Tag Archives: mattel

Feb 27 2023

Masters of the Universe (Masterverse) ’87 Movie Skeletor by Mattel

Last week I checked out He-Man based on the 1987 film from the Masterverse series, so it’s only fitting I swing back around and have a look at his nemesis Skeletor. Mattel did a few figures from the movie as part of their Classics line, but sadly the line came to a close before they could get to those versions of He-Man and Skeletor. Super7 stepped in to release them, but now Mattel has finally served up these versions as regular retail release action figures. Skeletor had two distinct looks in the movie, regular and golden God all hopped up on power. This is the former version. Super7 did both, and I sure am hoping that Mattel will too. But that’s getting ahead of myself. Let’s have a look at the packaging…

Skeletor is a Deluxe release, which means he comes in a bigger than normal window box with some extras. The Masterverse packaging does a great job of showing off the figure and all the goodies, but the art styling doesn’t strike me as being very evocative of the MOTU brand. It’s not ugly or anything, but I found it surprising that they didn’t at least go with green stonework for the backdrop. But that’s fine. It used to make me shed a tear every time I ripped into those beautiful MOTU Classics packages. And while these are collector friendly, I don’t feel bad about tossing them after I open them.

As much as I loved He-Man’s redesign for this film, I think I dig Skeletor’s even more! It’s an even bigger departure from the classic design, but it looked great on the big screen and it looks pretty damn good as an action figure too. There’s a lot of layering here, with the partial skirt being cast in plastic, as well as the two strips of plates that run from his shoulders to his ankles. You get some beautifully sculpted armor on his chest and shoulders, which I can only describe as having an organic techno-skeleton vibe to them. The metallic purple paint used for these pieces is really snappy too! The lower skirt also has a series of square plates sculpted onto it, resembling brigandine style armor. Skeletor has some really cool bracers, and I dig the silver paint on the backs of his gauntlets that reminds me of a circuit pattern. It’s a bit more pronounced here than on the actual costume, but that’s fine. The cape is light cloth with a triangular plastic piece jutting down, probably intended to be leather, and punctuated with a single bronze painted medallion. The layering and textures of the costume combined with the ornate sculpting makes for an awesome looking figure.

In terms of portrait, Skeletor fares a lot better than He-Man did. You only get the one head sculpt, but I guess Mattel’s thinking was if you get it right the first time, you don’t have to offer a second option. And wow did they get this right! The definition of the skull features mixed with what looks like lumps of malformed flesh makes for a sinister look and a downright superb bit of sculpting. The waxy gray coloring of the skin works too, although I sometimes wonder if a greenish tint would have been the way to go. The hood is sculpted in plastic as part of the head, which looks great, but does curtail his head articulation quite a bit. The rest of the articulation points seem to be identical to He-Man, but you do get a little more restriction in the hips because of the plastic skirt. It’s also worth noting that the shoulder pieces are designed to pop off if you exceed the range of movement up there.

What would Skeletor be without his Havoc Staff? And this iconic accessory got a pretty cool redesign for the film as well. The ram skull motif is a lot more elaborate here with a design resembling a burst of powerful rays behind the skull, and a horn on top. This is a beautiful piece and pretty damned intimidating. In addition to his right fist and left flat hand, Skeletor comes with a pair of accessory holding hands to work with the Havoc Staff and sword.

The sword is quite impressive! There are hints to the design that make it a little similar to He-Man’s, but I can’t remember whether there was supposed to be any connection between the two swords in the movie. At least I don’t remember there being any. The hilt is beautifully sculpted, and the blade is broad and straight. Alas, it is left as unpainted gray plastic, and I wish Mattel had given us some silver paint on the blade. Unlike He-Man, there is nowhere for Skeletor to wear the sword, which is a bummer, but probably more a fault of the movie costume design than the figure.

And finally, you get the Cosmic Key! Mattel gave us this accessory with the Classics version of Gwildor. This time around, the key is in its dormant state with the tuning forks closed. The device is painted in brown, silver, and purple and it looks OK, but I feel like the detail could have been a bit sharper. There’s a plastic loop on the side, so the Key can be held by passing Skeletor’s flat hand through it.

I think both of these figures turned out excellent, but I have to give the nod to Skeletor for not having to make any apologies for the head sculpt. It’s a shame we never got these versions in the vintage line. I would have loved to see at least a couple waves of toys come out branded specifically for the movie, as opposed to stuffing Gwildor and Blade in the regular line. Then again by 1987, I was 15 and almost completely drifted away from toys to pursue other interests. But it’s nice to have these two on my shelf now, and I’m hoping that at minimum we get the golden armor Skeletor, but even better, I’d love to see Mattel use Masterverse to get us a bunch of movie figures. When I get back to Masterverse again, we’ll start checking out some of the Princess of Power figures!

Feb 13 2023

Masters of the Universe (Masterverse): ’87 Movie He-Man by Mattel

When Masterverse was revealed it seemed to be focused on the Netflix series and I wasn’t interested. But then it grew to be a giant melting pot, including all the classic characters. Still, I managed to resist because I already have those figures as part of the MOTU Classics line, and I’m also re-collecting them in Origins. But when they started doing Princess of Power, I began collecting those, and now I’ve added two more with the ’87 movie versions of He-Man and Skeletor. While I haven’t gotten around to reviewing any of those PoP figures, I decided to push these two to the head of the line. So let’s check out He-Man!

I’ll go on record by saying that I’m pretty fascinated by the 87 MOTU movie. I was 15 when it was released, so I didn’t have too strong an attachment to it back then, but I re-watch it from time to time. It’s a bizarre movie with some great highs and lows, an interesting behind the scenes history, and about 90% of it feels like its a struggle between ambition and reality, with reality winning the day. We got a few movie characters in Mattel’s Classics line, and Super7 did some as well, but this is the first time we’re seeing this version of He-Man as a mass release in the toy aisles, and that’s pretty cool. Movie He-Man is a Deluxe release, which means he comes in a wider window box and has some extra goodies. The package design is surprising to me, as it doesn’t go for the obvious green stone Grayskull motif. What we get is certainly fresh and new, but just doesn’t feel all that iconic. The figure comes on a clear plastic tray against an illustrated gray stone backdrop, and everything is collector friendly.

Here his is out of the box and ready to take on whatever 20th Century Earth and Cannon’s limited budget has to offer. And I do really like a lot about what Mattel did with this figure. This reimagining of He-Man is definitely one of the high points of the film for me, and this figure conveys that look very well. I particularly love how layered the figure is, with most of the costume being sculpted as separate pieces and attached to the body. Only the undies, leg and bicep straps, and boots are part of the body itself. This gives the figure a lot of wonderful depth. There’s some excellent detail sculpted into the armor grieves, shoulders, and that left wrist bracer. All of these pieces are cast in a rich bronze with some wash to bring out the detail. You get similar fixtures as part of the belt buckle and the medallion on his chest. The sculpted muscles are well-defined, although they look a bit awkwardly pinched at the elbows, which was clearly done to improve articulation, so I’ll take it. He-Man’s cape is made of a very light red cloth, connects at the shoulders, and has a gold ornate pattern across the bottom edge.

Behind the cape is a scabbard for his sword, and this is an interesting design. The scabbard itself only houses the last quarter or so of the sword’s blade, with the top portion being secured through a loop up near the top of his back. It works well, and since it’s covered by the cape, it sort of creates the illusion of being a full scabbard. He-Man also has a pistol holster on his left hip, and two dagger sheathes attached to his right leg, so he can comfortably carry all four of his weapons. Although, I think I have the daggers switched in my photos. They will each fit in either sheath, but I think the more ornate one is supposed to go up high.

OK, so let’s talk about these heads. You get two, and I think this one is supposed to be an approximation of Dolph Lundgren and I’m going to guess that Mattel didn’t have his likeness rights, because I refuse to believe this is the best they could do. Now, accepting that this is not Lundgren, I don’t dislike this head, as it looks like it could have been based on concept art for the film. It kind of looks like they wrote an algorithm to see how much Lundgren they could infuse into the portrait without getting smacked down by lawyers. The hair sculpt is similar to what we saw in the movie, and if I’m being honest, the portrait just works fine for me. I think it looks good on the figure, although I’m willing to bet most collectors will be disappointed at not getting the real thing.

The other option is more of a classic He-Man noggin, and I like this one too. The face is very traditional, as is the poufy coif of hair. In the end, I’ll likely display the figure with the first head, just because the hair sells it as the movie figure, even if the face doesn’t. But I’ll still alternate heads a bit for the pictures in this review.

The articulation here is pretty good, although I have a few little gripes. The upper body is all great, with a pretty good ball joint under the chest and a ball joint in the neck. I especially like what we got with the arms. There are rotating hinges in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps, double-hinges in the elbows, and hinged pegs in the wrists to swap out between the two sets of hands. You get one set of accessory holding hands, one left fist, and one right flat hand. I really wish we had gotten a full set of fists and a set of relaxed hands, as just one of each feels kind of weird. The legs have decent ball joints in the hips, swivels in the thighs, double-hinged knees, and hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. The lower hinges on my figures knees are fused, so that’s a bummer. My guess is I can free them with some heat, but for now they’re useless.

I am very pleased that the arm articulation allows He-Man to double-hand his sword! And speaking of swords… let’s check out them weapons!

The two daggers are cool little pieces, and they look great paired up on his right leg, as either last resort weapons, or just to throw at Karg’s ugly face. One is very simple, with a utilitarian gold hilt, no guard, and a double edged blade. The other has a more ornamental hilt and guard, and looks like it could be some special artifact from the bowels of Grayskull. These fit well in either sheath or gripping hand.

Next is the laser pistol. I’m not sure if having He-Man carry a gun in the film was controversial or not, but I loved the idea. Eternia is all about that mix of swords, sorcery, and tech, and I’ve always adored fantasy-sci-fi like Flash Gordon where laser guns coexist with swords. The gun has a cool sci-fi design, but sadly He-Man does not come with a trigger-finger hand, and this gun has a really pronounced trigger guard, so he looks kind of weird holding it. I suppose we can chalk it up to Trigger Discipline, and maybe that’s part of a lost PSAs planned for the end of the movie.

And finally we have his trusty sword, and this is a beauty. It’s a huge departure from the design seen in the toyline and the cartoon, and it looks more like it’s patterned after Conan’s theatrical blade, but I love it. The grip is ribbed, and the guard and pommel are painted in an aged bronze to match He-Man’s armor pieces. The blade is left as bare plastic, and while I would have loved some silver paint here, it still looks fine.

I don’t have the Super7 figure to do a direct comparison, but having looked over some pictures, I think this one holds up remarkably well. Indeed, if you forget about the head for a moment, I’d say I like this one better than what I’ve seen of Super7’s. And to be fair, I don’t think Super7 did all that great a job with the Lundgren likeness. Either way, I am really happy with how this figure turned out. A better selection of hands would have really boosted him a lot higher in my eyes, but even as he is now, I think he’s a great figure and lots of fun to play around with. Next week, I’ll circle back and check out his nemesis… Skeletor!

Feb 6 2023

Masters of the Universe Origins: Mekaneck and The Ground Ripper by Mattel

In case you missed the first memo, and the second, and possibly the third… Marvel Mondays are no more. This will give me a better opportunity to spread the love around to all the other toylines that I collect. Today, I’m ripping into another Masters of the Universe Origins release with a new figure and vehicle bundle… Let’s check out Mekaneck and The Ground Ripper!

The packaging here holds no surprises. You get an elongated window box with an extended back flap. There’s some bitchin vintage-style art of Meka speeding along on the vehicle, and the window shows off all the goods. My only gripe here with the packaging is that the alternate head for the vehicle and Meka’s accessories are sealed to the cardboard tray in bubbles, so you do have to tear them open to get everything out. I’ll still likely keep the box, but it just isn’t quite as collector friendly as I would like. Let’s get to ripping, and we’ll start with the figure first!

Mattel did a great job recreating the vintage figure for this Origins update, as it is absolutely spot-on! You get a brilliant shade of blue plastic for the torso, arms, and legs with the sculpted bracers left unpainted, and the hands flesh colored. The belt is painted green, the furry diaper is black, and his boots are cast in an almost pearlescent silver. Just like the vintage figure, Meka’s chest piece is borrowed from Stinkor. Or is that the other way around? This time it’s cast in bright red plastic with some very nice silver painted trim on the front. Unfortunately, it’s a bit loosey-goosey and I don’t remember having that problem with Stinkor’s, but either way it’s no big deal. I really dig the coloring on this figure, as the red and blue just look spectacular together.

The head sculpt is a dead ringer for the original figure, with an almost pyramid-like helmet exposing only the lower half of his face. The giant triangular goggles are gray with mirror-finish lenses, which were a nice surprise. I’m not sure if that’s paint or actually a little vac-seal action, but it looks great and adds a little premium kick to the figure. I also like the way the extended piece on his chest armor synchs up with the cutout for his face. At the right angle it almost looks like its covering it.

As with the MOTU Classics version, Origins Mekaneck uses an additional neck piece to work the extending neck gimmick. You simply pop off the head, reattach it to the extended neck, and then attach that to the body. Origins has been sticking a little closer to the original play gimmicks than Classics ever did, so I guess I’m a tad disappointed it doesn’t have the neck extending gimmick from the vintage toy. Then again, it makes sense with the heavy reuse of parts in this line. At least, maybe since they repeated the Classics engineering here, they should have added a longer neck piece too. Still, it works fine and I’ll likely keep him displayed with the extended piece to show off his special talent.

You also get an orange club, styled very closely off the original figure’s accessory. Let’s move on to the Ground Ripper!

This is my first experience with this vehicle, since I never owned the vintage version, and we didn’t get one as part of Classics. It’s a simple one-manned vehicle designed to speed warriors into battle, and from what I can see this Origins version looks to be extremely close to the vintage toy design. The body is cast all in green plastic and features some very sharp and deep-sculpted detail, along with some well-placed stickers to spruce things up a bit more. The vehicle rolls along on two large back wheels and a smaller front wheel, giving it a bit of an Eternian dragster vibe. Sadly, it’s missing the ripcord gimmick that allowed you to pull out a serrated plastic strip and make it go. It doesn’t seem like it would have required a lot of engineering, and while I knew ahead of time there would be no ripcord, it still bums me out a bit.

You get two options for the vehicle’s head. The one that comes attached in the box is very similar to the original toy with stickers for the eyes and a slightly bent beak at the front. This piece also has a rather large instrument panel on the dashboard, also represented as a sticker.

The second option is a lot more bland and looks more like a robotic dragon. There are no eye stickers, and everything is very angular. The dashboard detail on this head is made up of two narrow sticker strips. I’m not sure where the inspiration from this head came from, but I guess it’s a good look if you find the first a bit too goofy. But, I prefer the first one to this by far. I suppose if I ever got a second Ground Ripper, I’d be up for displaying one with each head.

The Ground Ripper fits most of the regular style figures in the line and has a seatbelt to hold them in. I like the way the driver’s feet can touch the pedals, but with the belt on, their hands can’t reach the dashboard console. Still, the figures look pretty good in the seat and it’s fun to zip them around!

I love The Ground Ripper and I really dig Mekaneck, but I have to ask why bundle the two together? If they had to bundle a figure with this vehicle, I wish it had been a troop builder of some kind because I would have been more likely to buy a second. Maybe a Palace Guard or a variant comic-repainted figure would have been a better choice. It’s also worth mentioning that now mint-on-card collectors will never have an Origins Mekaneck to hang on their wall. Nope, that doesn’t effect me, but it still makes this seem like a misguided bundle. I picked this set up for $35, and if you break that down to twenty for the figure and fifteen for The Ripper, that seems like a pretty square deal. All I can say is keep the Origins vehicles coming, they are loads of fun!

Dec 2 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: 200x He-Man and Skeletor by Mattel

Happy Friday! And what better way to bring on the weekend then by opening some new toys! Mattel’s MOTU Origins line continues to pump out the content at a record pace, leaving me behind on reviewing these magnificent figures, but I’m doing the best I can to get caught up! Today I’m checking out two more variations of He-Man and Skeletor, this time based on designs from the 200x toyline.

The figures come on the same gloriously retro designed cardbacks that we’ve been seeing all along. You get the 40th Anniversary logo in foil up at the top left corner fo the card, and a rather spiffy MOTU logo sticker on the front of the bubbles. What you don’t get is any actual reference to the Mike Young Production cartoon or 200x series. And that’s fine. For any kiddies out there who are into this line without any context, these are just cool new versions of the two main characters to play with! I should note that I never collected the 200x toys, although I did run into them a lot back in the day when I was making my weekly trips to KayBee Toy Outlet, and I was often very tempted to pick some up. Ultimately, I reasoned that the line was too far along for me to start collecting from the beginning, and so I resisted the temptation. I did, however, get into the MYP cartoon BIG TIME, and I still consider it to be one of the absolute best cartoon reboots ever made. Needless to say, I was pretty excited to get these figures in the Origins style. Let’s start with He-Man!

One of the things that characterized the 200x figures were the somewhat stylized proportions, and since these figures retain the usual Origins bodies, a little of that flavor is lost. What we have left is mostly a costume change, but I really like it. The arms and legs are left unchanged, with the boots all painted brown and the wrist bracers in silver. The pelvic piece is new, with a silver belt and red and gold circular buckle. The sculpted furry diaper is still present, but trimmed back quite a bit. The chest harness features a hexagonal plate with another red and gold motif. The silver border looks great and there’s a nice hammered texture to the background. This design is different enough from the classic look to stand out, but not so much to be jarring. Were I a kid playing with these figures, I could easily see this one becoming a regular stand in for the more classic He-Man on my adventures. It just looks fantastic!

As for the head sculpt, I like it a lot, but there have been so many He-Heads in this line so far, I’d be lying if I could keep them all straight. Is this new? Is it recycled? Without digging through a tote for my head bag, or scrolling through my past reviews, I’m not going to say for sure, but I’m guessing it’s a repack. I will say that it is emphatically not designed to look like the 200x figure, and instead retains that very vintage look. I think this head would work on pretty much any Origins He-Man we’ve seen so far. Either way, I think the head looks really good with this costume.

As for weapons, He-Man comes with the 200x redesign of the Power Sword. I’ve never been a big fan of this design, as it just way too clunky and impractical. I do, however, appreciate the attention to detail in the sculpt. It’s more machine now than sword, but that really gave the sculptors something to work with. There’s a loop in the back of He-Man’s harness so he can wear the sword on his back. I will point out that the figure’s grip is a little loose on the sword. I’m not sure if that’s a problem with my figure in particular, but it helps to squeeze it tight so he doesn’t drop it.

You also get his battle axe and shield, and I absolutely love these! The axe has some techno-gizmos sculpted into it to resemble the same tech that went into the sword, but here it doesn’t really make the weapon look unwieldly or cumbersome… just futuristic!!! The shield also has a little mesh circuit pattern on one of the arms of the cross, and some really nice texturing in the red field areas. These accessories look great together, and I’ll likely display He-Man with the wielding these and with the sword on his back. OK, let’s move on to Skeletor!

To me the 200x version of Skeletor looked extra stylized to me, and there was something about him that made his limbs look extra long and his head extra tiny. As a result, this Origins version looks a lot more like its doing its own thing, and boy do I love it! The armor pieces sport some excellent detail, like leather texturing in the hip and groin armor, organic designs in the grieves, and the shoulders and gorget look awesome! In addition to the purple plastic on the armor, you get red jewels painted on the knees and in the center of the crossed bones on his chest, as well as black for the shoulder guards. The wrist bracers are painted purple, and his feet are left pale blue. The fastener on the armor tends to slip out of the loop on my figure from time to time, but even when it does the harness and shoulders stays put. All in all, I love the way Mattel adapted this design to Origins, and this is a great version of Skeletor!

And then there’s the head sculpt! Hot damn, is this outstanding! The skull face is nestled in the center of a purple textured hood, and boy does he look pissed! The angry, downturned brow looks very expressive along with the red dots in the center of his eye holes. I also really love the paintwork on the face, with the way the yellow transitions to the green at the edges. This portrait is a little work of art, and one of my favorites that this line has produced so far!

Skeletor comes with the 200x version of his sword, which I believe was two swords joined together, which is why it has what looks like two grips. I suppose one could be a knuckle-guard, but either way the design of the hilt makes it kind of awkward for him to hold. Like the 200x Power Sword, I think this is well sculpted, but it just looks completely impractical. I wish they had given Skeletor a loop on his back to tuck the sword into like they did He-Man. I guess I could tuck it under the strap, but with the way it likes to come loose, that’s probably not going to work.

And you also get his trusty Havok Staff, which I think is just a repack of the one we’ve seen a bunch of times before.

I usually get tired of toy lines constantly churning out variants of main characters, but in the case of Origins I haven’t minded so much, because they’ve all been really good. And this pair may be the best yet. Normally, I would take the classic look for these guys over the 200x designs any day, but I’m shocked at how great these look adapted for the Origins bodies. Both figures get high marks from me, but I’m leaning toward the Skeletor as being my favorite of the pair. The armor just looks outstanding and the portrait is perfect! What’s even better is right now both of these figures have been turning up online at pretty good sale prices. Last time I looked Skeletor was going for $10 on Amazon, and boy is that an absolute steel for such a remarkable figure! Do I get another to keep carded? Nah… but it is tempting!

Oct 14 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: Mantenna by Mattel

Life is returning to normal here at hurricane ravaged FFZ Central! It’s nice to be able to round out a full week of reviews again, and hopefully I can keep that going. Today I’m checking out another figure from Mattel’s absolutely amazing MOTU Origins line, and it’s time to add another baddie to Hordak’s Evil Horde with Mantenna!

He’s the Evil Spy with the Pop-Out Eyes! As always, these figures look fantastic on the retro-style packaging, making me forever tempted to pick up doubles to keep sealed. But thankfully I’ve managed to just keep a couple doubles so I can always have an example of the overall presentation here. Despite his extra limbs, Mantenna is carded as a regular release instead of a Deluxe, and you get an Evil Horde sticker on the front of the bubble. At some point Mattel needs to start turning out some more Great Rebellion figures in the Origins line because right now it’s just She-Ra alone against The Evil Horde!

Mantenna is among my favorite Horde figures because he’s that perfect blend of creepy and goofy. The extra set of legs makes him stand out, even among an army populated entirely by freaks and weirdos. And while he does have a certain silliness to his design, if I saw this thing in real life I would shit my pants and run. Granted, I suppose that could be said for a lot of the Masters baddies. Obviously there’s a lot of special tooling for this figure, with the standard MOTU arms being about the only normal recycled parts.

He has a special new pelvic part designed to accommodate his extra set of legs, each of which is wonderfully detailed with sculpted Horde symbols on the front of the boots, ugly bumps on the thighs, and blade-like fins protruding from the upper and lower legs. And each one of these limbs features the same articulation as the legs found on regular Origins figures. The chest and back armor are sculpted as part of the torso, rather than something worn by the figure. I really dig the coloring here too. The body is very dark purple and it contrasts nicely with the bright yellow belt and the bright red chest piece, head, and Horde symbols. The fact that the red for the head is glossy and the chest piece is more matte is another great little touch.

The head sculpt conveys all the kooky and ugly weirdness that characterizes this character. I mean, holy shit just look at him! This guy is pure nightmare fuel! He’s got wide fins that make up his ears, and two tusks jut down from the disgusting maw he calls a mouth. The hole of a mouth is circled with tiny black appendages, and I can’t even imagine what it’s like sitting across from him at The Fright Zone Cafeteria and having to watch him eat.

And then there’s those giant, bloodshot globes he calls eyes. These bug out from his head even under normal conditions, but if you press the lever on the back of his head, they pop out even more. I still adore the MOTU Classics version with its interchangeable parts, but there’s something that’s just so fun and satisfying about being able to make his eyes pop in and out with this gimmick.

Mantenna comes with the usual Horde Crossbow, this time cast in a pale gray color. His right hand is equipped to hold it, while his left hand is just relaxed.

I absolutely love Origins Mantenna, and Mattel spared no expense introducing this delightfully bizarre character to the Origins line. He looks great, the extra legs are fun to pose, and I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of flipping his eyes in and out. Even with as prolific as Origins has been, I’m still in awe of how quickly Mattel has delivered a good chunk of Horde baddies, and Mantenna looks absolutely smashing along side his fellow villains. Now we just need to get some more of Etheria’s gals in the line to fight them!

Sep 9 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: “Flying Fists” He-Man and “Terror Claws” Skeletor by Mattel

Holy crap, that title is a mouthful, innit? I’m overdue for visiting with the MOTU Origins line, and since I have relatively new versions of He-Man and Skeletor on my pile of figures to open, I decided to knock them both out today! These are both Deluxe figures, which means they cost a little more than the regular ones, and come on bigger cards, and lots more stuff!

And wow, don’t they look so good in the packages! The presentation here kind of reminds me of the old rack toys, only actually good and not at all crappy. The character art looks amazing, but Mattel could have just as easily let the bubble do all the talking, because there’s so much cool stuff packed in here. Exposition explosions tell us that He-Man swings his arms with awesome might, while Skeletor swings with fearsome fury! Which is better, YOU DECIDE!!! This is a line that constantly tempts me to get doubles to keep one sealed, because they look so good in package. Let’s check out He-Man first!

Flying Fists He-Man is basically regular He-Man with gorgeous vac-metal armor encasing his manly torso. His wrist bracers and belt are painted bright red, and he has white fringe around the tops of his boots. The armor has a beautiful mirror silver polish with gold trim around the arm holes and waist, and a red H emblazoned on the front. His back has a large bracket so he can store his preposterous weapon, and yes it does make him very back-heavy. And in keeping with the vintage gimmick, He-Man does indeed have arm swinging power, which is activated when you rotate him at the waist left or right with the help of a grooved wheel at the bottom of his back. This is an absolutely beautiful figure that really gives Battle Armor He-Man a run for his money.

You get two portraits with the figure, and that is awesome! I absolutely love how many options we now have for swapping heads between regular He-Man and all the other flavors. The one that comes on the figure is my favorite of the two, and I can easily see myself displaying this on my regular He-Man as well. I’m a bit conflicted on the other one. I really like the work they put into this, with the windblown hair and the open mouth, but I’m not sure the end result really conveys what they were going for. Still, a nice option!

Flying Fists He-Man introduces two new weapons to his arsenal, and these are some real Rube Goldberg kinda stuff! The weapon is sort of like a mace, but with a huge spinning wheel with three balls at the end of each arm. It looks absolutely ridiculous and it seems completely impractical. But, we’re talking about a world with a robot elephant as the fire marshal, so when you put it in the proper context, I’m sure this thing makes perfect sense. The shield is pretty out there too, but I like it a lot more. It’s got spinning blades on it, which seems like it would be good for offense and defense. Both of the weapons feature more of that gorgeous vac-metal finish, and as demonstrated earlier, the mace weapon can store on He-Man’s back. Laugh as I might, if I saw a He-Man coming at me with this shit, I would still run for my life.

He-Man also comes with his trusty power sword, and this is a fantastic accessory, because it isn’t the crappy half-sword that came with the original He-Man release, so you know this is getting handed off to my regular He-Man as soon as I’m done with this review! I can’t help but think it would have been cool if this got the vac-metal treatment too, but I’m still happy to have it. OK, let’s check out Skeletor…

As with He-Man, Skeletor uses a lot of the same parts we’re used to seeing on the character, but he also has some shiny new vac-metal plate armor. While He-Man got his whole torso covered, Skeletor only has his covering his upper chest, so he can still show off those washboard abs. The new armor has a skull fixed right in the middle and a gorgeous purple tint to it. My only complaint with this figure is that, apart from the chest armor, he looks kind of bland. I think I’m missing the wrist bracers, and I’m wondering if they omitted those so his Terror Claws would fit better. Naturally, he has the same arm-swinging play feature as He-Man, and he can also store his ridiculous new weapon the clip on his back.

Once again, you get two heads with the figure, and I absolutely love these. The regular one is just so expressive, even if I’m a bit unclear on what the expression is supposed to be. He kind of looks like Beast Man just brought him a dead rat as a present and he’s genuinely touched by the offering. But the second one is just pure money. Skeletor looks so damn happy here, like he’s so proud of his ridiculous new weapons and can’t wait to try them out. These are both great, and they will likely spend some time on my regular Skeletor figure.

Of the two figures, Skeletor seems to have made out better in the accessories department. I was surprised to see that they included his trusty Havoc Staff, considering how much else is here. I’m sure it didn’t break the bank for Mattel to throw this in there, but it’s a welcome bonus nonetheless.

Next up is the white snappy dragon thingy, which is roughly comparable to He-Man’s spinning mace. It makes me wonder why this didn’t get top billing for the figure over the Terror Claws, but it’s probably because they couldn’t think up a cool name for it. As I’m pretty sure I mentioned when reviewing the Classics version of this figure, it looks like Skeletor cut off Sky-Lynx’s head and turned it into a grabby arm. I totally dig it.

And finally, we have the main attraction, which are the Terror Claws. These clip onto Skeletor’s wrists and give him giant tearing appendages. And much like He-Man’s spinning mace, I find these hysterical to look at, but I’d pretty much shit myself if a skull-faced assailant came after me with them. I like the little sculpted detail added to them, and my one complaint would be that I wish they had added pegs for the hands to grip onto like they did with the dragon chomper weapon. They still stay put fairly well, but pegs would have been even better.

I think it’s safe to say that every time I open a new MOTU Origins figure, I am absolutely delighted with the purchase. These figures are just so damn fun, and I’m very happy to see that Mattel is going all out. For a line that I originally swore I would never collect, this feels like the absolute best values to be found in the current action figure market. I’m also thrilled that Mattel has been keeping the play gimmicks alive in these figures, which really sets them apart from the more collector-driven Classics line, where they were mostly omitted. Keep them coming, Mattel!!!

Jul 26 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: Stridor by Mattel

My MOTU Origins backlog may not be nearly as bad as other lines, but there’s still a few things I’m behind on. Case in point, poor Stridor has been waiting to be opened for a while now, and it’s well past time we let this mecha-horsey out of the stable. And boy am I excited! I love animals, and I love robots, so it stands to reason that I love robot animals like Stridor!

The packaging for this line continues to kick all sorts of ass, thanks in no small part to the vintage-style artwork on the extended back panel. It shows He-Man charging into battle atop Stridor while Fisto gets ready to lay down some righteous fist on Skeletor, who approaches in The Roton! Oh yeah, baby! The Origins Roton is coming! Ah, but let’s not take any thunder from Stridor, because he looks all sorts of awesome on display in that window box! Give me a sec to carefully open this box (because it’s a keeper!) and let this electric equine out to trot!

Stridor comes out of the box more or less assembled. You really just have to attach his front guns and he’s good to go. The design is very faithful to the original vintage toy, but with a bit more detail in the sculpt, and now fully articulated legs! You still get the mostly brown body with some lovely silver paint on the neck, head, and ass. You also get some additional silver paint picking out the joints and hydraulics on the legs, which looks quite nice! The orange here looks a lot brighter than what I remember from the vintage toy, and I certainly dig that. The tail, front guns, and head armor all add some bright red to the colors, making this figure’s deco pop brilliantly! What a fantastic looking toy this is!

In addition to the sculpted vents and mechanical bits and bobs, the toy makes use of some well placed stickers to add some detail. These include the vents between the legs on the front, the instruments on the back of the seat and in front of the ass-cannon, the dash board controls, and the heraldic images on each side of the body. I’m not sure what the collector consensus is on the stickers, but I really dig them. They evoke the feel of the vintage toys, and I’m sure they help to keep the cost down on these toys as well.

Stridor comes with the vintage-style armor for his head, which can be removed and swapped out with a more modern look. The modern armor covers more of the head, encompassing the nose and adding holes for the robot horse to… breath? I dunno… maybe that’s where he expels exhaust. There’s a lot more sculpted detail in this armor, including interlocking scales around the top of the neck, and overlapping plates on the snout. The longer spike and the shape of the eyeholes conspire to make him look a lot more aggressive. I like them both, but I think I’ll go with the vintage one for display.

The added articulation in the legs is a welcome treat, with three joints in each leg: At the top, knees, and ankles. The back legs are also ratcheted, so they can easily hold Stridor as he rears up on them. The figure is also balanced well enough to pose like this without any support, which is pretty damn cool. There’s a little articulation in the neck, but not a lot of movement there. Stridor’s jaws will open and snap shut again, so watch your fingers when you’re feeding him sugar cubes, or energon cubes, or whatever! The ass-cannon can turn left and right, and the two front guns can raise and lower a little. I do have a bit of a gripe with the front guns, as they have a habit of falling out when rotated.

Naturally, Stridor has room for a rider, with the rider’s legs going into the body, more like a car than a horse. It works really well, and Stridor can pretty much handle any of the normal Origins figures. Sorry, Ram Man… Not you! You have to walk! Or bounce, or whatever the hell it is you do! Stridor comes with a set or reins, which are made out of rope and has a plastic bit that goes in his mouth, and two handles for the rider.

You also get some blast effect parts to go over the three guns. These are cast in translucent blue plastic, and they’re kind of big. It’s nice to have display options, but I just don’t know about these. I doubt I’ll use them much.

And finally, Stridor comes with a little stable, which consists of a green stone floor and a couple of hitching posts. It’s a cool extra, but I wish they had added a computer or something to make it look like Man-At-Arms could run diagnostics on him or program him or whatever. Maybe I’m being greedy. It’s fine.

The base also has an optional stand, which can hold Stridor in action poses, and that’s very cool!

I paid $30 for this magnificent robo-steed, which I think is the actual MSRP, and I think that’s a damn fine deal considering his size and all he comes with. Indeed, Stridor encapsulates everything that’s fun about the Origins line. He’s a big and satisfying toy, with plenty of display options. He’s a great figure all by himself, but he also interacts really well with the regular figures, giving them yet another option for riding into battle against Skeletor and his minions of evil. Now, bring on Night Stalker! God, I love this line!

Jun 3 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: Mosquitor by Mattel

Once again, I’ll point out how much I love the MOTU Origins line as a vehicle for finally getting figures that I haven’t owned in any previous format. I didn’t have any MOTU figures when I was a kid, and there were a handful or so that I missed out on when collecting MOTU Classics. Mosquitor was one of those, and now I’m absolutely thrilled to finally have this overgrown parasite land in my collection. Does he suck? You bet he does! And I mean that in every good way possible!

As you can probably tell by the packaging, Mosquitor is a Deluxe figure, which means he comes on a slightly larger card, with a few extra bits and bobs to push him over the $20 price point. These cards are absolutely magic to see on the shelf, with it’s vintage style and bubble glued to the card, it almost looks like an overgrown rack toy of the past. The explosions of exposition proclaim that Mosquito’s chest pumps “Red Fluid” but we all know IT’S BLOOD! Sticky, crimson BLOOD! I don’t understand it. Half the toys on the shelves today are about poop, but we can’t say blood? I’m surprised Mattel hasn’t introduced a new figure called Poop-Or. Anyway, let’s tear this bug man open and check him out.

Straightaway I’m going to say that I love everything about this figure! He feels so fresh and new, and that’s a big deal in a line that is built off of recycling a lot of the same parts. Mosquitor is built on a black buck, with heavy, gray robotic looking boots, smooth gray undies with a purple belt and silver triangular belt buckle, deep crimson gauntlets, red bands around his biceps, and bulbous crimson shoulders, that look like they’re made of some kind of disgusting organic membrane. He’s also got a button on his back to pump that blood!

The window in his chest has a painted silver border and clearly shows off the reservoir of life juice in his blood tank. Pressing that button gets the blood flowing and it looks really good. It’s also surprisingly fun to pump it. Once again, I never owned the original, so I can’t say how it compares to the vintage original, but either way, I’d say Mattel did a fantastic job recreating this gross play gimmick.

Mosquitor comes with two heads, and deciding which one to go with is a win-win scenario, because they’re both so damn good. The figure comes out of the package wearing one which I believe is based on his appearance in the UK comics. This one transforms Mosquitor into more of a reptilian looking creature, with a scaly textured skin, and bit yellow eyes with vertical pupils very reminiscent of alligator peepers. There’s also a hint of a silver tube exposed in the middle of his snout, suggesting his bio-mechanical nature. I do like the look of this head a lot, and because it’s so new and fresh, I used it for a lot of the pictures here. But, you also get this one…

Ah, that’s the Mosquitor I’m a lot more familiar with! Here we get a smoother and more angular head with giant white eyes, and very prominent cybernetic parts on his snout, ending in what looks like a scalpel, perfect for sucking that life-giving blood from the do-gooders of Eternia or Etheria. I figure that if I want to reconcile the two, I can just imagine that this head is a helmet that goes over the other head! But in the end, this is the head I’ll likely be displaying him with.

And since Mosquitor is a Deluxe, the goodies keep on coming! First, he comes with his purple rifle and an extra left hand, to replace the fist with a gun-holding hand. The gun looks great, and it seems to be a pretty good recreation of the vintage figure’s gun. I’m not sure why Mattel included the extra left hand. It certainly wasn’t necessary, but it does give you the option of making Mosquitor ambidextrous.

And lastly you get this absolutely incredible blood-sucking effect part. If you know me, you know that I’m not usually that impressed by effect parts, but this thing is fantastic! I thin kit’s supposed to be an energy field that holds his prey while he’s leeching them dry, but I like to think it’s just gallons of blood leaving his foe’s body. And dang, it looks like Man-at-Arms has a lot of blood! Egads, I love this!

Mosquitor is one of my favorite figures released in Origins to date. Yeah, I probably say that a lot, but it is just such an amazing line of toys! Granted, Mosquitor is a little bit extra special, as it’s the first time I’m owning him, but even if that weren’t the case, I think he’s a fantastic update to the vintage figure, with just enough of that sweet additional articulation to make him even more fun to play around with. It’s also nice to finally get another member of The Evil Horde, since I’ve been buying a lot of Horde Troopers to fill out Hordak’s ranks!

Apr 27 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: Horak and Horde Troopers by Mattel!

It’s been a little too long since I last visited with Mattel’s Masters Origins line, and with how many figures have been added lately, it’s past time that I remedy that. Today, I’m switching my attention to the She-Ra side of things with a look at Hordak and his evil Horde Troopers!

I was never a big fan of the She-Ra cartoon, but when I did watch it, I watched it for The Evil Horde characters. Of particular appeal where the Horde Troopers, which sported a badass design and were pretty damn menacing, at least in appearance. In reality they were just there to give the heroes something without a soul that could get trashed, but I still thought they were damn cool. Anyway, let’s start with Horak himself.

I don’t have a whole lot to say about Hordak, other than Mattel stayed pretty close to the vintage original for this one. He has dark gray arms and legs with black boots and gauntlets. You get a painted silver belt with black furry diaper, and a bulky vest worn over the figure buck with the bright red Horde symbol sculpted on the front. There’s a black armband on his left bicep with a smaller Horde symbol, and two more down on his boots. Finally, he has a red cape, which extends down to about his knees. I really dig the coloring on this figure. The dark black and gray contrasts beautifully with the bright red, and little touch of silver that gives it an extra pop.

The head sculpt is solid enough, but it lacks some of the coloring in the original figure. It still looks fine, but feels a little more basic and a slight step down from the source material. Hordak is still an ugly sunovabitch, with pointed ears, a mohawk-like crest running down to his pig nose, and hideous bumps on his bald head. The coloring on the cheeks sort of resemble facial hair, and he has a single top row of red spiked teeth protruding down into his open maw of a mouth. I think I dig the eyes here the most. They appear to be separate from the head and attached from behind, giving them some cool depth and definition.

Hordak comes with his all white Horde Crossbow, which can be clipped onto either arm. I appreciate the use of a clip here, as his left hand is not designed to hold anything. Like the figure itself, the Crossbow is a pretty solid recreation of the vintage accessory and he looks great holding it. Moving on to the Horde Trooper…

The Horde Trooper was one of my favorite figures in the MOTU Classics line, and it looks like history is repeating itself here. I just dig this design so much. There’s something about mechanized suits of armor that just scratches my itch. Obviously this figure required all new tooling, and the attention to detail in the sculpt is excellent. You get all sorts of vents, mechanisms, and bits and bobs scattered about his armor. The Silver finish looks great, and I like it more than the flat gray used for the Classics version. There’s some black used for the boots, gloves, and joints, as well as bright red for the Horde symbol on the chest, and a yellow round cap in the middle of his groin. I don’t want to know what that’s used for! The only downside here is that the plastic shows off some swirling and a few creases from the molding process, but it’s nothing so bad that it detracts from my enjoyment of what is a great looking figure.

For the head, Mattel stuck with the toy design’s big yellow and black boomerang visor for a face. I’ll confess, I do tend to like the animated head design a bit more, but I’m not hating this. It looks fine, and fans of the original toy will no doubt be pleased. Hey, I wonder what that big red button in his chest is for?

Of course, it’s for the break-apart gimmick, inspired by the original toy design. Give it a press, and the Trooper breaks apart to reveal the red interior with some mechanical doodads sculpted onto it. The play gimmick is pretty well done here, and I find that my Troopers don’t break apart under normal handling, just when the trigger button is pressed.

And finally, the Trooper come with his Force Staff, which is cast all in red plastic. There is some nice sculpting on this piece, but it can be hard to make it out, because of the plastic used. It would have been nice to get a left hand that could hold it too, but I do like him having a fist as well.

And that’s two more excellent figures for the MOTU Origins line. I’m very pleased that Mattel has been dipping into The Evil Horde sooner rather than later, as I think it contains some of the coolest and wildest character designs. The Trooper was surprisingly easy to get a few of, at least initially, and thanks to spreading my pre-orders out, I was able to pick up five with no trouble at all. I do hope we get the Horde Jet Machine at some point, as it would be a great opportunity to bundle another Trooper with, and I’d be down for two or three of those!

Mar 16 2022

Masters of the Universe Origins: Stinkor and Webstor by Mattel

One of the coolest thing about MOTU Origins for me is getting a crack at figures that I missed out on during the Classics line. Case in point, Classics Stinkor and Webstor are among a small handful of Skeletor’s minions that sold out on Matty Collector before I could get them, and now sell for ridiculous money. Meanwhile, here are the Origins versions just swinging on the pegs down the toy aisle at Target!

As always, these look great on the retro-style cards. The backs show some of the figures’ play features and some other figures that are available. You also get a Mini-Comic bundled with each figure, which is a nice bonus as well. Let’s start with Stinkor!

The package says he stinks, and I was expecting to get hit with a ripe dose of patchouli oil when I tore open the bubble, but that wasn’t the case at all. I even put his whole hand all up into my nose and I could only barely smell much of anything. Not that I’m complaining, because I really don’t want my toys smelling like dirty hippies. I’d just as soon use my imagination. In any event, Skeletor’s Man-Skunk looks great with his high tech stink-activated armor, complete with nose extension. The bright orange armor matches his gauntlets, webbed monster feet, and even his belt and furry diaper are all orange. The outfit contrasts nicely with the black matte of his arms and legs, and white jagged stripes running up his arms to his shoulders.

Mattel did a fine job with Stinkor’s ugly mug, from his perky, pointed ears to his creepy down-turned fang-infested maw. His yellow peepers have cat-like irises, pulling an expression that makes him look like he’s shocked by his own stink. You get some white around his eyes, and a stripe that runs from his nose up the center of his head and down to the back of his neck.

Unless you count his super-weak smell, Stinkor only comes with one accessory and that’s his blue shield, which seems to work best when tucked into his right open hand, allowing him to parry and spray! Yup, Stinkor is a pretty simple figure without a lot going on, but I dig him all the same! Moving on to Webstor…

Of course, Webstor is a creepy Spider-Man, but not one of the friendly neighborhood variety. And WOW, do I love this figure! The dark blue plastic that Mattel used for his skin is just gorgeous. He’s got the same monster feet as Stinkor, but now colored purple to match his chest armor. His belt is orange, his furry diaper is black, and he’s got orange and red emblems painted on his chest. Flip him around, and he’s got a big backpack to accommodate his giant grapple hook. If he’s a spider man, why doesn’t he just shoot web? I dunno!!!

Webstor’s head sculpt is super creepy, with a pushed in bat-like nose, fangs pointing up and down, two giant soulless red eyes with two smaller ones up above on his forehead. PErsonally, I always thought Webstor could have used a few more eyes, but that’s just nitpicking, I think this is a great looking head!

The backpack includes a generous amount of string, which runs through it, allowing Webstor to climb, repel, or just zip-line into action!

And if the zipline isn’t enough to make Stinkor feel like he missed out on accessory day, Webstor also comes with an orange rifle.

Every new MOTU Origins figure is a treat that brightens my day! This line is so simple, and yet so damn fun! And it feels damn good to be collecting a line of figures that are under $20 these days. Stinkor is cool and all, but Webstor has always been a favorite of mine, and he’s easily the stand out figure of this pair. Not having the Classics Webstor really hurt a lot, and while I’d still love to add him to my collection some day, I’m a lot more comfortable with Origins Webstor at $17 over the $200 or so that I’ve seen the Classics figure going for these days!