Review of Adora action figure
Masters of the Universe Classics

Introduction

Oh, how we adore ya, Adora! Her plastic version went on sale January 15th at Matty Collector, but the Princess of Etheria sold out so fast Danica Patrick couldn't keep up.

Yep, there's a lot of She-Ra fans out there, no doubt about it. Adora is the alter ego of She-Ra, and twin sister of Prince Adam aka He-man. While the "She-Ra: Princess of Power" show was Mattel's attempt at reaching out to young girls, much the same way they had marketed to boys with He-man, the reality is that it appealed to young boys as much or more than it did with its intended target audience. The popularity of this figure in the new line is no surprise, since many of the boys of the eighties watched She-Ra as an extension of the He-man show, and those same young boys are now the ones driving the demand for the MOTUC series.

I think some of her popularity is also due to her disappearance from the mythos pretty much since the end of her show. While the other He-man characters have been featured in both shows and action figure lines post-80's, poor She-Ra (and likewise Adora) have been shunned by Mattel. This lack of attention to the character has thrown more fuel on the fire of desire for any merchandise.

Obviously, you won't be picking up Adora at Matty Collector now, but all the more reason to pay attention to the release of She-Ra later this year. We don't have an official date yet, but we know she's coming...

Packaging - ***1/2
Same packaging, and I still love it. Eventually the bloom will fall off the vine, but for the foreseeable future I'll be digging on the retro look.

It is a bummer that these aren't collector friendly, forcing you to either be an opener or be a MOCer...or be insane and own two.

Sculpting - ***
Adora is another pretty lady from the Four Horsemen. She has a beautiful face, with gorgeous features.

However, the plain appearance of much of her costume leaves me a tad cold. The red smock thingee has an awful lot of smooth surface, and the gauntlets, boots, and shirt don't have much going on either.

The hair is decent, but suffers a bit from the tootsie roll effect, as well as having some pretty obvious mold lines right up front.

She's a smidge taller than He-man, coming in close to a full 7".

The big plus in sculpting here is on the belt and holster, where there's some very nice detailing, but I'm including them (and their score) in the Accessories section.

Paint - ***1/2
The paint application is very clean an neat, better than what I saw with my Teela overall, but then again...she has fewer paint ops to screw up.

But the work on her face is excellent, and they did add some nice paint detailing to the holster and belt.

Articulation - ***1/2
The articulation is identical to Teela's, with a ball jointed neck, ball jointed shoulders and hips, cut biceps, pin elbows, knees and ankles, cut wrists, cuts at the boot tops, and rocker feet.

Her one down fall is the sculpted hair. While it's fairly soft, the long locks on the left restricts the head movement quite a bit. the shorter strands on her right are less troublesome.

Her big plus are those rocker feet. These joints allow her to keep her feet flat on the ground no matter how deep the stance.

Accessories - ***
The Princess comes with three accessories, or at least what I'm counting as accessories.

The belt is iffy for this category, but with it floats on her hips and looks terrific doing it. I love the sculpted details, particularly on the holster, and the included gun, next accessory up, fits perfectly inside.

The gun also has some very nice sculpted and painted details, and has that cool retro sci-fi look, as though she just borrowed it from Buck Rogers.

Finally, there's her sword which she uses to complete her transformation to She-ra. It's slightly smaller than He-man's, with a fairly simplistic sculpt. While it lacks much detail in both sculpt and paint, the jewels goes a long way to improving the overall appearance.

Fun Factor - ****
I think I've made my position on this pretty clear, but why not beat that old dead horse one more time? Mattel's best toys - TOYS - are being made for adults right now. Between this series and the DCUC figures, Mattel is creating some classic action figures with tons of play value. And there's just something wrong about that, when other mass market lines like Batman: Brave and the Bold go wanting.

Value - **
Yea, she's still a $20 figure plus shipping. For a lot of folks, that's a bitter pill to swallow, especially considering all the part re-use across the series.

Things to Watch Out For -
I did have to fight the urge to break out the DVD's of the old Filmation series, but other than that you should be good to go.

Overall - ***
The overall score involves more than just the individual scores. There's various weightings which depend on the figure in question, as well as some of my own personal bias that naturally slips in.

For me, Adora isn't a bad figure...just not a particularly exciting one. I'm glad I picked her up, and once She-Ra comes out she'll be an even better addition, book ending that figure. But when compared to releases like Scareglow, Skeletor, or Teela, she's not quite got the stuff.

Score Recap (out of ****):
Packaging - ***1/2
Sculpting - ***
Paint - ***1/2
Articulation - ***1/2
Accessories - ***1/2
Fun Factor - ****
Value - **
Overall - ***

Where to Buy 
This was a Matty Collector figure, but sold out in under a half hour. Now you're best bet cruising ebay for a deal.

Related Links -
I've covered quite a few, but not all, of the series so far:

- I really liked Scareglow, although he's not exactly what you'd call a key character.

- Adora isn't the first girl in the series - Teela has that honor.

- before that there was Webstor, one of my favorite, and Tri-klops, another one of my favs.

- prior to that was Man-at-arms, Hordak, Zodac, Faker, Mer-man and Stratos, starting out with He-man, Skeletor and Beastman together in one review.

You should also hit the Search Reviews page, in case any other applicable reviews were done after this one was published.

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