“If not for a nearby Bionotops, Skeletor would have indeed perished and Hordak’s revenge would have been complete.” – “Buzz Saw” Hordak’s MOTU Classics Bio.
It’s way late, but I want to get a review up for tomorrow (today, really). I took a quick scan of my giant pile of unreviewed figures and had to pick one I thought I could do quickly. My MOTU pile is probably the worst of the lot, so I started there. My method, if you call it that I guess, is to figure out the pics first and the many of the pics below popped into my head instantly when I read “Buzz Saw” Hordak scrolled across that brown mailer. So I picked him.
Turns out, he’s not really the figure you want to talk about in the middle of the night after working all weekend. You want to be happy! And excited! And blown away! And… not thinking that this guy was better off in the box.
It’s not the figure’s fault per se. We slavishly must complete the vintage line and BS Hordak, no matter what, is part of the vintage line. We had to get him and so the lack of imagination that led to his basically unchanged deco thirty years ago has returned. Well, except that this figure doesn’t quite match this one in a few tiny ways.
From a distance, this figure is basically Hordak redux. The one saving grace to this deco is that the regular Hordak figure, from way back in 2009, had a little bit of a MO2K flare. I’m sure there was some MOTU Classics Collector ready for a Hordak without silver trim, with the regular loincloth, with brighter greys, etc. I know! It’s almost starting to sound different! Side-by-side, there are differences, but it’s subtle except for one big thing.
And that big thing? It should totally be a good thing! It should be amazing! It should make us bowled over excited! See, BS Hordak’s action feature was a buzz saw bursting out of his chest. I don’t know what happened to his lungs, but suffice to say, you don’t have a lot of time to ask the question before you probably die from the buzz saw hitting your lungs. The lack of action feature is MOTUC is tricky here – if this Hordak figure were just a (barely) repaint with a new accessory, it would suck! That would’ve been a terrible idea. Continue to Page 2…
Problem is that we got 4 freaking Hordak Variants in addition to Vanilla Hordak. They could have totally combined Filmation AND BS into one figure and make something a bit more worthwhile.
One Forearm swap (and slight repaint) with Miller Bats and now BS looks less BS and more BA…
There’s another thing about this Hordak that some may consider a positive. If I were collecting Teh Lein BUT I’M NOT (ha! 10 point Skeletor reference!) this would be my ‘default’ Hordak. Why? Because it looks like (from Noisy’s photos) the hollow chest corrects the ‘chestplate flex pose’ problem, where you can’t have your figure doing anything but “MY GUNS, THEY ARE TOO POWERFUL CHECK THEM OUT BRUTHER!!” poses.
Hey, with the New Regime in power, maybe they can be lobbied for a Rio Blast 2.0, now with hollow chest?
A new Rio Blast would be great.
Agreed!
Well I thought owned this one as a kid but found out was wrong. I don’t get the appeal but as not having a hordak would go for it. Alas I have slacked from the line a bit. Have some to get on 2nd market.
BS Hordak design wise good and the feature (less) just does look like “Look at me I gotta thing” kinda deal. The Filmation idea I think woulda looked much better. Oh well, still a good review and again great pics.
I spent many, many hours of my childhood gleefully blasting other toys with the buzzsaw launcher. This was my favourite version of Hordak, probably still is. O’ course, that’s dependent on his buzzsaw actually being able to launch, but I still have warm memories of the fun I had with the vintage figure. HE SHOT TWIN BUZZSAWS OUT OF HIS GUTS, fer cryin’ out loud!
There is no way that is not cool. };D
Not gonna lie: I love this one. Not “like,” but LOVE. As much as I enjoyed the first MOTUC Hordak as a composite of vintage and 200X goodness, I just felt let down by him. He had wobbly ankles (BS Hordak’s are nice ‘n’ tight), and the 1-2 punch of bulky chest armor and the longer loincloth made his forearms and dainty gloved mitts look even more ridiculously undersized. While the arms and hands on BS Hordak are the same, they look better proportioned thanks to the slimmer torso and, erm, less ‘saggy’ crotch. Combined with the brighter deco, he comes off looking a bit more rejuvenated than his first MOTUC entry. And even if he isn’t a perfect update of the vintage BS figure, he’s an awfully nice modern counterpart to the *original* vintage Hordak. I’m not usually a fan of slavish updates in MOTUC, but Original Hordak was one of my first and favourite vintage toys, and one I’ve still held on to after all these years. If only for nostalgia and personal bias, MOTUC BS Hordak has turned into one of my favourite figures in 2015.
Nice positive spin on this. And I completely agree. You may have just convinced me to open my BS Hordak if only for just this reason.
Great review, pics, and comics, as is the norm.
Anyone else have problem with his chest door? Mine just did NOT want to open. I’d tug at it, and it would warp under the stresses of trying to pop it open. IN the end, I filed down the latch on the top of door, and that made things a lot easier and less nerve-racking.
ha. “BS Hordak” being aptly named.
…reminds me again why I don’t use my middle name/initial.