Unlike my Star Wars toys and Legos, somehow my Masters of the Universe toys didn’t make it past my childhood. I seem to remember a lot of them breaking at the limbs. Since top ten lists are popular and generate a lot of controversy in the comments section among Internet geeks who take this stuff seriously, lets take a trip back to 1982 at the very earliest and look at the best, and the worst, He-Man toys. By the power of Grayskull, I have the power!

10. Snake Mountain

Skeletor’s home had an awesome facade and plenty of fun features, but wasn’t a must-have playset. Regardless, I was jealous of anyone who had it.

9. Teela

Teela was cool because she was a hot chick with a snake staff. Since She-Ra wasn’t around yet, He-Man had to get it on with someone, and I don’t think Man-At-Arms swung that way (although I had my suspicions about Ram Man).

8. Man-E-Faces

Human, robot, monster! Man-E-Faces was three different guys in one.

7. Wind Raider

There weren’t too many cool vehicles released, and the Wind Raider was about as good as it got, considering it was He-Man’s main vehicle. There were a couple others released years later that were okay, like the Roton, but not nearly as popular.

6. Man-At-Arms

Man-At-Arms was He-Man’s right-hand man.

5. Trap Jaw

Trap Jaw was cool because he had so many moving parts. While he wasn’t as popular as other villains, like Beast Man, there was more to do with him.

4. Battle Cat

If you had He-Man, you had to have his trusty feline friend, Battle Cat. Skeletor also had a cat called Panthor, and his skin was purple felt, which was kind of strange to play with.

3. Skeletor

The second most essential character to have.

2. He-Man

The original He-Man was the best and obviously the essential character. Not having this guy would be like having Star Wars toys without Luke Skywalker.

1. Castle Grayskull

This was the only cool playset that they released. Of course, it’s utterly pointless without the action figures, but that front facade makes it the most awesome of these toys (the trap door inside kind of got boring after a while, though).

And the three worst (excluding several of the later toys, like Stinkor, that few people actually owned):

3. Battle Armor He-Man/Skeletor

How dumb was this? You punched them in the chest, and that part of the armor got ‘damaged.’ Some people will say this is the best toy, but to me it was nothing short of a gimmick that fell flat. I had it. It sucked.

2. Orko

This character made the Master of the Universe franchise not cool, and the toy was even worse. It had one of those zipper-like thingies where you pulled it and he randomly moved around.

1. Prince Adam

Who in the hell would want to own Prince Adam? That’s like wanting a Bruce Banner toy, or a Clark Kent doll.

Here’s a funny photo I found:

And, of course, we’ve gotta watch the cartoon intro: