For kids in the eighties and collectors today, one of the things that sets Masters of the Universe apart from other toylines most is its creativity. A unique combination of Star Wars, Conan the Barbarian, and Edgar Rice Burroughs, no other sci-fi or fantasy world looks quite as colorful or weird as Eternia. In the original line’s six year run, lead designer Roger Sweet and other contributors would create characters like a patchouli-scented skunk man (Stinkor), a robotic elephant fireman with a water-spouting trunk (Snout Spout), and whatever Mantenna is supposed to be. Standing in tribute to the line’s creativity are the scores of concept art sketches, paintings, and drawings that have surfaced over the decades. Through these, early iterations of Masters of the Universe‘s iconic heroes and villains are showcased, as well as something else that holds fans fascinated: glimpses of characters, vehicles, and concepts that never saw production in the original toyline.
The best-known unproduced Masters of the Universe characters are a group of six figures intended for the 1988 product line, cut short by Mattel discontinuing Masters of the Universe early in the year. These six figures are notorious among long-time fans, and reproductions have been included in both the Masters of the Universe Classics and Masters of the Universe Origins lines. However, even the most hardcore fan would have a hard time recognizing some of the characters featured in this lot of Masters of the Universe concept art up for auction through Heritage next week, most coming from the personal collection of concept artist Ted Mayer.Early iterations of iconic characters like Teela and settings like Castle Grayskull and Eternia are on auction, but more interesting to long-time fans will be the unfamiliar places and names. He-Man almost did battle in environments like the “Mysterious Dungeon” and an Old West-inspired mountain against characters like the four-armed Brainiac and the devouring Glob.
While many of Mayer’s sketches include designs that ultimately went unproduced, several of them feature design elements that would be incorporated into produced characters. This lot of nine sketches is grouped along those lines by Heritage. It includes several character sketches for figures with a “modular” action feature, where the figures would include numerous parts that could be clipped together and detached. Though Mayer’s designs for “Modular Man” and a modular robot character were not used exactly, traces of both can be seen in the produced Modulok and Multibot. Also interesting is a mammoth-tusked, furry Evil Horde character concept, whose overall design resembles Evil Horde leader Hordak, while the fur would be used for his henchman Grizzlor, and the elephantine headsculpt for the heroic Snout-Spout.
Most intriguing in the lot are a pair of character sketches for “Horrorsaur,” an armored, dinosaurian Evil Horde henchman. Mayer did two sketches for Horrorsaur, one with a dragon-like headsculpt resembling Skeletor’s henchman Whiplash, the other with a snarling, reptilian visage. From these sketches, Horrorsaur looks much cooler than several produced Masters of the Universe villains, and one hopes that like the 1988 concept art characters, a reimagined version Horrorsaur might be incorporated into the modern line.
One of the most impressive designs is “Brainiac,” whose design evokes both Superman’s famed foe and several fifties-era b-science fiction antagonists. Brainiac is a squat, crustacean-like creature with malevolent-looking red eyes and four clawed arms. The claws’ design makes it look as if, at least during this stage of development, the intent was for them to open and close, as with Clawful, Skeletor’s “Warrior with a Grip of Evil.” Brainiac’s other action feature was his bulbous brain, visible through a transparent plastic panel, which would surely have been a hit with kids. Unfortunately, it’s likely the tooling and assembly costs of these elaborate action features were what led Brainiac to be scrapped. From his belt buckle, Brainiac was intended to be among the ranks of the Evil Horde.
The most bizarre of these unproduced figures is “the Glob,” another character designed for the Evil Horde. An early, rough character study of the Glob demonstrates what was to be his signature feature in action: Glob would have had a giant, opening mouth in his torso, capable of swallowing a whole Masters of the Universe figure. In this concept sketch, He-Man himself becomes the Glob’s victim. This rough early design portrays the Glob as monstrous creature with clawed hands and feet and bubbling purple skin. The Glob retains a more polished version of this same appearance in Mayer’s later designs for the character, which gives us a better idea of what a Glob action figure might have looked like. The mouth would have operated off of a button-press hinge in the figure’s torso, opening it up in the middle. Like Brainiac, engineering and tooling costs likely played a role in Glob’s cancellation, as the figure would have needed to be much larger than the average figure to be able to “eat” a standard-size Masters of the Universe action figure.
The best display of Mayer and the rest of Mattel’s design team is the concept art for unproduced Masters of the Universe playsets. Most, like the “Mysterious Dungeon,” represent a logical expansion of the world of Eternia as we know it. They’re a showcase of the blending of science fiction and fantasy aesthetics that make the line so unique, with laser turrets mounted atop crumbling castle walls. The Mysterious Dungeon looks like it might have been intended as an expansion to Castle Grayskull similar to the Point Dread playset. The most intriguing aspect of the sketch is a giant mace sticking out of one turret, possibly modeling an action feature where the mace could be made to rotate and knock over any hapless figure positioned too close by.
Other concept pieces take Masters of the Universe in totally new directions, featuring factions or ideas virtually unseen in the line. None of these are wilder than a proposed “Western Playset” complete with genre staples a stagecoach, gunslingers, and a mine. Possibly expanding on the bizarre one-off character Rio Blast, this playset looks totally unlike any other produced or designed for Masters of the Universe. It would have been built around a boulder-topped mountain, with mine train tracks running through it and turret defenses along several levels of its sides. Ropes and wooden ladders are included to access these turrets. On the ground level, Mayer includes a base-camp for the cowboy faction that inhabit the playset. Along included in the design are the aforementioned stagecoach (likely sold separately), and a character on horseback (either a new vehicle built off the existing Stridor mold, or just the old vehicle).
Strange as it is, the Western Playset epitomizes what makes concept art so appealing to fans. Not only it is a glimpse at what could have been in their favorite toylines, it’s a peek behind the curtain at the creativity of the design process that brought every character, playset, and vehicle they do have to shelves. Owning a piece of that history is why auctions like this one are an event for a dedicated fandom like Masters of the Universe. Few other toylines boast collectors more fascinated with its history and behind-the-scenes process than He-Man, whose fans once spent thirty years researching a mystery figure. Two weeks out from the auction’s close, these fans have already put in bids of $5k and $6k for original artwork, with the most in-demand item on auction being a painting that showcases another crazy end-of-line Masters of the Universe concept, the prehistoric world of “Preternia.”
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