Per Battlegrip and a buncha other places, Mattel's Masters of the Universe Classics line may be ending after the next subscription year. Maybe? Or maybe rolling into something else, like a movie-based line or a new incarnation. Maybe they just wanted to use that Game of Thrones-styled ad and slogan. But, that means it's as good a time as any to look at another time MOTU was ending: from 1988, Masters of the Universe #12, "Lifetime" Written by George Caragonne, art by Ron Wilson, inks by Danny Bulanadi.
Prince Adam was facing the Clark Kent dilemma: his alter-ego, He-Man, got all the credit; while his friends and family were left to think Adam was a cowardly tool. Man-at-Arms Duncan tries to explain that the secret identity gimmick both kept his loved ones safe and gave them a tactical advantage over Skeletor, but Adam feels it's now a liability: instead of calling for help from Champ Clamp or any of the other heroic masters, everyone always goes crying for He-Man at the slightest emergency. Duncan seems to be proven right, though, when Skeletor attacks them in Duncan's workshop! Tying Adam and Duncan up, Skeletor explains that when He-Man comes to rescue them (don't ask why he doesn't recognize Adam as He-Man: say it's magic) his brainwaves will activate a bomb, that "will blast He-Man into the distant future and out of my hair forever!" Wait, Skeletor has hair? Um, I'm not going to think about that any further.
But, since Adam's brainwaves are the same as He-Man's, the bomb's countdown begins immediately! Getting loose from his bonds, Adam throws his sword into the bomb, short-circuiting it and sending the sword into the future! A pissy Skeletor claims he can't build another one of those, and didn't want to just send Adam's stupid sword into the future, so he'll get revenge on Adam...on some future date. He's busy now. But Skeletor doesn't realize he may have succeeded: by separating Adam from the sword, he can't change into He-Man! Which he didn't want to anyway, but since Duncan can track the sword to the future with his "dimensional early warning system," Adam feels he should recover the sword to return it to the Sorceress at Castle Grayskull.
Of course, when Adam arrives thirty years in the future, it's a totalitarian nightmare ruled by Skeletor, that's made up of equal parts 1984 and the X-Men Days of Future Past. Adam's parents were imprisoned, as was the Sorceress, who sacrifices herself to give Adam a weapon to escape. He finds the resistance, made up of Teela, who had taken the mantle of the Sorceress, an aged Champ Clamp, and Prince Adam. Wait, that would mean the younger Adam either got back to the past, without the Sword of Power and unable to transform into He-Man, or never went! To rally the troops, the younger Adam defaces the grave marker Skeletor put up for He-Man, proclaiming "Skeletor lies!! He-Man Lives!!!"
We may have to come back to the conclusion at some later date, but the story works pretty well so far...except for having two Adams.
Doesn't seem that bad of a story. One thing seems to bother me though but shouldn't; why the hell is prince Adam rocking the Amish beard? Did Skeletor outlaw all the decent razors or something? ;)
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