This review was originally published on June 21st, 2010.
June is here! And with it came She-Ra, the first figure with increased production following Adorapocalypse in January. What was the net result of the increase? About four minutes longer than Optikk, a little over ten minutes longer than Evil Lyn, and she sold out faster than Adora.
Interestingly, I haven’t heard anything about a future change in production levels even with the quick sellout, but with a few 200x characters in the pike, it may not be a priority for Mattel. Either way, I’m curious to see what the next few months hold.
Isn’t She-Ra so pretty? The head sculpt is really… wait, you don’t see the head on the figure? Weird, that’s how I pulled her out of the package…
If you’ll permit me a tad bit of sarcasm here, I have to say I really enjoyed fixing my $20 “adult collector” figure. I’m sure there’s a good round of “it’s an easy fix” versus “I shouldn’t have to” that can come out of this, but I’ll leave that to others. Suffice to say, She-Ra’s head was not attached and attempts to simply put it back on were not successful. The hole in the bottom of the head simply wasn’t big enough to fit over the ball and my first experiences with She-Ra were some light dremeling to remove excess plastic. All so I could recreate the classic bobblehead that is typical of the females in this line. Now that I’ve mentioned it, I’ll move on and take a look at the figure as intended.
She-Ra utilizes the standard female buck, but has a few more new pieces than the average female receives. Her boots are entirely new, with an internal “rocker” joint, she has new forearms with new gauntlets, the new dress with sculpted details, new cape, two new heads, and the detachable mask.
I like a lot of the new pieces. They’re mostly here for accuracy, but I enjoy how the boots come up to encapsulate the calves for one. It gives a better illusion of depth to that part of the figure. When I saw the Toy Fair pics, I didn’t think the dress had quite the right shape to it and I still think that now, but I can’t put my finger on why it looks off to me. The cape is a separate piece and can be slipped off the neck when the head is unattached. She looks better with it on, mostly because of the choker collar, but it’s one more display option for the figure.
The two heads are both sharp. I don’t believe they’re simple reuses of the Adora head though the face is the same. I removed Adora’s hair to make the custom of my Shopkeeper and the sides of the head are different. I’d have to remove She-Ra’s hair to be sure and I don’t currently have a reason to do that. It’s best guess for now.
I’ll be sticking with the classic head. I think the “toy” head and mask turned out really nice (the holographic stickers give me flashbacks), but I don’t think of the toy when I think of She-Ra. Particularly not when the rest of the figure was made to match the artwork and not the old figure. The mask pegs into a hole in her head that allows for it to be reversible (covering her face or not). I’m with Mattel on this decision, it’s better than fragile clips and with the helmet hair that’s behind the mask, she wouldn’t look good “de-tiaraed” anyway.
Articulation is standard for the line. The hidden rocker joint in the ankle doesn’t have as much range as the earlier exposed joints, but it works. The skirt is fairly pliable and it allows this waist to turn freely, but the longer length now blocks the range of the hips. It’s always something with the MOTU ladies apparently. Finally, the head is wobbly, which is sad because there’s some decent range (no looking up because of the hair) but the loose neck peg and heavy hair can’t hold poses and the head will always return to a fairly neutral position. Continue to Page 2…
There was a lot of death in this review. LOL
And it’s crazy how small She-Ra makes Barda look. I know Barda was too small, but geez!
I only killed Hordak and She-Ra…
And they got better!
Love your blog and your reviews! Great pictures!
Thanks, Chanel!
I actually like She-Ra with the Adora head. This review was great!
The skintones aside it does look pretty good. 🙂
Man, the comics were flowing like water this time. The CSI reference was great, but on some occasions I find that Skeletor is more Caruso-like than Faker.
Thanks for pointing out that the She-Ra head may be more than just a simple reuse of the Adora head. I was considering buying an Adora to use her face for a tiara-less She-Ra custom. But indeed, there is something that makes the She-Ra head a bit better in most pics. I don’t know if it’s paint or a slightly different sculpt.
I may have been having too much fun. 😉
Faker for the tab because of the red hair, but I could see Skelly as Horatio!
HAHAHAHA!! I’ve read every review and loved them all…but the last pic had me rolling. I knew what you were going for before I even noticed the little caption in the lower, right-hand corner. Bravo, sir.
Thanks, Sephron!
I have to ask: When you said the head wouldn’t fit, did you happen to mean it wouldn’t “click” in? My She-Ra head doesn’t click either, yet it stays on.
The other guys here had ones like that that wouldn’t “click” in, but mine would absolutely not stay on without modding it.
Loved the review, but the Horatio Caine reference needed a dramatic pause between fame and went.
LOL. I can see that.
Funny as all hell!
Love how She-Ra’s head looks on Teela’s body. I wish She-Ra’s body was that detailed!
Thanks!
Yeah, She-Ra’s dress is accurate, but a little plain. I like the head on that body, something like a more battle ready She-Ra.
The head that she came with fit, but I couldn’t get the other head on her without working out a bit of the plastic with a knife and hoping I didn’t destroy the head. She’s pretty sweet and I’m always glad to get another female figure to keep the display varied.
Both mine were that way, neither would go over the ball. She’s a good figure though, I just had to do a little work to get her back on par.
Great review as always. That sucks about the head you got though. I’d be more pissed about it personally.
The thing that always keeps me in check is that I see a bunch of them get opened at once, so any problem is lessened over if I was just getting the one. It puts things in a different light for me.
I love the She-Rafied watermark! You’ve made a great site for MOTU fans.
Thanks! That was a last minute addition!
When I opened my She-Ra, her head popped off… I guess production line couldn’t get the heads popped on either lol. Awesome figure. Now, bring on the other POP’s! Glimmer!!! …. I think I called her Glitter before… ugh…
I want to see Mermista, Frosta, and Castaspella, I think. LOL I always have to check the names…
LOL. I guess it was She-Ra day today. Loved all the reviews.
It was a bit of a bottleneck, but I appreciate seeing all the different takes!
Great review as always, Noisy. Loved CSI: Eternia & dead Hordak!! The head on my She-Ra requires Herculean effort to swap and I don’t like the toy head so mine will be go on as a one head princess.
Thanks!
It just took a bit of cleaning out to become a normal head. I wasn’t worried about doing too much since the peg was wobbly anyway.
love the pics!
Thanks, Elaine!
Got mine today but I’m cautious especially with the reports of the breakage while trying to switch heads. I’ve had problems before with figures that require assembly on the joints and the arm peg breaking. The issue doesn’t seem isolated to just Mattel’s figures even though the popular belief seems to point in that direction.
Mattel, and surely other companies, seems to fall prey to odd interior architecture like the triple barbell or the MOTUC ladies and their keyring necks. I don’t know where those choices are being made, but it seems to be different than back in the day when most toys had a basic internal setup that rarely varied.
Damn, the headswap with Teela looks awesome! I’m tempted to pick up both of them now. How’s the skin tone match? I know Adora has lighter skin than She-Ra.
And yeah, the hologram stickers on the alternate head gave me flashbacks too.
Adora & Teela have painted faces while She-Ra has molded skintone, so it’s a little off there too:
Another great review, but man, does Mattel even HAVE a QC person over in China checking this stuff?
Two things. Has anyone tried the ‘heat soften’ approach to getting her head on the peg? either hot water or a hair dryer to soften the plastic of the head just enough for it to fit? Or is the plastic too hard to allow that? (this is an old trick from my GI Joe fandom, also used in the construction of soft vinyl model kits from Japan)
Second. Um, is something wrong with She-Ra’s legs? Is it an optical illusion due to the paint and the difference of seeing it 2-D via a picture and 3-D in life? I’ll try and explain what I’m seeing. (and I’m sorry if it sounds dirty, there’s no other way to try and say it)
Her thighs don’t seem to ‘point’ where her shins point. Visually, her thighs seems to point ‘out’ while the calf and shin seem to curve ‘in’, then it sweeps back out at the ankle. It’s not *exactly* a knock-kneed look but it’s not a splayed ‘heroic pose’ look either. It just seems…odd to my eyes. I think it’s the most obvious in the Barda pic.
Thoughts?
Thanks, Steve! Glad to have you around!
The heat approach has worked for a lot of folks. The majority of the cases that I’ve heard of were what like RageTreb described – where the head will fit on the peg, but not “click” in. The heat approach seems to fix that. In my case, that was something I tried unsuccessfully and had to resort to the dremel.
I think the Barda pic is largely due to my bad posing. I was so focused on getting her to hold up Barda that I wasn’t paying attention to the feet. But looking at her, there might be some odd curvature in the lower calf area too.
Another excellent review. We need more female characters. Bring on the rest of the POP female characters!!!
Thanks, Sy! I was never a big POP fan – I couldn’t tell you one thing about the majority of the characters, but I’m excited to see some of the figures. I do wish they’d hurry it up.
I just pre-ordeded She-Ra today from BBTS she looks sexy and she comes with lots of accessories.BTW cool review
Thanks!
One thing I’ve noticed about some figures is that they look great on their own and others look great with a group. I think I tend to favor the standalones. She-Ra is a group figure, I liked her, but looking at her over there in the pack she stands out. It’s a weird thing.