Sad Hordak!

Throughout the She-Ra series Hordak was portrayed as such a strong character, that we rarely saw moments of weakness. Usually when these moments of weakness would occur, they would revolve around him having his leadership tested by his Horde peers. This comical piece of animation art from the season two episode "The Inspector" wonderfully showcases a moment in which Hordak's decision-making is questioned by a Horde Inspector, portrayed by a disguised Prince Adam. I love the fact that Hordak's sad-looking face is so dramatically striking, because we are so used to seeing the same aggressive expression upon his face!


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Tom Sito's Echo Valley.

When storyboarding "The Greatest Show on Eternia" Tom Sito decided that a specific scene in the episode needed explaining visually. Every once in a while the storyboard artists would create these expositional illustrations to create a better understanding of a scene, and aid those that referred to the storyboard during the production of the episode. In this particular illustration we see He-Man and Battle Cat on a ledge overlooking Crackers, who is deep in the valley.


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GIANT Picture Book (Heroic Warriors) illustration #5

Golden Book published a great deal of Masters of the Universe material during the eighties. Two of the most notable and yet rarely seen books are the Giant Picture Books; oversized quality publications printed on thick quality paper featuring artwork by Fred Carrillo. One book focused on the Heroic Warriors, whilst the other focused on the Evil Warriors. Here I present, from the Heroic Warriors book, the first of the two black and white illustrations focusing on Man-At-Arms, resized for you to enjoy! Here Man-At-Arms demonstrates his ability to throw Beast Man, as if he weighed nothing!


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Dragoon title card.

As I have mentioned on this Blog numerous times over the years, storyboard artists would often prefix their He-Man and She-Ra storyboards with an illustration featuring a character or scene featured in the very same episode boarded. In this panel we see Steve Hickner has illustrated his concept for the villainous Dragoon; the same design of which also appears throughout the storyboard. It is also interesting to note that whereas the episode is titled "Dawn of Dragoon" this is referred to as "The Dawn of Dragoon"...


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Skeletor's monitor.

Here is yet another fantastic illustration by Robin Davies from the Masters of the Universe Ladybird book "He-Man meets the Beast". I always like the way in which Robin Davies illustrated his figures. While his drawing of Skeletor is as good as always, I love the strength of Evil-Lyn's hands-on-hips pose! From this illustration, especially if you look at the way her legs are illustrated, it is clear that Robin was referring to the Evil-Lyn action figure...


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Confused She-Ra!

Here is a very interesting panel from "Twiggets in Trouble", a two part story from rarely-seen preview issue of the UK She-Ra comic. In this panel She-Ra clearly tells Bow that Hordak tricked her into helping him rule Etheria. Obviously the writer of this story was somewhat confused, because not only is this Adora's back-story, but She-Ra herself did not exist until Adora allied herself with the Great Rebellion! Is the UK comic proposing that both Adora and She-Ra worked for the Horde? I have to say though, I do love the idea that She-Ra helped Hordak conquer Etheria...


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GIANT Picture Book (Heroic Warriors) illustration #4

Golden Book published a great deal of Masters of the Universe material during the eighties. Two of the most notable and yet rarely seen books are the Giant Picture Books; oversized quality publications printed on thick quality paper featuring artwork by Fred Carrillo. One book focused on the Heroic Warriors, whilst the other focused on the Evil Warriors. Here I present, from the Heroic Warriors book, the two pages focusing on Man-At-Arms. Admittedly, this illustration appears to focus on the abilities of the Battle Ram, more than the individual driving it. Interestingly, the text refers to Man-At-Arms being the "captain of the guard", a position held by Teela in the animated series!


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Skeletor is imprisoned...

Volume three of the Masters of the Universe comic from MVCreations featured numerous changes. One of the changes I was saddened to see was the straightforward two-tone coloring on the characters, rather than the beautiful colors that adorned the characters across the first two volumes. However, there are moments throughout each issue where the old coloring magic returns! In this splash page from issue six we see a fantastic illustration by Emiliano Santalucia of Skeletor imprisoned by King Hsss. The colors on this piece are fantastic!


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Picking up Trap Jaw...

Here I present another couple of amusingly illustrated storyboard panels by Rich Chidlaw from the season one He-Man episode "The Region of Ice". I like the expression of Trap Jaw in the first panel, as well as the additional panel showing how the camera shout rotate to show the villain being hoisted up in the air by He-Man. One has to laugh at how serious and heroic-looking He-Man is drawn in the second panel whilst Trap Jaw is illustrated over his head wide-eyed and terrified. Once again the use of a simple marker pen creates a wonderful use of shadows; even though Filmation would rarely create shadows!


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What happened to "City of Children"?

Here is a very interesting find; a memo detailing the upcoming production schedule for the episodes of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe that would end up part the 1985 batch! There is a lot of interesting information on this page, including the dates of the voice actor recordings as well as what episodes were grouped together. Interestingly, "Journey to Stone City" is missing, and in its place is a different episode entirely titled "City of Children". One has to ask, whatever happened to this episode?


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