A bunch of these have come up on MyComicShop, and so I got one! Probably there is a spike in demand because of the new Masters of the Universe movie!

This is from Summer 1986, exactly 40 years ago. Also, this one announces the contest where a kid will get to be in the movie! This came true as Pigboy was indeed a child who won the contest! (Follow the link for more information…I’m not taking any responsibility for anything you encounter in your searching around with that.)

The main idea of this one…”King Hiss and the Snake Men challenge He-Man” features fantastic Earl Norem artwork of the toy-style Snake Mountain, King Hiss, Cobra Kahn, Tongue Lasher, and Rattlor. He-Man anatomically swings into action with his battle axe and shield! (Yes…Norem was a master of anatomy…as my art friends say). Meteorbs are a minor push in this issue, Create a vehicle has promise, while Start a Summer Power Club sounds ambitious for a bunch of kids under 10.

I have another one of these magazines, and I collect them only for nostalgia purposes. No one should ever pay more than $20 for one of these except for possibly issue #1. You never see these graded, but if you do (I have) then it will be a low grade…more trouble than it is worth. And besides, the fun of this is going back into the past, reading the stories and letters, and seeing the old ads. You can’t do that if you have your magazine slabbed and are asking more than $75 for it, most of that value being upcharge.

You can tell that my copy is well worn. But it is all here! I am going to present photos and then some commentary behind them.

I can’t drink that red dye anymore…but Looney Toons were still popular back in the 1980s. In recent years, the most popularity you see of them is Space Jam. The erosion of values!

The table of contents…pictures on the right would indicate a Meteorb, He-Man with a tree, Kobra Kahn in a cool vehicle, and the Snake Men and Skeletor on the bottom.

There are two posters in this issue!

A Letter from He-Man, Orko Earth Report, and He-Man of the Issue are regular columns, you can read the features for yourself, but we have a movie article here not really mentioned on the cover.

Another add, this time for the Walt Disney Home Videos. You have Alice, the Cheshire Cat, Mickey Mouse in a tuxedo, and Winnie the Pooh. I believe the only feature movie here is Alice in Wonderland if you look close at the photos. Are these BETA-MAX? I looked close, and there’s no indication of Beta or VHS.

He-Man, Grayskull, and the Jet Sled. The Jet Sled was a recent accessory offering in 1986, Do you think maybe they pasted the Jet Sled over He-Man somehow?

I am keeping my magazine together, but removing the posters takes a big chunk out of the included comic book…something that bothered me big time as a child. So I never took them out until the magazine was falling apart. And then my mom WOULDN’T LET ME HANG THEM UP!

The Snake Men poster is the same as the cover, but here is the Meteorb poster.

This was already ripped and then re-stapled by fingernail obviously. The Meteorbs…we didn’t have them as kids. I felt like they were stupid anyway. If you look into it, you will find that they were actually a different, failed toyline that Mattel folded into MOTU. I feel like they were already seeing the need to have transforming toys in order to compete with the Transformers. I also never had Rokon or Stonedar. (Looking at the posters was skipping ahead…, oh reader).

A nice letters column. Notable that I have a letter published in Transformers #10...I have every cover that I could get. And I wonder if these kids still have their copies of this magazine?

I don’t remember which of these I actually had as a child. I had a subscription, though. If I had only known…In fact, if we all would have known we would have bought two of everything and kept one pristine in storage…

So is this our first look at the movie that would be come Masters of the Universe: The Movie? This is so relevant to today because of the recent Masters of the Universe just released on June 5 this year.

Because I already talked about Pigboy, let’s talk about Dolph Lundgren. As a kid, I had seen Rocky IV, and was truly sad when the evil Russian steroid-user boxer killed Apollo Creed, who was dressed in the American Flag, and so happy when the Italian Stallion who actually worked out fair and square took him down. We all knew the USSR were the bad guys…see Top Gun for instance. When I was told that the same villain was going to be He-Man…I didn’t…get it…if that makes sense. I was only 7 years old. He looks nice enough in these pictures. And I am now a big fan of Dolph. I also thought his He-Man was really good back then and now. But it was hard for me to digest everything…I was forming my ideas about what was real and what was fiction. Could I grok ideas behind the making of movies? Casting choices? Budgets? Limitations? No, I could not.

As we go through this magazine…be ready for this to be pushed some more. Kids loved the Statue of Liberty back then…the world was more patriotic. I remember cheering when the Ghostbusters made it come alive using a NES Advantage controller in Ghostbusters 2. (Yep. I out nerded you, readers!) It was apparently the 100th year of the anniversary of France giving the United States the statue. And I guess it was time to capitalize on that also to the smart kids who read magazines.

ORKO’S EARTH REPORT

Labyrinth– I have seen this a few times…they used to show it at school. It is similar to The Dark Crystal and The Never Ending Story. Kind of scary to see at times. When kids see things like that song reference in Stranger Things today…I mean…we lived it.

SpaceCamp– NASA had a real Space Camp, I’m pretty sure. If you were rich! I don’t remember this movie.

Ulysses 31– What amounts to an ad for a different fantasy cartoon…what? But no one remembers Ulysses 31, but everyone remember He-Man. I’m sure it was great, though.

Reading Rainbow– If you are reading this blog, you probably have had the theme song for Reading Rainbow stuck in your head before. I remember discussing LeVar Burton in college with my friends, and how we loved him in Star Trek: The Next Generation. One of my friends said he cried the first time he heard him cuss…

Oh yeah…

This is a cool picture of He-Man. I was glad to see this still in the magazine.

Never heard of any of this. NOTICE. This is the second time we see The Statue of Liberty Magazine pushed.

The USELESS Prince Adam. Now you know why I probably blog with all-caps a bunch of times.

Jet Sled, Cyclone, Spydor, Tongue Lasher, Rattlor, Kobra Kahn, King Hiss, He-Man, and Skeletor. The marketing strategy was SOLID in 1986.

Remember the “Meteorb” from the Table of Contents. Nope. It was a bait-and-switch. Spydor is throwing rocks and He-Man hits them like a baseball player. So 1980’s!

Trunk of Tree a Serpent Be!

He-Man shows a new power with his sword. He breaks King Hiss’s spell and changes the tree back to normal. I also like how he won’t hurt the snakes. The strong women in my family are so terrified of snakes. Deathly terrified. And typically a strong man would use a hoe or shovel to chop off their heads if one was around to ease their minds.

(I find this truly horrifying, Hub City Geeks. Poor snakes. I do feel this drastic action is necessary if it is a poisonous snake that will be around where kids or pets are playing. Most of my family hasn’t had the knowledge to tell the difference, and besides that my mom, grandmother, and aunts were so afraid. But there is a 6ft+ long black snake likely under my house right now…I don’t mind! It needs to be worried about my German Shepherd.)

Seriously…we used to swim at a lake house that my grandparents owned (Sadness!) We were told to stay on one side of the dock, because the other side “had snakes.” OK…the logic…

He-Man won’t hurt the snakes because they are innocent creatures…I love it!

I was a science nut as a kid. And I heard about tornadoes picking up frogs, fish, even people and dropping them in other places as hail stones. So, someone has a hailstorm of snakes. My grandmother and mom would have a true nightmare!

King Hiss’s gimmick…as a kid…me and my brothers generally thought King Hiss was disguised as a good guy, but then would reveal himself as evil. The mini comics and magazines like this pointed us in the correct direction. Also, at this point, shouldn’t the Snake Men have already been prepared for battle? The point here was to roll-call them for marketing purposes.

A classic Filmation move. Bowl the enemies over with a round boulder.

So…are they presenting the Blasterhawk as a potential fan-created vehicle? This was a toy you could buy in 1986! So this doesn’t seem fair. (I never had a Blaster Hawk)

The Bat Pak- I had to look up and see if this was ever produced. It seems so…logical. But they didn’t make it.

Rattle Trap- Wouldn’t this one have been cool to have?! They didn’t come out with any vehicles for the Snake Men faction, and so it makes you think…was this an idea that they decided not to go with?

Up-Scaler- With Moss Man driving. Also, this one looks kind of logical…why didn’t they ever make it? Leech was an action figure with suction cups…in fact suction cups and sticky toys were “cool” in 1986.

What vehicle would the SpartanNerd make…OK. The Sound Shocker. With Rio-Blast driving it. It is shaped like the Battle Ram (without the Sky Sled), but has giant amplifiers on all sides. Rio-Blast or WHOEVER can sit up front with the included guitar accessory, and assault everyone’s ears with glorious noise!

And here is our third mention of The Statue of Liberty Magazine. This time they are giving you a card to bug your parents with.

POWER PUZZLES- This page was all worked by a previous owner. The color-by-number is a picture of Orko. Matching…some of these characters go to more than one place.

True story. My first-grade-self had a true saint for a teacher. She isn’t with us anymore (she’s with Jesus). But I remember taking one of these magazines to her and telling her that she could run copies of the puzzles for the class to do. She just looked at me, and then said “I don’t want to!” I still remember it… But think about it. We were always doing word searches and coloring pages. A kid would like to contribute. So now as an adult, I include any reference to He-Man that I can into work that I create. For instance, Skeletor is one of the multiple-choice answers on my substitute worksheet response to a video about The Human Voice. I even included a picture of the more recent Golden Book “I Am Skeletor!”

This page wasn’t worked, but you can easily tell that the puzzles here are more difficult.

It says there are 17 power swords…they aren’t as easy to see as you think. It took me a minute to find them all.

Mystery Meteorbs. Once again, not a fan of the Meteorbs. In Norem’s poster, did you notice that one guy is a big red ball? He looks orange here. I don’t know…when I see these guys, they look like general 1980’s toys. Like they are an oval ball with an animal coming out. The robot guy and the lion are the best ones…Maybe the elephant. I mean…the crocodile? What croc looks like this? That is one fat bear. I know that Brontosaurus was a hefty boy, but not round like this.

The He-Man club. Anybody remember the movie The Little Rascals. They had a no-girls club called “The He-Man Woman Haters Club“.

So this brings up a question…because in 1986 this was when She-Ra came out…What if…

No question about Mary Lou Retton being an awesome athlete. I didn’t know, but just spent some time on Wikipedia. $30? for a 30 minute video? Notice that Mary Lou is apparently an olympic athlete wearing red, white, and blue. I’m just saying…this vibe with the Statue of Liberty. Wikipedia seems to indicate that she was a big supporter of the Reagan Administration, also very 1980’s. (NOTE: The Disney videos already mentioned in the magazine were also $30).

This is a cool story about Jason Isroff. It was good public service, and it was good that the publishers recognized this to encourage others to do right. I remember the principal of our school had a “Tiger of the Day” award to someone who served the school community. (Tigers was the mascot at Clifdale Elementary…glad they changed that when we became a middle school!)

Yep. I’m a rare kind of guy who has had three careers in the same place. I attended Clifdale Elementary, then as an adult I taught music at Clifdale Elementary. After moving to Cowpens Middle School to teach chorus, what was decided? To move Cowpens into a re-formated Clifdale Middle School. I say often, “The Lord Jesus really wants me to be at Clifdale!”

Check this ad. I remember Rainbow Brite fondly…and I remember the toys of the Popples. But I don’t remember anything about Ulysses 31. All three of these are worth looking at on Dan Larsen’s “Secret Galaxy” YouTube channel.

The back cover is yet another ad. This one doesn’t jump out at you as an ad, however. It invites you to order one of these personalized storybooks. But as you look closer…BAM…Fruit Rollups and Fruit Bars.

I felt like this trip down memory lane was fun, and am thinking about getting more of these magazines as people are putting their copies out for sale or trade while demand is up. Do you have any of these, Hub City Geeks? Let me know in the comments!

MASTERVERSE Moss Man- SpartanNerd Unboxing and Review

September 6, 2025 by SpartanNerd

Check out this review on my YouTube channel!

I saw Moss Man’s reveal online at SDCC, and thought, “I better jump on that or I will miss it like I missed Blade.” (Yes. Still belly-aching about that). What I didn’t expect was for it to be offered FIRST to the people who subscribed to Club Grayskull last year.

All year long I have thought “What a waste of $10. All they have released are Origins figures.” I haven’t been collecting Origins Masters of the Universe figures, mainly because the first couple of waves had colors that pushed against my sensibilities. I mean, the vintage form factor is obviously cool, but the colors they chose just looked like…Play-Doh. And I couldn’t bear it. And even now, the Origins figures still have an off-putting quality. I do feel like what is up ahead in that scale for Mattel looks better, with the MOTU/Thundercats mashup. And then there is the 200x figures that they previewed kind of in the same form as the Thundercats thing.

But back to MASTERVERSE. The line aimed at the Classics collectors. Club Grayskull hasn’t put anything out for us until Moss Man. Now that he is out, I will be looking for more stuff.

Moss Man- This is a figure I remember playing with a lot as a child. That flocking…You know…I thought I imagined that piney fresh scent. I played with him a lot outside in actual moss. We had Stinkor, who definitely smelled “bad.” But Moss Man’s smell was at least not overpowering the actual smell of the pine trees, pecan trees, maple trees, oak trees in Spartanburg. I specifically remember having a large pecan trees on top of a hill behind our house, and there being moss on this tree and hill. It was a good place to play with Moss Man, and also freak out my mother! (“Moss is poisonous.” She might have been right…I looked it up.)

I would eventually get the Masters of the Universe Classics version, which was also flocked. There was controversy at the time…something about “flocked ears.” Mine didn’t have flocked ears.

This was my Classics Moss Man…I sold him off as part of my post-Covid purge. I am regretful.

So how did he turn out? And was he worth the extra $10 paid a year ago? Keep reading!

PACKAGING

Moss Man came in a plastic-free box that contained no blister, and no photography. All artwork. This is in line with Vykron and Snout Spout. This is a great box to keep for storage, or in my case to beef up the forest scenery in my diorama. It has a large picture of Moss Man’s face with energized eyes, reminding us that in recent versions Moss Man is considered a nature god. This is a wraparound image, that has more plants on both sides and some Eternian animals.

The back has an artwork rendition of Moss Man, rather than a photoshop. So this is very welcome in my book. More Art=More Better. If you watched my YouTube video already, you know I missed the faint images of the Roton flying in the background.

So Roton has been on several MASTERVERSE packages. Is this a hint, Hub City Geeks?

Inside there is yet another figure cover. What is disappointing here is that because the words Moss Man are so prevalent, this isn’t that usable as a diorama piece.

I’m complaining about it not being usable, but it really is. You could cut it up or photoshop it or whatever. They gave you something to work with.

Sorry for the blurry photo. This Moss Man title reminds me of a student at the school where I work’s t-shirt for the musical “Wicked”

The other side has an opening in the forest revealing the three Eternia towers. It also features a tree resembling Skytree…the oldest living thing in Eternia according to the filmation cartoon series.

This is a nice picture. But Moss Man is so large it looks strange behind him.

WHAT DO YOU GET IN THE BOX?

A new use for Mekaneck. Moss Man is ten neck segments tall. (8 inches at the tip of the horn on his back.

Moss Man figure
Alternate “plant” hand
Knife (dagger or machete?)
Belt with knife sheath
Club (or magic wand/staff?)

So not many accessories here. Notably, he didn’t come with any alternate hands. “The plant hand” thing is also usable in other ways around or on the figure.

FIGURE REVIEW

MASTERVERSE New Eternia Moss Man is very large. The horn on his back makes him slightly taller than Snout Spout, and this is saying something! But if you dig a little deeper, you can see what is really going on here.

Moss Man stands even taller than Snout Spout.

You basically have New Eternia Beast Man’s buck with an armor piece over the top of it. It is clear that the torso, the biceps and elbows, and the thighs are all the same parts that were on NE Beast Man. And this is kind of fitting, considering that the vintage figure was a repaint of Beast Man with flocking.

Moss Man IS taller than NE Beast Man. And yet they share the same basic parts. It is the feet and the head that pushes him over.

Sometimes I think big companies (like Mattel) want US to forget about stuff that came before. For instance, we had a Moss Man in MASTERVERSE already…it was based on the Kevin Smith show. I never picked it up because it didn’t look like MY Moss Man. And they probably want us to forget about the New Eternia Beast Man shown here. (They have two more recent Beast Man figures…the movie version and the ugly version with the articulated jaw. BUT THE SPARTANNERD REMEMBERS! And so Moss Man is using Beast Man’s parts.

I haven’t removed the armor, but that armor is what makes him so tall…it has the spikes on the back similar to Clawful’s armor.

In turning Moss Man’s head, he has so much Michael Bolton hair that his head can’t turn without popping off when his beard rubs against that armor. This is an articulation point worth mentioning, but it is a common problem so I won’t mark off for it. Just the same, don’t be disturbed if your Moss Man loses his head…it goes right back on.

He stands very well, with big feet. But he is kind of stiff in the articulation department. He doesn’t’ seem to be “lanky” like Two-Bad, but he is such a chunk at least I kind of want him to stand there and flex on my diorama.

THE FLOCKING DEBATE

I don’t know how I feel about this not having flocking. The flocking is such an embedded characteristic of the character.

I have two vintage Moss Man figures. One of these was definitely mine as a child. I don’t know why I have two. That flocking is NASTY after all these years.

The sculpt on NE Moss Man is undeniably good. But by removing that fuzzy texture (and piney scent,) it is like removing the soul of the character.

Now if he was flocked, we would lose those sculpted details.

By not releasing him with flocking, they increase their artistic opportunities. But I wonder if there might be a compromise somewhere. Also…maybe one day this will be releases with flocking. OK…one more thing. NE Beast Man and a few others have SOFT GOODS. It just seems like somehow that fuzzy furry quality could have been represented somehow. Maybe make that plastic armor piece cloth goods or something. Or the arm wraps cloth goods.

On the other hand, you can clearly see that my two vintage toys have taken a beating. And that flocking has rubbed off around the joints.

I don’t have to have a totally flocked Moss Man, but that part of his legacy needed to be honored here.

Check out this Earl Norem image from the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe Magazine, May 1985 issue. (I haven’t removed the poster, so I can only show the bottom corner)

Over and over in old media, Moss Man is presented as a fuzzy-wuzzy.

Check out this DC comic, He-Man and the Eternia War Issue 10 (this one has Skeletor transforming on the front)

Moss Man kamikazes the Fright Zone in this story.

DC New 52 designed him with these horns, but just the same he is a hairy beast. He also wears the gold armor that they seemed to favor.

SPARTANNERD RATING

Sculpt- 1 point. My only complaint about the sculpt is that Mattel doesn’t take efforts to hide the joints. But this is across the board in this line. And at large the figures are under $25. So they aren’t Mythic Legions sculpted and engineered by the Four Horsemen studios.

Paint- 1 point. This is a good paint job. Maybe something could have been done to make his face “pop” a little better in a green context, however.

Articulation- 1 point, with no real “stupid problems”. He stands very well, AND in this picture where he is throwing Stinkor at Two-Bad, I left the room for awhile and returned and he was still standing there holding him all stable!

I did this photo as an homage to the minicomic “The Stench of Evil”. What…your Two-Bad didn’t come with a helmet?

Accessories- Why didn’t this come with more stuff? Why no left gripping hand? BOO! I would even be ok with paying more money for more appropriate accessories.

The feels- Well he’s Moss Man. I have so many fond memories! Playing with him outside in the moss and getting fussed at! On the heroic team, we have needed a Moss Man.

I am not marking Moss Man down for not being flocked. But I am marking him down for not having more accessories. I used that craft moss I got from Hobby Lobby. Mattel should have given us some plants and trees and such. In fact…I had this complaint about the Classics version. (That flower in the photo was in the wild when I took the photo.)

This is Figura Obscura Monkey King, with MASTERVERSE New Eternia Moss Man. Also MOTUC Temple of Darkness Zoar.

I rate MASTERVERSE New Eternia Moss Man a 4/5, losing a point for not having many accessories. I also feel that there should have been some way to present flocking on this figure, if not having him totally flocked. And it isn’t like the technology doesn’t exist…go check out the Mythic Legions “Bryophytis” (I don’t own this one)…he looks just like Moss Man should with a different head.

Do you agree or disagree? Let me know in the comments!

SpartanNerd Project…Earl Norem Poses

July 20, 2015 by SpartanNerd

I had this crazy idea. Really more of a dream. I could get each person who is interviewed in the Masters of the Universe Art Book to sign their article. Or maybe a piece of art. I know it never would happen…I am not a well traveled person. But it was a fine thought.

But not soon after the book was published, one of the greatest artists of Masters of the Universe passed away. Earl Norem. I wrote my thoughts right here on the SpartanNerd Blog. (Link)

To help illustrate my love for Norem’s work, I thought I would attempt to emulate it with the incredible Masters of the Universe Classics figures. So here is my attempt at “The Sunbird Legacy.”

A few Caveats have to apply.

The figures have one expression. Some have alternate heads. But you still have a limitation.
The hair can be wrong.
Norem didn’t always paint the weapons the same way.
I don’t have the diorama piece. As this stuff becomes more available to me, I will see about photographing some of it.

I chose this picture because I thought it was one of the most do-able. My favorite is the one with He-Man on a lion and Skeletor leading an elephant army, with the space battle among the meteors a close second. But you’ll see.

I tried the Snake Armor He-Man head. But it doesn’t look as good as the original. In the picture, Skeletor’s sword is more of a scimitar. The closest I had available is Draego Man’s sword. The Havoc Staff is bigger than the one in the painting. This proves to be the biggest problem. I felt like the pose above was too…boring. Not capturing the motion of Norem’s work.

This photo is closer to Earl Norem. Still not perfect. It is really hard to get Skeletor to balance like this. If you look at the Norem at length…(as I have,) you can see that He-Man and Skeletor have very parallel hips. He-Man’s figure can’t quite stress his head back or hold his shield at quite the same angle, and still keep balance. (He-Man has weak ankles.)

The colors are pretty good. The white background is about as good as I could do. I applied a filter to mute it a little.

So, Hub City Geeks. What do you think about my new venture? Can you do better? Send me your pics, and let me know in the comments!

The Grieving SpartanNerd

June 23, 2015 by SpartanNerd

Today, (June 22) I just learned that Earl Norem passed away. (He died on June 19, 2015, at the age of 91.)

Earl Norem was the incredible artist who did posters and covers for the Masters of the Universe magazine back in the 1980’s. My mother subscribed to this for me, and I never knew why I stopped getting it. (Later as an adult I would learn that it was discontinued.)

Norem leaves a legacy of Masters of the Universe work, not only including magazines, but all kinds of books. Think “Little Golden Books” type. Also the paperback kind you could get at Book Fairs in elementary school.

I reconnected with Norem’s work back in the late 1990’s, when I was just learning to explore the internet. I was a part of Adam Tyner’s page, which eventually evolved into He-Man.org. (I am only a member of the forums there now. Oh. And one of my songs was published on the Roast Gooble Dinner soundtrack.) Back then, I scoured the internet for images of He-Man, and kept a folder on my computer so I could look at them anytime and reminisce. This folder would follow me to today, where I have it on my mac to circulate desktop pictures. Norem’s work is the most classically spectacular of all of Masters of the Universe paintings.

Eventually, I would listen to Roast Gooble Dinner, and Val Staples, Emiliano Santalucia, Eamon O’Donahue, and Pixel Dan Eardly would interview Norem. I listened to this interview at least three times! Just to hear him talk about his work…and the guy was almost completely clueless that he was revered as a great artist!

To hear his story, he was a painter for advertisements. It was cheaper for magazines to print artistic work than photographs. Eventually he landed the gig to do some Marvel comics, and then pick up with Conan the Barbarian, eventually leading to He-Man.

He worked in paints. I recently visited Bob Jones’ University’s Classical Art Gallery, and I dare say Earl Norem’s painting is on par with the great classical masters. A person might argue that his subject matter didn’t lend to the best examples of classical art, with exaggerated muscles or femininity. But he always made He-Man, Skeletor, Teela, Gwildor, or whoever look tasteful. His work emphasised action…his painting always give a sense of energy.

I came up with the idea to try and emulate some of Earl Norem’s paintings with the incredibly posable Masters of the Universe Classics figures. I will be featuring some of my results here on SpartanNerd.com in the future.

Until then, please go by Earl Norem’s fan page. (You can see some of his art. I believe Eamon O’Donahue runs this site.) Also swing by He-Man.org.

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Tag Archives: Earl Norem

SpartanNerd Vintage Review. He-Man and the Masters of the Universe Magazine, Summer 1986.

MASTERVERSE Moss Man- SpartanNerd Unboxing and Review

SpartanNerd Project…Earl Norem Poses

The Grieving SpartanNerd