Optikk comes in a white mailer box and carded on the standard packaging for the Classics line. The only thing new here is the Space Mutants sticker on the front. As is sometimes the case, the logo at the top of the bubble obscures Optikk’s “head” a bit. I know this really bums out mint on card collectors, but it doesn’t phase me since I rip these babies open as soon as I get them. On the other hand, his spare eye is mounted so that it is perfectly visible in the bubble.

The most amazing thing about Optikk is how much of him is a new sculpt. In a line of figures that prides itself on reusing parts over and over again, Optikk looks both fresh and brand new. I absolutely love the detail in his armor, particularly the wires and all the tiny bolts, giving him a smidge of steampunk. I also love the way the top portion forms the cradle to hold his giant eyeball of a head. The armor sculpt even includes a mock thumb wheel on the back that was part of the original figure’s gimmick to turn the eye. In terms of color, Optikk is pretty subdued as the overwhelming bulk of his armor is gold with some black showing from beneath and a little purple. The wires are blue and red and the aforementioned bolts are neatly painted silver.

Since Optikk’s head is a giant eyeball, there isn’t a lot to the sculpt, but it still looks amazing. The translucent part is painted over with veins making for a nice effect. The two eyeballs are identical save for the color of the translucent part, which are either green or orange. I actually haven’t swapped the eyes out on my figure because its difficult to do, impossible to tell what’s going on at the neck, and I’m afraid I’m going to bust the post. Besides, I like the green one better anyway.

Optikk has the same basic articulation as past Classics figures. The main difference is that the ball joint in his “head” doesn’t give a lot of up down leeway, which is a bit disappointing, but it goes from side to side just fine. He has universal ball joints in his shoulders and hips, hinged joints in his elbows, knees and ankles, and swivels in his biceps and wrists. My only quibble here is that the ankle joints on mine are a bit on the loose side.

Optikk comes with two accessories (not counting the spare eye), a laser rifle and a shield. The shield is cool, but not much to talk about. It clips onto his wrists like all the other shields we’ve gotten in this line. The laser gun is a really cool design and sculpt, I just wish they hadn’t stamped CHINA on it in such an obvious place as it kind of detracts from the aesthetics.

So it just goes to show you that The Four Horsemen can take a character that I don’t know or care about and still make a figure that I had to have in my collection. Everything about Optikk is just so cool. He’s the most unqiue looking figure we’ve got in the line so far and yet he blends in just fine with Skeletor’s mob of baddies. Great stuff!

Coming into collecting the Masters of the Universe Classics line at the beginning of this year, I had a lot of catching up to do. Some of the figures I was able to grab on Ebay without getting beaten up too badly, but there were a couple that were going for far more than I wanted to pay. Mer-Man was one of those pricey figures, so I was really happy to see Matty giving him a re-release. I was also really happy to see that he didn’t sell out right away, because on Sale Day, I didn’t get to my computer until a couple hours after Zero Hour. I sure as hell missed out on Optikk, but good old Mer-Man was still waiting for me.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have batteries for my camera when this figure arrived. I went out the next morning to get some fresh ones, but by then it was too late and I already ripped him open. So, no in-package pics this time. Not that it really matters, because there’s no difference between this guy and the dozen or so other MOTU Classics figures I’ve looked at. You get the same awesome retro-styled cardback. The only interesting change here is that he didn’t arrive in one of those white mailer boxes. Some may get pissed off at this, but it really doesn’t matter to me, it all just winds up in the trash.

Virtually every bit of what makes Mer-Man a unique figure is found in his armor and head sculpts, as his base figure is pretty unremarkable and generic. It uses the standard He-man pelvis, with green belt and yellow furry diaper. The arms and legs are from Skeletor, with the grieves and bracers painted yellow. The rest of his body has a pretty cool blueish-green tint to his skin that gives off just a hint of metallic sheen and makes him look rather fishy.

Fortunately, Mer-Man’s chest armor covers a lot and goes a long way to make him look like a fresh figure. The chest armor is great, as its made to look like it was fashioned from fish bones and shell and it even has a clip on the back to store his sword. The head sculpts are both really well done. Yes, he comes with two heads, one to match his vintage style and one to look more like his 200x counterpart. I like them both. Right now I’m going with the vintage style, but chances are I’ll go with the newer sculpt once Stinkor gets a release, as he’ll most likely use a repaint of the Mer-Man head as with the vintage figures. I will note some disappointment that Mer-Man’s left hand is sculpted in an open position and is therefore quite useless. Its annoying that he can’t grasp his trident with both hands or hold his sword in the off hand.

Besides the extra head, Mer-Man comes with two other accessories: A trident staff and a sword. Both accessories are nicely sculpted with an underwater theme. Like his armor, they look like they’re fashioned from bone and shell. The sword is really awesome and its blade is even serrated like shark teeth.

Mer-Man has the standard MOTU Classics articulation, which includes a ball jointed neck and shoulders. His arms have hinged elbows and swivel cuts in the biceps and wrists. His hips have universal joints, his knees and ankles are hinged. He can swivel at the waist and he has a large hinged joint in his torso. Good stuff.

All in all, this is a really solid figure. Although, Mer-Man has never been one of my favorite of Skeletor’s minions, he was a core character and thus an important figure in my collection. Picking up Mer-Man pretty much brings me up to date on the “must have” figures in the MOTU Classics line. There are still a few I’m missing like He-Ro, Stratos and now Optikk, but as far as the core characters go, I’m finally content with what I have. Of course, the bad guys are starting to outnumber the good guys on my shelf, so hopefully Matty will start throwing some more of He-Man’s buddies our way soon.

Yep, it’s the same old packaging. The green stone castle motif and MOTU logo really picks at my nostalgia strings. The only real difference here is the Evil Horde sticker that appears on the bubble and “The Original” appearing next to the name, which signifies that this is a re-issue and not really the original. Ahhh… OK. The back panel has a bio and photos of some of the other figures that have been released in the series. As always, its a shame to tear these things open, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

This revamp of Hordak is a really great looking figure on every front. In fact, I’d dare say he’s just about perfect. His head sculpt is brilliant in both design and execution. He’s always looked friggin creepy but this updated sculpt is all the more so. His face isn’t white anymore, but more bone colored. I love the way T4H textured the little bumps into his head and his little boney mohawk. His head rests in a large collar, or cowl, that is connected to his cape. The whole piece can be removed, if you so desire, just by popping off his head, lifting it off, and popping his head back on. This gives Hordak’s head a lot more range of movement, but to me he just doesn’t look as good without the whole evil ensamble.

The rest of Hordak is just as fantastic, and his unique armor pieces go a long way to make this one of the more unique looking figures in the collection. In fact, the only piece of him that is an overt reuse appears to be the pelvis. His armor pieces are black with embossed, red crests on his chest piece and grieves. The silver trim used on his belt and armor is antiqued to make it look worn, which I think is one of the best paint app effects we’ve seen in the whole line. The whole black, gray, red ensemble really looks amazing together. There is a rather unfortunate little chip in the red crest of my Hordak’s breast plate, but I can live with that. In terms of looking evil, its hard to top a guy with a skull for a face, but Hordak manages to out-evil Skeletor on this outfit alone.

Hordak comes with a few accessories. First, there’s his staff, which is amazingly well done. The detail work on the sculpting for the head of the staff is really elaborate, featuring a clawed hand holding a sphere with Hordak’s crest on it. Unfortunately, the plastic is a little soft and it has a habit of bending a bit. His crossbow is really cool, with the sculpt and paint job so good, it looks like the bolt is a separate removable piece, even though it isn’t. Finally, there’s his little Imp, which is a nifty little pack-in, although for some reason it has a rather unsightly seam running through his lower body. Couldn’t he just have been molded into one piece?

There are no surprises in the articulation, as we get exactly what we’ve been getting in all the male characters of the line. The ball joint in the neck is a bit inhibited by the cape/cowl piece, but as mentioned above, you can remove it if you like. Hordak’s arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders, hinged elbows and swivel cuts in the biceps and wrists. He swivels at the waist and his legs have universal joints in the hips and have hinged knees and ankles.

In a line of figures as fantastic as MOTU Classics, it seems like every new figure I get is my new favorite. My expectations on Hordak were pretty high, and I wanted him so bad that I came pretty close to paying Ebay robbery prices. Sure, I’m glad I waited, but even if I had picked him up at twice the price, I still would have been quite happy with him. He’s just all around excellent. Here’s hoping Mattel continues to add more of The Horde to this collection.

The packaging on these figures has not changed, and that’s a good thing because its still awesome. The green rock-motif on the card and the classic Masters logo makes me want to pop in a Filmation DVD and remember the simpler times. The package shows off the figure nicely, along with her falcon Skreetch. The back of the card features a bio as well as teases you with photos of a bunch of figures that you can no longer get outside of Ebay. Lord knows I’m not a mint on card collector, but if ever there was a line that tempted me to it, its this one. The presentation on these figures is just fantastic.

Naturally, Evil Lyn is a repaint of Teela from the neck down, but amazingly, she just doesn’t seem like one. I don’t know if its the dramatic color change, the yellow skin, or the wonderful head sculpt, but Evil Lyn really feels like her own figure and not a quickie repaint cash grab. Everything that was white and gold on Teela’s outfit is blue and darker blue on Evil Lyn. I was admittedly worried about Matty’s choice to go with the vintage-style yellow skin on this figure, but I have to say it turned out looking great. Its very faithful to the original figure and it serves to set her apart from Teela all the more. Overall, the other paint apps on the figure are a bit mixed. The paint apps on Evil Lyn’s face, notably the eyes, lipstick and green mascara are practically perfect, and its cool that she even has little black paint apps on her fingernails, but there’s some notable slop on her chest armor. Its not terrible, but the paint on my Teela is so immaculate, its hard not to notice even minor flubs here.

The head sculpt is spot on. She’s the perfect blend of beauty and wickedness and I love the exotic quality to her eyes that makes her look not quite human. Her simple skull cap with crest is right in line with her vintage counterpart. There’s a little disparity between the skin tone in her face and the rest of her body, but apart from that I wouldn’t change a thing. Funny, it wasn’t until getting this figure that I realized we have no idea what Evil Lyn’s hair looks like… or even if she has any!

Evil Lyn comes with a nice inventory of accessories, although not quite as much as her counterpart, Teela. She has a little hooked dagger with a nicely sculpted skull pommel and a wickedly jagged back edge. She has a blue orb wand that can convert to a full staff by swapping out the shaft. She also comes with her bird buddy, Skreetch. Granted, Skreetch is just a repaint of Teela’s Zoar, but its still an awesome sculpt, complete with hinged wings and feet that can grip Evil Lyn’s arm. Skreetch also comes with his own perch, which Zoar was sadly missing, as well as removable birdy battle armor. No doubt about it, with Evil Lyn you get a good amount of stuff for your money.

The articulation here is the same as on Teela, which means its close to the standards set by the male figures in the line, but not quite the same. Her head is ball jointed. Her arms have ball joints in the shoulders, hinged elbows and swivel cuts in the biceps and wrists. Her legs have universal movement in the hips, hinged ankles and knees and swivel cuts at her boots. She also has the extra joint in her feet that allow you to set her at a wide stance, while keeping both her feet flat on the ground. What she’s missing is a swivel cut in the waist. Still, she’s got a great degree of poseability. No complaints here.

Naturally, I’ve been waiting to get my hands on an Evil Lyn figure ever since I first started collecting this line and my cadre of evil-doers from Snake Mountain no longer feels like it has a huge vacant hole. (well, except for Mer Man, but thanks to a pending re-release, he will soon be mine!) I still give Teela the nod as the better figure, mainly because the paint apps on her outfit are just so striking and expertly applied, but then Evil Lyn makes up with that in spades because, well, she’s the bad girl and we all know bad girls are more fun.

Those of you who are getting a little weary of Matty’s reuse of parts on these figures, you’ll be happy to see that Trap Jaw is refreshingly new. The only obvious reuse is from He-Man’s pelvis, but even that is mostly covered by a new wide green belt with a sculpted skull and crossbones on it. See… I told you he was a pirate! He’s got new boots and legs, new arms, and naturally a new head… er, make that heads, plural, but we’ll get to that later. I also love the coloring on this figure. He’s mostly blue, green, black and pink, so you know the color on this figure really pops! I also really like the metallic sheen to some of his blues. That’s nice!

Trap Jaw’s head sculpt is just awesome. His green snarling face is hideous, right down to his beady yellow eyes. There’s definitely a lot of the Filmation character in there. He retains the same ring on the top of his head from the vintage figure, which you can pass a string through so he can zipline into action using his head! Another really cool addition is the articulation in his lower mechanical jaw, which lowers to reveal a really nasty mess where his real jaw used to be. My only nitpick about his head is that his jaw piece is a little lighter than his helmet. I would have liked if they matched the colors a little better. Hey, I have to think of at least one critical thing to say.

Besides his… um trapjaw, Trap Jaw’s other big gimmick is his cyborg right arm and interchangeable parts. He can switch out a laser gun, a robotic claw, or a hook, so he always has the right tool for the right job. Each piece just pops off and you can hang his extra parts from hooks on his belt. The laser gun is a little longer than I remember the vintage one being, but I think I actually like it better. The robotic claw is articulated, and the hook is… well, just a hook, but plenty cool nonetheless.

As if all this wasn’t cool enough, Trap Jaw also comes with the extra head and arm to turn him back into his original pre-ghoulish form, Kronos. The replacement right arm is a match for his left arm and when you pop the cyborg arm off, you can remove the armor piece that covers the right side of his torso. Initially, I had very little interest in these parts, but I have to admit they go really well with the figure and they’ve grown on me a lot and the figure looks really cool as Kronos. And even though I know the armor piece is supposed to be part of his cyborg arm, I prefer to leave it on him even when he’s Kronos. I just think it looks better.

And there ya have it. Trap Jaw is another slam dunk for Matty’s MOTUC lineup. As usual, The Four Horseman offered up a fantastic update to a great character. This figure is loads of fun to play around with and looks great standing alongside Skeletor’s cadre of bastards. He’s definitely my favorite release in this line to date, and I have a feeling he will be for quite a while to come.

Yeah, I’m still missing Mer-Man. C’mon, Matty, reissue him already. Why is Stratos getting reissued before Mer-Man for crying out loud?