Welcome to the 19th issue of the Scrolls of Grayskull! I apologize that ittook longer than expected to send out this issue, and I hope you thinkit'll be worth the wait.
I'm proud to say that my site turned 2 years old in December 1997, and I'dlike to thank everyone who has contributed to my site and this newsletter.1998 is upon us, and I think this'll be a very big year for us. ScottWhite contributed this month's file attachment to commemorate theanniversary. If you don't receive file attachments, the picture will beavailable on the Scrolls of Grayskull archives at http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/3624/archive.html, which is also maintained by Scott.
Unsubscribing: If you'd like to unsubscribe (or if you plan on cancellingyour e-mail account), please let me know. E-mail me atctyner@cs.clemson.edu and I'd be more than happy to remove you from the list.
Remember, I need all the articles and such that you can send! Pleasee-mail me at ctyner@awod.com if you'd like to contribute to the newsletter. Thanks, and enjoy this issue!
-Adam
[Petition News]
Michael Mace (LSkywlkr36@aol.com) sent a petition to the business director of Hallmark, Whitney Vliet. Not only did Michael receive a response, hegot He-Man videos! :) Here is the letter:
Dear Mr. Mace:
Thank you for writing to us and expressing your interest in He-Man and theMasters of the Universe and She-Ra, Princess of Power. The petition youenclosed has been noted and your enthusiasm is greatly appreciated.Unfortunately, there are no plans to air the series in the United States atthis time.
For your enjoyment, I have enclosed a few He-Man videos.
Have a wonderful holiday season and best wishes for the New Year.
Warm regards,
Whitney Vliet
Although it's a little disappointing to hear that He-Man and She-Ra won'tbe aired anytime in the near future, it's nice to know that the people atHallmark are so courteous and that they do know we exist! :)
In regard to the action figure petition, I stopped taking addresses inmid-December. I haven't finished compiling it, but I hope to have it donesoon.
Video news: Robbie Beisweinger (battlecat0@aol.com) is pushing for a drive to have videos re-released. E-mail him for more information.
[He-Man.org]
Here's some excellent news from Jason Moore, administrator of the He-Manmailing list:
Hey gang,
Yep, this is true. HE-MAN.ORG is taken. I own it.
The reason that I chose HE-MAN.ORG is because I wanted to make theUltimate source on the net for us He-Man fanatics. A place where allHe-Man fans can come to for anything and everything they may ever wantto know about the Masters of the Universe.I chose HE-MAN.ORG because of one thing. I want this to be theheadquarters of our Organization. Whether you see it this way or not,look at all of us on this mailing list. When there is some order andcontrol, we can and have acted as an organization of fans dedicated tokeeping our favorite Universe of heroes and villians alive. I believewith a Central location for all Masters of the Universe fans we willbe a powerful force.
I'm also going to be setting it up so that people can purchase webspace at a very reasonable cost to have their own He-Man web pageunder the he-man.org domain name. For example, Joe Blow can have hispage at http://www.he-man.org/joeblow and have up to 10 or moredifferent e-mail addresses such as joeblow@he-man.org,joeblowcool@he-man.org and so on. You get the drift.
These accounts will have complete access to essentials like CGI/Perl,Java, ready to go cgi scripts like counters, formail etc...and so muchmore.
Now, this by no means is a way to shut down the fans pages. The morepages we have out there the better. We NEED them. HE-MAN.ORG willpromote the fan pages to no limits. We will have free banneradvertisements for any He-Man related site that will place a link ontheir page. HE-MAN.ORG is a central page for information. Webmasterswould be encouraged to take the information they find at HE-MAN.ORGand place it on their own pages. [*NOTE This does not mean to cut andpaste word for word our information.]
This will also be the beginning of a Fan Club. I'm looking into thepossibilites of making this an Official Masters of Universe Fan Club.I'll let you know the details as they become available.
I will also be changing over this mailing lists e-mail addresses soonfrom heman-list@hypenet.com to heman-list@he-man.org. I will make anofficial announcement when this change goes into effect. Hopefully itwill go smoothly.
I'll be looking for help with this huge undertaking. If anyone wouldlike to offer assistance, please e-mail me at help@he-man.org.I will contact you with a list of projects that I may have at the time andyou can choose from that list what you would like to lend a hand with.Or, if you see something that isn't on the list and should be, by allmeans tell me.
I know this may be exciting to some of you, hopefully all of you, butplease remember one thing. This will take time. I do not want to rushinto this just to throw up an average page. I want this to be a pagethat will get noticed by the entertainment industry. Which brings meto this...
I have a friend who is a Press Agent for a Hollywood agency and wehave been talking about ways to promote this website once it is fullycompleted. Once this site is fully completed and ready to show to theworld, we will be sending out press releases to all of the internetmagazines, television shows, book publishers, you name it and theywill get one.
Again, this is going to be a very slow process, but in the long run itwill be worth every minute and more that will be put into it.
If anyone has any thoughts on this, please direct all personalcomments to jason@he-man.org. I would like for this thread to continue through the mailing list to see if any interesteing ideas spring up, sowhen replying to another person's message in this thread, pleaseremember to CC it to the mailing list.
(Man talk about a run on sentance)
Thanks everyone!!
Best wishes,
Jason Moore
Guardians of Greyskull Mailing List Owner/ Administrator
[Greyskull Tales]
A new
He-Man series is being proposed, and it's called "Greyskull Tales"[sic].
If you'd like to support this project, JTQ (sorceress@tamu.edu)suggests that you write:
Mr. Matt Bousquette
Senior Vice President
c/o Mattel Inc.
333 Continental Blvd.
El Segundo, CA 90245-5012
JTQ has also written a sample letter:
Dear Mr. Bousquette,
As a loyal He-Man fan and Mattel toy consumer, it has come to my attentionfrom science-fiction conventions and art shows that plans for arevitalization of He-Man were made entitled 'Greyskull Tales', but were puton hold for one reason or another.
As a fan of the original series (and of related products and merchandise),I would very much like to see the new, serious version of He-Man producedand released in the United States, along with the new special-editionGreyskull Tales action figures, playsets, and vehicles.
I would applaud Mattel's decision to release the new Greyskull Talesanimated series. Thank you for your time and attention to this matter.
Most sincerely,
(your name & age
here.)
[Revamping He-Man For The '90s?]
I've received a number of letters from people who have ideas on how He-Mancould be updated for the '90s (or the '00s, considering how close we are tothe end of the decade). Opinions run pretty deep, and there are plenty ofpeople who would like it to stay exactly the same. Here are some lettersI've received on this subject:
Adding to your "He-Man for the 90´s" idea, I think these guys should chancethis
way:
Beast
Man - He should be completely savage, his bestial side should rulehim, and
he should barely talk since he shouldn´t
be able to think much.He should drop his dopey attitude and look ferocious;
he would only looklesser at the side of Skeletor.
Mer-Man - His body should have more monster-like anatomy and look lesshuman. He's a monster, so he should be considerably strong and also alittle savage. Also, he should have a special power that connects him tothe sea, like maybe restoring his energies completely when he enters thewater. That way, He-man would have trouble fighting him next to the sea orany water container.
Trap-Jaw - He
should look almost like a robot, but with human anatomybehind all the technology.
His armor should be really high-tech and
makehim look like a tough opponent. He should fly and have many kinds ofspecial
weapons; you´ll never know what he has under his sleeve. Hewouldn´t have
to take off his weapons to use another - he should haveretractable weapons
that spring out of his arm and retract when he needsanother one.
Skeletor - He should be exactly the way you described him. I wanna pointout he should really be very powerful - his magic should be incredible.
Man-At-Arms -
Don´t take this guy out. He´s older now, but still not anold man; he´s almost 50. He´s
not as agile as before, but he has a lot ofexperience now and is sort of
like the one who knows when, where, and howto attack. His skill with weapons
is amazingly good - his aim is the bestin Eternia. Also, he would design
weapons to use in special missions. Takeoff that hat! He should be wearing
something over his head, but not thathat. The moustache is still there.
He-Man - I like
your idea of him, but also I would add to make him thebest at fighting ability.
No one can fight like him, and he doesn´t
dependon his strength anymore. He has to be more agile and have fast reflexes.Also,
his suit should be made of a very strong material andhas no sleeves so he
can show his muscles.
Teela - Your description
is good. I would also change the haircut, but Iwouldn´t make her hair long.
Evil-Lyn - She should not be in the cartoon, or maybe killed at thefirst chapters.
Skeletor should
have an army of soldiers, not robots. They shouldn´tcarry guns, but swords. They would all look the same...dark, maybesoldiers from a dark dimension? Also their faces shouldn´t
beshown.
There should be
new characters, both good and evil. He-Man hasn´tbeen around all Eternia, and there should be people with power willingto fight against Skeletor´s
tyranny. Skeletor should also be getting newbad guys.
He-Man hasn´t explored all of Eternia, so he should be discoveringnew places, new friendly and unfriendly people, and maybe a town of felinepeople hidden in the forest from civilization and now are willing to helpHe-Man fight against Skeletor because he´s
slowly destroying the planet?Feline people...whatever, the point is that
He-Man should also find morearmies; not only the rebels are supporting him.
Also, Skeletor
should have allies in Eternia too...other armies that arehappy with Skeletor´s
domain and therefore become enemies of the rebellion.
Etheria shouldn´t
be mentioned ever again, or She-Ra or the Horde.
There should be
more mystical places in Eternia. Power and secretsshould be hidden everywhere,
maybe "the temple of the dragon on top ofthe mountain" or "the underwater city"...things
like that. Skeletorwould find some of those places and try to get power from
them, butHe-Man would always thwart his plans.
No one knows where
Grayskull is - good one. But there are secretways to it, and they could be
blocked by the battles, or secret mapsthat are destroyed.
Even when Grayskull is not He-Man´s and therebellion´s primordial hope, He-Man wants desperately to find it because heneeds help from it or something, and the Sorceress is not willing to revealGrayskull´s location...not even to He-Man! For some strange reason, shedoesn´t want to say. But Grayskull shouldn´t look like a myth fornewcomers to He-Man´s universe, so He-Man and Skeletor should be able toget to it - possibly by some magical way that disappears after they´vereturned
from their battle in there.
We should forget
the whole Teela-Sorceress thing and make Teela andHe-Man fall in love, but
Teela with rejecting him for some strange reasonnever
revealed until the end of the series. Although she rejects him, shereally
loves him but doesn´t want him to know it for this reason I justtalked about. Everyone watching the cartoon should know this - Teela shouldn´t
fool them.
Also, not only Skeletor and his allies should fight He-Man. Eterniahas monsters, menaces and secrets all over it, and He-Man should beconfronting them too.
He-Man´s haircut
will definitely change...maybe a bit little shorterand with another style.
Snake Mountain
should be impregnable. He-Man and the rebellionshould try to enter some time
and discover that it has a lot of trapsand soldiers
in it. Also, it would be cool to see He-Man fight againstsome gigantic monsters
that inhabit the dark places of Eternia. Also, acity should be around Snake
Mountain since it´s the capital of Eternia.
Skeletor´s past
should be resolved once and for all, and it shouldbe good, and yes, this
time the Horde and Hordak can be mentioned.
There should be a legend that He-Man and Skeletor find out about. Itshould feature the big fight atop Grayskull between He-Man and Skeletorlike you said, but it should be a little longer.
Skeletor keeps the hood, gets a cape, gets a cooler suit and haslonger boots.
So, what do you think? Let me know if you can, thanks for readingthis.
I just thought I'd congratulate you on your two year anniversary. Istill remember when you first created your web page. It was awesome.
Well, I thought I'd add a few sentences on my views of what the Mastersof the Universe for the ninties (or even the new century) should belike:
I think the Masters of the Universive series should be a lot darker thanwhat was portrayed on television. I remember growing up with Masters ofthe Universe without the television show, but rather, with the comic booksthat came with the characters. Yes, I enjoyed the show, but it wasn't theMasters of the Universe that I knew. The comic books portrayed the MOTUworld as a lot more realistic in terms of historical context (i.e. historyof the Snake Mountain), political agendas (the teamwork of Skeletor and theSnakemen) and rational thinking of the characters (i.e. Ram-Man.) Forexample, Ram-Man in the comic book wasn't a dumbass like he was on the tvshow. Rather, he was a kickass guy who had a good head on his shoulders --he was a real warrior. Ok, all this talk about historical context,political agendas and rational thinking may sound a bit boring to some, butin essence, that's what made MOTU cool. It wasn't until towards the end ofthe series, that the comic books started taking on the personality of thetv show and everything went down the drain.
All this could
realistically happen, but it couldn't happen before.Why? Because He-Man and
the Masters of the Universe was the firstcartoon
show to work as an "advertisement," and because of that,Filmation got a lot of heat for it. So, they had to do what was"acceptable," or
they'd lose their jobs. However, since then,successful shows like X-Men that
have historical context, and Beavis andButt-Head that can get away with murder,
have opened up new doors to whatsociety and tv stations will deem as acceptable.
One last thing: I have a major pet-peeve when shows/ series arerevamped, and they completely disregard previous shows/series as if theydidn't exist. THAT'S COMPLETELY OFFENSIVE. My vote for the new serieswould continue where the He-man series (not the Masters of the Universeseries) left off. (Why disregard any of the history no matter how stupidit was?) I picture the new series having He-Man return toEternia after it had been conquered by the Horde or even better, theSnakemen. Bringing back Skeletor from future Earth is optional. Theonly thing I wouldn't mind disregarding would be He-Man's dumbass lookin the He-Man series. So, I think I would have to give He-Man back hisoriginal look perhaps in a darker outfit.
I choose this story-line for the new series because it would add to theMasters of the Universe historical context. The new generation couldlearn about the old series and see how things were before He-Man madethe dumbass decision to leave Eternia for Future Earth, and because ofit, things fell apart. The new series could give hints about the oldseries. This could be best compared with how Star Trek works with itshistorical context -- and it's very successful in retaining fans.
Remember, what made Masters of the Universe COOL was its historicalcontext. Be honest now, didn't we take some great interest in learningabout He-Ro, or how Teela came to be, or how we found out He-Man's momwas from Earth? Finding out made the whole series that much cooler. Wecould do the same for a whole new generation.
She is Skeletor concubine and Eternia's biggest gold-digger. She was aweak powered witch who just had enough power to keep a small town in check.When Skeletor came to Eternia, one of the first places he attacked was hervillage. She forsaw his arrival and hid in the forest. When he showed up,she came out of the forest and helped him destroy her own village. Thenshe made herself one of his first allies. She does most of the dirty workof Skeletor, but she isn't his flunky. She is in it for magical knowlegdeand she is a fast learner. When she feels she's gained enough magic,she'll take all the artifacts and money she can steal and strike it out onher own.
Mer-Man
An ocean king who had a friendly relationship with King Randor, but whenSkeletor demanded that his kingdom surrender to him, he gave up. He thoughtthat then they would be mostly left alone, but Skeletor forced him and hiskingdom to fight in his war for conquest. To make sure that he doesn't tryto fight back, Skeletor placed Spikor (a pro Skeletor groupy) to literallywatch everything he does.
Try these out too!! PLEASE!! :)
[Snake Mountain Question]
I received mail from Roger Vickers (sunstreaker7@hotmail.com) asking abouta hole in Snake Mountain. Roger wants to know what purpose this hole serves.
Also, Roger would appreciate it if anyone who has accessories and spareparts for sale would contact him.
[Trivia]
Here are this month's trivia questions by Scott White. Next issue, I'llpublish the answers.
(1) What
color is Evil-Lyn's hair?
(2) Who
is Teela's mother?
(3) What
planet did Queen Marlena come from?
(4) Who
does Orko have a crush on?
(5) What
is Orko's home world called?
(6) What
planet did Roboto come from?
(7) Who
is the oldest tree on Eternia?
(8) What
color is the Sorceress' hair?
(9) Skeletor
used to be the pupil of what evil villian?
(10) What gives the Bird People of Avion their powers?
Here are the answers to last month's questions:
(1) Q: Who
is King Randor's father?
A: King Miro
(2) Q: What
is Queen Marlena's maden name?
A: Marlena Glenn
(3) Q: Who
is Orko's uncle?
A: Montork
(4) Q: What
is the Sorceress's name?
A: Teelina
(5) Q: Who
is the Sorceress's daughter?
A: Teela
(6) Q: Who
is the oldest and wisest of dragons?
A: Granamyr
(7) Q: Where
does the oldest and wisest of dragons live?
A: Darksmoke
(8) Q: Where
did Prince Adam find Cringer when he was a boy?
A: Hills of Eternia
(9) Q: Who
was the Sorceress of Grayskull before the current Sorceress?
A: Kodak Ungor
(10) Q: What are He-man's dwarf friends called?
A: The Widgets
[Classifieds]
This section of the newsletter is for people who would like to buy, sell,or trade He-Man/She-Ra related items. If you'd like to submit an ad (whichis free, of course), e-mail me a -short- ad at ctyner@awod.com.
* WANT TO BUY
Looking for Fright Zone and Fright Fighter. Wallet is not big, so Idon't want to spend much. Justin Volpe; lvolpe@snet.net
Looking for Eternia Playset, Laser Power He Man, Battle Punch HeMan, Tyrantisaurus Rex, and Bionatops - MRe4051151@aol.com
