1980s Bad guy Goodness–Classic Mumm-Ra!!!

Although I never watched much of Thundercats, nor did I get many of the original toys, somehow I ended up with an original Mumm-Ra (as a kid) and somehow, it disappeared somewhere.  Sad days because as I think back to it now, Mumm-Ra was actually my favourite 1980s cartoon bad guy.  He looked cool!  As a result, I really really, really wanted a Classic Mumm-Ra.  They did Lion-O, so why not Mumm-Ra??

Eventually, Bandai did make a Classic Mumm-Ra.  Sadly though, while my first release Lion-O was made in the 8 inch scale, Old Mumm-Ra here has been relegated back to six.  Of course they then released a shrunken 6 inch Classic Lion-O.  He did have an angrier face, but (funnily enough) that wasn’t enough for me to care.  Sadly my Classic Mumm-Ra is a good 2 inches shorter than Classic Lion-O.

He comes in the usual blister package with multilingual blurb on the back.  Now, this guy hasn’t been seen in Australia at all and as far as I am aware, there are no plans for him either, yet going though most stores online result in the old “Sorry not for sale outside of the Americas” shtick.  OH COME ON!  Luckily Ebay can be your friend (occasionally) and supplied with this well earned evil leader of um, evil guys…  Thundercats has consistently had great character artwork.  This Classic Mumm-Ra has some really nice, classic styled art for his noggin’ on the side of the box.

More boring shots of many languages and text that tells you very little about the Thundercats OR Mumm-Ra.  Who can say “Wasted opportunity”?  I can!

So many languages, so little to actually say… So few accessories.  He comes with two extra hands, which look like they should hold something.  Oh perhaps it would be his totally cool sword that the original toy had?  Oh, Not here.  He does come with some instructions and mummy wraps though.

And the actual figure itself looks like this.

Very stocky body and unlike Modern Mumm-Ra his helmet doesn’t come off.  The instructions are included to tell you how to pull off his hands and for placement of the floating wraps.  I rather like the wraps as they are flowing and give the feeling that he is pulsing with power.  Interestingly though, they seem to require a fair bit of trial and error before you can have them in the desired spot.  I kind of wanted one to flow around his arm a little bit, but just couldn’t get it quite right.  Eventually I did come across a satisfactory configuration.

This is my preferred flying wraps set up.

They are soft and can therefore be moved around as you see fit on his arms.

He has his open hands, which I just leave on, as they look like magic casting hands and he also has fists.  Sadly as I said before, he has no sword to hold.  Modern Mumm-Ra is missing his wings, Classic Mumm-Ra is missing his sword. 

His face sculpt is pretty good but is a little too crazy for my liking.  I’d like it to look a little more angry personally.  Sadly the paintwork around his eyes is a little on the sloppy side too.

One common complaint I have heard about this guy is that his body plastic colour is too shiny.  To be honest, it probably is and would look better is it were a matte colour instead.  It doesn’t really bother me all that much though as all of Bandai’s Thundercats have had the shiny plastic going on.  It just seemed to suit them a bit better.
The helmet is delightfully sculpted.  The snakes, the tassels (possibly his weak form’s cloak) and the crest are all very sexy indeed.

Other paint apps are nice, the gold is good (I really like the stuff on his feet) and he has a few painted wraps around his neck but there isn’t a whole lot there. 

Despite this being a Classic 80s Mumm-Ra, they actually gave him Modern Mumm-Ra’s insignia on his chest…
Whoops

His articulation is surprisingly good.  Sadly he lacks the level of jointage that Lion-O got, so no double jointed elbows here folks, but since his muscles are quite a bit larger he can get away with it.  You would also think that his skirt would get in the way of his legs and it does, but not to the point of destroying the character of the toy.  It’s slightly flexible but I very much doubt Mumm-Ra does much crouching.  There is no ab crunch and even though he has a waist swivel it is hindered by his skirt.  The feet are very adaptable, but don’t allow him to lean forward much due to his hair feet coverings, but they still lean back and tilt side to side.

One thing I did find restrictive was his neck and head.  His head is joined by a ball joint.  No surprises there, but the sculpting of his neck has a large bump that conflicts with his chin.  Well his ability to look up is already hindered by the tassels at the back of the helmet and being Mumm-Ra, one would rather he looked DOWN at his enemies.  Well this guy can’t.

So being the crazy dood I am, I popped his head off to see what I could do about that.  Turns out that if you shave a fair bit off the neck bump, you can get more out his head without destroying the toy, since the chin will cover up your chopping.

It made a pleasing amount of difference for me.  On the left is how he looked, middle is about how much I shaved off and right is end result.
So there we go.  By no means a horrid toy by any accounts.  It’s just a shame they didn’t make him in the same scale as my 8 inch Lion-O.  I don’t really want to buy the six inch Lion-O that much.  Also a shame they neglected his sword.  Something tells me that despite being the uber-bad-guy of the Thundercats, Bandai just think that he won’t sell toys by the looks of things.    I am happy with him, but then really I was very likely to be.  Being my favourite 80s enemy character in looks.  Hell I even forked out for the SDCC version of Mumm-Ra that is so big I don’t know what to do with it.  But it DOES glow in the dark, so I was likely to get that anyway.

So summarising 6 inch Classic Mumm-Ra;  Close, so very close, but not perfect.  Had they just refined a few things this could have been a real winner, but they didn’t so he is by default an OK toy.  I guess he was cursed with not being a good guy.