So I wanted to briefly write about The Toys of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. Way back in 2018 Val Staples and Dan Eardley invited me to contribute to the project, and I was honored and thrilled to be a part of it.
Initially my contribution was to be somewhat limited, basically just taking several of the interviews already published on BattleRamBlog.com, and adding a few new ones based on some contacts that Val gave me. A big thank you to all the great, creative folks who took the time to answer my questions! The full list of people interviewed includes:
- Ted Mayer
- Mark & Rebecca Taylor
- Mark Ellis
- Rudy Obrero
- Mark DiCamillo
- Janice Varney-Hamlin
- David Wolfram
- The Four Horsemen (split into two sections)
- Jeremy Padawer
- Scott Neitlich
- Bill Benecke
- Terry Higuchi
- Brandon Sopinsky
Another thing from the blog I thought might be a good inclusion was my Timeline article. Val agreed, and the arcane wizards working behind the scenes were able to create a fantastic layout for it!
Val also suggested that I throw in whatever factoids I could think of for the toy writeups that might help to spice them up. You can see a couple of examples below:
I also ended up writing roughly half of the entries for the Masters of the Universe Classics Section. I don’t often write about that line for the Battle Ram Blog, but despite that I think it’s an elegant and masterful toyline, and it was fun to revisit it for this book. Dan wrote about half of it, but found himself in a time crunch, which is why I came in to finish it.
Finally, I (along with many others!) helped out with some of the copy editing for the book. Having the book in hand, my contributions actually seem less significant. Not because I didn’t put a lot of time into it, but because it’s obvious Dan, Val, Darah, Peter and the rest contributed SO much by comparison! I can’t imagine how much time Dan and Val spent on this project, but I imagine it was many thousands of hours. I’m glad I got to come along for the ride. If you haven’t gotten your copy yet, what are you waiting for?
Buying the exclusive combo pack (which includes a supplemental Character Guide) supports all the contributors to these books: http://toyguide.thepower-con.com. Alternatively, the combo is also available through Big Bad Toy Store.
You can also purchase the individual toy guide at Amazon or through Big Bad Toy Store.
I want to thank the readers of the Battle Ram Blog for all the time you’ve spent with me exploring He-Man lore. Without your support, I never would have had the chance to contribute to the toy guide. Many of you have been giving helpful comments on the blog and on social media since I started this in 2015, which I always read and always appreciate. So thank you, thank you, thank you!
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