LEECH – THE MASTER OF POWER SUCTION UNLEASHED! (mini-comic, 1984)

Leech – The Master of Power Suction Unleashed! is a 1984 Masters of the Universe mini-comic; no author or artist is credited. Here, the Heroic Warriors fight Leech and Hordak.

The writing here is poor, and nothing that occurs make a great deal of sense. Sy-Klone knocks Leech out with one punch on page 2 – we’re supposed to take him seriously as a villain after this? How does ramming the Talon Fighter into Hordak open a portal, send him through it, then close the portal again? And Mer-Man’s threat of Skeletor rejoining the Horde contradicts everything else ever written about the Horde – including in this issue. Or maybe Mer-Man just isn’t up on current events (neither, apparently, is Randor, as this seems to be the first he’s hearing about the Horde).  

As bad as all that is, the art is worse. The figures are often stumpy, like dwarves; faces vary wildly from panel to panel and frequently look smashed. There are scale issues throughout – Leech is sometimes eight to ten feet tall; other times he looks to be forty feet tall. Hordak uses his magic to become a giant “more than twice his normal size,” but he’s actually about a hundred times bigger. Additionally, the coloring is a complete fiasco, with the most egregious offense being Randor’s pink hair and beard.

This mess is easily the worst mini-comic to date; never fear, though – we’ll see substantially worse before we’re through.   

NOT RECOMMENDED

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SKELETOR’S ICE ATTACK by John Grant and Robin Davies

Skeletor’s Ice Attack is a 1984 Masters of the Universe children’s book written by John Grant and illustrated by Robin Davies. Here, the royal family goes on a cruise, only to have Mer-Man encase the ship in ice.   

This book really should have been called “Mer-Man’s Ice Attack,” since Skeletor only shows up at the end; actually, it should be just “Mer-Man’s Ice,” since for whatever inexplicable reason, Mer-Man never actually gets around to the “attack” part.

That’s just part of Grant’s not-trying, something that’s plagued all of Ladybird’s He-Man books. We’re supposed to believe He-Man couldn’t just smash the ice? I mean, jeez, look at the cover. Instead, He-Man decides it would be a good idea to use a volcano to, apparently, boil half the ocean (presumably destroying Eternia’s ecosystem in the process). And the telepathic shenanigans in the name of “the Lord He-Man” are back, too.

Unexpectedly, the highlight of the book is Davies’ art, which was quite poor in other books in this series. His figures still aren’t great, but they’re better than they’ve been, and overall, the art is very solid. He also gives us some killer-whale-versus-sea-monster action and an interesting toy/Filmation hybrid of Snake Mountain.

Skeletor’s Ice Attack isn’t a good book by any stretch, but it’s as good or better than anything else in the Ladybird series.

TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT

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HORDAK – THE RUTHLESS LEADER’S REVENGE! (mini-comic, 1984)

Hordak – The Ruthless Leader’s Revenge! is a 1984 Masters of the Universe mini-comic. No author is credited; it’s illustrated by Larry Houston and Michael Lee. Here, Hordak changes things up a little bit by sending Grizzlor to kidnap Stinkor (same old plan, different faction), proposes an anti-He-Man alliance with Skeletor, then immediately stabs him in the back. 

The nonsensical plotting continues. The Heroic Warriors have nothing to lose by letting the Evil Warriors and the Horde fight it out for a while, but fine; this happens in cartoons with multiple villains all the time. Hordak’s elaborate plan to stick it to Skeletor is poorly executed (unless his ultimate goal was to steal the Land Shark – that’s a sweet ride). Grizzlor seems to have lost his ability to speak in complete sentences already. And He-Man – who’s already turned into He-Man – draws his sword and shouts, “By the power of Grayskull” to do some kind of charge-up attack.

At least the anonymous author has a way with words, which keeps things somewhat entertaining, if unintentionally so. The unequivocal highlight is the most epic redundancy ever uttered: “Traitor, your treachery betrays you!”

The art is adequate – when Houston gets it right. The villains all seem eager to fight to the death, yet are completely stymied by an easily-jumpable crevasse – come on, Houston, it’s like six feet across. We’re supposed to have the Horde fighting the Evil Warriors, but on page 10, we get Leech fighting Grizzlor and Jitsu fighting Whiplash. And what’s up with Leech’s gargantuan head?

He-Man says it best in this issue: “Time to put an end to this nonsense.” Indeed.

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GRIZZLOR – THE LEGEND COMES ALIVE! (mini-comic)

Grizzlor – The Legend Comes Alive! Is a 1984 Masters of the Universe mini-comic. No author is credited; it’s illustrated by Bruce Timm, who’s best known for designing the DC Animated Universe. Here, Buzz-Off tells the Heroic Warriors a campfire story about the mythical Grizzlor; Hordak then sends Grizzlor to kidnap Teela.  

Wow, the Evil Horde already. One tends to forget that there was a pre-She-Ra Horde with a distinctly different backstory from the Filmation spin-off. And Grizzlor himself is a pretty cool villain here – he’s like a werewolf with a gun, and he can actually speak in complete sentences.

The story itself is middling at best, though. There’s a half-baked boy-who-cried-wolf storyline. There’s the convenient coincidence of the mythical monster turning up the very next day. There’s the exceptionally weak resolution (A mirror? Seriously?). But while the plot turns on Teela getting kidnapped for the one thousandth time, at least Hordak has some logical rationale for it.

I’m all for letting the supporting characters get a day in the sun once in a while, but let the record show that He-Man has nothing to do here besides fly the Wind Raider and shout “Thar she blows!” in a completely nonsensical manner. It’s also weird that Man-At-Arms is calling his daughter “fair Teela.”

Timm is easily the best artist we’ve had on these comics who wasn’t named Alfredo Alcala. His action scenes are dynamic and his renditions of the characters, poses, and facial expressions are all strengths. There’s some continuity shenanigans going on with the layouts, though. On page 12, you’ve got all the Heroic Warriors flying in the Wind Raider, then jumping out in cool action poses (presumably leaving the unpiloted Wind Raider to crash dramatically into a mountainside in a giant ball of flame). But on the very next page, He-Man is back at the wheel. Let’s just respond to that with “because He-Man” and move on.

One more point on the art. Man-At-Arms doesn’t have his mustache here; that in and of itself isn’t unusual, but, believe it or not, except for maybe the background of one panel where it isn’t colored, it doesn’t appear again in any of the almost two dozen mini-comics that follow, running all the way into 1987. Perhaps it quit over a contractual dispute.

Back to business: the long and short of it is, despite some very nice art, this just isn’t a very good comic.

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