Castle Greyskull

I had a look through my Masters of the Universe toys HERE way back in October and promised then to do a video of my Castle Greyskull, sorry it took me so long but here it is at last. I've not watched any other videos of Castle Greyskull but I think the condition of mine is pretty good, other than it being dusty as heck and a little handle broken off of the sentry gun. I realise as well that the Castle set came with a weapons rack complete with weapons which I know I have in a bag with the action figures.

The 1st Castle Greyskull action set came in 1982, I am not sure how many versions there were and which set I have but I would guess I got this one around about 1983/84, so I'm guessing it's of the 1st set and the other set never came until the 2002 relaunch.

In the lore of Masters of the Universe King Greyskull is Prince Adam's ancestor, in his time the castle was very different and was a centre of great knowledge known as the Hall of Wisdom. In a cataclysmic final battle defending his kingdom and all of Eternia from Hordak, the bottomless abyss that surrounds the castle was created. After King Greyskull's death the Hall and it's secrets were left in the care of his advisers, the Elders, who foresaw a great coming evil but also prophesized He-man. They concentrated their power to create the Orb of Wisdom and stored it and Greyskull's Sword of Power in the Crystal Chamber which is hidden underneath a secret trapdoor. They turned the Hall into Castle Greyskull to scare away intruders and protect the Orb.

By Prince Adam's time the Castle is largely forgotten and is inhabited by the Sorceress and a rarely seen, mysterious Spirit of Greyskull. We see Man-at-Arms lead Prince Adam to the castle where he receives Greyskull's Sword and this has "The Power" to turn him into He-Man. Skeletor and his forces of evil seek to get into the Castle to steal the powerful secrets housed there so he will be able to conquer Eternia.

In the 1987 live-action movie The Masters of the Universe, Skeletor finally takes the Castle and captures the Sorceress, forcing He-Man, Man-at-Arms, Teela and a Thenorian locksmith called Gwildor to flee through a portal to Earth. They are aided by a teenage couple and a police detective in finally defeating the forces of evil. One of those teenagers was Courtney Cox of Friends, Scream fame in a very early role.

In November 2012 a new character was created. to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the toys 1st launch there was a create a character competition and the winning entry was for Castle Greyskullman!! I don't own this toy, in fact I'd never even heard of it but looking at this picture it is one sweet action figure!

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DC Exhibition: Dawn of Super Heroes

So, I'd seen the ads, I'd seen people's posts about it on Facebook and I decided that I had to go and see it for myself, so off I jolly well trotted to the O2 at North Greenwich at 12 O'clock today to go and see the DC heroes on display. And jolly glad I am that I did cos it was fab. 

Click to enlarge

The venue was pretty quiet today which was nice, I could take my time poring over all the cool vintage art from 80 years of comics action. All the great names I knew from my collecting days and even a fair few I'd not heard of were on display. I was fascinated with the way it was put together with annotations in the borders and with the lettering and page banners etc all applied on top of the drawn page. You could see the alterations made as well and penciled guidelines. 

I love the older comics with their hokey stories and dated notions of romance, they have a kind of naive innocence of a bygone era that always tickles me.

If you are more interested in the movies rather than their source material then you shouldn't be upset as there are a wealth of props, models, costumes, concept art and storyboards from all the DC hero films and even some focus on the old 60's and animated Batman shows. The display rooms were divided by characters with focus on the more recent crop of movies. So Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Suicide Squad & The Justice League all got plenty of coverage. I would have liked a Green Lantern dedicated room as well but with the unfair negative feedback that movie got there was no chance of that!

Upon entering the exhibition you can get an audio exhibition guide which was easy enough to use and gave some fascinating insight into the comics world. My only real gripe was the lighting which was very muted. The info plaques were black with the white text on them in pretty small font and it made them hard to read. I also missed a load of the audio guide number prompts probably due to the lack of light also. (Although I am not sure if that was the fault of the light's dimness or my own!) Perhaps I was too enraptured by the art to notice the numbers.

Another small gripe but probably only specific to old bums with flat feet like me was that there could've been a few more seats to park weary butts in for a while.

Anyway, in summary I thoroughly enjoyed my couple of hours and thought it was excellent value for money. If it sounds like your cuppa tea the exhibit runs till September the 9th. 

Click HERE for more info.

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