For those not in the know, Mattel and Stan Lee have a new partnership, the details of which, as far as I can make out, haven't been released yet and no one knows anything much about it. To celebrate this partnership Mattel decided to make a Masters of the Universe figure based on comics legend Stan Lee.
Up til this point, everything makes sense. More or less.
There are two ways to look at Standor, the figure produced: as a Stan Lee figure in Masters of the Universe, or just as a standard MOTU figure which just happens to look like someone famous (much like Flipshot bore a resemblance to Val Kilmer).
Taking case (1): Stan Lee in MOTU. This isn't necessarily a bad idea. If Standor had been a minor, artistic character. Maybe an Eternian writer, for instance. This would have made some kind of sense. Mattel, however, decided to make him a god. And not only a god, but a god who created the entire MOTU universe, despite Stan Lee having absolutely nothing to do with He-Man.
If it'd been Lou Scheimer, or one of the other guys who worked on the Filmation 'toon, then this would make sense. Hey, do a bunch of them based on Roger Sweet, Mark Taylor, the guys who wrote the 200x cartoon, even the Four Horsemen. Heck, even ToyGuru Scott Neitlich himself would make a kind of sense (though he kind of already has a figure...or two).
But Stan Lee?!
Okay, we put aside the Stan Lee issue. Let's take case (2) and judge the figure on its own merits. This god, apparently, wears glasses for some reason. This, to me, make zero sense for a god. My wife pointed out that a god doesn't need armour either, but I can accept that. I've watched enough crazy TV series and read enough comics to accept omnipotent beings wearing armour. But not blue-tinted glasses.
I generally dislike Standor's face-helmet combination. I think the helmet would have looked better with some kind of faceless 'face', like a Ringwraith or The Faceless One. Or to have the existing face and change the helmet to something else, or do away with it altogether. The old man head-super muscular body jars too. I know all He-Man figures share the same buck, but the other older men in the range cover themselves up a bit more than Standor does.
The black armour is translucent, with sparkly bits in (though the gloves and boots are all black with the glitter painted on...or not painted on as in the case of his right boot). I think it would have looked better if Standor's body had been translucent with sparkly bits with the black armour as solid on top. It'd run the risk of looking a bit Star Wars ghost-like, but he currently looks like a Gar (Skeletor's race) with faded colours. In addition, I'd kinda like my gods to be bigger, like in the scale of the giants in MOTUC.
Finally, I'd have like to see him with a staff. Standor doesn't come with any accessories (other than his armour and glasses) and I think a staff would make him more god/important-looking. It's probably not logical for a god to have a staff, but I think it'd just look 'right'.
So there we go. I don't really like this guy. In fact it's the only MOTUC figure I really don't like at all. Heck, I like Molarr as a fun, jokey figure. Molarr was made as a minor character with a 'minor' occupation, much like Standor should have been. The only other figure I really didn't like was Nepthu and two seconds with a black pen soon sorted that (eyebrows) out.
The really annoying thing is that I was charged £11.05 in customs/handling charges on top of the figure and shipping costs.
Despite being released in December, Standor is still available to buy on MattyCollector.com. I suggest you leave him where he is, in a warehouse somewhere in America.
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