Welcome back! Are you still with us? We are now in day four of our current round of Mattel First Looks and we have a dandy for you today. We are taking a look at Mattel’s two hottest collector properties smashed together for double the awesomeness. That’s right, I am talking about the upcoming DC Universe/Masters of the Universe two-packs! These Toys R Us exclusive sets prove the old chocolate and peanut butter theory (or beer and pretzels for you “Adult Collectors”) in that they are certainly two great tastes that taste great together (I would refrain from tasting the figures themselves, however). They are testing the market with these so there are two sets leading off – Superman versus He-Man and Lex Luthor versus Skeletor, come take a peek!
Right off the bat, I have been in love with the idea of these sets since we first caught wind of them just befor New York Toy Fair earlier this month. I mean c’mon – these are just the logical next step, the natural progression. Mattel has been rocking the collector sect with their amazingly-Four Horsemen DC and MOTU lines for a couple of years now so to find a way to bring them together is like a nostalgia overload for the children of the 1980s. It makes perfect sense since DC Comics did publish a run of Masters of the Universe comics back in the early 1980s and that is the road Matty used to bring them all together. Furthermore, this is MOTUC’s very first venture off of www.mattycollector.com and into the retail aisles, that is a very exciting prospect in and of itself.
With these two sets you are getting comic-accurate renditions of all four of the included characters. For Superman and Lex Luthor that means the figures were all the way there already so the repaint value of He-Man and Skeletor is a little higher since this is first time that we have EVER gotten comic versions of the Most Powerful Man in the Universe and Evil Lord of Destruction. Before I get into the figures though, I want to take just a moment to talk about the packaging.
Yeah, I know, I rarely speak to the packaging of action figures, even though there have been some very cool designs for them recently. However, the blister cards for these two sets are particularly outstanding. So much so that I was actually contemplating keeping them mint on card, and I open EVERYTHING. Mattel package designer Frank Varela has really outdone himself this time around. Yes, the DC and MOTUC designs are very striking and his Comic Con work is always a main part of the attraction, but something about these just appeals to me on a lot of levels. First, the bubble design is really neat in its own right – the DCUC and MOTUC bubbles have been literally smashed together and melded down the middle to illustrate worlds colliding, very cool. Also the cards themselves are very visually striking as they integrate the covers of the included comics (more on those a little later) into the art. Particularly with the Superman/He-Man set, it looks like they are duking it out in recreated fashion from cover. The card back continues the “smash-up” theme as well as the DC sides use the same art style as the regular DCUC figures, and the Masters utilize the old Battle Cat and Panthor oil paintings. Again, this makes for a very cool effect. So, even though I am a fully-committed opener, my kudos to Frank Varela for these, he really does keep out-doing himself.
Let’s look at the Superman and He-Man set first. For the former half, you have seen this figure before. The included Kal-El is the same that you got in the Gotham City five pack and the All-Star rerelease from last year. Since these are simply repaint packs, nothing really had to be done to Superman and they chose the best Mattel version of the character so far. Poor Supes is the only one of the four that did not receive any accessories, but then again, he is not really known for carrying around a lot of baggage – Lois Lane not withstanding. Zing! It is worth mentioning that my Superman figure has a very nice level of quality control to him. I know a lot of people have been saying that it would have been cool to get a Superman figure based off of the MOTUC standard body and while I agree to some extent that that would have been really neat if done right, I think that for legal reasons that is something that we will probably never see.
He-Man though, has several dramatic deco changes both to him as well as his accessories. Mattel did one of those “he stepped right off of the cover” repaints and, as I mentioned before, it is really exciting to be getting a comic He-Man after all these years. I will start with my favorite change – his head. It is basically the same with the exception that Adam is now much more blonde than he has really ever been (even dating back to the old days). His hair is painted a bright yellow in highlights that added a lot more depth and detail to the sculpt than ever before. It is not full blown Eternian Metrosexual highlights, just a nice added paint application that enhances his overall look. I am willing to bet that as people start finding this pack at retail we are going to see a lot of head swaps from this figure onto the body of the standard He-Man, just putting that out there. It looks great. The other most notable changes come in the color of his gauntlets, now bright yellow to match the cover of the comic (He now also has just the wrist bands like Tri-Klops as opposed to one full forearm guard) and loincloth and boots. Gone are the more brown tones in favor of a more reddish hue (again to match the comic) and the ornementation on his belt has also gone to an almost pink color. Now, I know there is some chatter online about the aesthetic choice here but it is most certainly accurate to the coloring in the book and, in person, it does not stand out very vividly. I think a lot of people are really going to dig this He-Man figure and he might become the default Adam on a lot of toy shelves; also, as I said, I think a large portion of people are going to swap out this figure’s head on the classic body because the paints are so strong on the new addition.
He-Man does come with two accessories – his battle axe and shielf. The axe is a straight up rerelease and the sheild is repainted to a silver and black combination in favor of the red (this is the shield shown at the MOTU Art Show from last month). I can also tell you that, just because these are being mass produced for a retail exclusive there is not one slip in quality from the normal Matty MOTUC figures.
The second pack, a more villainous variety, includes Lex Luthor and Skeletor. Like it’s more herioc counterpart, the bulk of the deco changes fall with the Masters character, but I have to say that Lex has gained some subtle differences depending on the previous release that you own. The good news is that both characters benefit in the accessory department.
The included Lex Luthor figure has seen release a few times before. He was first offered in the old DC Superheroes line (the Super/Bats prelude to DCUC) and again more recently in another two pack with the Kara Zor-El Supergirl. If you only have the DCSH version, this will be a slight repaint for you. If you have the new two pack Lex you know he has a bit of a pearlessence to the paint job on his armor and his skirt is made of a much softer plastic than previously so those points are shared with this the version as well. Also, in the accessory department you get four different flavors of Kryptonite – red, green, blue and gold. This is a nice touch to help out our boy Lex with some add-ins. We know the success he has fighting Superman with Kryptonite, but I am not sure if it will do much good against his card mate, Skeletor.
Speaking of old Bonehead, I think that, out of the four figures featured here, he is my favorite. He gets a pretty significant repaint and it probably works better than all of the rest. First, the purple in his hood and armor is has almost a velvet sheen to it, it really pops over the matte purple from the regular figure. Also, all of the highlights in the costume, the crossbones, rivets, ect, are painted in a very nice metallic purple. Again, this matches the new purple of the costume very well and gives him a overall theme. The most striking difference in the new paint scheme though, is on his face (or what’s left of it) and I am having a really hard time deciding which one I like better – the original or this one. Let’s, ahem, face it – the first Skeletor figure (and his subsequent rerelease) really captured the look of the vintage figure. He has the green highlights and red “pupil” insets in his eye sockets. This comic version though foregoes the green and his eye sockets are an empty black. This may seem like a stripped down version but it is actually quite bright and striking (I thought for a minute the paint might be glow in dark, but it is not). Again, if I were the Gambler (which I am not as Kenny Rogers has had that wrapped up for decades now) I would bet that A LOT of people are going to make this their new default Skeletor. The purples work so well and even if he is based off of the comic appearence, his face is also VERY remeniscent of the old Filmation cartoon Skeletor. I am pretty sure that is very appealing to several collectors, especially since Filmation rights are currently off the table.
On top of all of this we also get a new Power Sword with Skeletor, this time in a translucent yellow that harkens back to the old Thunder Punch He-Man sword (in fact, it was mistaken by many as that sword at the Art Show). It is very garish and sticks out like a sore thumb, but again, I really like it. It is like Skeletor charged it up and made it rather goulish, very neat.
Finally, both sets come with reproductions of two books from the MOTU DC comics run from the 1980s. It is really neat to see these included as it has been a long time since I have gotten figures with comics added (since the ML day, I think). They are hidden in the back of the front card in their own little bubble so you can’t actually see them in the package. The reprints are nice and vibrant and it is fun to read the stories as well as get an idea of what the future could hold for these if the intial offerings are successful.
Overall, I think that these sets are a lot of fun and they represent a couple of pretty major things that are hopefully good signs. I think this is Mattel’s real way of testing the MOTU market at retail and while I really like the monthly figure program on Matty Collector, having this line eventually also be at retail opens up a lot of possibilities. I think it is also exciting as this is a very neat joint venture between the DC and MOTU properties and thus Mattel and DC/Warners. To me it marks recognition for a very strong partnership that will last well into the future (at least past the initial agreement of 2012). I don’t think it is any secret that my two favorite lines at present are DCUC and MOTUC, I want to see them both go on for a very long time and if they can be together from time to time, all the better. Bring on Mer-Man and Aquaman, Hawkman and Stratos, Teela and Wonder Woman. I could go on all day.
*Thanks for checking this First Look out and be haunting your local Toys R Us stores, it looks like these could be hitting any day now. Check back again this weekend as we wrap up our MOTU Looks with a special guest review and then move onto DC!
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