Written by Adam McCombs
I hope everyone has been having a wonderful holiday season. I am excited to share a document I’ve been chasing for a little while. Years ago I’d seen a couple of low res images from it. This year it came up for auction, but I didn’t end up winning. Then Andy Youssi was kind enough to send me some scans of his copy, which is greatly appreciated. For those who don’t know, Andy Youssi is the person who first shared with us the “Lords of Power” slides with all the early prototype images, created when Mattel was calling the line Lords of Power. Andy had this material because his father John Youssi was a freelance artist for Mattel who did promotional artwork for MOTU.
The “Power Promo” was given out to retailers and venders as a way to promote the soon-to-be launched Masters of the Universe line. It was not intended for consumers, which is why you rarely see it pop up. The document outlined Mattel’s plans for promoting the new Masters of the Universe line, along with some great pictures of the figures. Each page has text added by Andy as way of making sure the source of the images is retained in the future. I’ll go over each page and add some commentary.
Cover Page
The above cover image shows Castle Grayskull, He-Man and Skeletor. He-Man and Skeletor lack the quirks of the first release figures. Texture-wise Skeletor especially looks like a hard copy prototype rather than a factory example. As we’ll see later, Castle Grayskull is probably an early factory sample. This image also appeared in the 1984 Aurimat (Mexico) MOTU Catalog.
Page 1
Page 2 mainly focuses on marketing and market research Mattel had conducted on the line before release. Mark Taylor talked frequently about the early child testing for the line, and how kids were so excited about the early product they would often try to steal it from the testing room!
Page 2
Page two talks about some of the planned promotions, including TV ads, national print ads, the free minicomics included with figures, something called a “Power Sword National Sweepstakes,” shelf strip marketing, and cash rebates. The earliest commercials must have been filmed at this point, since there appears to be a screen grab from one of them. However, I’m not familiar with the Power Sword sweepstakes. That will show up again later in this article.
Page 3
Page three talks about some of the other promos, including the upcoming DC comics full-size five issue miniseries. They don’t have actual covers for them, so they must not have been available yet. Also discussed are Ben Cooper Halloween costumes and the MOTU Pop-Up Game. Also included in a folder on the page was the early sample version of He-Man and the Power Sword, which I recently discussed in a separate article.
Since both pages work together as a centerfold, I’ve included them together below:
Page 4
I’ve previously covered the history of early MOTU photography, as way of tracking toys from their early prototypes to final prototypes/hard copies, to early factory samples and eventually to common production examples. The photos on Page 4 appear to have been taken sometime after the photos in Mattel’s 1982 dealer catalog, because the development of the toys is further along on almost all of them:
Castle Grayskull: looks like an early factory sample. It has the finalized lock mechanism and the light colored jaw bridge, but the fine paint of early Mattel models.
He-Man: this looks pretty close to a factory He-Man, but it lacks the production quirks of early examples. Maybe it was an early factory sample that was sent to Mattel before the partially unpainted boot tops became a common error on early figures sold at retail.
Battle Cat: this looks like a factory striped tail Battle Cat, as opposed to a hand-painted prototype.
Skeletor: this version looks hand-painted to me – possibly a hard copy made at Mattel.
Teela: this is at least the third generation Teela prototype, the first that was actually articulated. Note the Barbie/She-Ra style hip articulation, green snake eyes on armor, and large shield. There was at least one other prototype made after this before Teela actually went into production.
Battle Ram: this looks pretty much like a factory version.
Man-At-Arms: this is an early version that has the cuff at the wrist. The armor looks like it might be painted, so possibly this is a hard copy made at Mattel.
Beast Man: this looks like it might be a sample from the factory, except he has an early whip that actually fits in his hand (thanks to John for the heads up).
Mer-Man: possibly a hard copy made at Mattel? It looks to have a matte, painted finish.
Stratos: this has the glossy finish of a factory toy. But, it has a gray beard and blue goggles. Perhaps the Blue Beard variant/error came in once they went into full production.
Zodac: He looks like he has a matte body, but his armor has been updated from his appearance in the 1982 dealer catalog to the finalized version. He still has the prototype paint pattern on his helmet (thanks to John for the tip).
Wind Raider: this has been updated since its appearance in the 1982 dealer catalog, with enlarged engines and more detailed looking wings.
One more interesting thing below: we see what looks a few early packaging samples. Note that He-Man and Skeletor are missing their minicomics, and Battle Cat is missing the black insert in his packaging. Note also that Battle Cat is the early striped tail variant.
Recently some similar figures showed up at auction. The Man-At-Arms below lacks a minicomic in his packaging as well, although he does have a warranty slip. The card has a Mattel Archives sticker on it, and was something Mattel held onto for a while and eventually offered to its employees for sale.
Page 5
Page 5 is interesting because it includes a marketing schedule. Now, I’ve done quite a lot of research on the release dates for the MOTU toys. Multiple lines of evidence point to May 1982 as the mass retail introduction for Masters of the Universe. However, Mattel’s rebate program for the year included a March 1, 1982 date as the earliest window for the rebate. It’s possible that the so-called test market program was going on in March. It’s long been rumored that Mattel did a limited release of the figures ahead of time to one geographic area as a way of testing out the figures at retail. The March date for “promotions” on the calendar above may also point to that as the true date of introduction of the line. But, I’ll also point that this page says that Mattel reserved the right to change their marketing schedules, so this wasn’t written in stone.
Other interesting dates are May, August, September, November and December 1982 for comic issues, presumably referring to DC comics. The actual printed dates on those comics was somewhat later than the dates printed here, but Jukka Issakainen has pointed out that actual release dates for DC Comics was usually ahead of the printed date.
For network TV we’re given dates of June, July, and then September through December 1982. For merchandising we’re given a date of May 1982 through the rest of the year, which may give us a date for the MOTU Pop-Up Game. I believe the Ben Cooper masks actually came a bit later.
John also included the following scans of the proposed Power Sword Sweepstakes promotion and Shelf Talker. Again, I’m not familiar with that particular promotion or if it event went into effect, so if someone has any information on it to share I’d be grateful!
Below is the actual final art Andy’s father John Youssi did for the shelf talker promo:
Because it’s so wide and short, I’m chopping it up into two pieces to make the art easier to appreciate:
And finally, here is a pencils version for a promotional Man-E-Faces standup display, by John Youssi:
Thanks again to Andy for sharing this amazing material with me. He has truly been a treasure trove of historical information over the years!
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