Webstor Evil Master of Escape - '80s Adventures! He-Man and the Masters of the Universe Cartoon Collection Basic Figure Item No.: Asst. GNN84 No. HYD36 Manufacturer: Mattel Includes: Grimalkin, The Shape of Vengeance mini-comic Action Feature: n/a Retail: $19.99 Availability: May 2024 Other: Just different enough to make you mad
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The great thing about the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe Cartoon Collection is how it can reconcile the cartoon redesigns from the action figures. So many figures looked significantly different in color or costume, that it makes sense Mattel would want to sell you two flavors of them. But Webstor looks very much the same - the Origins toy figure is pretty much the same colors, with slightly different armor and more eyes. Toy Webstor has a nice orange blaster and a blue grappling hook, while Cartoon Webstor has a statue of the cat-like Grimalkin and an orange hook. Do you need both? Probably not.

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The figure shares the same body as all the men in this segment, adding a circle on his belt and using the same basic toe boots as Mer-Man.

Since the figure uses the same body again, you know basically what to expect - it's sturdy, you can pop the arms off, and he's a smidgen taller than the toy versions. Since it's very similar to the cartoon and not too different from the other toy, it's worth noting the backpack has a knob you can twist to retract the rope for his grappling hook, and that's more "action feature" than most of the basic figures get these days.

He looks a lot like the cartoon, with a less freakish face and a more subdued mouth with a couple of big fangs and two big bright red eyes. The bald head, pointy ears, and ridged forehead look like any of a number of humanoid creatures or aliens from the 1960s-1980s, making this fellow and the whole line look a little old-hat to their contemporary creatures. He doesn't look too far off from various Bronze Age comic aliens or villains, whereas a few pegs over might have had clearance Alien toys, Admiral Ackbar, or other then-modern designs. It's old hat today and it was almost a throwback when he was new, but that's OK - as kids, everything was new to us.

Since he can't hold the statue, and he stands well, and his backpack is pre-mounted to the figure, he's ready to go out of the box. You can unravel the grappling hook a few inches, but for safety reasons these things get smaller and smaller so nobody strangles themselves. For this reason, it's not much of a climbing toy - it's a nice-looking accessory, but you won't be getting him to go up the wall or anything like that. Mostly I just have him standing around with it loaded and ready to go. I wish it was a bit snappier, or could climb on its own, but alas - it does not. You can crank it in, crank it out, or just have it sitting there.

The Grimalkin statue is a dark green big cat statue, and it could use a plinth or some other means of display. It looks almost exactly like the cartoon counterpart, and is arguably more interesting than another blaster accessory. Score one for thinking outside the toy box, and it's certainly surprising to see bad guys not include a weapon for a change. He has specialized gear and a stolen statue - which is still plenty for a kid to go on an adventure of some sort were kids to buy these, which I assume they do not.

Despite being hard to find in stores and a relatively new release, Webstor is already kind of cheap on the online market - you can get him for a couple of bucks below retail. That usually means the market is satisfied, and with more product likely in warehouses waiting to ship that probably means he'll be cheaper down the road. At least for a while. I prefer his cartoon look since I watch the TV show as a kid and didn't have the original action figure, but you can and should get whatever you want. Functionally they're similar, and that string on his hook is too short to be of much use beyond as a token display element. I'm sure you can hack it but I don't want to break anything - and I like how he looks, so I'd say grab him if the price suits you and you don't already have a toy Webstor.

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