Tomart’s Action Figure Digest #202 features one of several articles from the magazine dedicated to the vintage Masters of the Universe toyline. Almost all of the concept art in the article below comes from former Mattel designer Ted Mayer.
The author of the article (who is not named) gets the general thrust of the history of the toyline right for the most part, although there are several factual errors. For instance, the author identifies several variant He-Man and Skeletor designs made midway through the line as early concept versions of the original figures. They also conflate Ted Mayer’s green witch concept with Evil-Lyn (they’re unrelated) and seem to place Vulture Man before Screeech or Zoar (Vulture Man came after).
Still, it’s a fun article with lots of interesting concept art and prototypes. Selections from issues 89, 90 and 91 are available from both He-Man.org and Grayskull Museum (there is definitely some overlap between those articles and this one), but I’m not aware than anyone has shared scans from this particular issue before.
One of the best things about getting new He-Man toys as a kid was the box art. The toys were of course amazing and fun, but personally I spent almost as much time staring at the boxes as playing with the toys. I remember being pretty heartbroken when my mother made me throw away my Castle Grayskull and Battle Ram boxes. She saw them as clutter, but for me they were almost stories in and of themselves. You could see whole adventures unfolding in a single painted scene.
Unfortunately, good photographs or scans of the original art are not
available for every piece. If you happen to have a nicer images than I
do (higher resolution, better composition, etc), please do feel free to
share, and I’ll make an update! For pictures of the packaging itself, a
neutral (white or black) background is preferred. High resolution scans
of the artwork, where it appears without logos, would be ideal. Bottom
line – if you have better images than I do, please share them!
One final note: I’m defining box art as the front-facing painted
artwork that appeared on boxed Masters of the Universe toys. The
illustrations on blister card packaging, then, are outside the scope of
this series.
Part One: 1982
Name: Battle Cat Year: 1982 Artist: Rudy Obrero Description: He-Man sits astride an unhelmeted Battle Cat, with his axe and shield at the ready. Castle Grayskull looms in the background, partially shrouded in mist.
Name: Battle Ram Year: 1982 Artist: Rudy Obrero Description: Due to the folded shape of the box, this piece of artwork is in two sections. In the top two thirds of the artwork, He-Man flies the front half of the Battle Ram (Sky Sled) against enemies on similar flying vehicles, while a battle rages below. Several back halves of Battle Rams are launching missiles. Skeletor, Beast Man, Stratos, Man-at-Arms and Teela are seen, along side a warrior with a horned helmet, and Castle Grayskull in the background. The bottom section of the artwork features He-Man navigating rocky terrain in the complete Battle Ram, as several evil Sky Sleds attack him from the air.
Name: Castle Grayskull Year: 1982 Artist: Rudy Obrero Description: Skeletor stands ready just inside Castle Grayskull, while He-Man, Teela, Man-At-Arms, Beast Man, Stratos and Zodac prepare to attack. Several Jet Sled-like vehicles fly overhead.
Name: He-Man and Battle Cat Year: 1982 Artist: Rudy Obrero Description: In a misty, rocky wasteland, He-Man rides Battle Cat into battle, accompanied by Man-At-Arms. Skeletor and Beast Man ride their own Battle Cats into Battle, accompanied by Mer-Man.
Image source: He-Man.orgImage source: He-Man.orgImage source: He-Man.orgArtwork with added logos (just for fun)Image source: He-Man.org
Name: He-Man and Wind Raider Year: 1982 Artist: Rudy Obrero Description: In a misty, rocky wasteland, He-Man pilots the Wind Raider against Skeletor, Beast Man, a mysterious warrior in red, and shrouded hordes of barbarian warriors. In the background, laser fire erupts from Castle Grayskull.
Name: Wind Raider Year: 1982 Artist: Rudy Obrero Description: Due to the folded shape of the box, this piece of artwork is in two sections. In the top half or so, He-Man uses the Wind Raider’s anchor to destroy a section of Castle Grayskull, while unknown enemies piloting their own Wind Raiders attack him. In the lower section of the artwork, the Wind Raider has landed, and He-Man and Teela battle against Skeletor, Beast Man, Stratos and hordes of unknown enemies.
Freelance illustrator Rudy Obrero left an indelible mark on the Masters of the Universe landscape. He was originally selected by Mattel designer Mark Taylor for his ability to produce artwork in the style of Frank Frazetta, a major early influence on the He-Man toyline. Rudy’s moody atmospheres have made him a fan favorite in a toyline that was blessed with many talented artists and designers.
Today I’d like to take a look at something we often don’t notice in this artwork – the background characters and vehicles that never existed as actual toys.
The artwork referenced in this post includes:
Battle Cat
The original Battle Cat artwork (the first piece painted by Rudy for the He-Man toyline) is pretty sparse. You have He-Man on Battle Cat, some rocks and Castle Grayskull in the background, and not much else.
However, if you look more closely at the Castle, you’ll notice a barbarian warrior manning the laser canon on the castle turret:
Notice that the laser canon on the castle is the prototype design rather than the final version.
In the background, to the left of Battle Cat’s helmet, you can also see a couple of shadowy figures:
In the original charcoal drawing (a piece owned Eamon O’Donoghue, who graciously shared a picture of it), you can also see there were going to be a few more background characters in the illustration, but they were dropped in the final oil painting. Like many of Rudy’s background characters, they look like barbarian warriors straight from a Frank Frazetta painting.
Image source: Vaults of GrayskullThere are two warriors on the turret in this version.
Castle Grayskull
Rudy’s Castle Grayskull artwork has nearly a complete line-up of all the 1982 action figures, with the exception of Mer-Man. But there are also two shadowy figures in the background, behind Beast Man.
Rudy also includes a small fleet of flying Sky Sled-like vehicles. They are v-shaped and each appears to have a single pilot.
Battle Ram
Rudy’s Battle Ram illustration features a barbarian warrior with a Viking helmet, and the suggestion of at least a couple of figures on the turrets of Castle Grayskull.
It also features six of the V-shaped Sky Sled-like vehicles that appeared in the Castle Grayskull painting, each with its own pilot. Some of them are shown in side profile here. The basic design seems to be the front half of the Battle Ram without the griffin figure head, and extended, swept-back wings.
Wind Raider
Rudy Obrero’s Wind Raider illustration features about a dozen warriors at ground level, most in silhouette. One of them, however, is a blue-skinned warrior with red armor and helmet. Update: this may in fact be Stratos. Thanks to Øyvind M. for pointing this out!
The artwork also features three Wind Raiders, each with an unknown pilot, mounting an attack on He-Man, who mounted his own attack against Castle Grayskull.
He-Man and Wind Raider
The illustration for the He-Man/Wind Raider gift set shows the clearest example of an invented character. I used to think this was an off-model version of Zodac, but Rudy has said he hadn’t seen Zodac when he did the painting (indicating this was done before Castle Grayskull). Dubbed the “Warrior in Red” by fans, he is just that. His costume looks a bit like He-Man’s, but recolored. He seems to have some kind of red and gray helmet on, but it’s hard to make out any details.
Behind Skeletor, Beast Man, and the Warrior in Red is a small army of shadowy figures. Presumably they’re aligned with Skeletor.
Special thanks to Shawn, who gave me the idea for this post.
Skeletor’s most iconic weapon has always been his havoc staff, with its distinctive and menacing ram’s skull. The two are so interconnected as to be practically inseparable. Skeletor also carried his purple half of the power sword, and it made plenty of appearances in mini comics and story books.
There is however, another weapon that Skeletor carried in the 1982 mini comics (artwork by Alfredo Alcala, story by Don Glut). This was Skeletor’s energy blade (sometimes called lightning blade or lightning weapon). It was a fairly ordinary-looking short sword with a curved hilt that was capable of releasing searing blasts of energy, or even calling up magical images.
I always assumed that this particular sword’s design was an invention of artist Alfredo Alcala. But I recently noticed what appears to be the same sword showing up in early box art by Rudy Obrero. That lead me to believe that the energy blade may have originally come from Mattel*. I’d like to think there is a B-sheet lying around in a box somewhere with a drawing of this sword in it. Without definitive proof, of course, we can’t know for sure.
Here are some representative appearances of the energy blade in the 1982 mini comics. There is some variation with how it was drawn, even within the same comic:
Here are the appearances of the sword in Rudy Obrero’s packaging illustrations for the Battle Ram, He-Man/Wind Raider, Wind Raider, He-Man/Battle Cat, and Castle Grayskull boxes. Note that at times Beast Man carries the same sword:
Incidentally, a sword of the same design appears in Man-At-Arms’ hand in the 1983 comic book, The Power of Point Dread:
Artwork by Alfredo Alcala
He-Man holds a similar sword on the cover of the same booklet (hat tip to Jukka Issakainen):
Artwork by Alfredo Alcala
Somewhat similar swords appear in this 1982 advertisement for Faker:
Image source: Robert Schultz. Artwork by Alfredo Alcala
In one depiction of Mark Taylor’s Vikor character (who pre-dated He-Man), Vikor carries a sword similar to the energy blade:
Image source: The Power and the Honor Foundation/The Art of He-Man
*Update:
Øyvind Johannes Meisfjord pointed a fatal flaw in my reasoning. It seems that Alfredo Alcala drew a very similar looking sword that predated the He-Man property by several years:
1976 illustration of Conan by Alfredo Alcala
Furthermore, swords similar to those in the Rudy Obrero illustrations show up in artwork by Frank Frazetta and John Buscema throughout the 1960s and 1970s:
Given this evidence, it seems unlikely now that the common source for this design was Mattel (it’s possible, but I don’t think a strong case can be made for it). I have to conclude that Alfredo Alcala was drawing upon the fantasy concepts he’d been illustrating for years, and Rudy Obrero was drawing upon general sword and sorcery themes of the ’60s and ’70s. Given Mark Taylor’s Frazetta influences, he probably drew from the same general creative well for his Vikor sword.
Thanks to Øyvind for challenging my theory. I think it’s been successfully refuted!
