Just a reminder to He-Man/Masters of the Universe fans, Tri-Klops will go on sale today at 12 noon EST. He can be ordered at MattyCollector.com.

He will come with:
* Secret glow-in-the-dark Warrior’s Ring with opening top
* Assassin sword
* Doomseeker with stand
He is sure to sell out quickly, so get him while you can!

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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The 7th Kingdom, the top property in the FANtastic Exclusive series of polls from 2006 and 2007 has been spun out into its own line. The Four Horsemen excluded the property from the FanEx polls for 2008 because it proved so popular, they felt it could sustain its own full line.

The top vote-getter in the poll for 2007 behind the Elephant Swordsman was Queen Alluxandra of the Bloodmane Clan. She was chosen as the first figure to be released in the 7th Kingdom line post-FanEx. The sale of this figure and its variants will follow the style of previous FanEx releases. Each variant will be sold exclusively through a different online retailer, while the main figure will be exclusive to the Four Horsmen’s site StoreHorsemen.com. Additionally a full set of all 11 figures will be sold for US$220 starting Wednesday, July 1st starting at 8PM EST, also at StoreHorsemen.com. Sets will be limited to 125.

I voted for Alluxandra in 2007, so I am pumped for these figures. I will say though, there are way too many cats in this line up. Based on the numbers it looks like the 4H picked enough retailers to do a variant for each unique figure, but when given the choice, nearly all the retailers chose the cat because the Animal Kingdom was so popular, while the poor mutant was apparently not chosen and is exclusive to StoreHorsemen.com. A shame, I think the Mutant is one of the best variants along with Isadorra.

After the jump, you can see more of the Queen and each of her variants.
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Sometimes we get to be so awesome that we run over time. Since we’re committed to making these podcasts shorter and more cohesive, sometimes things just fall by the wayside. Sometimes those things are so awesome that we still want you to hear them, hence “Mermans in SPACE.”

So here are some extra bits from last episode to tide you over until episode 9 tomorrow!

Subscribe:

Show notes after the jump!
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In what has to be the fastest overall series of polls from the annual FANtastic Exclusive event brought to us by the Four Horsemen, the final round is upon us! After the first round of elimination featuring 27 different character designs, each round has gotten successively shorter. The final three rounds have been about a week each so far, with this final round possibly lasting a little longer due to a tight race! We are now down to two designs with the winner getting its own toy and series of variants available exclusively to partnered retailers.

The final four bracket consisted of Vampire Lady vs. The Ministry of Hunters and Wolfbat vs. The Raven. While the Ministry won out against the Vampire Lady, it has been said the margin was as tight as 5 votes!
The Four Horsemen’s last announcement on the FanEx forums stated just days after the final poll began:

“We’re now over 500 votes, and the gap is only 43 votes. Every vote counts. -FH-“

Make sure you make your voice heard on what design you’d like to see win!

Go here to vote and check out the active thread discussion on our very own Powet Forums, here.

Some may remember an episode of PowetToys early on that focused on the Four Horsemen’s FANtastic Exclusives for 2006. The exclusive was based on an original story premise from the Four Horsemen called The 7th Kingdom. The exclusive figure was a minotaur named Xetheus of the Animal Kingdom and had several variant figures. In the course of that episode, I looked at the logo and revealed what sections of the design represented which kingdoms from the storyline. This was not public knowedge beforehand, nor had it really been discussed before the episode’s release. The design hadn’t seen much exposure before the figures’ release. Because of this, I have been credited for this revelation.

The 7th Kingdom was so popular in the FanEx polls, it has been spun out into its own line, independent of the annual FANtastic Exclusive promotion. I thought I would take this opportunity to take a look at the logo and how I figured out what symbols went with what kingdom.

Read on for some simple reasoning, research and deduction.
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This video turned into a more overly ambitious review than I first thought.

Show notes after the jump
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Mattel has been hard at work lately trying to meet the concerns of fans of the DC Universe Classics line. One of the initiatives to try and better meet demand is to offer “open stock” to online retailers. This is basically a solid case of a single figure. So if Shazam is doing really well, but Killer Moth isn’t getting any orders, the online retailers can adjust their orders and order a few more cases of Shazam without worrying about getting Killer Moths that there is not demand for. Unfortunately the Wave 6 and 7 chases will not be offered in open stock due to an error or some sort, but it is the intention of Mattel to offer the Wave 8 variants in open stock. This is really great news for fans who order online.

In addition to this news, Mattel also announced that they were able to redirect all remaining stock of the KB Exclusive Maskless Batman Beyond and Sonic Arm Cyborg to online retailers. The status of these figures was in question since KB Toys has gone into liquidation and the exclusives were difficult to come by in the first place.

Great news all around and its good to see Mattel trying to address the concerns of fans and correct some early mistakes in the line’s life.