Recommended music: Blood, Sweat & Tears – Spinning Wheel
Happy Monday, MOTU fans! I hope you had a great weekend. For this #MastersMonday, let’s take a spin with another 1985 release from the vintage Mattel Masters of the Universe line: Sy-Klone!
When the “Heroic fist-flinging tornado” showed up in stores in the fall of 1985, he quickly became one of my favorite Heroic Warrior action figures. I loved his bold blue-and-yellow colors with red accents, and the fact that his design used all new parts made him stand out. The lenticular sticker on his chest displayed some kind of space radar that may not have made much sense, but to a farm kid in the mid-1980s, it felt high-tech.
Sy-Klone only came with a simple yellow shield as an accessory, unless you counted taking off his visor. What really made him fun was the action feature. He had a small grooved dial, or ‘action wheel,’ on his waist that let you spin his torso all the way around. This also made his ball-jointed arms lift up, which really made him look like a tornado in action. Sy-Klone came with the mini comic ‘Spikor Strikes,’ and he also appeared in a few other mini-comics. He showed up in two episodes of the Filmation He-Man and the Masters of the Universe cartoon and even made a quick appearance in He-Man and She-Ra: A Christmas Special.
Sy-Klone also appeared in the Golden Books hardcover story ‘I Have The Power,’ in German comics, and in the Masters of the Universe magazine. Earl Norem painted him for the cover of the Golden Books story ‘Power From The Sky,’ even though Sy-Klone wasn’t actually in the book. Luckily, both William George and Earl Norem included him with other top-tier characters in packaging art and posters for many years.
After the original toy line, Sy-Klone showed up in nine episodes of the 2002 He-Man and the Masters of the Universe series, where he was called Syclone. He didn’t appear in Netflix’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation or Revolution series, even though he was mentioned in a prequel comic.
Kids who got Sy-Klone in the J.C. Penny 2-pack with Moss Man, or in the ‘5th anniversary’ three-pack with Hordak and Roboto, missed out on his cardback art by Errol McCarthy, which shows Sy-Klone ready to face Battle Armor Skeletor. Mattel has made more Sy-Klone figures over the years, but this original version is still my favorite.
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