Written by Adam McCombs
Name: He-Man
Faction: Heroic Warriors
Approximate US release date: May 13, 1982
He-Man was released with the first wave of action figures in the 1982 Masters of the Universe line. But for a simple, relatively unadorned action figure, He-Man has a complex and storied history. His origins are the subject of much controversy, and frequently discussed lately in the wake of the recent Toy Masters documentary and the Dark Horse Art of He-Man book. I can’t definitively settle those controversies, but I will attempt to present the key facts as I understand them in the development of the most powerful man in the universe.
Update 2/7/2024: since writing this in 2015, I think I have a much clearer picture of He-Man’s origins. This article has been updated several times since 2015 as additional information came to light, and my recent article about the “He-Man Trio” also provides a very clear picture of the early development of He-Man.
Design & Development
The earliest known artwork related to He-Man is a 1979 drawing by Mattel artist Mark Taylor. When Taylor was hired at Mattel, he initially did packaging design for the Barbie line. In his free time he would sketch the kinds of fantasy heroes he had been interested in since he was a child. He was influenced by Tarzan and Prince Valiant comic books, as well as the artwork of Frank Frazetta and the various artists featured in Heavy Metal magazine.
In this 1979 sketch (above), Torak certainly looks the part of He-Man. The facial features, determined expression and blond hair are all very familiar. The leather strap around his chest almost looks like half of what would eventually be He-Man’s distinctive chest harness. There is even a villain in the background who resembles Skeletor.
The image below has commonly been assumed to be an early He-Man sketch, but it’s possible that this was done for the Conan line – Mark Taylor did the concept art for both, although the Conan line didn’t move forward due to the sex and violence of the movie.
As Taylor tells the story, Mattel was looking for a new boy’s action figure line that could be produced without paying licensing fees to a third party. The company had passed on making Star Wars toys, and of course Star Wars had become enormously successful in the meantime. Mattel’s existing boy’s lines (Clash of the Titans, Battlestar Galactica and Flash Gordon) could not compete with Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader.
As part of the initiative to create a new male action figure line, Roger Sweet (a designer at Mattel), used some of Mark Taylor’s drawings to assist in developing a pitch for a new line of action figures. For a presentation to Mattel CEO Ray Wagner, Sweet sculpted a rudimentary action figure, which was really a Big Jim figure packed with extra clay muscles. It was then cast and duplicates were created to try out different costume looks. In Roger’s concept, the character could be a generic hero, outfitted with science fiction, barbarian or military costumes, and would have access to science fiction vehicles.
As you can see, a recognizable version of the final He-Man harness is present on the center figure, which has come to be known to fans as Vykron:
Roger has acknowledged in a podcast interview (Masters of the Universe Chronicles) that Mark Taylor designed the harness for his barbarian prototype, including the Templar cross. And if you look closely at the bracers on the center figure, you can see they resemble those of Mark Taylor’s Torak character. The shin guards also have the cross, so they are another Mark Taylor element. The helmet also comes from another Mark Taylor design from the 1970s. This fits with statements by both Mark Taylor and Ted Mayer that Roger’s model was based off of Mark Taylor’s designs. Elsewhere, in the Toy Masters Podcast, Roger and others acknowledge that Mark’s He-Man artwork predated Roger’s prototype.
Of the three 1980 prototypes, it was the barbarian-themed figure, with his Mark Taylor-designed costume, that was green-lit by Ray Wagner for further development. Roger designed the other two costumes on the military and space themed figures (they are actually kit-bashed, using one or more parts from existing toys, such as the repainted Boba Fett helmet and a WWII German tank kit).
Mark Taylor also drew a couple of illustrations in 1981, apparently based on the prototype (in turn based on Mark’s designs). The harness in these drawings was even closer to the final toy design:
Still, Roger Sweet has been claiming for many years that he “originated” He-Man:
“What I always say is, I originated and named He-Man, and originated the general concept of the Masters Of The Universe. I constructed three prototype figures at nine and a half inches, which I first showed at a product conference at Mattel in late 1980. These three prototype figures brought He-Man into existence. They were all of He-Man in different themes and configurations. One had a barbarian theme from the ancient past (low tech), another had a current military enhanced theme (mid tech), and the other one had a futuristic military, a la Star Wars, enhanced theme (high tech), showing that He-Man can go anywhere, and do anything, at any time, in any theme. These figures were nine and a half inches tall, and the figures in the line from 1982-87 were five and a half inches. But I knew if I showed these figures at the height they ended up being, I would have a very poor chance of selling the concept, so I made them very tall, huge, and very impressive.” – Roger Sweet
As far as Roger Sweet’s barbarian prototype goes, the harness appears to be the only element on the sculpture that is unique to the final He-Man’s design. And as we’ve already learned, it was Mark Taylor, not Roger Sweet, who designed the harness. It appears, moreover, that the entire barbarian prototype costume was designed by Mark Taylor. Roger appears to have been the first sculptor, not the designer (later, finer sculpts were done by Tony Guerrero). Sweet has based his claim to creating He-Man on this prototype, but it’s hard for me to see how Sweet can be given any credit for the visual design of He-Man.
Based on all available evidence, it is my conclusion that Mark Taylor is the principal and primary designer of He-Man, with some ancillary contribution and input from many others at Mattel. In fact, the whole 1982 lineup was almost entirely designed by Mark Taylor, aside from the vehicles, which were designed by Ted Mayer. The toyline was really Mark’s vision, at least for the first year of its existence. Mark was in charge of the creating the figures and the Castle for the 1982 line, in addition to being in charge of the packing on the larger items like Castle Grayskull and Battle Cat.
As far as I can tell, Roger Sweet’s contributions to He-Man (the figure) were primarily as follows: the name itself, and the “power punch” action feature, and the idea to exaggerate the musculature (as Roger often says, he wanted He-Man to make Arnold Schwarzenegger look like a wimp). Roger Sweet’s more significant contributions to the Masters of the Universe toyline seem to have come later, with figures like Tri-Klops, Mekaneck, Sy-Klone, Kobra Khan and others. We have Sweet’s concept drawings for most of those figures, but all the concept artwork for He-Man and other figures released in 1982 comes from Mark Taylor. You can see in the quote by Roger below, he didn’t really like the first wave of the line – indicating he had little say in its design or direction (and indeed Roger has said he was taken off the line as soon as it was approved for Development by Mattel’s president):
“When I first saw the [1982] Masters of the Universe line all together I thought it was somewhat weak because it was low-tech and it was conservative. My concept of MOTU was that it combined everything- low-tech, high-tech, past, present and future. I wanted MOTU to be as expansive as possible and do anything that was appealing. I would love to see a G.I. Joe segment in MOTU. I wouldn’t mind seeing a character like [Child’s Play] Chucky in it.
“In other words, anything could go into it. When I became the manager in charge of creativity for the line in 1983 I worked real hard to change that.” – Roger Sweet
Mark quit Mattel in 1982, after the line had launched. Arguably had he not quit, he would have continued to lead the design of subsequent waves of figures. But because Mark had left, Roger was put in charge. You can kind of tell Mattel was caught off guard, because the 1983 wave of figures relied heavily on repaints and old tooling, and had the fewest new figures of any year of the brand. Mark had designed Ram Man and Man-E-Faces before leaving Mattel, leaving other Mattel designers like Colin Bailey and Roger Sweet to move very quickly to get toys out in time for 1983.
Rudy Obrero, the freelance packaging artist behind the artwork for the earliest MOTU product boxes (Castle Grayskull, Battle Cat, Wind Raider, etc), described his working relationship with Mark Taylor:
I don’t remember the conversations [with Mark Taylor about the MOTU line] but I remember the feeling I got. I left there thinking this guy is really into it. He’s really into this. And that’s why I always thought he created it. It just felt like it was his baby.
These 1981 prototype models (above) by the late Tony Guerrero are closer to the final He-Man design in some ways. The bracers and belt now look very recognizably He-Man, as does the belt/loin cloth. I’m not sure if this was meant to have a harness put over top it or not, but I would assume that it did. A cast of this sculpture appears in early prototype pictures of Ted Mayer’s Battle Ram vehicle, as well. I would speculate that they may have been considering cloth boots for He-Man at this point, which would explain the bare feet.
Incidentally, a helmet very similar to the one on the above prototype appears on the door to Castle Grayskull:
The horned helmet stuck with He-Man until very late in his development. It appears in several versions of Mark Taylor’s B-sheet for the character, including an early colorized version dated April 6, 1981, and a later recolored version dated August 3, 1981:
The above version looks very close to the final production figure. The colors have been made brighter, probably in a bid to be more appealing to children. The shield looks close to the final version.
A prototype (below) was sculpted based on the 1981 B-Sheet. Most of the elements from the B-sheet are there, with the notable exception of the horned helmet. This version is also missing the bracer on the left wrist and the boot knife. Perhaps the left bracer is missing because its presence on the B-sheet was obscured by the shield.
Closer to final prototype. Image source: He-man.us
Mini comic artist Alfredo Alcala probably used both the B-sheet and the above prototype as a reference, because his earliest depictions of He-Man have specific elements from both (notably, the knife in the boot, the two-tone boots, the belt, the occasional lack of a bracer on the left wrist, and the shape of the axe).
Another view of the close to final prototype appears in this photo (courtesy of Ted Mayer) of an early version of the Wind Raider. In this image, the detail on the right forearm bracer is more evident. From this angle, it looks like the harness is a part of the chest sculpt, although it’s difficult to say for sure. It’s also clear that the cross symbol on He-Man’s chest is also more raised than the final toy.
Update: More views of this early prototype have recently surfaced in these promotional images shared by Andy Youssi. These images include He-Man’s prototype axe:
Mark Ellis, who was in charge of marketing for the fledgling MOTU line, explains some of the changes to He-Man’s design:
Preliminary Design did the original figure for the theme test, one of which was the barbarian. After the research came back on the theme, work began on developing the line. Engineering and the art departments took over the development of the characters. Each character was modified a few times, each time being a little less barbarian and finally to what was produced. In developing the original line, you have to remember that we were introducing it without the benefit of a movie, comic character, or TV show. It was on its own. From the Usage Research, kids when they are 5 and 6 want to know if the character is good or bad. So over time, changes were made to make He Man more clearly good and Skeletor and his cronies made to look quite different from the good guys. I do remember changing He Manâs hair to be blond because my boss had blond hair. I had a chart on my office wall to keep track of who was who, and what their special powers were so that everything we did in the commercials and packaging was consistent.
You might have noticed that every version of He-Man we’ve seen so far lacks the iconic power sword. The sword seems to have been an added later as a marketing consideration, according to Ellis:
I will say that at Mattel, we were careful to make sure the sword fit into the characters hand. An idea was proposed when we were doing the television commercial for the line that involved a split sword. That is why He Manâs and Skeletorâs swords fit together. We later dropped that idea in the development of the commercials.
I’d also like to note that the upward-curved cross guards on the sword were meant to be open, as in the Alfredo Alcala artwork (below). But it appears that strengthening connectors were added to the cross guards because the plastic used was so flexible. So the ends of the cross guards were often depicted in media as being fused together, especially in the Filmation cartoon – an interesting accident brought about by engineering and safety considerations.
According to designer Mark Taylor, the upward curved cross guards were actually meant to be handles, as you turned the sword like a key to open Castle Grayskull. In his view of the He-Man mythos, He-Man would have inherited one half of the sword from his ancestors, and the Skeletor would have inherited the other half.
It was recently pointed out to me by DuĹĄan MitroviÄ that there is an early Filmation drawing that features the half sword concept. The split sword idea was dropped before the show went into production.
Image source: James Eatock
This final, hand-painted He-Man prototype (below) brings all the refinements and changes (many driven by market research) into the final iconic look for the most powerful man in the universe:
The cross sell art (below) is very true to He-Man’s finalized design, and so was likely created sometime after the final prototype:
Packaging
He-Man was first packaged on the sought-after â8-backâ card. Reissued versions featured an amazing scene on the back of the card of He-Man, Teela and Man-At-Arms gazing out over the rolling hills of Eternia, vigilant for any signs of Skeletor. My favorite version is the reissued “12-back” card, because it features that artwork.
The first He-Man 8-back release figures were made in Taiwan. The version below is the very first release, which you can tell because it has no warranty information listed on the back, no subtitles for the character names, and no batch number (ie G1, G2, G3, and so forth):
He-Man, Mexico “8-back” packaging, 1983, with warranty:
He-Man, Taiwan “12-back” packaging, 1984:
Production Figure
Early versions of the 1982 made in Taiwan loose figure (stamped 1981) have a sculpted belly button, which disappeared from the figure starting in 1983. I believe the earliest versions have somewhat blue-ish gray accessories, while subsequent versions have more of a flat gray color.
The belt color ranged from an orange-salmon color to more of a mustard yellow. His hair color could be subdued or quite bright. I won’t explore production variants in depth in this particular article.
One of the things that really captivated me about He-Man as a kid, aside from his powerful appearance and striking but simple design, was his face sculpt. It wasn’t a handsome face. He had very strong cheekbones and muscular jaws. Depending on the angle, his expression could go from a grimace to a smile. It’s really a remarkable face, and a testament to the great skill of Tony Guerrero.
He-Man in Action
Some photos and a short video of He-Man in action, contributed by Ăyvind Meisfjord:
Reception
He-Man and his early compatriots were an instant success. Even before the debut of the Filmation cartoon, the Masters of the Universe line sold five million figures in its first 10 months:
Some additional trade ads featuring He-Man, via MOTUC Figures:
Gift Sets
He-Man, as a toy, was sold in a number of configurations, apart from the single-carded figure. I wonât get into He-Man variants (ie, Battle Armor He-Man, Thunder Punch He-Man, etc) for now. But the standard release He-Man was available in the following gift sets:
- He-Man/Battle Cat
- He-Man/Wind Raider
- He-Man/Jet Sled
- He-Man/Skeletor
- He-Man/Teela
- He-Man/Teela/Ram Man
You can explore what these items looked like at the excellent Grayskull Museum site.
An interesting side note. In early materials He-Man is referred to as “Strongest man in the universe” rather than “Most powerful man in the universe.”
Artwork
He-Man appeared in most of the box art produced for the MOTU line. My favorite depictions of He-Man in box art tend to be the Rudy Obrero pieces. I’m also quite fond of William George’s depictions, but I’ll get into his artwork in another post when I discuss Battle Armor He-Man:
Origin Story
He-Man’s origin story changed dramatically over the first few years of his existence. In the Alcala/Glut mini comics, he was a jungle warrior who had been gifted by the Sorceress/Goddess with some powerful weapons and artifacts. His harness acted as a force field and amplified his strength. He-Man was strong but he couldn’t move mountains. He could be overpowered by enemies like Beast Man or Mer-Man, if he wasn’t careful. He-Man was always He-Man in this continuity – there was no Prince Adam.
In the earliest Golden Books stories, He-Man again lacks an alter ego. He is simply He-Man, tireless protector of Castle Grayskull. That’s even the case in some subsequent stories, like the one below from the Golden Book series:
In the 1982 DC Comics series, the alter ego of Prince Adam was introduced for the first time. This Adam (dressed in a blue vest) could only transform into He-Man by entering the “Cavern of Power”.
By the time the Filmation cartoon debuted in September 1983, Prince Adam was sole keeper of the power sword (in other canon it was often hidden in obscure places or guarded by the Sorceress), and he used it to summon the power of Castle Grayskull and transform into He-Man. He was warrior with immense, almost limitless strength, but he had an aversion to violence except as a last resort.
Animation
In the Filmation cartoon, He-Man’s design was noticeably softened. He lost the rectangular elements on his harness and the detail on his bracers and belt. But in the Filmation-produced commercial, He-Man retained the details of the vintage toy:
Advertising
As the protagonist of the MOTU line, He-Man was of course featured prominently in almost all marketing materials for the line, including catalog images and television commercials:
Impact
He-Man captured the imagination of a generation of children, from 1982 until the demise of the Masters of the Universe line in 1988. He was a bit of a contradiction, though. He tapped into the primordial barbarian fantasy worlds that were so popular during the 70s and early 80s (Conan the Barbarian, The Beastmaster, etc), but he also had a heart and was a good role model for children. And despite the fact that he wore furry shorts and rode a giant tiger, he would also pilot fantasy vehicles and fight opponents armed with laser canons.
Equal parts Conan, Trazan, Luke Skywalker, Flash Gordon and Prince Valiant, He-Man was derivative of dozens of disparate but iconic characters. But He-Man also transcended those influences and became something much more. Would it be at all plausible to say that He-Man represents some kind of unconscious primordial image – a Jungian archetype? Maybe that’s taking things a bit too far. But then again, maybe not.
As Mark Taylor recently said:
Joseph Campbell is one of my heroes. Joseph Campbell’s concepts about myths and legends and icons are ingrained in all artists’ mentality. If you’re going to tell a story, you need to understand Joseph Campbell.
As an artist it’s always been integral to me to tell the story. Even if I’m doing something that you wouldn’t think has a story to it, like a painting, I have to feel that I’m telling a story.
I think I got this [idea of what a hero is] by looking at Greek literature and Tarzan and Prince Valiant. I would read it with my dad, which was really important, and I wanted to be the next hero. And at the same time I was kind of fascinated with the idea of Cro-Magnons and Vikings. They would just go into battle with almost no armor on. They went into battle, and so did the Greeks and so did all the heroes. A hero doesn’t need a lot of armor. To me the hero is the guy that is willing to go out there and just do it no matter what. His job is to prevail.
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I know all this stuff but wasn’t aware Taylor did the harness…which does change things a bit and I would agree with your conclusion. This is a good read for folks not the know about such things.
Thanks Eamon! Yes, I think Mark Taylor doing the harness really clinches it. Not to say that he didn’t make changes based on input from marketing and others (changing the hair color, removing the helmet, etc). But I think it’s safe to say that He-Man is mostly Mark Taylor’s creation.
By the way, my comments about He-Man being an archetype were inspired by some of your comments from old RGD episodes. I think you were on to something there. There is definitely something very primal about He-Man.
Thanks glad you liked the podcast. Yes I think Mark deserves most but not all of the credit for creating He-Man. I have to read the rest of your blog yet about Skeletor which i will do next. đ
Thanks! Hope you like it. I’m sure 99% of my posts will contain information you’ve already heard, but I at least try to include some nice photos and some analysis of the figures and their history.
I’ve mentioned this before on the Sideshow forum, but I just want to say again how awesome your artwork was for that PCS He-Man/Battle Cat set. As someone who really loves the early MOTU box art, your piece hit all the right notes.
Oh thanks man! It was probably the best thing I have done so far and the most fun too. đ
Love this blog đ
I donât fully share your view on the Talyor Vs Sweet debate.
Having read Roger Sweetâs book, with all the evidence documents supplied, plus numerous interviews with others at Mattle, hereâs my takeâŚ
Roger Sweet came up with He-manâs super-massive musculature, he said he wanted to âmake Arnold Schwarzenegger look like a wimpâ. He also conceived of the âbattle readyâ stance, at a time when most other actions figures had passive, upright stances and straight arms at their sides. He also came up with the name âHe-manâ and the punch action. Mark Taylor style the first run of Masters and gave it that compelling style. His early work on Torak is not really compelling proof of the first ever design for He-man. Torak has an athletic, but not He-man like build and is set in a conventional Frazetta barbarian setting, no boiler-plate technology or âFlash Gordonâ style ray-guns. After Taylor styled the first series of Masters, Roger took over design of the whole range and came up with all the wonderful novelties that kept Masters on the shelves for years, such as the Dragon Walker, Roton, Spydor, Bashasaurus (which was a lot better before the safety committee reduced itâs power!), and the wonderful Eternia Playset. I do feel however, that Rogerâs original concept for He-man was likely just another generic Big Jim range, who would be dressed up in different costumes and themes. It was the Mattel marketing department and Taylorâs designs that created the compelling world and story arc of Eternia.
I have to say my sympathies lie more with Roger Sweet as I see him as the underdog here. Unlike others at Mattel who went on to great careers in the toy industry, Roger couldnât get another job after leaving Mattel, which is unbelievable given his amazing portfolio of successful toys (all proven and documented). It is clear he had become unpopular in what was, at the time, a highly competitive, corporate culture. He claims to have heard from a recruitment consultant that âsomeone in the industryâ was going around bad-mouthing him, saying he had nothing to do with he-manâs creation and he was a liar. I think itâs a shame that a talented designer lost his career, perhaps due to someoneâs inflated ego.
In the end, Masters was a joint effort of all the creative people at Mattel. I admire both Roger and Markâs work, and itâs a shame these guys canât share and enjoy the acclaim.
Hi Graham,
Thanks for your thoughtful response! I actually agree with a lot of what you write. It seems to me Roger Sweet made many general contributions to the the overall look of the figures to begin with, and more specific contributions once he started running the line in 1983 (affecting the 1984 figures).
The attributes like super-massive musculature, crouched stance, power punch etc are all great contributions, but none of those are specific to He-Man as a specific character. Man-At-Arms has the exact same proportions and action feature. I agree that Torak alone isn’t He-Man. Just the first step in the gradual evolution. What makes me think that Mark Taylor is the creator of the He-Man character is that all the elements that are unique to He-Man were designed by Mark Taylor, with some input of course from marketing (ie removing the helmet, adding a sword). Roger Sweet contributed ideas for toy attributes that were more general to all the male figures.
That’s why I say that Roger Sweet is one of the fathers of the MOTU toy line, because his ideas affected the whole line. But Roger Sweet was the creator of Mekaneck in way that he was not for He-Man. That’s because he actually designed Mekaneck’s specific look.
It’s kind of funny, I listened to lengthy Roger Sweet interview. I didn’t come away doubting the truth of anything he said about his work, but I also I didn’t come away thinking he had created He-Man. But I think he thinks of creating a character differently than I do. I think he thinks that big muscles plus the action feature and the name means he created the character. But I approach the “credit” the same way I approach songwriting credit. Someone who says, “you should add more bass, and a drum solo” doesn’t get songwriting credit, even if it was a good idea and made the song better. The person who writes those specific parts gets the credit. The person contributing general ideas is usually thanked in the album notes, but doesn’t get songwriting credits.
I appreciate both Roger and Mark’s work. Whatever their differences, I’m glad that they both contributed. But of course I am a particular admirer of Mark Taylor’s design work, which I think was absolutely brilliant. Same goes for Ted Mayer.
I wasn’t a fly on the wall at Mattel in 1981, so I can only form my opinions based on these interviews and the surviving artwork and prototypes. I understand that people will see the same evidence and come to different conclusions, which is totally legitimate.
Thanks again for your comments đ
I read Sweet’s book when it first came out and listened to his interview. I, too, give credit to Mattel, Sweet, Taylor, Watts, and Mayer. But I also agree that Sweet is more sympathetic in this case, and never received his just due from Mattel or even the He-man.org community.
I feel the book “Art of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe” had more access to Mark Taylor, and made the case for Taylor by showing all the sketches as evidence that he had the genesis of the idea. Also, Josh Van Pelt of The Power and Honor has been on the record downplaying Sweet’s role.
Mattel itself had tried to discredit Sweet when his book was published, even with his documentation. They never sued him for lying, so that speaks volumes. Mattel had also denied He-Man was based on Conan for years.
Sweet is bitter because he was blacklisted and Mattel employees were putting the word out on the street that he did not create He-Man. If we were in his position, and He-Man made billions, it would be natural to focus on that meeting were we showed the three prototypes. As you said, without him, there is no He-Man as we know it. Taylor’s sketches may SEEM to look like He-Man, but mostly with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight; they don’t look like the actual action figure, they look like generic fantasy heroes based on the sword and sorcery genre. Sweet added the sci-fi tech. The earlier sketch looks like the 200x He-Man cartoon and the viking looks like Conan.
The “Skeletor cameo” is not evidence either since he was originally Demo-Man who looks nothing like him, and both Conan and Kull fought Thulsa Doom, who obviously was the basis for Skeletor.
Well, I think Sweet’s contributions at the beginning are more general. IE, making all the male figures have extremely large muscles, or the power punch action feature. But there is nothing specific to the final He-Man figure that was designed by Roger Sweet, that I have been able to determine. The harness was Mark Taylor, the weapons were Mark Taylor, the face looks pretty much like the original Mark Taylor Torak drawing.
I agree though that Sweet added a lot of important things to the line as a whole. Sci-fi was an important part of making MOTU something unique and not just another barbarian fantasy franchise.
This was a great read! I have always been sympathetic to Roger Sweet. He did help shape the line, and he did come up with the name He-Man. However, just coming up with the name of a character is not enough to claim that you created the character. In this case, I think it is obvious that Roger was on some level inspired by Mark Taylor’s designs.
Roger is certainly one of the fathers of Masters of the Universe, and even though he and his former colleagues at Mattel see things differently, I think it is important not to be dismissive of his work.
Agreed! I definitely appreciate what Sweet contributed to the line, with characters like Webstor, Mekaneck, Sy-Klone, Tri-Klops, etc. Thanks John
Great blog, Battleram. I’m a life-long and hardcore MOTU fan (though my main love lies in the early “Barbarian” mythos; the Filmation series has it’s own place in my heart, not so keen on some of the latter directions the line went in, even pre-NA) and found this blog by chance, and love it – reading such in-depth notes on each figure, creature and vehicle. I’ll gradually try to post my own thoughts on each one as you do them.
…Ah, He-Man. Where it all began for so many of us. I remember I’d just started school in 1983, and my best friend had this new muscular toy called ‘He-Man’. I was blown away by it – it’s vibrant colours, it’s tactile feel, it’s chunkiness, and it’s power-punch feature. I didn’t know anything more than ‘he’s called He-Man’ but that was enough to hook me in – for life, it turned out. A few weeks later, when out shopping with my mother, I was treated to my own He-Man figure (I can remember the price well, ÂŁ2.99 here in he U.K.). It’s interesting in that my parents always tried to push me towards puzzles and gentle or educational toys, toy cars at most, but for whatever reason, He-Man was deemed okay. I remember being overwhelmed at owning this figure, as well as all the bits he came with – armor harness, sword, ax, shield, and comic book.
I remember if being a warm sunny day, and that afternoon excitedly taking my new man to my grandparents, who lived just a couple of streets away at the time, and showing them and telling them about it. I have such vivid memories of sitting on the garden bench and my late grandfather reading the mini-comic with me – mine (I deducted years later when one of the first things I ever looked up on the internet was MOTI) was a second wave re-issue that came packed with “The Magic Stealer!” For this memory plus the fact it has an awesome cover, “The Magic Stealer!” generally ranks as my own personal favourite mini-comic (though a few others from the second wave come close). Furthermore I loved the hybrid space-aged-medieval setting of these comics, and this (with the first wave barbarian tales) has always been my favourite “version” of the mythos, that I long for a future reboot to one day return to.
It’s always amazed me too, at not only the flexibility of the line and how so many characters can be interpreted through preference, but also how creative children could be at play. One day when some friends were playing with our He-Man figure around a school sandpit, one friend, Stephen, had a armor-less He-Man. “Who’s that?” I for some reason asked him. “It’s He-Man’s brother, Gripper!” Stephen replied. For some reason, Gripper always stuck in my head, and I instantly imaged him as a member of He-Man’s jungle tribe (these were still pre-Prince Adam days)…
Anyway, that was me set for life. I always looks after all of my toys, but He-Man got a heck of a lot of playwear. I never replaced any of my figures (nor had much need to as I did take care of them well), but He-Man was the only one that I ever did replace during the original line’s run. It was quite late on, and by that, original He-Man’s right arm would often come off from wear, the back of his armor was held done up with a rubber band, and his rubber head was coming away; my grandmother brought he a stray (boxed) He-Man that showed up at a local charity sale one Saturday morning. With a new He-Man not so beaten up to helm my battled, my original wasn’t left without a duty. From that day on, he became Gripper, and has been ever since!
Fun fact: My new replacement He-Man (can’t remember what mini-comic he was packed with), was Malaysian-produced, and as such had the fairly rare added “side handle” to the a. Now whilst I used to take care of my figures, I wanted this to be exactly like my original figure… so I pulled this additional handle off, not realising how vaguely sought after it would be!
I’ve always felt one of the best things about vintage He-Man, was his face sculpt, which was awesome. It captured so much, determine and battle-ready, but not vicious. It also has different ‘looks’ from different angles.
As is known, the colours can be found to vary a bit on different versions, especially the hair and belt. The boots do too, though seldom as red as they’d often be shown to be in various illustrations. Some of the darker browns some examples can be found with I’ve always felt to be a bit drab.
Oh, and while exactly “who created He-Man” will likely never be fully determined, I personally am generally in the Mark Taylor camp. His early sketches and designs clearly have the basic elements of a very basic He-Man character. I believe it to be Roger Sweet who rounded things out into an actual toyline, but for the pivotal lead that had everything build around it, I believe Taylor’s rough sketches to be the initial seeds.
Well that’s my memories on He-Man (I’ll try not to make all of my response posts so long!). I’m sat here with He-Man and Battle Cat on my t-shirt (I only occasionally dare wear it, tho I did do get people stopping me in the street asking where I got it), and by coincidence, this very week, my original original He-Man and Skeletor came out of storage. I write and run our local pub quiz, and this week I made it a “toys & games special”, inviting people to bring along their own favourite childhood toys. Naturally, He-Man and Skeletor, complete with cats, had to make an appearance (complete with a leg repair on Skeletor, due to the rubber band having by now disintergrating). Future posts not so long hopefully, else I might as well start my own blog!! đ
I’m super late to the conversation, but being a comic book guy, it’s clear that Roger Sweet and Mark Taylor are co-creators of He-Man — one singular person doesn’t have to receive all the credit.
Jerry Siegel came up with the origin, powers, etc. of Superman, but Joe Shuster threw in a few and created the iconic costume that visually separated Superman from every other adventurer of the time. Ergo, the credit always reads, “Superman created by Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster”.
Why can’t the credit read, “He-Man created by Roger Sweet & Mark Taylor”?
In Italy he man continued to be called the strongest man in the universe “L’uomo piĂš forte dell’universo” in commercials until at least 1985!
(Tl;dr at the bottom)
It’s pretty obvious you’re squarely on the Taylor camp and certainly have more than a shade of Taylor’s overt animosity towards Sweet.
Taylor contradicts himself in several sources when he claims he came up with “He-Man” (he calls him that, even though he didn’t came up with that name). He said in the early 2000s he had a pre-Sweet’s pitch sketch of an “unnamed” character (referring to the “Torak” character). 10 years later he claimed the character was named Torak. I doubt he just “forgot” the first name of “his” prize creation. The date on the drawing is 79, but other sources like Pixel Dan’s book I think have him saying he had the character as early as the 50’s.
He also claimed Skeletor came from his experience as a child with a very famous urban legend that ended up being real, the corpse at the spook house. Then even said in Pixel Dan’s book that he’s based on Mexican Day of the Dead imagery. I’m Mexican, and born in the state where such imagery originated (the imagery, the work of Jose Guadalupe Posada, was originally entirely unrelated to the Day of the Dead celebration). I doubt Taylor was familiar with such imagery in the 70’s-80’s when most of Mexico itself wasn’t that familiar with it until recently. People say it’s always been around, that’s false. It’s experienced a huge boom in popularity in the last 20 years.
However, it just so happened that Captain Drake and Charon, both from earlier Mattel toy lines were very similar to what Skeletor ended up as. And it also just so happened that Conan had a nemesis by the name of Thulsa Doom who is- guess what- a man with a skull for a face.
Taylor also claims he created Battle Cat because he “Always thought “He-Man” should ride a tiger” because if a guy goes into a bar riding a tiger, you wouldn’t mess with him. This despite all of us knowing full well that Battle Cat came about as a coincidence, that Mattel already had that asset ready, that people like Paul Cleveland kept pushing for it’s inclusion in the toy line, to save money, etc. I highly doubt Taylor “always thought” He-Man should ride a horse-sized tiger and then lo and behold, Mattel JUST so happened to have a previously made tiger asset that was just the right size for He-Man to ride on.
What I’m getting to is that Taylor’s claims are suspect and contradictory, and the only proof we have that the Torak drawing even existed in ’79 is Taylor’s word, and that is simply not enough for me, given the contradictions previously stated, among others.
You word it very diplomatically here, but it’s clear you’re just repeating Taylor’s accusations. He flat out said Roger Sweet weaseled around his office and stole his drawings and that that is the only way Sweet could’ve come up with a barbarian character. Everyone knows Roger Sweet was the first man to work on the concept that would become He-Man. This claim by Taylor conveniently places him as the victimized original creator of the idea. How aggravating it must have been for him! Odd, then, that Taylor later agreed to make an illustration for Sweet to use in his pitch, based on Sweet’s rough sculpt, this by Sweet’s own admission.
My own idea of what happened is that despite what everyone at Mattel says, Occam’s Razor states that Mattel working on a Conan toy line and then coming up with He-Man immediately after squirreling out of the Conan contract is too much of a coincidence. It’s obvious (and they all state it outright, they just substitute “Conan” with “Frazetta”) that Mattel’s people were influenced by Conan. Sweet likely got the idea to push the barbarian concept into the top 3 winning concepts for a possible boy’s toy line from Conan. A barbarian warrior, and it’s associated imagery, aren’t a THAT terribly original of an idea that the only way Sweet could’ve come up with a barbarian character was by “stealing” from Taylor. Hell, all of the design elements you use to champion Taylor as the sole creator of He-Man are lifted directly from Frazetta’s Conan art, so it’s not as if either man was being terribly original.
Fact is, if you take Roger Sweet out of the equation, and He-Man and the entire line NEVER happens. Period. Taylor was not going to pitch a Barbarian line to Mattel. He can claim that he created He-Man-sorry-“Torak” and Skeletor at age 3 with his first set of crayons, but his creations, if any, would’ve stayed in a drawer in his desk and never would’ve become MOTU. That simply wasn’t his job.
On the other hand, replace Taylor, and He-Man and the MOTU line DO happen, because Mattel simply would’ve gotten another designer to work on the final designs for the characters of the line. He-Man and MOTU both would’ve looked very, very different and maybe wouldn’t have been successful, sure, but it would happen.
You’re ignoring the collaboration method that was responsible for virtually every aspect of this line and universe and give credit almost solely to Taylor for everything. Taylor didn’t come up with the basic concept of several of those early characters, people higher up did, including Sweet. See his 2019 powercon appearance. Yes, concepts as basic as “flying guy”, or “aquatic guy”, but that already makes it a collab. You forget that every figure had to conform to the muscular build sculpted by Tony Guerrero on Sweet’s instruction, so many of Taylor’s more intricate designs had to be turned back and made to conform to that.Taylor didn’t market the line and made it a success, Mark Ellis, Paul Cleveland, etc did. Taylor didn’t name these characters, several of Mattel’s people did. Taylor didn’t create the story of these characters, Donald Glut did. And he didn’t create the most well known version of these characters, Lou Scheimer and Filmation did.
Taylor was pivotal for this line, but he wasn’t the only one and no one man can be credited with the creation of He-Man and MOTU, to pretend that it can and tell people that trust you that it can is quite simply a lie.
As far as I know, it was Sweet that pushed the Barbarian concept as far as the pitch, it was Sweet who insisted on the physical massiveness, the punching action feature, the battle-ready stance and intense facial expression, and of course, he was the one to christen our hero as He-Man. No other named would’ve worked. Without these elements, I don’t care if Taylor made the same designs, the line would never have been successful. It wasn’t only the design that sold these toys, it was also their size and apparent power and massiveness when combined with the design and marketing. A 3’75 line with the exact same characters and concepts and minus the He-Man name would’ve likely failed.
Taylor couldn’t even concede that Sweet came up with that name. Out of all the Mattel people involved in the creation of MOTU, only Taylor (and his faithful acolyte, Meyer) try to wrestle away credit from anyone else. Not just Sweet. Taylor only recognized himself, his buddy Meyer and a few other of the art people, as being pivotal to the creation of He-Man and MOTU. All the others recognize Sweet’s contribution and this speaks volumes of Taylor. Believe me, I used to worship the man. That changed after hours of hearing interviews with him, it changed after listening to Taylor mocking Sweet for having to work at Home Depot (guess those lowly jobs are below Taylor’s contempt), a situation he was left in thanks to Taylor (and friends) working hard at getting Sweet blacklisted from the toy industry because they couldn’t recognize his role in creating He-Man.
Tl;dr: To assign credit of He-Man and MOTU to one single man is a flat out lie, whoever that man may be. He was created by the people at Mattel, namely Roger Sweet, Mark Taylor, Derek Gable, Mark Ellis, Paul Cleveland, Tony Guerrero, Rudy Obrero, Joe Morrison, etc, and Lou Scheimer and Filmation, without whom the MOTU line would’ve likely ended up as one of many short lived 80’s toy lines.
So I will respond to some of your points. Your statements will be in quotes, and my answers will be without quotation marks.
âTaylor contradicts himself in several sources when he claims he came up with âHe-Manâ (he calls him that, even though he didnât came up with that name). He said in the early 2000s he had a pre-Sweetâs pitch sketch of an âunnamedâ character (referring to the âTorakâ character). 10 years later he claimed the character was named Torak. I doubt he just âforgotâ the first name of âhisâ prize creation. The date on the drawing is 79, but other sources like Pixel Danâs book I think have him saying he had the character as early as the 50âs.â
So I have an audio interview from 2006 where Taylor talks about his Torak drawing. In the interview he brings up the drawing. At first he calls it âKorakâ and on the audio you hear his wife reminding him that it’s Torak.
The Pixel Dan book interview was actually done by me. That interview is also on my blog. (https://battleramblog.com/mark-rebecca-taylor-on-the-origins-of-he-man-2/) What he’s talking about is that when he was a kid he would sketch a heroic character. It may or may not have been called Torak, maybe that name came later. Lots of artists will sketch and work on a character for years. The 1979 drawing is just one version of it.
âHe also claimed Skeletor came from his experience as a child with a very famous urban legend that ended up being real, the corpse at the spook house. Then even said in Pixel Danâs book that heâs based on Mexican Day of the Dead imagery. Iâm Mexican, and born in the state where such imagery originated (the imagery, the work of Jose Guadalupe Posada, was originally entirely unrelated to the Day of the Dead celebration). I doubt Taylor was familiar with such imagery in the 70âs-80âs when most of Mexico itself wasnât that familiar with it until recently. People say itâs always been around, thatâs false. Itâs experienced a huge boom in popularity in the last 20 years.â
Mark’s wife Rebecca is Hispanic, and they lived in Southern California for most of their lives. So this objection doesn’t really work. I didn’t grow up anywhere near Mexico, and I knew about Dia de los Muertos when I was a kid. It’s completely plausible that Mark knew about it too. And again, the interview you’re referring to in the Pixel Dan book was done by me.
âHowever, it just so happened that Captain Drake and Charon, both from earlier Mattel toy lines were very similar to what Skeletor ended up as. And it also just so happened that Conan had a nemesis by the name of Thulsa Doom who is- guess what- a man with a skull for a face.â
Yes, there are lots of villains with skull faces, just as there are lots of heroes with swords and big muscles. It’s an archetype. That doesn’t mean Mark wasn’t influenced also by Day of the Dead and the corpse at the carnival scare ride. Every piece of art is going to have multiple influences.
âTaylor also claims he created Battle Cat because he âAlways thought âHe-Manâ should ride a tigerâ because if a guy goes into a bar riding a tiger, you wouldnât mess with him. This despite all of us knowing full well that Battle Cat came about as a coincidence, that Mattel already had that asset ready, that people like Paul Cleveland kept pushing for itâs inclusion in the toy line, to save money, etc. I highly doubt Taylor âalways thoughtâ He-Man should ride a horse-sized tiger and then lo and behold, Mattel JUST so happened to have a previously made tiger asset that was just the right size for He-Man to ride on.â
I mean Mark worked on those previous properties too â Big Jim and Tarzan, both of which used that cat mold. I’m not sure which interview you’re referring to where Mark says he âAlways thought He-Manâ should ride a tiger.â Do you have a link?
âWhat Iâm getting to is that Taylorâs claims are suspect and contradictory, and the only proof we have that the Torak drawing even existed in â79 is Taylorâs word, and that is simply not enough for me, given the contradictions previously stated, among others.â
I don’t think you’ve demonstrated anything âsuspectâ in your arguments so far.
âYou word it very diplomatically here, but itâs clear youâre just repeating Taylorâs accusations. He flat out said Roger Sweet weaseled around his office and stole his drawings and that that is the only way Sweet couldâve come up with a barbarian character. Everyone knows Roger Sweet was the first man to work on the concept that would become He-Man. This claim by Taylor conveniently places him as the victimized original creator of the idea. How aggravating it must have been for him! Odd, then, that Taylor later agreed to make an illustration for Sweet to use in his pitch, based on Sweetâs rough sculpt, this by Sweetâs own admission.â
So this is an interesting issue. If you listen to Roger Sweet talk, you’ll notice he often claims to have originated something based on a âseed idea.â For Roger that means if he ever mentions an idea in a work document that vaguely resembles a toy that came out later, that means he originated it. (He doesn’t claim to have designed it, only originated it). For instance, there’s an old 1981 document about He-Man accessories. In that document Roger says He-Man should have a powerful wife with blonde hair, and her name is âShe.â From that he said he âoriginatedâ She-Ra, even though no one was thinking about developing a character like that until years later, and it wasn’t He-Man’s wife, and the naming process for She-Ra was completely independent of Roger Sweet. Someone at Filmation actually came up with She-Ra’s name.
Sweet admits that Taylor actually worked on the design of the barbarian figure in the He-Man trio â specifically the harness (including the cross at the front), the cape and the furry shorts. He also mentions he didn’t like the boots that ended up on the final He-Man, complaining that they looked primitive and they were a Mark Taylor thing too. Here’s the thing â those things that Taylor came up with are the only things that make He-Man recognizable as He-Man. Most of the heroic male characters have the same basic body, with different costumes. Mark Taylor created He-Man’s costume. The other costumes that were created by Sweet were the military and space themes (and even the space theme borrows a helmet from Boba Fett). Those were the ones that were not chosen for the toyline. Maybe that’s why Mark Taylor was chosen to lead the design for the entire line. Roger Sweet wasn’t put in charge until 1982, when Mark Taylor left Mattel (at that point all of the 1982 line had been designed). That’s why there are fewer figures in 1983, and lots of quick repaints â it took some time to recover from the loss of their principle designer.
âMy own idea of what happened is that despite what everyone at Mattel says, Occamâs Razor states that Mattel working on a Conan toy line and then coming up with He-Man immediately after squirreling out of the Conan contract is too much of a coincidence. Itâs obvious (and they all state it outright, they just substitute âConanâ with âFrazettaâ) that Mattelâs people were influenced by Conan. Sweet likely got the idea to push the barbarian concept into the top 3 winning concepts for a possible boyâs toy line from Conan.â
So you’ve got the timeline reversed here. Mattel started working on He-Man (officially) in winter 1980. They didn’t start chasing the Conan license until April 1981, and that agreement wasn’t official until July 1981. He-Man was already designed before they had the Conan license. The first He-Man B-sheet by Mark Taylor is early April, before others at Mattel were independently pursuing the Conan license.
You can see a timeline of the actual dates here:
https://battleramblog.com/masters-of-the-universe-timeline-1979-1987/
âA barbarian warrior, and itâs associated imagery, arenât a THAT terribly original of an idea that the only way Sweet couldâve come up with a barbarian character was by âstealingâ from Taylor. Hell, all of the design elements you use to champion Taylor as the sole creator of He-Man are lifted directly from Frazettaâs Conan art, so itâs not as if either man was being terribly original.â
I don’t think anyone will disagree that He-Man was influenced by Conan. He very clearly was. Mark Taylor said he was influenced by Conan, Prince Valiant and other fantasy properties. But as I’ve already said, Sweet has already admitted that Taylor designed the things that are unique to He-Man. Sweet just claims to have âoriginatedâ the concept, which seems to be an idiosyncratic idea that Sweet uses to claim credit, just as he claimed credit for She-Ra.
âFact is, if you take Roger Sweet out of the equation, and He-Man and the entire line NEVER happens. Period. Taylor was not going to pitch a Barbarian line to Mattel. He can claim that he created He-Man-sorry-âTorakâ and Skeletor at age 3 with his first set of crayons, but his creations, if any, wouldâve stayed in a drawer in his desk and never wouldâve become MOTU. That simply wasnât his job.â
Yes, that’s true. In some way Roger is responsible for the creation of the MOTU line because he worked to pitch it. I agree, Mark Taylor would not have pitched the idea on his own. However, Roger did not come up with any of the visual designs on the first wave of MOTU characters. Roger did work with four other people to create the mechanism for Castle Grayskull’s trap door, which is preserved in the patent filing. Roger Sweet’s earliest design that was made into a toy was Tri-Klops. He did that after Mark left Mattel, and when Roger was promoted to be in charge of visual design for the line. At that time Roger hired Martin Arriola. I interviewed Martin, and Martin also says Roger had a tendency to take credit for other people’s work. Martin is not a friend of Mark Taylor and didn’t work with Mark on the vintage line.
âOn the other hand, replace Taylor, and He-Man and the MOTU line DO happen, because Mattel simply wouldâve gotten another designer to work on the final designs for the characters of the line. He-Man and MOTU both wouldâve looked very, very different and maybe wouldnât have been successful, sure, but it would happen.â
This is conjecture. We have no idea what the toys would have looked like with another designer. They may not have been approved. There just isn’t enough information to justify this statement.
âYouâre ignoring the collaboration method that was responsible for virtually every aspect of this line and universe and give credit almost solely to Taylor for everything. Taylor didnât come up with the basic concept of several of those early characters, people higher up did, including Sweet. See his 2019 powercon appearance. Yes, concepts as basic as âflying guyâ, or âaquatic guyâ, but that already makes it a collab. You forget that every figure had to conform to the muscular build sculpted by Tony Guerrero on Sweetâs instruction, so many of Taylorâs more intricate designs had to be turned back and made to conform to that.Taylor didnât market the line and made it a success, Mark Ellis, Paul Cleveland, etc did. Taylor didnât name these characters, several of Mattelâs people did. Taylor didnât create the story of these characters, Donald Glut did. And he didnât create the most well known version of these characters, Lou Scheimer and Filmation did.â
I’m only crediting Mark Taylor for the visual design, because that’s what he did. We have the artwork to prove it. Mark also said it was collaborative and never claimed full credit for everything that went into the line. But I would also argue that the visual design of these toys is the most critical aspect.
âTaylor was pivotal for this line, but he wasnât the only one and no one man can be credited with the creation of He-Man and MOTU, to pretend that it can and tell people that trust you that it can is quite simply a lie.â
I’ve never claimed that Taylor was the only important part of the line.
âAs far as I know, it was Sweet that pushed the Barbarian concept as far as the pitch, it was Sweet who insisted on the physical massiveness, the punching action feature, the battle-ready stance and intense facial expression, and of course, he was the one to christen our hero as He-Man. No other named wouldâve worked. Without these elements, I donât care if Taylor made the same designs, the line would never have been successful. It wasnât only the design that sold these toys, it was also their size and apparent power and massiveness when combined with the design and marketing. A 3â75 line with the exact same characters and concepts and minus the He-Man name wouldâve likely failed.â
Like I said, Sweet didn’t design the barbarian costume, Taylor did. But yes, I think Sweet’s behind the scenes ideas were important. Maybe you didn’t read my article all the way through, but I do credit Sweet for the exaggerated muscles, the action feature, and the name.
âTaylor couldnât even concede that Sweet came up with that name. Out of all the Mattel people involved in the creation of MOTU, only Taylor (and his faithful acolyte, Meyer) try to wrestle away credit from anyone else. Not just Sweet. Taylor only recognized himself, his buddy Meyer and a few other of the art people, as being pivotal to the creation of He-Man and MOTU. All the others recognize Sweetâs contribution and this speaks volumes of Taylor. Believe me, I used to worship the man. That changed after hours of hearing interviews with him, it changed after listening to Taylor mocking Sweet for having to work at Home Depot (guess those lowly jobs are below Taylorâs contempt), a situation he was left in thanks to Taylor (and friends) working hard at getting Sweet blacklisted from the toy industry because they couldnât recognize his role in creating He-Man.â
Yeah, this just isn’t true. Mark acknowledged that Sweet came up with the name. A lot of this is just straw man arguments.
âTl;dr: To assign credit of He-Man and MOTU to one single man is a flat out lieâ
If you think that’s what I’ve done, you haven’t read my article carefully. I credit Mark for the visual design only, because that’s what he did.