HE-MAN MINICOMICS 1987

"THE SEARCH FOR KELDOR" | "ENTER: BUZZ-SAW HORDAK!" | "ENERGY ZOIDS"
"REVENGE OF THE SNAKE MEN!" | "THE COSMIC KEY" | "THE LEGEND BEGINS!"

Writers: Steven Grant & Phil White
Artists: Bruce W. Timm, Chris Carlson, & Larry Houston
Inks: Steve Mitchell, Bruce W. Timm, & Chris Carlson
Letters: Stan Sakai | Colors: Charles Simpson
Editor: Lee Nordling

Still free to forge a path away from Filmation's MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE TV show (and with SHE-RA cancelled as well, clearing the ongoing Filmation continuity completely from the table), 1987 sees the minicomic universe continue to expand Eternia's mythology, even as the toyline winds down. Only six comics were published in '87, and nearly all of them reveal some unknown clue or tidbit about the universe's past.

First up, "The Search For Keldor" sees King Randor (now dressed in battle armor thanks to his newly-released action figure) and the Sorceress (also representing a long overdue toy) team up to search for Randor's brother, Keldor, who vanished before Prince Adam was born. But Skeletor learns of the king's quest and realizes he must stop it at any cost. With his henchmen, Ninjor and Scare Glow, Skeletor battles Randor, his bodyguard Clamp Champ (a favorite of mine from the toyline's later years and the first black character rendered in plastic among He-Man's allies), the Sorceress, and He-Man.

Though never actually revealed in this comic, the intention was of course that Skeletor would be revealed as Randor's brother -- and therefore, as He-Man's uncle! I believe later MASTERS continuities ran with this idea, which I think is a great sort of tragic angle to take (and way more original than making Skeletor a contemporary of Prince Adam, like a childhood friend or a brother or something), but the truth never came out during the property's initial run.

HE-MAN MINICOMICS 1986

"THE FLYING FISTS OF POWER!" | "ROCK PEOPLE TO THE RESCUE!"
"KING OF THE SNAKE MEN" | "THE TERROR CLAWS STRIKE!"
"ESCAPE FROM THE SLIME PIT!" | "THE MENACE OF MULTI-BOT"
"THE WARRIOR MACHINE" | "EYE OF THE STORM"
"THE FASTEST DRAW IN THE UNIVERSE" | "THE HORDES OF HORDAK"
"BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE!" | "SNAKE ATTACK!"
"THE ULTIMATE BATTLEGROUND"

Writers: Tim Kilpin. Gayle Gilbard, Larry Houston, Steven Grant,
Eric Frydler, Tina Harris, Jim Mitchell, & Phil White
Artists: Jim Mitchell, Larry Houston, Bruce Timm, Chris Carlson, Mike Van Cleave, Greg Brooks, Mike Vosburg, Peter Ledger, & Red Grant
Inks: Steve Mitchell, Bruce Timm, Todd Kurosawa, Tom Luth, Red Grant
Letters: Stan Sakai | Colors: Charles Simpson & Tom Luth
Editor: Lee Nordling | Art Director: Ron Cook

A year with more cooks in the kitchen than ever before -- just check out the number of writers and artists involved in the production of these stories -- somehow brings with it the tightest continuity since the very first four minicomics. Behold...

The saga kicks off with the Sorceress bestowing on He-Man the gift of "The Flying Fists of Power!", a magical battle technique to aid him against the forces of evil. In reality, Flying Fists He-Man was a brand new action figure with a different outfit than the normal He-Man, but the comics simply depict our hero as his normal self when he uses the power. Following from this comic, He-Man calls on the power of the Flying Fists a handful of times throughout the year's remaining stories. Also, at one point he uses the Thunder Punch, which readers may recall was bestowed upon him by Castle Greyskull in the 1985 series (and, unlike Flying Fists He-Man, the Thunder Punch figure was depicted in his alternate costume during his first appearance -- but now looks just like the standard garden variety He-Man).

HE-MAN MINICOMICS 1985

"SKELETOR'S DRAGON" | "THE BATTLE OF ROBOTO" | "SPIKOR STRIKES"
"THE STENCH OF EVIL!" | "GRIZZLOR -- THE LEGEND COMES ALIVE!"
"LEECH -- THE MASTER OF POWER SUCTION UNLEASHED!"
"MANTENNA AND THE MENACE OF THE EVIL HORDE!!"
"HORDAK -- THE RUTHLESS LEADER'S REVENGE! | "THE TREACHERY OF MODULOK!"
"THE POWER OF THE EVIL HORDE!"

Writer: Christy Marx
Artists: Larry Houston, Peter Ledger, & Bruce W. Timm
Inks: Charles Simpson & Michael Lee
Letters: Stan Sakai | Editor: Lee Nordling

Following from a set of 1984 minicomic offerings that did their best to hew to the Filmation TV series' continuity (even though that show was still in the development phase when most of the comics were produced), 1985 brings us an odd hybrid of the Filmation universe existing in sort of a parallel world. The comics continue to maintain most of the Filmation trappings, and as we'll see below, even bring in the character of Orko, who originated on the show. As well, the cartoon's character designs continue to be used for the most part. However, 1985's comics also introduce a number of characters to the minicomic world, complete with origins in many instances (which were pretty universally eschewed in '84), even when the same characters were presented with alternative debuts in the animated series.

I'd like to note that the credits I've been presenting for all these minicomic posts are assembled to the best of my ability. Many of the earlier comics, going up through 1985, had no credits at all, while others had only artist signatures on the covers, or occasionally writer/penciler/inker signatures. I've done my best to search online and fill in blanks, but I can't speak to the complete accuracy of these credits. For example, Christy Marx wrote a number of 1985's comics, but there's no way to tell whether she penned every single one -- and in fact it seems pretty likely she did not -- however since no other writers are listed, she's the only one I can mention here even if she wasn't the sole scribe for the year.

HE-MAN MINICOMICS 1984

"DRAGON'S GIFT" | "MASKS OF POWER" | “HE-MAN AND THE INSECT PEOPLE”
“SIEGE OF AVION” | “THE OBELISK” | “THE SECRET LIQUID OF LIFE!"
"DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD" | "TEMPLE OF DARKNESS!" | "SLAVE CITY”
"THE CLASH OF ARMS"

Writer: Michael Halperin
Artists: Alfredo Alcala & Larry Houston | Inks: Tod Smith, Michael Lee, & Gerald Forton
Colors: Anthony Tollin & Charles Simpson | Letters: Stan Sakai | Editor: Lee Nordling

1984's minicomics are written by Michael Halperin, the man who was hired by Mattel and Filmation to create a MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE "bible" which informed much of the development of the cartoon series. As a result, these tales hew more closely in the Filmation direction than ever before, in terms of story. The artwork is mixed, on the other hand -- Alfredo Alcala continues to draw extremely literal interpretations of the characters' action figures, though for certain characters he appears to be working off of Filmation model sheets -- while Larry Houston, who draws most of the later stories in the year's run, goes Filmation all the way.

Footnotes in the Dark Horse collection of these tales indicate that they were produced while the cartoon was still in development, which gives some fascinating insight into the lead time involved in crafting the minicomics. These were released with the 1984 line of characters, and they feature lots of not-quite-finalized character designs -- but the TV series itself premiered in the fall of 1983 (and mostly featured the toyline's earlier characters for that first season)! As a result, the minicomics include characters who would not even debut in the cartoon until the second season (such as Buzz-Off, Mekaneck, and Fisto) fighting alongside "prototype" versions of Man-At-Arms and Teela.

HE-MAN MINICOMICS 1983

"HE-MAN MEETS RAM-MAN!" | "THE ORDEAL OF MAN-E-FACES!"
"THE TERROR OF TRI-KLOPS!" | "THE MENACE OF TRAP JAW!"
"THE TALE OF TEELA!" | "THE MAGIC STEALER!" | "THE POWER OF... POINT DREAD!"

Writer: Gary Cohn | Pencils: Mark Texeira
Inks: Tod Smith | Colors: Anthony Tollin

Following from the first round of "storybook style" 1982 minicomics by Don Glut and Alfredo Alcala, 1983 brings the first MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE pack-ins which can actually be called comic books. With Gary Cohn taking over writing chores from Glut, we also have Mark Texeira, who would come to prominence drawing GHOST RIDER in the nineties, turning in some of the earliest work of his career as artist.

Cohn and Texeira continue the setup established by Glut and Alcala, presenting Castle Grayskull as a mysterious edifice neutral to both good and evil, and giving us a fairly barren and lawless Eternia -- but they also provide glimpses of an established civilization, which the initial minicomics skipped. In 1982, a reader could've been forgiven for believing He-Man, Man-At-Arms, Teela, Skeletor, Beast Man, Mer-Man, and the Goddess were the only seven living beings on the planet. But now, thanks to Cohn fleshing out Glut's original vision, we see that's not the case.

The year's seven stories are mostly all devoted to spotlights on characters and/or vehicles introduced in 1983, with one minicomic explaining the origin of a 1982 character. The first outing, "He-Man Meets Ram-Man!", sees He-Man get into a skirmish with a bull-headed wanderer named Ram-Man. Skeletor then tricks Ram-Man into believing He-Man lives inside Castle Grayskull, and uses Ram-Man's power in an attempt to break into the fortress. But He-Man arrives and saves the day, and Ram-Man realizes he was in error when he took He-Man for an enemy. Right off the bat, this story gives us a look at the denizens of Eternia, as He-Man stops by a village during his journeys to save it from from a monster. We also see the Sorceress (alternately referred to as the Goddess in a couple of this year's tales), still depicted as Teela in her snake armor but presented as a different character, though she no longer has green skin as was the case in 1982.

HE-MAN MINICOMICS 1982

"HE-MAN AND THE POWER SWORD" | "KING OF CASTLE GRAYSKULL"
"BATTLE IN THE CLOUDS" | "THE VENGEANCE OF SKELETOR"

Written by: Donald F. Glut | Illustrated by: Alfredo Alcala

The first couple years of MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE minicomics are an interesting curiosity in the property's history. I touched on this a bit when I looked at a graphic novel from the eighties called THE SUNBIRD LEGACY, which was sort of a transitional state from the early comics world to the more familiar setup with He-Man as an alter ego for Prince Adam, along with a generally more light-hearted/superheroic tone. But in these four earliest MASTERS tales, none of that was even remotely established.

These stories instead paint a drastically different picture of the planet Eternia than what most fans have come to expect thanks to the Filmation TV series. Here, Eternia is a wild, untamed world. He-Man is a barbarian who leaves his tribe to defend the planet from the forces of evil. Castle Grayskull, rather than being the benign source of He-Man's power, is a mysterious fortress, neutral to good and evil alike, but which holds the power to rule the planet. References are made to a "Great War", which turned Eternia into a wasteland. As a result, high technology is an unusual artifact of the past.

Now, I'd never trade away my memories of the Filmation cartoon, which I loved as a child (and really, I still like it quite a bit today). And as that same child, I never really warmed up to the early minicomics, different as they were from the TV show -- heck, even the later minicomics, which as we'll see generally hewed pretty closely to the Filmation setup, didn't always float my boat either due to smaller inconsistencies. But nowadays, there's room in my head for different interpretations of the He-Man mythos, and I actually really like this early minicomic continuity quite a bit. It's more of a post-apocalyptic dark fantasy than the straight science-fantasy that later interpretations would present.

HE-MAN AND THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE

As promised not long ago, this fall will find us looking at a new toy tie-in series to replace the Transformers stuff I've read over the past four autumns. And stepping up to take over for Optimus Prime and friends is another beloved icon of the eighties: the most powerful man in the universe himself, He-Man.

A few years ago, I "Unboxed" Dark Horse's collection of MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE minicomics, the little comic books that were packaged with the vintage action figures thirty-plus years back. Since then, I also bought a "backup copy" of the book in digital format during a Comixology Dark Horse sale at some point. Thus, armed with the book in both physical and virtual format, I'm ready to read it. Beginning this Saturday and continuing over the subsequent few weeks, we'll examine the He-Man minicomics by year, from 1982 through 1987 -- the full run of the original toyline.

But that's not all! Once the minicomic retrospective wraps up in October, we'll crack open another tome I picked up some time back (and also re-purchased in digital format later on) -- HE-MAN AND THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE: THE NEWSPAPER COMIC STRIPS. Unlike the minicomics, which I read as a child and of which I retain some hazy memories, the newspaper strip is an iteration of MASTERS that I've never seen in my life. But my He-Man fandom and my recently developed interest in newspaper adventure strips have intersected to make this something I'm really excited to read.

The strips are broken apart into story arcs in the book, so we'll read two arcs per week, starting in October and running through November. After that, I have one more thing in mind to close out the year -- but we'll get to that when the time comes. For now, we're off to the distant planet Eternia to check out the never-ending struggle between He-Man and Skeletor.