Now for those of your who'd don't know, I am a He-man and the Masters of the Universe fan. I have been since the day that I walked into the Mervyn's toy department, yes readers in the 1980's Mervyn's department store had a LARGE toy department that rivaled Kay B Toys in it's day. Anyway, imaging it's 1982 and ten year old me walks into this store, and after years of little 3 3/4 star wars and micronauts figures I see this massive display of these hugely muscled barbarians, scarey cool monsters and even a sorceress thrown into the mix (come on Teela had a Cobra staff and hood, doesn't scream warrior to me).
What really got me going though was the artwork. Big bold Frank Frazetta style fantasy art of fantastic battle, fierce monsters, and THE CASTLE. Castle Greyskull, the art on the front of the box was enough to draw me in. Of course it wouldn't be until my birthday that year that I got any of these fantastic toys, but they were worth the wait. Never did get a Castle Greyskull, still don't have one to this day. Gonna have to fix that someday.
But speaking of that amazing artwork that drew me in. The original artwork for those Masters of the Universe toys was done by Rudy Obrero, and he was one of the first people I got to meet on my rounds through PowerCon.
The fantastic castle artwork I referred to sits over my right shoulder. I really wish I had the 200 dollars he was asking for it, but I had to settle for this picture instead. You can find more of Mr. Obrero's great work at: www.rudyobrero.com
As a kid, the He-man and the Masters of the Universe Cartoon was a big part of my life. Everyday after school I would get to see another adventure with my favorite heroes and villains. The action was toned down, the villains were cheesy, but it was great when you were a kid. One of the minds (and pens) behind that great show was Robert Lamb.
Mr. Lamb was nice enough to spend a good half an hour talking with me about the series, the studio, and the differences between the Filmation series and the Mike Young Productions series that aired in the early 2000's. We agreed that the 200X series had much better story lines and action, but lacked the amazing backgrounds that the Filmation series produced. Mr Lamb's website can be found here: http://www.robertartwriter.com/Home.html
While speaking to Mr. Lamb I also met James "Bustatoons" Eatock, who had his table set up next to Mr. Lambs. James has his own blog about the Filmation series which can be found here: http://bustatoons.blogspot.com/
It's a picture of Evil-Lyn, one of my favorite characters, from one of her featured episodes "The Shaping Staff".
It has actual animation notes written on it.
It's a piece of MOTU history that I now own!
A couple of years ago I came across this guy called Pixel Dan. Dan did reviews of the new Masters of the Universe Classics figures for www.he-man.org. He was also a member of another website called the pop culture network. I started watching their reviews and web shows and became a fan. I then started doing various pieces of fan art for them which they would often feature on their shows. Then Dan began co-hosting a MOTU Podcast called "Roast Gooble Dinner" which quickly became one of my favorites. Needless to say, one of the things that I was looking forward to doing at the PowerCon was meeting Pixel Dan and the other members of the podcast team, since they were the ones who were hosting the PowerCon itself. Well mission accomplished!
When I first walked up to them, there were several people in line to get pictures taken with them. Dan has become a bit of a celebrity in the MOTU collecting community and his wife Christina is his camera man and sometimes co-host on his own website: http://pixel-dan.com/
When they finally had a free moment, I walked up to Dan and said "I know you don't know my face, but here's a hint as to who I am." and I produced my sketchbook revealing sketches of the fan art I had done for him in the past. He laughed and said "Yeah I know exactly who you are now!"
Dan and his wife were extremely nice and I spoke to them often throughout the day.
Emiliano Santalucia.
Emiliano is a former co-host of Roast Gooble Dinner, and was the main artist on the Masters of the Universe comic book that was released in the early 2000's to coincide with the animated series.
Emiliano currently does freelance toy design work for Hasbro and several other companies and is one of the founders of the Power and Honor Foundation. A group dedicated to the preservation of all the old Masters of the Universe artwork from its various incarnations.
The last of the Gooble hosts I was able to track down was Danielle Gelehrter. Danielle often filled in for other co-hosts when they couldn't make the show and became a permanent member of the group when Emiliano left the show.
In additon to Roast Gooble Dinner, Danielle hosts a Horror B-movie show similar in style to the old Elvira T-show as "Penny Dreadful." The show includes a bunch of supporting characters including her husband who plays a werewolf named "Garou."
Another person that I met at the convention is the "face" of Masters of the Universe for Mattel. Scot "ToyGuru" Neitlich is the MOTU brand manager for Mattel, and unfortunately is the one that has to shoulder most of the heat from the fans about the problems with the current line.
He's a nice guy who goes out of the way to talk to the fans and be a part of the community. I feel bad because people who aren't in the know consider things to be his fault when in fact 80-90% of it is completely out of his control.
And of course what would a Convention like this be without Cosplayers!
I didn't get these ladies names, but they had some spot on costumes and I believe Cheetara (the one on the left) won first place in the costume contest.
Costumer and sometimes actor Johnny Bilson as Songster from the Powertour, and actress and Model Tanya Tate as Princess Adora.
You can find Johnny's costume work at http://havocstaff.50megs.com/
Tanya Tate can be found on various sites around the web, though I must warn you, while she currently does a lot of "geek" related stuff with toys, comics, and games. She's a former adult actress and your google search might be NSFW.
PowerCon/ThunderCon was a great experience and I want to do it again. However from what I understand it will be held in New York next year, so I probably won't be able to attend. However if it keeps going, it will most likely return to California in 2014. So here's hoping!
No comments:
Post a Comment