Are You OK with Bow Replacing Sea Hawk?

As Teela and He-Man were destined to be love interests, I always thought that Bow and She-Ra would be the same. Bow was essentially the "Teela Equivalent" in the Princess of Power toyline - maybe that's why the writers at Filmation wished to avoid the predictable route by creating a non-figure character to fill the role.

Granted, both the He-Man and She-Ra shows spent most of their time avoiding the romance theme, but enough insinuation was done to solidify the idea that Teela was He-Man's love and Sea Hawk was She-Ra's. I always thought that was wrong - especially when Bow is listed as "She-Ra's Special Friend" in the toy line.

Now with Bow's bio being released for the MOTUC line, it seems more likely that he will finally take his place as Adora's official love interest - especially with the fact that Sea Hawk is unavailable to the MOTUC storyline with him being a Filmation-exclusive character.



How do you feel about this?

The Takara Tomy Unicron is Exciting,
but NOT THAT EXCITING.

The following review, provided by Optibotimus.com, gives a relatively rave review of the new more G1 accurate 2010 release of Unicron. I agree with most of the points that this version of the Unicron mold (released previously in the Transformers: Armada line) is an improvement of its predecessor. But with the 3-figure price point, and the toy just being little more than a repaint with some new molding, I'm not going to rush and buy.

I will save my $$$ for when they release a Unicron that is perfectly spherical, like his "brother's" figure Primus. We know it's possible Takara/Hasbro. Give it to us! We'll buy it.



-M

2010 hasn't been the greatest year for top-of-the-line blockbuster, popcorn flicks. Of course, everyone has an opinion like they have an asshole, so I'm sure there's room for disagreement. What's left for 2010 that MAY drive me to the theatre you ask? Let's see if the following titles catch your eye...


Machete
Resident Evil: After Life
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole
Saw VII
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows I
Chronicles of Narnia
Tron: Legacy.

2011's year promises to be a better one for movies. 2011's Summer Blockbuster season alone promises to be a spectacular one:
Thor
Pirates of the Caribbean 4
Green Lantern
Transformers 3
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows I
Captain America
Smurfs*

Why "By the Power of Eternia"?
Adam says "By the Power of Grayskull" in the first episode of The New Adventures of He-Man. But by the second episode, the phrase is inexplicably dropped and replaced with "By the Power of Eternia".

The toy line's explanation is revealed in a mini comic, where the Power of Grayskull is channeled into Starship Eternia. But by that point in the comic, He-Man sheds his Adam persona. Obviously the mini comic continuity is NOT in sync with the cartoon...

There is thus no definitive answer for the cartoon series, as the Starship Eternia does not serve the same purpose as in the mini comic.

Here are my theories:

1) It's possible that in this future, Castle Grayskull no longer exists, and so the Power comes from the planet Eternia itself.

2) With the big focus in the previous toyline shifting to the Eternia playset (in the mini comics, I believe the playset was more powerful than Castle Grayskull - since in the mini comic "The Ultimate Battleground", the Eternia playset becomes more important than Grayskull), perhaps "By the Power of Eternia" refers to it.

3) This is a retroactive idea: Maybe "By the Power of Eternia" is the original summoning cry that was used before and during King Grayskull's claiming of the sword of He (this idea ties into the concept of the Power being a force created by, or existing within, the planet Eternia itself).

Who should have been Catra cohorts?
It has always been strange that Catra and Entrapta were the only villains in the She-Ra toy line. Is it because girls aren't allowed to be bad? Looking at that prototype video, and reading up on some of the characters on wikipedia has made me write this entry.

From the prototype video, it looks like Catra, Glimmer, Double Trouble and Castaspella (villainous Castaspella a precursor to Filmation Shadow Weaver?) were supposed to be the first wave of villains - leaving She-Ra, Bow, Angella and Frosta as the heroes. This makes more since, establishing both sides with an even number of characters.

So who do you think would be the heroes and villains for waves 2 & 3?

I go for this line up (some choices enfluenced by events in the show):

Wave 2
Peekablue - Villain
Sweet Bee - Villain (nemesis of Flutterina)
Entrapta - Villain
Flutterina - Hero
Mermista - Hero
Perfuma -Hero

Wave 3
Spinerella - Villain
Netossa - Hero (nemesis of Entrapta)

MikeJenkinsDesign.com Updated

I just updated my website, check it out: http://www.mikejenkinsdesign.com

It's been a long time coming...

Collecting: Double Trouble

Double Trouble is one of the She-Ra figures I collected in February. I always thought this character was interesting - BECAUSE of the fact that she was rarely used (she doesn't even appear in the cartoon series). Hopefully, she finds her way into the MOTUC series.

I consider Double Trouble to be the Zodac of the original She-Ra toyline. You see, Zodac was labeled as the "Evil Cosmic Enforcer" when he was first released, but his character would evolve over the years to be Neutral to Heroic - never evil. So the evil interpretation of the character was short-lived. Speculation on Zodac's allegiance-shifting points to Mattel wanting to balance out the number of evil figures to good ones (see the Wikipedia bio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zodak). Though Double Trouble was labeled as good in the toy line, I consider her to be evil (her name and role as a spy help, as well as her original prototype color scheme) - Catra needs all the help she can get.

Here's my fleshed out bio for Double Trouble
(influenced by her Wikipedia entry):

Double Trouble was born as the princess of the Kingdom of Green Glade. She is cousin to Glimmer, and similar to Glimmer, was born with magical abilities. Double has the ability to make a magical duplicate of herself. Before she explored the extent of her own powers, she witnessed her cousin Glimmer's growing abilities and became jealous. She sought out a way to increase her abilities. She ventured to Mystacor for the guidance of Castaspella, only to be told to "be patient". She was soon approached by dark Horde magicians, who promised her exactly what she sought.


Through Horde magic, Double's powers were augmented, allowing her to cast powerful mirror-like illusions, and change her appearance to look like anything she could think of. There, however was a side affect: Double could still split herself into two entities, but her personality was split between the two. One entity polarized into the inherently good-natured persona (Green Double Trouble with blonde hair), the other was inherently evil (Blue and Purple Double Trouble with black hair - prototype colors). Because of the Horde magic, the evil Double Trouble was the more powerful portion, and could force the good portion to merge into one at will.

Double Trouble is most powerful when merged into one entity. With the evil portion in command, Double willing serves the Horde. But if the evil portion experiences physical trauma, or becomes incapacitated, the good portion can "split" off and escape (and work with the Rebellion), or take control of the one body. Both portions of Double's personality are eternally struggling to control the one form - which is when they are at their most powerful.