Category Archives: Masters of the Universe Mega Construx

MASTERVERSE New Eternia Ram Man

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You can see my video of the package here!

Here I am back to Ram Man. The last Ram Man I had was the Super7 Ultimates MOTUC “re-issue,” that had that orange color scheme on his armor instead of the classic red. The orange was from the “cross sell” art on the back of the vintage figures. It was cool. Very detailed sculpt, with even the boots having skull details.

(Surely people reading the SpartanNerd blog are familiar with vintage Ram Man. But just in case…) The vintage Ram Man toy was so iconic…so incredibly cool and everywhere. Everyone had one. I always felt like his plastic was a little different than the other figures…it felt like some Christmas ornaments my grandmother put on her tree. And it had that springy leg action feature. You locked him down first by pressing his legs up through his armor skirt into his hollow body. Then you pressed this button on the back of the boot, and he would pop up. Only his arms were articulated, and he had this axe that really no one else could hold, and likewise he couldn’t hardly hold anyone else’s weapon. He was featured heavily on the Filmation cartoon, and was portrayed as kind of stupid. And he was shorter than everyone else as well.

But since 200x, Ram Man has been portrayed as larger. And more of a “Juggernaut” type who has powerful strength to smash things with his head. No version of Ram Man has had the spring loaded legs. (I don’t think the 200x toy had them.). I suppose the requirements of modern sculpting just keeps it from happening. But today, I am going to show what I think is a terrific attempt at giving us some of the feel of the vintage Ram Man’s action feature.

Here is what New Eternia Ram Man comes with.

Check out this pose! I know I already talked about what was in the box, so lets talk about these legs. What we have are evidently standard MASTERVERSE legs encased in a hollow rubber tube. It is bendy stuff, and you can see it kinking up behind the left knee. But this is a fine attempt to do something that calls back to that original idea. Just be careful when bending the knees. That green covering prevents you from seeing which direction the knees are facing. I had to feel around for awhile before attempting to pose the legs. I really, really didn’t want to break anything.

So some things I didn’t mention in the package video. The axe has a very nice “patina” on it. Some brown, rusty shading. The armor has the Battle Ram missile warhead on the front.

I haven’t complained too much about the quality of the toys in this line. The ones I have are pretty terrific. I am a very picky customer. There are a few that I am just not going to get, for instance Andra, Mercenary Teela, or any of the Virgil Abloh collection. There is no appeal to those specific offerings for me. I also am holding out for a better Gwildor than the Revolution one they are offering with Orko. I would like a movie accurate figure. Some of their products don’t appeal to me, but otherwise the quality has improved, and the New Eternia figures are giving some of the Masters of the Universe Classics figures a run for their money. Still not quite as awesome of sculpt work as the Horsemen do.

Which is why the next statement is shocking. Ram Man is the first MASTERVERSE figure I have that came with a problem.

Full disclosure. I opened and photographed this after 1:00 AM, (I went to a Disturbed concert. Very nice!) I was trying to remove this head, and I just couldn’t get a grip on it. The helmet has smooth surfaces, and my fingers kept sliding off. So my solution was to pinch it tighter. Perhaps I should have got out the hair dryer, but you see, after the Disturbed concert, I wasn’t in the mood to get that out I guess. At any rate, I heard a “crack,” and I knew something very bad was amiss. I got the head off and saw that a piece has cracked, and the neck is separating at the seam. BOO! So for the rest of the photos you will see, I am showing you the head barely on. You can’t tell it isn’t snapped down, but I just couldn’t risk it.

The armor has its own special issues. On Ram Man, I haven’t been able to get the straps to lock tight. The left side keeps bucking open. Why do we have this head? I would have rather had an unhelmeted sculpt like the MOTUC version, with the metal plate on top. This looks like Judge Dredd to me. Is it supposed to be a helmet for riding the Battle Ram? I don’t hate it and am glad to have it. This is one of the New Eternia “riffs” like Beast Man had, where he had awesome fur armor in addition to vintage style armor.

And here he is with the Samurai helmet. This one does remind me of Shredder from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I don’t have a problem with that, but I have never thought of Shredder as being so big. (This weapon is the samurai spear from Animal Warriors of the Kingdom.)

Oh yeah…I almost forgot. In the comparison of MEGA Ram Man and the back of MASTERVERSE Ram Man’s back right leg, you can see that he has a stirrup or something…this is a call back to that little switch that activated the action feature in the vintage line!

Speaking of size, Ram Man isn’t a towering Juggernaut as he has been in the past. He isn’t short. But he isn’t bigger than, for example New Eternia Beast Man.

So armor swap time. This armor looks OK on Beast Man. But there is still room. I tried it on 40th anniversary He-Man, but it was way too big. I suppose it could work on Two Bad. The issue is that Ram Man is just “fatter” than anyone else so far.

So I am a little conflicted on scoring this one. I love the character and am glad to have a new figure of him. The sculpt is very nice, and the solution they came to for the springy legs is novel. Nobody ever asked for those two heads, but they are nice additions. The helmet-less head would have been cooler. The armor that goes on top of the armor…really just, “why?” It is barely usable on anyone else, and the straps don’t want to connect. The axe is nicely done, and the paint all around is as well, though I think this Ram Man is a bit more youthful than I would prefer.

The neck joint breakage is a big problem. I am a grown-up. I am not going to cry about stuff getting broken. But what about a kid? And he comes with those alternate heads, but they are not easy to swap even for a dexterous SpartanNerd. But I feel a little burned every time something like this happens. Super7 Ultimate Cobra B.A.T. had a hand that snapped when I was swapping it, and it almost put me completely off of their stuff. But there were other hands. On Ram Man, this was the whole neck joint!

I have to give this figure a low 3/5. The armor is aggravating and the head swap resulted in a broken neck. Those are negatives outweighed by the positives of well-thought-out leg design, excellent sculpting and paint, and variety in the accessories.

Do you agree or disagree, Hub City Geeks? Let me know in the comments!

MASTERVERSE Revlations Evil-Lyn

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Many years ago, at about 5th-6th grade (I’m on the older side, so I might have been 11 turning 12,) I got some of the final Masters of the Universe Toys I would ever have for Christmas. These were Tyrantisaurus, Rio Blast, Extendar, and Evil Lyn. So I took Tyrantisaurus and Evil Lyn with me to my grandma’s party, where I was promptly made fun of. (That’s a doll! You have a girls toy with a purple dinosaur!) Didn’t matter to me. I loved those toys! 

I haven’t owned an Evil Lyn since, (if you disregard the many MEGA ones I have.) So I didn’t even feel bad about picking up two at the same time. I got MASTERVERSE Movie inspired Evil Lyn, and MASTERVERSE Revelation Evil Lyn. (See the review of Movie Evil Lyn Here.)

Revelation Evil-Lyn came in this basic style of packaging that all of the first wave of MASTERVERSE figures used. You can see everything you get clearly. Unlike other figures I have opened in the line, this one had a “double blister”. And if I was keeping it MIB that would have been very nice. The top images, you can see that my crop tool hasn’t been working right, but you get the essence of the rest of the packaging. There is a nice artwork of Evil-Lyn on the side. I heard somewhere that Eamon O’Donahue was doing this artwork? I don’t think there has been a piece of MASTERVERSE artwork that I haven’t liked. I might not care for some of the Revelation designs, but this artwork is very good. Evil-Lyn has the tag “Evil Warrior Goddess,” which I am pretty sure was the vintage toy description. (I am saying it one final time, I don’t like this blue window box.)

I was tempted to get the “Bat Sorceress” version, which was SO Eternity War. Maybe I still will someday. But I got this one because she fits with the style of the rest of the bad guys that were dear to my heart. Now I am only waiting on Whiplash and Clawful! Then I will have the whole of MY bad guys. (I place Modulok in with the Horde. Never had Webstor, Ninjor, or Jitsu. Cobra Kahn and Tongue Lasher go with Snake Men, and that will be another collection for me when they ever come out.)

Here’s what you get. Evil-Lyn with an alternate, not helmeted head, a short staff and a long staff, a pocketbook, a pair of punching hands, another gripping hand, and another spellcasting hand. This is a lot of stuff, considering Movie Evil-Lyn came with basically nothing. I am especially fond of the un-helmeted head with white hair. In Filmation we only saw this a couple of times…maybe even only once. 200x and Revelation did this right. In fact, this updated Revelation design has absolutely nothing wrong with it. Nothing to complain about. The sculpt is great! Not sure if it was intentional, but the white haired head also has two-toned eyebrows, giving the appearance of some age. Notable that the other head doesn’t have this detail. (I don’t like God-Lyn. But I do really like the reformed Evil-Lyn (just Lyn?) design. Beautiful and princess-like.)

You can tell that the same designer did these two hairstyles. I in fact double checked to see if this was a re-used part. (It isn’t). The short staff and the long staff. I believe they are the same weapon…she can extend it to use more as a bo staff, and for general magic casting she uses the short staff.

Notice that these 6 to 7 inch scale figures with staffs like to be posed in this way. I have already posted a few pictures of mythic legions, Savage He-Man, and also of Mer-Man doing this pose. Probably even more characters. I will say that the joints are much looser than I would like, and also I was afraid I was going to break the right hand thumb on the gripping hand trying to get her to hold this.

And because Movie Evil-Lyn came with basically nothing, one of the staves is a good weapon for her. Either one only needs one magic staff at a time anyway. Despara here is taller, but doesn’t she seem more stiff? It isn’t an accident. The more recent figures are more posable. Movie Evil-Lyn has no problem standing or being posed. But Revelation Evil-Lyn has looser joints.

Let’s talk pocketbook. If I remember the Revelation Part 1 series, Evil-Lyn carried something around in her pouch. It contained some of the last magic left in Eternia. But no one would have to know that, would they? This is a fine purse, for any female figure actually. I couldn’t resist making this photo!

The alternate head goes nicely on Masters of the Universe Classics Battleground Teela’s body to make basically an entirely different character. I’ll concede that Evil-Lyn has less of a tan, but if she is wearing makeup then this is a fine shade of skin for her face. At least we don’t usually see Evil-Lyn in barbarian armor. See how nice of an added detail the purse is?

These two finally reunited! (The 200x story presented The Faceless One as Evil-Lyn’s father. He was the original protector of the Havoc Staff, and that green face in his off hand is the Ram Stone…magic that can take down any wall.)

That these two bonded in Revelation was quite a surprise. We got more backstories for both characters from that!

I read the Revelation comic book that detailed Skeletor’s origin story. (Spoiler…he is like the Joker. You can’t tell if he is being truthful). My point is…I don’t think Evil-Lyn could be attracted to Skeletor. Not as a bare skull face. She is too beautiful herself for that. True, she lusts for power and Skeletor provides that for her as something to admire as well as gives her an ambition to overthrow. 200x was more believable, that she thought Keldor was handsome, but then the transformation “hideous.” January 25, 2024 UPDATE- Watch Revolution! See how this turned out!

There is a loyalty of Beast Man to Evil-Lyn. Why? I don’t know. She treats him bad. And in Revelation Part 2 she turns him into a gigantic attack dog, that gets thrown into the abyss. AND that is a loose end for the next installment I suppose.

So my rating for this figure. I only have one complaint, and it is that the joints are a bit loose. She can stand just fine, and hold her weapons (but be careful of the thumb). But it isn’t as tight as I would like. I am surprised at how small she is compared to the male figures. (Trust me. Most of the camera shots I took has her standing more in the front, skewing the effect of this). Beast Man pictured above kneeling really makes her look small. But I appreciate her femininity, especially in comparison with the design of Teela. Loose joints, but lots of accessories, another head sculpt that can be used on almost any other female figure with a removable head, a great sculpt and terrific paint job. A versatile pocketbook accessory. Two wand staffs. Nice artwork on the package. I am giving this a 5/5. I mean…maybe 4.5/5 if that is allowed. (Why not. It’s my rating system).

So what do you think, Hub City Geeks? Am I right? Let me know in the comments!

MASTERVERSE Trap Jaw

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I already mentioned that I picked up two MASTERVERSE figures on my birthday. Then came Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales which were wrapping up near the end of December. But I missed Trap Jaw from Mattel Creations. This led me to looking around somewhere else to purchase figures, and turns out that this was BigBadToyStore. They had a huge Cyber Monday sale, and I went looking for Super7 Ultimates actually. There was a huge and controversial sale on those. I wound up instead seeing how inexpensive the MASTERVERSE figures were. So I purchased Trap Jaw and Beast Man. Both of them are New Eternia. A video of the packaging below, with me giving commentary.

CLICK HERE FOR THE VIDEO

So I am pretty tired of using the MASTERVERSE packaging as photo backgrounds. Trap Jaw here is giving us a nice new red background. I am going to use that this time, but next time, something different entirely. You’ll just have to wait on my review of Movie Evil Lyn! 

What they have done with the packaging is more like modern Transformers of similar size. There is a small window in, with wraparound artwork. I like it…it is a departure from what we have had so far. But I was surprised to find something else when I opened the box!

There was a contents graphic on the inside. Furthermore, instead of displaying all of the accessories, they put them in this black box piece of packaging. (Actually packed in a little paper bag). I know this is a concession to cut down on the waste plastic. And I don’t dislike it. It is like a compromise between the windowless Hasbro boxes and classic packaging.

So what do we have?

This is everything you get. The figure, a hook hand attachment, a lazer gun hand attachment, and a claw-mouth hand attachment. And a short sword or dagger, which was a real surprise to me.

Looking a Trap Jaw reminds me of all those re-uses of the leg sculpt in Masters of the Universe Classics. I didn’t have many MOTUC figures, but it seems like several had his legs. Which isn’t a bad thing. They look good. Let’s turn him around. They are more science fiction-y.

You can see that behind him we have the expected clips for the hand attachments, and also a strap for the sword. Once again, what a nice new addition! Trap Jaw to me is the kind of guy who never needed a weapon…I mean, his arm does the trick. Mattel really gave us a nice update here.

As you look around the packaging, sometimes the jaw appears silver and sometimes red. So this begged the question…could we swap the classic “stock” jaw with the one on his arm. YES!

This is a bigger jaw, but looks even more “heavy metal.”

Just for fun, here is a comparison pic. (MEGA Masters…Mattel needs to give us more of this. Soon.)

Here’s another comparison. That is Eternia Mini Trap Jaw from the Snake Mountain exclusive set.

So how long is that machine arm? It almost extends his body twice as tall.

So here is a question. How compatible is he with other figures of a similar gimmick? It always bothered me as a kid that Roboto and Trap Jaw couldn’t swap parts. (I don’t have MASTERVERSE Roboto. Going to wait on a New Eternia version).

New Eternia Trap Jaw does not work with Super7 Ultimates Metal Head. You can see that the pegs are a way different design.

How about Super7 Ultimate Cobra BAT (Comics colors)? I really wanted this one to work. NOPE. You can see I have BAT’s gun arm on there, but it is very loose and holding there by gravity/balancing. There is a little ring on Trap Jaw’s peg that keeps it from working. BAT’s design is like a “straight plug.”

Trap Jaw is the perfect addition to the bad guys. Just like Beast Man, this New Eternia Trap Jaw is a real update. I love it and give it a solid 5/5. 

Hub City Geeks, I just joined the ForEternia.com website. I discovered that He-Man.org is no more. So there you have it. It isn’t like I posted there much since they took everything down except for the forum. I actually lost my log in. I got some feedback from Val Staples a couple of times when I e-mailed him questions, so that was cool. And best of all, one of my songs was on the Roast Gooble Dinner CD they took around to PowerCon, San Diego Comic Con, etc. Not that anybody is beating down the door to listen to my music. Just the same, it is an end of an era in my mind. I started with Adam Tyner’s page all the way back in high school, and that morphed into the org. It was the driving media for MOTUC it seemed. There were toxic elements of it for sure also. Fans seem to want a forum divorced from the industry, and I get that. So I am going to try ForEternia. You might see me on there sometime as the username SPARTANNERD, of course!

Mega Snake Mountain Review part 2

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This is the third part of a huge review.

Part 1- Packaging and Minifigures (Click)

Part 2- “Section One” (Click)

Part 3- “Section 2” and final thoughts (You are here!)

I mentioned in the Part 2 review that this is a “daunting” project. I kept putting it off. I actually figured it would snow some during the school year, but that never materialized, and so a lot of the projects I would work on never happened. But this one…the first part took hours and hours. And I knew this part would also. Throw in that this is my least favorite looking piece of Snake Mountain, and it finally just took me getting tired of the box taking up all the room in the closet.

This build took about 10-12 hours. I would work on it for 1.5-3 hours and then stop. (I would take brief breaks to do normal things, of course. I mention the box was taking up my space. I ultimately decided to throw it away. I kept some of the more “diarama”-ish pieces, which is why you see the build sitting on the black and gray “brick” packaging. Going forward with vehicles and such, this will be nice! I saw someone on FaceBook used HeroClix floor pieces to fill out their displays, and that looked fantastic! Using the box this way gives a similar vibe I think. The other thing…I used a large poster board we had sitting around as a backdrop. It is kind of beaten up and has a conspicuous label on the side, but I blurred that out in case anyone was wondering what that was about.

I have never been a big fan of the “face” on the vintage toy Snake Mountain. As a kid it was kind of confusing to me that the Filmation version had such a radically different design. All these years later, in order to make the most fans happy, they have amalgamated the designs. I don’t dislike it. But I still am not a fan that stupid face. As a kid I think I supposed it to be a snake…only the ugly face we can see. As an adult I learned that it was supposed to be a demon face. Well…it is a stupid face either way. It has a lever that you can used to open and close the mouth to make it “speak,” but I thought it more fun to have it eat Ram Man.

Up at the top where He-Man is being eaten, I still don’t know if that is a rat or a wolf. The original toy featured a removable microphone “voice changer.” This is still removable, and you can move its mouth also.

I like to joke about the Battle Bones having a “secret action feature.” One or two of the claws, they just launch off! I guess it is the type of plastic, the thickness of the pieces. But usually when I move it around, I lose some toes. Well, the back cheeks of the rat/wolf also have this problem. Eventually, not really caring as they aren’t that necessary of pieces, I just took them off.

I’m getting ahead of myself! What about the build.

I almost had a seizure when I saw the discoloration on these bricks. The SpartanWife decided I shouldn’t complain…it was probably on purpose. Turns out she was correct! Easily some of the most rewarding Mega building I have ever done was the lava slide!

You can take a flashlight of some kind and shine it behind and it makes a really cool glowing effect! The way the pieces are layered is also very fun and satisfying. The mix of translucent yellow/orange, opaque red, plus those unsightly paint splotches are what makes this work. (Isn’t the bridge a cool feature. And it is designed to break down like this also!)

Fans will sure get the picture reference of the above!

I don’t have pics of the other two sections alone. But the lava slide was just fun!

As you can see, there is a nice stairway going in front of the face that leads up to the bridge that crosses the lava slide. There is a ledge with shackles…actually a piece of the vintage design that I had forgotten about! In order to get a minifigure on it correctly, you pretty much have to take the chains off and attach to the arms, and then put them back on the wall. Beneath the ledge there is a false wall so that prisoners can bust out! It has a much better switch to cause it to open than the ones that came with Grayskull.

There are lots of pink squirel-ly things and a couple of “faces of evil,” as well as pink horns all over the place making this place into a corny, campy, obvious base for bad guys. One of the problems I had more than once in both sections of this build was getting the “faces of evil” to work. I wound up adding a round or square stud piece in several instances to make them fit. (You can’t tell I added a piece.)

Let’s look at the inside.

We have a jail. (Guess who is inside…) Filmation’s magic table. (Notice I placed Filmation-type figures around it. You don’t get more 1980’s than this!). A ladder leading from the top floor. The top floor also has the computer, which I think was in the vintage toy (maybe?). And the bone throne!

I love that more is going on here than in the vintage playset, where there was nothing but a hollow shell.

The magic table. This is the most worthy item! And the bone throne! If you watched the unfortunate “Some Kind of Monster” rockumentary about Metallica’s “St. Anger” disaster, I think I remember Kirk Hammet having a similar item. He said he likes to sit on it and think. In Filmation, we saw Skeletor sit on this quite often. I love the design…so evil! I like how Super7 made one for their MOTUC Snake Mountain, and was positively envious as it would be something I would never have. But this is great for Mega! Now, I do have a complaint. There is almost no floor space in front of the chair.

The throne rests on some flat gray pieces that have a single stud, so it is easy to take it out to set in other places or on other playsets. Traditional Skeletor works better. (Hub City Geeks, do you think this havoc staff is a darker color than the carded one?)

Notice that we have the correct stand for Screech also. It is red, and he (she?) has dark blue or black feet. Sorry, the SpartanNerd isn’t great with colors!

Thoughts on the whole set.

When you put it all together, it is massive!

You can store your figures in here. But there isn’t really that much room. For instance…

By the way, the instructions state that this table is supposed to lock in here. NO WAY! It doesn’t, and I don’t want to.

Ultimately, in the interest of space, I am going to keep it on display like this…

The table, the throne, and the sarlacc pit monster are ultimately cool pieces to use anywhere. I don’t recommend relying on this castle to stay locked together as you move it around. Remember, the SpartanNerd has dropped Castle Grayskull and had rebuild it. On the other hand, the pieces here are very tight. Almost unreasonably tight. The little pink horns and teeth and such…those things break off very easily. But also, that is an area where you kind of have artistic liberty also if you wanted to change them around.

FINAL THOUGHTS

I mentioned I might have to think twice about building an Eternia three towers or Fright Zone on account of some of the frustrations I had with building this set. But if you have been reading my blog, then you know I already have Eternia tower. In other words, it wasn’t bad enough to deter me from getting it.

The box got on my nerves enough to finally toss it out.

Do I regret this castle? Not really. As a Mega set, it has its quirks. The pieces not fitting together well, or fitting together TOO well. For. the price, looking back, I know I gave the minifigs a 5/5. I can stand by that, but why didn’t this set come with more? Where are the Snake Men? Why did we get another Evil Lyn?

In total, it probably took 24 hours to build this set. Your mileage may vary. I am an adult with the responsibilities of jobs and a family, and do other things also to be entertained. Some things have to give sometimes, and Section 2 of Snake Mountain kept getting procrastinated in favor of spending time with my wife, playing Magic the Gathering with my son, building other sets, playing with my dogs, fishing, etc. When I began building section 2, it sat on the kitchen table taking up everyone’s space for several days.

I guess I am saying, this was probably too much. There are complaints that the new Eternia Tower is too small…even I said this. But looking back after building this behemoth, I don’t think I want anymore sets this large. It is too tedious, and I think Mattel/Mega believes the same thing.

Let’s consider $300…and. it has been almost 365 days since it first arrived.

The packaging was a fail.

The selection of minifigures…Dragonblaster Skeletor (Great), Thunder Punch He-Man (Great), Ram Man (Great), Webstor (Great), Trap Jaw toy colors (should have been available apart from the set), Evil Lyn (meh), Screech (OK I guess. Why can’t we have open wings?). Snake Men (MIA). Skelcons (MIA).

(Rather than a Battle Cat large set build, they should give us Zoar and Screech. That would be worthy!)

The Filmation Side was terrific.

The more toy accurate side had a cool lava slide and terrific accessories.

A lot of hours of work. I am going to give the whole set a 3.5/5. Why the decimal? I believe there is alot of fun ahead with this set. I already have plans to make a comic! But the build was daunting, tedious, and lengthy, perhaps moreso than the feeling of accomplishment when it was done. More like “I’m glad I am finally finished.” I know I am old and such, but who is this marketed towards? The mid 30’s to mid 40’s crowd. I am optimistic that I will really enjoy it as a part of my almost complete set (Battle for Eternia II is hard to get). This piece is essential to having a complete set on account of the minifigures and on account of being a Masters of the Universe fan.

Thanks for reading if you did follow all of this! Do you agree with my 3.5/5 rating? Let me know in the comments or let me know of FaceBook!

Mega Eternia Tower- Attak Trak and Mini Figures. SpartanNerd review

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The Eternia Towers. As a child I only dreamed of this set. I knew of it from the toy catalogue in 1987? and also from the mini-comics. (Here is a picture below.). In person I have only seen this toy one time, at the Toy Federation in Greer, SC. And it is truly a marvel. HUGE! Which is why the size of this set is a little bit of a downer.

Now I am NOT building the tower yet. I figure I would wait until I got all three pieces. Surely Grayskull Tower and Viper Tower will come out before Christmas this year. Just up front, this set looks to be smaller than the vintage set was.

Instead I was super excited that we finally got the Attak Trak! I don’t have much of a nostalgia connection to the tower. But the Attak Trak, now we are talking! I might have skipped this set if it weren’t for that specific vehicle.

But first, the packaging. This is one of the best boxes in awhile. (Pictured at the top). It features the Eternia Tower prominently, and shows off the mini figures with an illustrated vibe. You also can see the Attak Trak. Important…it also shows paintings of Grayskull Tower and Viper Tower, as well as Castle Grayskull and Snake Mountain. Eternia Tower is supposed to be a place of balance between good and evil. (I think this is the original lore anyway.). I heard sometime awhile back that the intention was to create a Grayskull 2.0. This set was to feature a piece of Grayskull and Snake Mountain, both of which were out of production but demand was expected to go up with the movie and all in 1987. The Eternia Tower story was to launch off new property, He-Ro and the Masters of Preternia, or something like that.

The sides and the back of the box are terrific, featuring retro blueprint types of designs in red. I can’t express how great I thought this was! And this box is much smaller than Grayskulls or Snake Mountains. Of course, this set is alot less pieces though.

Now for the figures.

We got Battle Armor He-Man. This is the same as the one we got before (I am going to show comparisons on all of the duplicates.). The only difference is this armor has the one scratch on it.

We got Webstor. This is the same Webstor from Snake Mountain, but with a darker color scheme (hard to tell in the photo) and also a larger lazer.

I couldn’t help but do an Erle Norem reference. We get Buzz Off. I prefer Buzz Off without the helmet. It seems I lost it when I was a kid, and kind of forgot about it until I was an adult. But he came with it, and his little axe also. This is the first Buzz Off we have had, and so Clawful and Whiplash couldn’t be too far behind soon… (They use the same chest piece and monster legs.)

And finally, Ninjor. This guy is a walking weapons rack! He comes with a bow and arrow, a katana, and nunchuks. Admittedly, this character wasn’t one I had as a kid. I have expressed that I had about 80% of Masters of the Universe stuff as a child. But Ninjor just wasn’t one of them. I don’t know much about the character either. I remember Jitsu quite well, and am surprised that we haven’t seen him yet to balance out Fisto.

I went ahead and built the weapons rack/computer system.

We have been given so many different weapon racks. But this one is different. the computer on one side…I just am not familiar enough with the Eternia Tower set to know if this was part of the original toy. I like how the graphics on there show the three towers. I almost think of it as a charging station for the Attak Trak. The weapons are in bright orange, and frankly I don’t really like that.

Here is some comparisons with other weapons racks we have from this line.

Here is a comparison with a Skeletor Head computer.

All of this is pretty consistent. On to the Attak Trak!

As a child, this was my FAVORITE vehicle. It ate the C batteries…that was the problem. But I loved it from the cartoon (which was more of a big talking van) and I loved the toy with the awesome treads to run stuff over.

Those blue things on the side were always a puzzle to me. Were they supposed to be guns? I never could tell, and really almost can’t tell now. It has a rocket design on it, so maybe a missle launcher?

They included nice vintage printed blocks to go where the stickers would be, just like they did with the Battle Ram.

On the vintage toy, figures could grab the handle basically with the same design as the battle ram. Here we don’t get that option. It just has some studs that stick off to the side and nothing for the figures to grab. The wheels work exactly like the vintage toy. Which is super fantastic. You have to push it yourself, of course. But it is a genius design.

In Masters of the Universe Classics, we got a few vehicles. Roton, Battle Ram, Wind Raider. But they skipped the Attak Trak. And that was actually truly shameful. I don’t even think we have had any Attak Trak re-dos or analogues since the 1980s. I don’t own a single Masters of the Universe Origins figure. But if they come out with a new Attak Trak, I bet I am the first to get it!

And now you know how this story will play out…

Here is a bug theme setup, Buzz Off vs. Monstroid.

Well, I rate the Attak Trak a solid 5/5. I think it is weak to give us another Battle Armor He-Man and another Webstor. Ninjor is cool, but doesn’t really belong in my head. Buzz off is terrific.

They need to give us more mini figures. You all know what. I really want. It is that Battle for Eternia II set. But no one has it. So….

MASTERVERSE Comics Collection

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I finally got the Cover B of issue 2, so now I have a complete collection of Masters of the Universe MASTERVERSE comics.

I am going to discuss in a little bit of detail my feelings about these, so there will be spoilers. I am going to leave some dead spaces for your protection, readers!

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So the MASTERVERSE comics start off with a rather weak and throw-away connecting story. Zodac has visited the Sorceress to discuss the balance of the universe, and how He-Man might be unnecessary or dangerous. She shows him the Nexus of Realities, which looks like a portal crossed with some kind of screen, and they watch He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, and their consequences across a variety of settings.

Which encapsulates what they have been trying to do with this brand recently, doesn’t it? They are trying to kind of say, “It doesn’t have to be what you remember it being.” The prevailing stories that people have are Filmation and Mini-Comics. I would say the movie, New Adventures, 200x, box art, and others are out there, but not the main stories that people have. Mattel wants to skew this view maybe as marketing, maybe as philosophy…who knows.

Issue 1 is one of my favorites! Prince Adam and Orko have ventured into the forest or something, and they are attacked by Webstor, Batros, and finally Scare Glow. And you keep thinking, “Why doesn’t he change?” It is like he is putting it off, or hesitating. Finally, as Scare Glow has him down, he transforms by saying “By the horror of Grayskull!” into…”Castle Grayskull Man!” What? And then he beats down scareglow and absorbs his soul. The final panel shows Castle Grayskull with shining eyes, and there is narrative saying “The castle must feast again.” or similar.

This is a FREAKY angle. I loved it!

The second story is based on the art and style of Groo the Wanderer. I have never read that comic before, but I could just kind of tell the gist of what it might be like to read it by the cover art. So…This is basically a newspaper comic strip style of story. It is told with slapstick elements…He-Man and Skeletor are just goofballs. It ends with them playing video games together…I mean. I think it is cute. But it just isn’t for me.

Issue 2 both surprised and disappointed me.

The first story, the surprise, is a pirate story. Basically General Adam is leading the ship on a treasure hunt to find the power sword. Keldor is the one who had the king send them, and you can tell he has the king hypnotized. Sending Adam away served two purposes…get him out of the way of the usurping scheme, and then either have Adam killed on the journey, or he comes back successfully and gives up the treasure. This story presents us with Jitsu as a prisoner who knows how to access the island, and we get a sympathetic look at him. This was something different and nice. Essentially a monster destroys the ship and kills everyone on board, but Adam saves Jitsu and swims to shore, dragging him and cursing about the giant metal hand. When he finds the sword, he transforms, and then it is revealed Keldor’s true intentions, for the Power Sword reveals what its potential users would do with it.

The second story is the one that disappointed me. Here is why…Cover B shows a character. It is a noir style drawing, and that is fine. I thought it must be EXTENDAR. Look at what you see there.

That mask looks like Extendar’s mask. And so I thought maybe we would have a rare Extendar Story. Nope…it’s dust Man At Arms. This story presents Duncan as a detective, with Evil Lyn as his lady sidekick/secretary/lover? We get a glimpse that both of them have been exiled from their team of good guys or bad guys. This story doesn’t even have He-Man or Skeletor in it…Orko comes in saying he cast a spell that made Kind Randor disappear, and so he created a fake Randor to prevent alarm. But his imperfect copy says “meow.” Evil Lyn brings him his “tools” so he can collect evidence, and he finds an orange hair on Orko. So of course they go to a bar to find Beast Man. (Of course in this noir style they had to visit a bar). It is Trap Jaw’s bar, and all the bad guys are there, but they don’t seem very healthy, and they are drinking to forget how bad things have become without Skeletor. They also accuse Evil Lyn of being a traitor. So Man-At-Arms kicks all their butts. Evil Lyn chases Beast Man outside where it is discovered that he is high and hallucinating the good ole days from inhaling magic fumes that shouldn’t be there. So detective Duncan figures it out. There are unstable dimensional portals popping up because of “overuse.” The magic fumes were transported to outside the bar from wherevere their origin was. Man-At-Arms figures out that another portal must have done the same thing, causing Orko to hallucinate that the king was missing. And that Beast Man must have been there by accident, wandering between the locations using the portals while hallucinating himself. Oh yes, Duncan also implies that Evil Lyn might have had some hand in that portal being open like that, just so they could get some business. Meaning they are in cahoots flim-flamming people!

Really, a dumb story. The last noir Masters of the Universe story we had was SO GOOD. It was the one where Evil Lyn seduces the guy to get the Eye of Grayskull. Hub City Geeks…look this story up. It is terrific! I believe it was a web-only DC comic, setting up the New 52 He-Man books. That story was one of the best Evil Lyn stories, but also in that black and white style, it was wonderful. The story presented in MASTERVERSE is just dumb.

The third issue was probably the darkest of them all. Story one presents an “end of time” story, where Teela and her unicorn (this keeps coming up…that she rides a unicorn…an artifact from the original minicomics) are lone survivors. That great wars have come and gone, and the world is savage. She happens upon a lynching. Beast Man is tied to a stake to be executed. She starts to not intervene, but then her “ancestor spirits” tell her she must. These include Veena from 200x, and other former sorceresses. So she attempts a rescue, but as she begins to be successful, out of nowhere Savage He-Man attacks her! She comments that they are equal combatives, but she outsmarts him with a headbutt. When she is about to kill him, she is warned that she must not, that he is essential to the survival of the universe. Beast Man came to this world to find her because as a shaman, he also has ancestor spirits that told him to seek out the two of them.

The second story is highly enjoyable. But so dark. I became interested in this artist…David Rubin. He publishes something called “Ether.” This one is a riff on Thor. He-Man is with his drunk viking friends Ram Man, Man-E-Faces, and Stratos. They are adventuring around looking for their next drink, when they happen upon Skeletor about to sacrifice The Temple of Darkness Sorceress in a pit of fire. He is doing this to obtain more power apparently, and holds the Sword of Chaos. He-Man just says, “Oh Well. Not our problem!” though the other drunken masters believe they should intervene. They all set up camp and get into a fight over some beer that Ram Man had stashed in his armor. Obviously He-Man won the fight, and got drunk and passed out. When he woke up, he found the Masters were gone. He followed their tracks back to Skeletor, where he found them dead or dying. They implored him that he must save her! He-Man goes into a black rage and recounts being banished by Randor, (as he was once Adam Randorson,) and then beats Skeletor down and takes the sword. He actually catches the blade and rips it out of Skeletor’s hands, and beats him with the hilt, causing him to fall into the fire he was trying to use for the sacrifice. It turns out that the Sorceress could have left the whole time, as she was an astral projection. This all happened so that He-Man could wield and contain the power of the Sword of Chaos and save the universe.

I like both of these stories, especially the viking one. He-Man and the Drunken Masters of the Universe is a very strange twist for the story. (I mean…it is Thor and the Warriors Three, right?)

And the final issue. This issue doesn’t so much seem like a Masterverse presentation as it is a re-assertion of more recent stories. One thing both stories have in common, however is “We have the power!” I really just can’t bear the Netflix designs, the story pacing and dialogue, the character portrayals…None of it. To me it is just awful. I don’t even want to try and explain it here. I got a headache just reading it, similar to watching “Transformers, Dark of the Moon.” The other is a He-Force story. The He-Force was given to us at the end of the comic series “He-Man and the Masters of the Multiverse.” They are kind of a Justice League made of He-warriors from different universes…Hence “The Multiverse.” It is notable that the first thing we see in this story is He-Sol beating Skeletor in what appears to be a movie accurate Eternia. (He-Sol is basically the African American He-Man). He gets called away from this fight to join the rest of the He-Force to take on a Red Menace. It turns out to be Multiverse Modulok becoming inter-dimensionally present (They even call him Megabeast) as well as his brain, and this is causing everyone to be on his side to take over all universes. The original He-Man, dressed in his New 52 end of series armor, says that the He-Force has to give him his power back so that he can take out Modulok. This happens out of the story, where we see He-Man meet with Zodac and the Sorceress, as Modulok comes in to attack. And it is over pretty much in one punch.

Ok. The He-Force. I am not against it. I think all of the characters in it are interesting. Why can’t we have individual comics detailing each one by themselves?

I’m proud of my complete collection. Now i need to get some of them signed!