Masters of the Universe Classics Feature: Snake Armor He-Man and Battle Armor King Hssss

Between the announcement of the new 200X subscription line and the release of this two-pack, February has been a very early ’00s kind of month for Masters of the Universe Classics. Party like it’s 2002 and check out more pics of this cool new two pack.

Snake Armor™ He-Man® Bio

Real Name: Adam of the House of Randor
When the Snake Men returned to Eternia from their banishment in the Void, Adam used the Power of Grayskull to create upgraded armor more adapted to combat his new reptilian enemy. Equipped with a venom-proof shield and a corodite snake pincher, Adam is now fully protected in his Snake Armor, ready to fight off King Hssss and his army of snake warriors! Eventually, Adam was forced to use his armor to battle against his former friend and mentor Duncan who had been hideously transformed by the Serpent’s Ring into a Snake Man. Refusing to kill Duncan, Adam’s Snake Armor was destroyed by Snake Man-At-Arms’ newly invented neutralizer blaster which could disrupt the Power of Grayskull itself!

Battle Armor™ King Hssss™ Bio

Real Name: Hssss of the Viper Clan
Beheaded by Zodak during the Battle against Serpos, King Hssss slowly regenerated thanks to the darkness of his dungeon cell. Regrouping at Serpos’ destroyed temple deep in Subternia, Hssss lead the Snake Men to the surface to find Skeletor and a newly returned Hordak warring for the throne of Eternia. Sent into hibernation by Hordak’s magic, Hssss’ army waited and multiplied. Returning at last, the leader of the Snake Men brought his army to the Second Ultimate Battleground to determine once and for all rule of Eternia. But unknown to him, He-Man had journeyed into the past and learned the Snake Men’s only secret weakness. With this knowledge the Masters were able to defeat the Snake King and his army. Orko cast the Spell of Separation which split apart the mixed mutated DNA that held the reptilian ruler and his Snake Men together!

The bios don’t offer a lot this time around. I was a little curious to see if perhaps the Hiss bio might explain away his different appearance in MOTUC canon, but I guess not. I like seeing the corodite mention in SA He-Man’s bio and it’s pretty funny that the bio creates and destroys the armor in just one paragraph.

Accessories

These two come with a shield and staff for Hiss and a sword and removeable pincher for He-Man. The shield and staff are repaints of the existing Hiss staff and shield in darker more 200X-y colors. A nice feature of the shield is that it’s got a slight metallic feel to the plastic.

They aren’t terribly exciting, but they look nice with the figure. The sword is also a repaint of the 200X style sword that originally came with Man-at-Arms and is appropriate and looks great with He-Man, but not terribly interesting. The pincher is new and is cast in a solid plastic. It plugs into the arm armor nicely, but I seem to recall it extending out further in the show.

A second longer piece might have been a nice inclusion to mimic that feature. One odd thing is that the shield is mentioned in the bio and he doesn’t actually have a shield here. The other devastating omission is the beautiful snake form shown at SDCC last year.

Now we’ve known since that show that the snake form was not coming in this set, but it was the coolest part of the set as shown at the show, so getting these two makes me miss it. We’ve been assured that it will be coming, so fingers crossed that ends up happening.

Sculpt

This set is definitely the largest helping of 200X style we’ve had so far in the line with the inclusion of a new He-Man head sculpt and the more angular and exaggerated King Hiss face. I think the designs are smartly integrated into the MOTUC format here with appropriate parts re-use on both Hiss and He-Man.

The Draego-Man forearms work so well for King Hiss that I wonder if that usage wasn’t planned all along back at the design phase of Draego. Hiss’s armor overlay is interesting in that it’s only partially covering his body, but it still manages to give Hiss a bit of that “body builder” syndrome where he can’t keep his arms down at his sides. I’m considering doing a bit of surgery on this figure like I did with Rio Blast, but Preternia.com mentioned something that may stay my hand a bit.

The body builder syndrome, coupled with thin waist of the original buck gives the figure a more exaggerated 200X style profile.

The torso swap feature is working here so you can easily mix and match Hiss parts to make your own ultimate King Hiss.

He-Man’s armor is probably the busiest armor we’ve seen from the line yet. There is a ton of detail packed into it with different metallic and leather textures and symbols. Something I never really got about the Snake Armor design is that he has the snake symbol on it. Not once, but twice. Seems like overkill to me, but it makes for a pretty cool figure.

Both figures also make good use of the original MOTUC King Hiss arms and legs and the shoulders seem to be in their proper position.

Articulation

Hssss and He-Man have the standard MOTUC articulation except He-Man is missing the usual boot cut. Hssss’s hip articulation is hindered quite a bit by his skirt. There will be no throne sitting for this guy.

Paint

Paint is nice here with all the detail lines coming in crisp and sharp for the most part. Each figure has a few different shades of metallic paint on their armors and some pretty subtle airbrushing for depth on their bodies. I was particularly impressed with the eyes on this He-Man.

Overall

While certainly not a set I was clamoring for (I’m not much of a variant guy and prefer new characters), this is a really nice set of well sculpted figures that do a great job of bringing in a significant part of the 200X show into classics. I can almost hear the drum beats from the show’s theme when I look at these two.