He-Man Is Back, Like You’ve More or Less Seen Him Before

For me, when I think of an action figure or even a toy, I think of He-Man. The toyline dominated my childhood, and between it’s wild range of bizarre characters and uniquely awesome action figures, I honestly feel like the line set the bar for toys. I bought every single one of the doomed recent toyline, and had been waiting to hear what Mattel’s bg He-Man toy announcement was going to be at NYCC.

The announcement was this: Mattel will release Masters of the Universe Classics, which are highly articulated, better sculpted 6-inch versions of the original ’80s line (there are more details at He-Man.org, if you’re interested). It’s not the awesome, modern reinterpretation that was recent line. It’s the same old boots and loincloths, and somewhat better heads, although it will include characters from the old and new cartoons like Prince Adam’s mom Queen Marlena (which I am terrifically excited by). To be honest, I was hoping for more of the recent line, which were uniformly better than the old figures; this is like souping up an ’86 Ford Taurus instead of a brand-new BMW. I mean, I’ll still buy them all, mostly because I’m not very bright. Oh, by the way, that figure above is King Grayskull, who is He-Man’s ancestor, a giant, and an exclusive to the San Diego Comic Con. If you’ll excuse me, I need to beg my boss to send me to SDCC.