Hordak Ruthless Leader of The Evil Horde! He-Man and the Masters of the Universe Cartoon Collection Basic Figure Item No.: Asst. HYD16 No. JBM79 Manufacturer: Mattel Includes: Time Stopper device, Slime Lord! mini-comic Action Feature: Nothing here really Retail: $19.99 Availability: November 2024 Other: As Seen in "Loo-Kee Lends a Hand"
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I didn't intend to get the Filmation She-Ra stuff in the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe Cartoon Collection, but here we are. Hordak is one of several figures of the character from the past five years. Interestingly, Mattel Creations had a set with cartoon colors on a toy mold that is long sold out, and didn't quite match the cartoon. It did have an arm cannon, which this 2025 figure does not.

I have a few Hordaks I still need to open. Buzz Saw Hordak I got on clearance, but I am not sure if I'm in a rush to open the Turtles one or the basic one now. This figure gets the job done and if I'm being honest with myself, it seems the cartoon versions are my preferred versions.

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As usual, there are new and old parts. The armor, shoulder bands, boots, feet, and head seem to be new elements. Mattel molded the head separately from the armor, so you can rotate the white part without moving the black part. The sculpt looks great, you can almost hear him sorting. The fuzzy boots don't seem to match other recently released figures, or at least, not ones I have handy.

The sculpting is good, with the paint being a perfect match for the included mini-comic. It's quite close to the She-Ra cartoons, minus the ribs and the shoes. The cartoon shoes have more silver or gray on them, as opposed to being entirely black. The bones across the sides of the armor were also colored to match the gray bones up top on the cartoon, but were left unpainted here. I assume this is for budget reasons. He still looks pretty good, but the results do come up a little bit short when compared to the animation cels.

In the cartoon, Hordak was able to transform his arm and body through technology. Maybe he'd have a cannon arm, or a rocket body. The figure does not do this. He does, however, come with a Time Stopper device which is so important that Wiki Grayskull still hasn't bothered to make a page for it.

The icosahedron has a handle across three faces and a Horde symbol on the opposing face. It doesn't have the visual weight of the cartoon, and the metallic gray seems to have been saturated a bit as to appear slightly blue. Details are a little soft, but that's likely due to the material. I don't actually remember this episode very well, so I can't say I'm excited for the accessory. I would have preferred some sort of alternate hand, but this is what you get. If there's a better non-limb gizmo I couldn't name it, and most likely he'll just be hanging out in the Fright Zone unarmed. So this is a perfectly acceptable gizmo.

This is probably my favorite of the many Hordaks I own, even though he doesn't have a cool mechanism and wasn't on clearance. The head sculpt and colors are nice, with a face that looks more or less like what I remember from the old Princess of Power cartoons. This is where I usually say "I have no reason to buy another Hordak figure," but in this case, that's not true. The Netflix revival of the show had couple of pretty great character designs (including Wrong Hordak) which could get me to buy the entire crew and all the playsets, were Mattel to make figures of them. I doubt this is likely, but it's a really fantastic show. If you ever watched toy commercials, or anime with some sort of magical girls in them, or just want to be entertained I'd recommend checking it out. Give it a couple episodes and you'll probably stick with the whole run. This will be followed by your checking eBay to see how much the various Catra, She-Ra, and other dolls (and 2 action figures cost.) And brother, let me tell you, it's a lot more than you're going to want to see.

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