Club Grayskull
Grizzlor and Mantenna
As soon as they popped up, the Horde grabbed my attention. If Skeletor gathered together the most dangerous villains on Eternia, Hordak gathered the baddest mofos in the galaxy. Beast man probably ate babies, but Grizzlor ate Beast Men. Leech was a disgusting vampire, Modulok was a disturbing schizoid creature whose every body part was sentient…these are some truly frightening creatures.
When I was a kid, a part of me wanted to see the truly terrifying things that these beings were capable of. Well, the FCC and all those standards and practices and whatnot might have scoffed at the utter carnage that I wanted to see, so instead Filmation did the expected thing, which was give us regular cartoon-styled villains to trouble She-ra and her friends.
In other words, Grizzlor never ate anybody on the She-ra cartoon. Because of that, the world just might be a little less awesome.
Super7 has been intent on filling out the animation-styled ranks lately, and the Horde gets a little deeper with the release of Filmation styled Grizzlor and Mantenna.
Let’s start off with Grizzlor. When discussion over the Classics-styled version would pop up, there were two distinct segments of fandom: one side wanted the grizz, and one side wanted sculpted fur. In the end, the vintage throwback side won out, and the Classics Grizzlor came as fuzzy as can be.
But now those who prefer their Grizzlor to be a bit more barbered have their sculpted option. Granted, the fur is sculpted more in line with the simplistic Filmation design, so there is no doubt yet another sect out there that wants a Grizzlor with sculpted fur that features a higher level of detail in the sculpt. Hell, I’d buy that one too.
Since Filmation Grizzlor was far more conservative looking than his vintage toy counterpart, this Grizzlor deviates quite a bit from the previous version. From head to toe he’s less feral. He’s quite calm, even. This is a grizzlor that sips English Breakfast tea while reading Emily Dicksinson on the patio.
Grizzlor features the standard single jointed elbows and knees. The hips one mine were a little loose, but not enough to impede his ability to stand. As has become customary with the Filmation versions, there is no torso crunch. I don’t quite miss it on other characters, but I do miss that point of articulation with Grizzlor, because it feels like he should be able to get down into that bestial “about to pounce” crouch and he just can’t do it. You can bend his knees and tilt the hips, but it’s just not the same.
Again, like many other recent figures, Grizzlor’s neck articulation isn’t the best. If I have one major complaint with Super7, it’s that they need to tweak the way the heads are seated. Grizzlor would benefit much more with a full range of ball-jointed motion, allowing him to tilt his head or look up/down.
The head is dead-on with Filmation.
Grizzlor comes with a stun baton and a shield. He can hold either of them quite well. I don’t know if I really need him to have them, but they’re nice inclusions anyway.
Overall I liked him, I just would have liked torso articulation and a better range of motion on his head.
Mantenna, however, is the winner of the set.
Poor Mantenna. Mantenna ended up having the roll of Hordak’s whipping boy on the cartoon, endlessly getting sent down a trap door and whining in that weird voice of his. He was always the sadist of the group to me, somebody so far outside the realm of normal by comparison to the other Horde members that the things he got his kicks out of disgusted even those other creeps.
Don’t look at me like that.
The classics-styled Mantenna was easily one of the best figures in the line, and it looks like they outdid themselves with the Filmation styled one as well. Mantenna features the same four-legged design as the previous figure, although with the stripped-down carton aesthetic. The legs are each fully articulated with a full range of motion in the hips knees and ankles, and can be posed in an endless variety of ways.
In addition, Mantenna comes with two pair of hands: relaxed and gripping. And finally, where the Classics-styled version came with swappable eyes, this version just goes whole hog and gives us two swappable heads, one with the regular eyes and one with a set of bugged out eyes. I was worried that the heads would be problematic in swapping, as Super7 has had issues with that area as well (there have been numerous reports of neckpegs snapping on other figures that have featured swappable heads) but the head is just rubbery enough that it can carefully be pried off without fear of damaging the neckpeg.
With the two heads, dual sets of hands and the four legs, Mantenna probably provides the most bang for the buck that I’ve gotten ever since Super7 took over the brand. I had absolutely no issues swapping the hands in and out, and even the additional threat of stuck hips with the extra set of legs was not an issue, as no joint was either stuck or loose. If you dig the Filmation aesthetic this is probably as close to perfect as it gets. High praise, yes, but Mantenna was given a little extra razzmatazz and it shows.
In addition to the heads and hands, Mantenna comes with a laser pistol that he can grip tightly in his gripping hands.
Of this last round of figures, Fisto, She-ra and Grizzlor were all strong figures that were not without issues here or there, but Mantenna is the definite winner, and I’d go so far as to say the definitive Filmation version of the character.
