I never cared much about the Snake Men
until the 20002 cartoon, which presented them as a massive threat to
both the good citizens of Eternia and Skeletor and his evil minions.
The faction made a huge impact and would have been an ongoing menace
had the series progressed past a second season.
General Rattlor, in particular, was a
favorite of mine. He was the guy that took control of operations
after Kobra Khan freed him from captivity and he essentially remained
the figurehead of the Snake Men for the remainder of the series. King
Hssss made very few appearances, as I think they were sort of saving
him for later.
Well, what do you know? Apparently
Mattel has that armor tooled and ready, but just didn’t see fit to
include it with the figure. Well, the chest piece, anyway. This guy
would need greaves and bracers to be accurate enough for me. The
colors and shape are still slightly off, but the armor is really all
I need. Check out this Pixel Dan post for more details about
that situation.
First Glance: Rattlor is
a very bold-looking figure. The colors are striking and he is almost
all new parts. Or would be, if the Snake Men 2-pack hadn’t
beaten him to release. But his vibrant colors definitely set him
apart from Scale Male.
Articulation:
Head – ball joint
Shoulders – ball joint
Biceps – swivel
Elbows –pivot
Wrists – swivel
Waist – swivel
Hips – ball joint
Thighs – swivel
Knees – pivot
Ankles – rocker joint
Rattlor is mostly standard, but lacks
the calf articulation that most MOTUC figures have due to his sculpt.
I appreciate that the Horsemen left it out rather than putting an
ugly line across those scales. Besides that, if there’s one joint
this line could live without, it’s that one. I like having it, but
it doesn’t exactly add a ton of posability options.
Just like Scale Male (so named by me),
Rattlor is a little limited by the thickness of his scaly sculpt.
None of his joints seem to move quite as much as they do on other
figures. His ankles are particularly immobile.
Like most MOTUC figures, the joints are
worked into the sculpt fairly well. All of them move freely and hold
poses well on my figure.
Sculpt: This new sculpt
is so nice, truly different from anything else in the line (except
the Snake Man, obviously). I can’t imagine the headache involved in
sculpting all of the scales. Not only is it just a ton of tedious,
repetitive work, they also have to maintain a regularity and size
relation to one another. I suppose there could be some sort of tool
to create the repeated effect, but I dunno.
Rattlor’s hands and feet are
distinctive. Where Matty probably could have gotten away with reusing
other feet, they went and had the Horsemen make new ones. They look
great and add to this guy’s alien-ness.
Rattlor has a brand new head sculpt. I
was surprised by how different it is from either of the Snake Men. I
mean, it should be different, but the Horsemen did a really
good job with it.
There is a new chest piece with a big
ol’ back piece where the figure’s tail attaches. This thing just
does not work for me. I mean, it doesn’t look bad, it just doesn’t
make any sense. What the fuck is going on here? How is this
overlapping his belt? I don’t get it. It’s bothering me.
Coloring: My gosh, this
guy looks fantastic. I’m not sure how villainous he looks with all
of these primary colors, but just like the sculpt his color design
makes him stand out. The applications are tight and the different
hues stay where they are supposed to.
I love the pupils on the eyes, as well
as the detail of the belly color going up the chin. I also love the
tint of the sides of the belly scales. The continuation of colors
make all of the clearly separate parts of the figure seem more
united.
I wish his rattle was all yellow. I
almost feel like this is an error.I'm also not crazy about his blue armpits and elbow pegs:
Flair: Rattlor’s tail
counts in this category. The Horsemen handled it very well, as it is
a nice, thick piece that somehow does not interfere with the figure
standing. There are a few figures that have amazed me with their
ability to balance despite large, weird parts and Rattlor is another.
The sculpt on the tail matches up perfectly with the back piece that
it attaches to and while the part where it does looks extremely ugly
if the tail is anything but positioned straight, it does move well
and stay securely in place.
Accessories: Rattlor
comes packed with the same staff as King Hssss, a Horde
armband, and a neck extension.
I didn’t particularly like the staff
with King Hssss and I really don’t like it with Rattlor. This guy
should have a sword and shield or spear or something. This staff
really doesn’t make any sense. Heck, I would have preferred he come
with the chest armor and no weapons at all.
The Horde armband is fine. I might use
it on somebody else. I dunno.
The neck extension looks great and
matches up well with the back. It’s fairly easy to put in place and
isn’t loose like Mekanek’s neck.
Packaging: It’s the
regular MOTUC blister card. Still neat and still effective. Here’s
his bio:
"Battle Rattle”. Heh.
Value: $28.70 (including
shipping) wouldn’t have been bad for this guy if he had lived up to
my expectations. For a (sort of) all-new sculpt with the right
accessories and no black plastic It would have been steep, but not
ridiculous.
Overall: I’m torn on
this one. I’m honestly not unhappy with it, but I really feel like
Rattlor should have been better. I see how awesome he could have
been, but he isn’t.
3
out of 5
If you want the Snake Men, you’re
going to have to have Rattlor. He isn’t bad by any means, but he
could have been so much more.
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