I jumped for joy when they leaked/announced this guy. I have waxed poetic about the 1987 Masters of the Universe movie, and you can read about that here if you want.

Beast Man is the fourth MASTERVERSE figure specifically from the 1987 movie. (So far we have He-Man, Skeletor, and Evil-Lyn). Like Evil-Lyn, this figure has never been made before. Sure there have been some Beast Man figures…several variations actually. But this is the first movie-inspired design.

PACKAGING

You can see a video review of the packaging here, along with the packaging for Skeletor’s Throne (Review here)

Beast man comes in the same packaging as recent MASTERVERSE figures. This time with a darker theme and the specter of the movie design for Grayskull behind him.

I like this Transformers style packaging, where you can see the figure and the accessories clearly.

FIGURE

Here’s what you get in the box

• Beast Man figure
• Wrist guards
• Sword
• Pair of open “grabbing” hands.

Not many accessories.

So my thoughts on the general design. Even as a kid, I thought he looked way too much like Chewbacca. (I pronounce that word CHOO-Bahka. I also say TAEN-ussee and Buh-JANG-uls). It was 1987. Star Wars was fresh in our minds. Plenty of other movies were made with similar ideas. Teen Wolf. Harry and the Hendersons. Even King Kong had a little revival around this time.

In the cartoon and on the figure, and in most comics Beast Man is always orange. I suppose the William Stout’s in the design studio thought that wouldn’t work. But this Sasquatch design didn’t ever do it for me. And in the movie he also doesn’t speak. Just growls a few times and grovels at Skeletor after he kills Saurod. (Sadness.)

To me as a Masters of the Universe character, the design was a lot closer to Grizzlor. And I am going to call this my problem with what we have here. If you watch the movie, you can see that fur getting wild and tangled and matted.

No chance for that here…all of the fur is sculpted and molded. Throw in that cheesy smile, and unfortunately, like I said, he looks more like a mascot on a Geico commercial.

And one more thing. His thighs are covered in what would be called armor, but you can see what it is in the picture above. These thigh-pads are supposed to be furry matts to cover the joints and prevent breaking the sculpt. But how wrong does this actually look in any pose outside of basic standing?

ACCESSORIES

Here is Beast Man armed with all he came with. You just remove the hands and slide the wrist guards on. I should go back and watch the movie to see instances of Beast Man using this sword.

As a sword, anyone could use it. I do get kind of a “wooden”toy sword vibe off of it. It is a basic as a sword could be, which make He-Man’s sword seem even more better I suppose.

SPARTANNERD RATING OF MASTERVERSE BEAST MAN (1987 MOVIE)

As much as I love the movie, this figure falls short. It is definitely the weakest we have gotten of the four releases.

However, he does represent hope that we might get more movie designs. I’m pretty sure in Masters of the Universe Classics they released a Karg figure from the William Stout Collection. So Karg will be coming, but hopefully they don’t repeat some of the mistakes they made with Beast Man here. Of Course we will get Blade and Saurod, and very likely “god” Skeletor.

And look how many “good guys” we have. Only He-Man. So bring on the Man-At-Arms movie design and the Teela, and a better Gwildor. (Could they beat the MOTUC Gwildor?)

I just can’t rate this guy very highly. The design is wonky. The paint is good, but that expression on his face just kills any vibe you could get from the rest of the figure. Why are wrist guards considered accessories? Practically he only came with alternate hands (which every MASTERVERSE figure comes with) and a bland sword which might have five seconds of movie time. (I’ll go back and check.)

So I am going to award this figure a reluctant 2/5. One of those points is really optimism for the future, because as a figure, he kind of …