about their episodes, but I did remember the characters. I can’t say that about Nepthu. Maybe that’s why I don’t have the same knee-jerk dislike for the figure as many have Masters fans have been spewing all over the forums where I lurk. A little research told me that he appeared in a little 25 minute ditty of animated torture called “Temple of the Sun” to which I am about to subject myself. I’m off to Hulu, be back in about a half an hour. In the meantime, here’s a look at the figure…

Ok, so the gist of it is that a shaggy, starving and dehydrated homeless guy crawls through the desert looking for the titular “Temple of the Sun.” He finds it, rummages through a bunch of relics and discovers his prize… a magical scarab that can grant him wishes. Instead of asking for a sandwich and a cold Fresca, he asks to be strong and that turns him into the mighty Nepthu, a young, chiseled asshole who wants to rule the Universe. Cut back to The Palace where we get a nice ass shot of Teela doing gymnastics while Duncan and Prince Adam watch. Even Cringer looked like he wanted to have a piece of that. It must be awkward for Adam and Cringer to be checking out Teela’s fine hinder while her adopted father is right next to them, but who knows? Maybe he’s sneaking a peek too. It’s not like he’s her real father. Aaaaaanyway, back in the desert, Nepthu shoots down the Sorceress and He-Man responds to save her. One of my favorite parts is when a giant Scorpion the size of a Winnebago attacks and Duncan says, “Watch out for the tail, it’s poisonous!” WTF, Duncan? Look at the size of that thing. If it stabs you with that tail, you’re going to f’cking die, poison or no. Ok, I’ve gone on about the episode long enough. The character’s backstory has been established. Let’s look at the figure.

Nepthu is an extremely simple figure, but that’s not meant as a slight on him at all. The Egyptian theme is very well executed. The buck is sculpted in regular flesh tone and he has a simple Egyptian skirt and sash-like belt. His boots, bracers, and bicep straps are blue and he has a matching blue collar. Like I said, there’s nothing at all flashy or elaborate about this guy, but that’s what makes him so cool to me. In a world like Eternia, populated by freaks, this guy looks positively normal. Plus, the coloring on this figure is quite nice.

I will concede that the portrait is where fans are correct in claiming that Matty dropped the ball here. In the episode, Nepthu is an evil bastard and he looked the part. Here, Nepthu looks like a nice guy. He’s the kind of guy who you’d happily ask to help you move a sofa or possibly lend you a few dollars for a Starbucks when you come up short. If you saw this figure without reading the bio or having seen the episode, i can guarantee you would assume he was some dude that helped He-Man fight evil. He has a kind and noble face that in no way fits the character from the cartoon. That doesn’t bother me so much, because I don’t give two shits about the character. I just like the idea of having someone from The Sands of Time on my MOTUC shelf. As far as I’m concerned, he can fight alongside He-Man with his Scarab of Justice. Why not, eh?

Articulation? I’m not going to do articulation. I’ve already run rather long and my rock glass of Jameson has run dry. Most of it was sucked down while having to watch the episode. Suffice it to say Nepthu sports the same articulation as the thirty or so other MOTUC figures I’ve featured here on FFZ in the past. If only there was an Index of Reviews on FFZ where you could look up some of those past MOTUC reviews and bone up on the line’s articulation. That’s called a shameless plug.

Nepthu comes with two accessories. First you get the scarab-ankh thingie that started the whole mess. It’s a cool piece and Nepthu’s left hand is sculpted so he can wield it like he did in the cartoon. It’s similar to the way The Faceless One had a hand tailored to hold his Ram Stone. He also comes with a crystal Zoar, because he turned The Sorceress into crystal when she tried to escape. The Zoar is a little disappointing, because I expected it to be a clear version of the articulated Zoar figure that we got a while back. Instead, it’s just a static piece of plastic. It still looks cool, but without a perch, there’s not a lot you can do with it except lay it on the floor and caution the other figures to try to step around it.

So, part of me understands why this figure was ill-received by fans of the show. Another part of me says, “Screw you, he’s an awesome figure!” Thus far, the Filmation Sub has done me no wrong. I’ve loved every figure in it, and I’m hoping that we’re going to get another Filmation Sub next year. When you wade through all the politics and bullshit of Matty and Digital River, the truth is that everytime I get a new MOTUC figure, I’m reminded of why I still love this line so much. Even as someone who is only marginally involved in the fiction, I’m thrilled to keep growing my collection, and I haven’t even started gushing about my Horde Troopers and Mantenna… stay tuned!