This is the first in a short series of articles covering a number of serious missteps that Mattel has made concerning some of their top properties.

Today I wanted to take a look at the Masters of the Universe Classics (MOTUC) Club Eternia 2010 Subscription. First let me explain what this subscription is.

Currently, once a month, at noon, a MOTUC figure goes up for sale on MattyCollector.com. Most months, the figure has sold in about one hour, despite continually increased production numbers. This has angered many fans of the line because of the inconvenient time of day to order and the inability of Mattel to ensure better availability.
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Since the alphabet is the building block of our language, the Powet Alphabet is the building block of what makes us geeks.

Before the Sci Fi Channel (or “SyFy”, as it’s now known) decided it hated science fiction fans, it was dedicated to bringing original science fiction content to the masses. The network didn’t always do this well (see Mission: Genesis), but in the late ’90s it would do this often. The first original series to catch my eye that wasn’t a total bomb was Farscape.

Farscape tells the story of IASA scientist and astronaut John Crichton, who is flung unwittingly across space via wormhole to try to survive in a much more advanced society that, due to his many other misfortunes, finds excuses to seek his complete and utter destruction. In true Douglas Adams fashion, we quickly find that Earth (“never heard of it”) is a truly backwater planet, leaving our hero stuck in the middle just trying to figure out what’s going on. Unlike other protagonists stuck in this situation, however, Crichton is able to bring his full knowledge of year 2000-era science fiction pop culture to bear in order to make sense of the things happening around him, to him, and without him.

For these and many other reasons that we are about to explore, Farscape wasn’t just another run-of-the-mill low budget hack writer’s fantasy. It was a hack writer’s fantasy with heart, drama, love, death, and re-death. And lots of sci-fi in-jokes. Come with us as we explore the Powet Alphabet’s “F”.

…what, you expecting Famicom?

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Since the alphabet is the building block of our language, the Powet Alphabet is the building block of what makes us geeks.

We are the E, E, E, E, Eeeeeeewoks!

What’s not to like about the Ewoks? A lot of things apparently. It would be dishonest not to mention the near universally negative fan reaction to these characters. They were considered by most to be cutesy characters made to appeal to children and fans consider it unrealistic that a bunch of teddy bears with sticks and stones would overthrow the Empire.

But I don’t want to talk about the hate. Those haters are a bunch of losers. The Ewoks were made to appeal to children? Well I was 5 years old when I saw Return of the Jedi in theatres and I thought the Ewoks were the cat’s ass, and I still do! I have one distinct memory of when I first saw Jedi and that’s when Wicket first appeared on screen and I turned to my mother and said “That’s an Ewok”. Somehow I think she had put that together.

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After Midway struck gold with Mortal Kombat, they tried again, again, and again to repeat its success in the fighting game arena, but failed miserably. While Capcom was able to follow up the wildly successful Street Fighter 2 with Darkstalkers and the Marvel fighting games, SNK successfully presented Art of Fighting (along with King of Fighters, Samurai Showdown, and so many others) as Fatal Fury’s successor, and Namco followed up Tekken with Soul Blade, Midway churned out failures such as Bio Freaks and Mace: The Dark Age. They had some potential though, as Bio Freaks had an dismemberment game mechanic and Mace could have been Soul Edge’s evil twin. However, Midway’s most notable attempt (and by this I mean biggest failure) was War Gods. Although it had some promise, it was dragged down by horrid controls, lousy character design, and a frustratingly cheap artificial intelligence.
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Back in May, I reported on how the Castlevania movie had been basically doomed to production hell and thus pretty much sacked in terms of going anywhere, making it for all intents and purposes a dead film.

Apparently the HP of the film hadn’t been completely taken out, though. BloodyDisgusting comes back to report that the movie is back on, with yet another director slated to take over the script and reigns of the flick. James Wan, who helped co-create the SAW series, has taken the helm to hopefully head the film back in the right direction. And why not? It’s better than Sylvian “Stomp the Yard” White or Paul “I rape VG movies almost as bad though not as frequently as Uwe Boll” Anderson. That’s a matter of opinion, of course.

Despite my overwhelming cynicism towards a Castlevania movie ever turning out decent and not like Helsing, my interest is piqued simply for the fact Wan actually references staples of the series beyond the words “Belmont” and “Dracula”.

Since the alphabet is the building block of our language, the Powet Alphabet is the building block of what makes us geeks.

The debut of the Transformers toy line in 1984 featured many different toys that were originally from several different toy lines in Japan (Diaclone, Micro Change). Soundwave, a robot that transformed into a micro-cassette recorder, was among the first figures in the Transformers line. Unlike most of the other Transformers in that first wave, Soundwave had a gimmick that went above and beyond just being able to transform and back. He was able to fit other Transformers that took the form of micro-cassettes in his chest.

This was a really well received gimmick and more Transformer micro-cassette figures would be released over the years that could fit in Soundwave and his Autobot counter-part Blaster. The truly unique aspect of these cassette Transformers was not so much in the fact that they could fit in the chest of another Transformer, but rather the variety and range of things, into which, these cassettes were able to transform all from the very same small form factor.

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Since the alphabet is the building block of our language, the Powet Alphabet is the building block of what makes us geeks.

Apathy. Greed. Corruption. Power. Hope.
Batman Beyond.
Courage. Honor. Justice.

These are the words that flash by during the opening credits of Batman Beyond. The series takes place in a not too distant future where corporate greed and power have taken over. Bruce Wayne has hung up the cowl, giving up his life as Batman, for reasons only partially explained in the two-part series opener. Further reasons would be hinted at in many episodes, but we wouldn’t really get an idea until the straight-to-DVD movie, Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker was released.
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Earlier this week, I featured one of the more recent Syphon Filter entries. This week’s Lost Classic features an earlier entry in the series, Syphon Filter 3. SF3 was the last game in the series to be featured on the PS1, and it had to be delayed due to the 9/11 terrorist attacks (the original box art featured protagonists Gabe Logan and Lian Xing jumping from an exploding building). Thankfully it didn’t take too long for the game to be released, and players got another explosive chapter in the popular espionage saga.
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