As a child of the early 80's I was totally fascinated by a lot of cartoons and toy lines of the era, but I never was a huge fan of Masters of the Universe. I never found the cartoon to be that entertaining. If I'm being honest I thought it was rather dumb. It also was launched before I really cared about toys. By the time it hit shelves I was already enamored by the likes of Transformers and G.I. Joe. What more could a kid want?!
When Ink and Paint released the original Filmation MOTU series on DVD I bought up most of the sets...I guess for nostalgia reasons. As I re-watched the original show as an adult I began to grow a little more fond of the characters and the series as a whole. Then I saw the Mike Young Productions cartoon.
The MYP animation and story telling was fantastic. Since I wasn't a long time, hard core He-Man fan I could appreciate some of the changes they made (such as making Prince Adam a youngster). That's around the same time that I discovered the awesome He-Man.org website and read up about everything and anything MOTU. When Mattel got around to releasing the 200X series of figures based on the new MYP 'toon I bought up just about everything I could find. Then like a lot of collectors I grew tired of the countless different versions of both He-Man and Skeletor that seemed to be shoved down our throats.
I eventually picked up a few of the NECA "staction figures" that the Four Horsemen continued to sculpt, but you could tell the end was near for MOTU. Fast forward to 2008 and Mattel had once again teamed up w/ the Four Horsemen to develop the Masters of the Universe Classics line. Based on the original designs with some modern tweaks, the series was a huge hit. Figures were made available one per month (for starters at least) via Mattel's new web store, MattyCollector.com. The first handful of figures would sell out within minutes after being made available to the general public.
2009 offered up a subscription service so fans didn't have to go through all of the hoop-la that was MattyCollector. I bought every figure in 2008 and grab a subscription for 2009 and was happy w/ the decision. Somewhere along the line though things just started to spiral down and my interest started to wane. Perhaps it was the cost (originally $20 a figure + shipping) or maybe it was the craptacular customer service from MattyCollector and or Digital River.
This year I believe I've bought 4 figures - Kobra Kahn, Stinkor, Snake Man Man-At-Arms and Spikor. I wanted the recent Snake Men 2 pack, but with the costs rising and a few other factors I decided to skip them. Today I stand at a cross roads. While my passion has dwindled a bit, I still can appreciate the great figures...but if you didn't already know my #1 toy line is Transformers. Always has and will probably always will be.
That said I decided to cull at least half of my current MOTUC collection - keeping only a handful of figures that still have ties to the 200X series. I couldn't figure out how I wanted to sell my unwanted figures at first. Do I try some forums and sell directly to fellow collectors? Do I try Yardsellr where I've had modest success at selling misc unwanted toys? Or do I pony up and eat the fees and sell them on eBay?
I decided to take the eBay route as it was the fastest method of moving these figures. I figured the sooner I can get rid of them the sooner I'd have some cash and free up a section on one of my shelves. After all, I need more room for my ever growing Transformers collection!
If by chance you are interested in buying any MOTUC figures please contact me (flywheels at yahoo.com) or check out my listings on eBay. It's been fun Mattel, but it's time for me to move on.
I feel your pain. I've had to put up most of my G.I. Joes because of moving my collection to a different room.
ReplyDeleteI've often thought about getting the MOTC figures, but the costs have kept me at bay. That and every time I read about the new figures, there's always a bunch of complaints about Mattel that seem to not paint the figures in the best light.
The figures themselves are fantastic. A lot of the figures have gotten better as the line has progressed. Which I could say the same for MattyCollector's customer service. If you are interested I'd suggest buying a figure second hand so you can at least get a hands on feel for them before walking away or going hog wild collecting.
DeleteI can respect your decision. I've cherry-picked the line since 2009, but the last year and a half I've skipped a lot of the figures I wanted. This year I had several issues with Digital River which led to me getting the BBB involved and my Club Infinite Earths sub canceled. I've been contemplating getting rid of most of my MotUC and I've already distilled it to the characters I consider "core".
ReplyDeleteIt may be that I just didn't have a big connection with the franchise to begin with. As a kid I always liked Transformers, G.I. Joe and Real Ghostbusters a lot more.
I had my fair issues w/ Digital River and a sub as well, but you had to get the BBB involved? Wow, I don't envy you.
DeleteMattel has to know that will be the nail in the coffin for their current sales model for MOTUC, Ghostbusters and the DC toys. Shame, because they put out a lot of great figures.
I began collecting MOTU Classics like couple months ago, and I'm planning of just getting those prominent characters from the cartoon and ignore the rest. I know collecting action figures of two or three different toylines can be a headache especially when you're running out of space in your room.
ReplyDeleteSo what I'm doing right now is that every two months, I keep changing my "theme." So... if I feel like putting an "MOTU Theme" in my room, it's going to be just MOTU action figures all the way for two months while I keep the rest (Marvel, Transformers) in storage boxes. I know it's kindof a pain in the butt but what can I do with such a finite space.
I've got a large enough room that I can display my non-TFs on a pretty regular basis...but I'm just tired with most of the MOTUC figures. I'm keeping He-Man, Skeletor and some of the others that have that 200X vibe (the Faceless One, Count Marzo, etc.) and of course my 200X collection is staying!
DeleteI hear you, dude. I had that pivotal moment last year when I had to decide what I was going to focus on and what was getting ebayed. Joes, Battle Beasts and Star Wars stayed while Ghostbusters, MASK, McFarlane, Legos and He-man went. Wish I could have kept it all although a lot of that money went to starting a G1 collection. MOTU classics always piqued my interest as well.
ReplyDeleteIf only decisions like this were the hardest ones I had to make! So you kept your Battle Beasts? I'd like to see those. In fact I've got some Battle Beasts posts coming up...
ReplyDelete