Monstroid: The Ultimate Battling Monster (1986)

Posted on May 23, 2024September 8, 2024 by Adam McCombs

Written by Adam McCombs

Name: Monstroid
Faction: Evil Horde
Approximate US release date: October 23, 1986

Monstroid is one of the most unique toys released in the vintage Masters of the Universe line, functioning almost more like a game than a figure vehicle or beast.

Design & Development

Unfortunately I don’t know of any concept art or prototypes for Monstroid. I’ll just note that Ted Mayer created a concept for a character called Brainiac who looks a bit like Monstroid in terms of head shape and the fact that it has crab-like claws. I don’t know whether or not it directly influenced Monstroid:

The resemblance is even closer in the version below, which features protruding fangs:

*Image: The Power and the Honor Foundation Catalog*

As described in the 1986 Mattel catalog page below, Monstroid was a mechanical creature with a wind-up spinning action feature. Its large red claws could capture and hold figures securely. The play pattern for the figure was to stop it from spinning by punching a button on the side of the creature’s body. The biggest differences between the catalog model and the final toy seem to be in the wind-up crank and the stopper button, which are molded white in the image below, but are black and red in the final toy.

Additional catalog-style images appear in these pages from Magic Boy magazine (images via Poochi and Other Friends):

From my research, Monstroid was apparently first released in the US in October, 1986.

Toy & Packaging

The artist who did the box art for Monstroid is sadly unknown, but they did a very dynamic scene featuring Sy-Klone, Man-At-Arms, Thunder Punch He-Man and Roboto. The packaging and toy images below come from various eBay auctions:

The artwork on the back of Monstroid’s box was done by Errol McCarthy. You can see the original line art below:

Errol also illustrated the artwork for Monstroid that appeared in the 1987 Style Guide:

In the above Style Guide page, Monstroid is described this way:

Name: Monstroid
Group Affiliation: Evil Horde
Role: The ultimate battling beast
Power: Latches onto warriors and whirls them around and around with a crazy twirling action.
Character Profile: It clambers out of the ocean to grab anything or anyone that is unfortunate enough to be nearby. Only by striking Monstroid in one place can it be stopped from thrashing about.

Here is the Spanish version of the instructions from Mundo Masters:

Filmation

Monstroid didn’t appear in the Filmation cartoon per se, but three giant robots called the Monstroids did appear in the 1985 He-Man and She-Ra Christmas Special. It’s unclear what relationship these have with the Monstroid toy. My guess is that Mattel had planned to make some transforming robots called the Monstroids, but for whatever reason didn’t end up releasing them. Perhaps marketing really liked the name Monstroid and decided to reuse that for the 1986 toy.

On a related note, Mattel had also planned to release another Evil Horde robot called simply Evil Robot. This one was never released, but appeared as a loose page in some 1985 Mattel catalogs. This one, like the Meteorbs, was a simple repaint of an existing toy made by another manufacturer.

In fact, Mattel went so far as to commission a minicomic for Evil Robot. In the image below shared by James Eatock, we see former Mattel artist Larry Houston showing off his comic artwork of Evil Robot:

Comics

Monstroid appeared in the Star Comics issue #5, released January 1986. It is featured prominently on the cover:

In the story, Monstroid comes from the Sea of Rakash and is centuries old. Hordak and his henchmen have to work together to telepathically contact and summon Monstroid from the abyss to rise up and attack Eternia. Multi-Bot is brought in to assist, and with his help they succeed.

Monstroid appears in a German Ehapa Verlag magazine comic story from 1988, issue number 7. This time the story, called “The Flower of Life,” takes place on dry land. The location on the cliff face recalls the product photography shown earlier in the article from Magic Boy magazine.

Monstroid is also featured in a story in the January 1989 issue of Magic Boy, published in Italy. In this story, Monstroid rises up from the sea to attack the heroic warriors, instigated by Hordak, shown in his Filmation colors:

*Hordak using Scubattack*! Images come from Poochi and other Friends

Artwork and Advertising

Monstroid was featured in an Earl Norem poster released in the Fall 1986 issue of MOTU Magazine:

Monstroid appears in William George’s 1986 Eternia poster, below:

Monstroid appears in the Italian ad below that originally appeared in Magic Boy magazine:

Monstroid in Action

Øyvind Meisfjord has kindly provided the image and video below. Enjoy!

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Evil Horde

Mantisaur: Evil Insectoid Steed (1986)

Posted on September 18, 2023September 8, 2024 by Adam McCombs

Written by Adam McCombs

Name: Mantisaur
Faction: Evil Horde
Approximate US release date: May 11, 1986

I don’t have a specific memory of Mantisaur, but he was immediately familiar to me when I first encountered him as a grown up, so I must have bumped into the toy at some point. He’s a rather unique and sharp-looking creature, and a probably under-utilized mount for Hordak. Sadly he never caught on in the popular imagination like Battle Cat or Panthor or Swiftwind.

Mantisaur had the working name of Mantor in this July 13, 1984 illustration by Ed Watts, which was created just a few months after Hordak’s toy look was finalized by Ted Mayer. He is an apparently organic giant purple praying mantis outfitted with green armor.

*Image source: The Power and the Honor Foundation*

Another artist at Mattel did a treatment on a number of different variants of the concept. All of them are based around an actual organic praying mantis, outfitted with weapons, a saddle, and in some cases armor. Many versions of this concept have upturned attachments at the end of the creature’s arms, which seem to have been added with the toy’s feature in mind.

*Image source: Tomart’s Action Figure Digest*

We can see the final version of the figure in the cross sell artwork. The final version looks almost entirely robotic, with hints of an organic creature underneath visible only in the head and perhaps along the underside of the body.

Toy Archive uploaded some interesting images of a hard copy pre-production prototype Mantisaur:

Figure & Packaging

Mantisaur was released as a single packaged figure, and as a gift set together with Hordak. The front artwork for both was done by Joe Chiodo. The artist for the action illustration on the back is unknown.

*Hordak & Mantisaur gift set. Image source: “Buzz Saw Hordak”*

Mantisaur was quite large, and stood on two legs with two “trapper arms.” His “action feature” was essentially that his arms could be used to manually pick up a figure in front of it. He features the same gray, black and red color scheme as his master Hordak.

*Images of Mantisaur & Hordak come from Øyvind Meisfjord*

Filmation Cartoon

Mantisaur appears in the She-Ra episode, A Talent For Trouble. His figure model is green, with an overall design based on the original Ed Watts concept art:

Comic Appearances

Mantisaur appears in the Between a Rock and Hard Place minicomic. He obeys verbal commands from Hordak, and in one page, it’s shown that he has the power to summon and control insect swarms, which he uses to attack the heroic warriors:

Mantisaur also appears in The Garden of Evil, a story in the third issue of the Star Comics series.

Hordak’s mount features heavily in the UK Comics Story The Power of the Mantisaur. Hordak (or actually a robot clone of Hordak) battle’s He-Man and Man-At-Arms while riding on Mantisaur (who is also, in this canon, 100% robotic) as part of a larger scheme to test He-Man’s limitations. You can read the full story in issue 32 here, courtesy of Danielle Gelehrter.

Mantisaur appeared in issue 3 of the 1987 run of German Ehapa comics:

Artwork

A nice poster by Esteban Maroto featuring Mantisaur appeared in the German Ehapa MOTU Magazine, 1989, Issue 1/2, although the steed doesn’t appear in the actual stories of that issue:

A poster featuring Mantisaur appeared in the third issue of the 1987 German series:

Mantisaur appears along with Hurricane Hordak in William George’s 1986 Eternia poster:

Mantisaur in Action

Øyvind Meisfjord has kindly shared this video of Mantisaur in action!

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Evil Horde

Buzz-Saw Hordak: Ruthless Leader with Blaster Blade (1987)

Posted on March 31, 2023September 14, 2024 by Jukka Issakainen

Written by Jukka Issakainen

Name: Buzz-Saw Hordak
Faction: Evil Horde
Approximate US release date: May 21, 1987 or November 11, 1987

Buzz-Saw Hordak was released in the last wave of the 1987 line-up for Masters of the Universe. He is the second variant in the vintage toyline after Hurricane Hordak (1986), but unlike that version, his appearance is very similar to the original Hordak (1985) at a first glance.

Design and development

In an interview over at he-man.org/[archive link], Derek Gable (Former Director of Preliminary Design) mentioned:

“I also formed an invention company West Coast Innovations and one of the many items we licensed was Buzz-Saw Hordak from the Evil Horde.”
He-Man.org Interview – January 29th, 2014

Toy Packaging Art

For the packaging artwork, Buzz-Saw Hordak was fortunate and got the triple hat-trick of artists:

The front art for the cardback was illustrated by Bruce Timm.

The cross sell artwork is most likely by William George who did the cross sell art.

The cardback art was done by Errol McCarthy. So all three artists had a hand in depicting Buzz-Saw Hordak.

We see Hordak getting ambushed by King Hiss, Tung Lashor and Rattlor. But as the accompanying text reveals, his “buzz-saw blasts them away!”

*Errol McCarthy black & white illustration. Source: he-man.org*

The cardback art has the main action piece covering most of the top, with a one rectangular frame on top-left corner showing the preceeding event. The same method was also used with the same 1987 wave figures such as Blast-Attack and Snake Face‘s cards.

Looking at Hordak’s close-up image in the Buzz-Saw card, while not a traced re-use, the head appears to be very close to the art of Hordak in Sorceress’ card art.

Action Figure

Catalogs & Advertisement

Curiously in the catalog image (US top, Italian below) that depicts the action feature, Hordak’s chest armor piece is not lowered but removed completely.

*1988 French Catalog. Image via Grayskull Museum*

*Italian advert with Buzz-Saw Hordak. [source: Facebook]*

Buzz-Saw Hordak also was advertised in a Finnish toy booklet.

*Finnish toy booklet “Suuri Lelukirja” 1988 – advertising upcoming figures. [Image credit: Arto Paappanen]*

*A Finnish action figure poster by BRIO. showing Buzz-Saw Hordak – but labeled simply as “Hordak”*.

There was a French **Masters of the Universe Club** in the 80s, that sent this leaflet to the members, thanks to Jerry Chamand for the information. Buzz-Saw Hordak is depicted on the cover with Mosquitor, fighting against Clamp Champ. [source: Facebook]

In the Spanish Masters of the Universe Club magazine from 1989 Buzz-Saw Hordak was advertised with many of the very last released action figures.

Buzz-Saw Hordak managed to appear in the Burger King box art along with Snake-Face, He-Man, Orko, Teela, and Skeletor.

Media

Buzz-Saw Hordak appears in the 1987 Preternia poster art by William George.

Buzz-Saw Hordak was called “Hordak Torpedor” in a Spanish minicomic sized booklet. The art by Bruce Timm was mirror-flipped.

Comics and Magazines

In the final 1987 wave of minicomics, there was a lot more continuity at play that dealt with the new playset Eternia (referred to as the Three Towers of Eternia / Ultimate Battleground in stories). Writer Steven Grant talks about it in an interview for the 2015 He-Man and MOTU Minicomics Collection book: “There wasn’t any long-range plan to the stories, but the project manager liked the idea of weaving in threads where possible…”

The Mattel minicomic “Enter… Buzz-Saw Hordak”, written by Steven Grant and art by Bruce Timm introduces to the readers Mosquitor as the newest addition to the Evil Horde and when Hordak discovers that the Central Tower of Eternia Towers has risen, he reveals that he helped build it long ago, before his banishment to Etheria.

Hordak knows only the true King of Eternia can enter the Central Tower, and uses King Randor to sneak inside, but it turns out the Powers inside the Tower alter Hordak.

In the Marvel comics under STAR imprint issue #8 “The Getaway” (street date release: March 24th, 1987), written by Mike Carlin and art by Ron Wilson we get a different depiction for Hordak’s new Buzz Saw feature. (The Hurricane powers had been previously on display in issue #3.)

Similar (on surface level) to the minicomic, the STAR comic shares the introduction of Mosquitor at the same time as the Buzz-Saw variant powers for Hordak.

In the comic Hordak has already at the start of the story raided Palace Eternia, and while Orko goes to check out the situation at the Palace, He-Man (in his Cliff Climber attire) follows and confronts Hordak. Hordak taunts He-Man for having “borrowed” something from the Palace and then displays his ability to shoot a Buzz Saw from his chest.

He-Man is at first taken back when Hordak shows he can actually shoot multiple buzz saws from his chest. He-Man deduces that “only one man could have created a weapon so fantastic – Man-At-Arms“

No explanation is given as to what the actual invention by Man-At-Arms was – the buzz saws themselves, or if they were simply a part of some larger new creation. Hordak never reveals how he was able to incorporate the buzz saws into his own armor either.

With the use of his Sword of Power, He-Man manages to destroy the buzz saw function in Hordak’s armor.

In the Masters of the Universe Magazine Winter issue 1988 we also get an appearance from Buzz-Saw Hordak in the story “Time Trap”, written and illustrated by Paul Kirchner.

Here Hordak is accompanied curiously by Saurod and Blade (but alliances were loose in some of the stories presented in MOTU Magazine), and displays the power of his Buzz-Saw by cutting up some trees, but in the end, his weapon is no match for a cube the heroes set up for the villains.

Personally, I have many fond memories of this version of Hordak. I received it on a holiday trip to Rhodes, Greece with my father and since I didn’t have the original version, the Buzz-Saw Hordak became my de facto Hordak. He still ruled the Evil Horde with an iron grip.

The minicomic story is also one of my absolute favorites from the entire run. It introduces a new character (I also had a Mosquitor toy which was a lot of fun), deepens the mythology of the Three Towers of Eternia, gives a mysterious origin to the variant powers (yet still meaningful), and leaves the story open to many possibilities. I really wish there had been a follow-up minicomic where Hordak would learn more about his Buzz-Saw powers and the Preternia technology of the Eternia Towers…

*Jukka Issakainen with Buzz-Saw Hordak action figure – circa 1989*

Buzz-Saw Hordak in Action

Øyvind Meisfjord has graciously contributed the following image and video showing Buzz-Saw Hordak in action:

Evil Horde

Hurricane Hordak: Ruthless leader with the wicked whirling weapons! (1986)

Posted on October 24, 2021September 8, 2024 by Adam McCombs

Written by Adam McCombs

Name: Hurricane Hordak
Faction: Evil Horde
Approximate US release date: September 10, 1986

Hurricane Hordak, released in 1986, is the first of two Hordak variants, and the only version of Hordak (in the vintage line) with any significant changes to his costume.

Design & Development

Hurricane Hordak in some ways is more similar to his animated counterpart than the original Hordak release, in that his arm ends in a “cannon” (or something that looks like one) and “transforms” into different weapons.

Recently Kris Oneida shared some reference Polaroids shown to him by MOTU minicomic colorist Charles “Skip” Simpson. Among them was a blue-skinned Hordak prototype with gold armor. Was this meant to be a Filmation-inspired variant of Hordak? Or perhaps an alternative color shot intended to be the original Hordak release? Without a date it’s unclear, but the gold armor certainly recalls Hurricane Hordak.

Hurricane Hordak’s action feature was actually originally intended for a different figure, as illustrated in this July 8, 1984 “Rotary Man” concept by Ted Mayer:

On October 11, 1985, Hurricane Hordak’s patent claim was filed by Mattel (it was not granted until 1987). The following drawings were included:

I haven’t seen any concept art specifically for Hurricane Hordak, but you can see the final look for the character in this cross sell artwork:

Production Toy

The final production toy can be seen in these US and France catalog images, along with other 1986 variants, Flying Fists He-Man and Terror Claws Skeletor (image from Nathalie NHT):

Hurricane Hordak included three arm attachments (similar to Trap Jaw and Roboto before him), all of which could be rotated at the end of his right arm by thumbing the red wheel on his back. In the instructions in the packaging, the attachments are called the Thunderball Mace, Battle Shield, and Bat-Wing Propeller:

Hurricane Hordak came on a large, deluxe card, with dynamic artwork by William George on the front.

The back of the card features artwork by an unknown artist depicting Hordak breaking into Snake Mountain with his “Battle Shield”:

Media

The 1987 MOTU Style Guide features Hordak in his Filmation look (illustrated by Errol McCarthy, but when discussing his weapons, it references the attachments included with Hurricane Hordak:

Weapons: Now he has fashioned gruesome weapons such as helicopter-like bats-wings propellor, 4-pronged “kinetic shield” and 3-headed “thunderballs” mace that all attach to his whirling arm.

Hurricane Hordak appears in The Hordes of Hordak, along with the minicomic introduction of the Horde Troopers. He has the whirling attachments, but is shown the in the colors of the original 1985 action figure:

Hurricane Hordak was featured in a number of UK and German MOTU Magazine issues, including in these full color posters by artist Esteban Maroto from the Ehapa Verlag issues:

He’s also featured in the 1986 Eternia poster by William George:

Hurricane Hordak in Action

Øyvind Meisfjord has graciously contributed the following image and video showing Hurricane Hordak in action:

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