Universal Dork

The Most Unsuccessful Blog on the 'Net Since 2009!

recent posts

about

  • The Top 5 Most BAD ASS He-man Action Figures! Plus Kevin Smith’s He-man Hatred?!

    So it seems that the ‘Masters of the Universe’ right now are all the rage for ALL the wrong reasons!  Yes, Kevin Smith is in the hot seat for his Netflix masters”He-man” series, having watched the first 5 episodes I will admit, I was pretty freakin’ underwhelmed. The animation was indeed pretty great but some of the voice work I wasn’t a fan of and the general storyline feels like Kevin Smith’s failed attempt at recreating the Transformers movie from 1986 while trying to model the series after what’s trending on Twitter. Killing off He-man twice in the first 5 episodes was a bit of a disappointment and having the “new & improved” Teela take over the entire show was all too predictable in this current landscape of the oddly forced “strong female lead” narrative. I mean if we wanted a female He-man we already got one: where the hell is She-Ra dammit?  The show is only halfway finished so maybe Kevin Smith will redeem himself with some masterful storytelling, however I don’t have too much faith as the guy hasn’t made a good movie in about 15 years. I mean has anyone actually ever been able to finish ‘Yoga Hosers’? DOUBTFUL! 

    All this  made me want to take a moment to go back to my childhood as I was a huge collector of the Masters of the Universe toy line and a BIG fan of the cartoon. My favorite thing about the toys were most definitely He-man’s cast of colorful villains!  So I wanted to take a moment to throw out there my top 5 favorite He-man action figures which were most def always the bad guys!

    Trap Jaw!!

     Of all of them I’ve gotta say that ol’ Trapjaw was easily my favorite as a kid! His movable jaw, his interchangeable weapon arms and just his rad look in general made him my all time favorite Masters of the Universe action figure! This guy was a true bad-ass, I literally carried him around everywhere with me.


    Modulok!!

     I really love this fucked up bad dude, he’s so damn bizarre & cut from a different cloth than the regular Masters of the Universe action figures.  I’d spend hours trying to configure him into the weirdest shapes and sizes that I could, big & small! Modulok was one of the coolest, and also a bit frightening! If you bought two Moduloks you could make him even bigger and weirder!


    Two Bad!

     Oooooh yeah this guy was a damn gem, a true freak of nature! When I first saw him in Shopko I was so PUMPED! He was also cut from a different mold with his 2 heads and strange giganto torso along with his spring action arms made him a true freakazoid enemy of He-man!! Two Bad was double the pleasure and two time the EVIL!!

    Whiplash!!

     Oh boy, I couldn’t get enough of Whiplash!! the first time I saw him in the package at Toy R’ Us I begged my mom To let me take him home with me. This bad-ass, green reptilian, half breed alligator man was one of my favorites and his rubbery tail could certainly give Prince Adam the ass whoopin’ that he always needed. Easily one of my favorite action figures of all time! I’d take this dude in the tub with me for a swamp alligator style  MOTU adventure – He-man was truly put to the test…thos were the days. Get bent Kevin Smith! Ahhh!


    Clawful!!

    Oh I just loved this freaky crab human hybrid baddie SO  damn much! As a kid I had hermit crabs and as an adult I still got one! So when I saw this guy At K-mart it was love at first sight!  I don’t know why, but as a kid I was obsessed with crabs and crayfish. When Skeletor added Clawful to the mix you wouldn’t hear me complaining. Nope, I dig his fiddler crab style look and his spring action giant claw hand was his greatest selling point! 



    BONUS: Hordak!!

    Damn it how I fucking loved Hordak! I was so happy with his introduction a fresh new bad guy and IMO he was cooler than Skeletor. He was a truly exciting addition to the evil gang and not only a rival to He-man but ALSO to Skeletor. So many good times with this evil asshole, but you know what, the whole damn ‘Evil Horde’ needs to make this list, they were all so bad ass and unique and screw anyone who thinks Grizzlor and Manteena were stupid-they were fucking rad-Kevin Smith you could redeem yourself by bringing in Hordak and his crew to kick Teela and Skeletor’s butts and just bring She-ra back to fight them ALL! 

     

  • Billy Blanks Channels Mr. Miyagi in the Rad 90’s Karate Kid Rip Off: SHOWDOWN!

    Hot damn! How I love me some motherfreakin’ Karate Kid and Cobra Kai! I’ll even openly admit that I love 1994’s ‘The Next Karate Kid’ as well, something I recently watched for the first time after writing it off for sooo many years as some lame soft remake of the original. So while waiting for Cobra Kai season 4 to drop I needed something in the same vein that could tickle my Karate Kid fancy, enter 1993’s big time radical ripoff: Showdown!!

    This sweet high-school martial arts action/drama hybrid flick hits all the same beats basically as Karate Kid but with more ridiculous & extreme circumstances around every corner! I guess it exists in the same idiotic type of narrative as Karate Kid Part 3, which is A-ok with me. Story wise I won’t waste your time here it’s pretty much the exact basic premise of the original karate kid except with Billy Blanks being being a janitor of a high school, taking the role of the Miagi mentor type character. It’s also worth noting that the high schoolers here, especially our hero and and his douchey “Johnny Lawrence” style opponent appear to be pushing 40!

    We get a mega ridiculous “love” triangle type of thing going on as well that’s far less believable and unromantic than anything in the Karate Kid. Also the villanous karate dojo here is focused around a violent unregulated illegal death matches rather than you’re all Valley karate tournament! Oh yeah and they also have an older sultry seductress working within their ranks who tries to use her feminine charms to seduce high school karate kids and lead them down a sexy path to defeat!

    I guess that’s why they needed to up the ante with the inclusion of major bad-ass Billy Blanks doing what he does best in this movie: kicking major highschooler ass.

    Jam packed with a ton of ridiculously stupid dialogue And idiotically charming characters, Showdown most definitely makes for a highly entertaining watch for die hard fans of the Karate Kid franchise.

    MVD’s “Rewind Collection” released this bad boy on a sweet blu ray with a ton of excellent bonus features!

    Check this out in the meantime to get your fix while we all wait patiently wait for Cobra Kai Season 4!

  • MOVIE MELT: The Best Worst 90s Irish Kung Fu Cinematic Bonanza!

    U-Dork teams up again with the Movie Melt podcast to cover 1997’s moronicly bad ass Irish martial arts flick: Fatal Deviation!

    Oh Yeah! We lost some serious brain cells here as a 19 year old Van Damme obsessed filmmaker puts himself in the lead role to constantly lose his temper and kick trailer park gangster ass!

    Yes another vanity project that would make Tommy Wiseau jealous jam packed with patheticly enjoyable “acting”, mindnumbing ^plot” twists and some impressive indie ass kickin’ kung fu! Take a listen here for a ton of debatably useless cinematic info to get your mind off the stresses of the damn daily grind! Fatal Deviation is a movie that will surely bring a smile to your face if you’re feeling blue!  Check out the new episode right HERE!

  • Comic Cover of the Week: Moon Knight Maniac!

    Now this is how you bring the fire to a god damn comic book cover! Moon Knight #26 from 1982 has one of my favorite covers by master icon Bill Sienkiewicz! His abstract style was a step above the rest and to this day no one comes close to doing covers better than Bill.

    Always a real treat when his art would grace a book’s cover and even better if you’d open it and see did the inside art as well, which he does ever so brilliantly with this particular issue.

    Things are always epic when Bill is on the damn job!

  • The DESCENDENTS Find a Time Machine & Bring Back Their Lost 80s Album!

    It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of The Descendents, so you can imagine how damn stoked I am for their latest release ‘9th & Walnut’. Long story short, all of these songs from the new album are from the late seventies and early eighties. Lost tracks the band demoed but never released, instead produced a batch of new songs that became their iconic album ‘Milo Goes to College’. 

    Well in 2002 the original line up recorded this lost album and in 2020 lead singer Milo Aukerman finally recorded the lead vocals for it. What we end up with is a bonafide classic brought back to the future, literally a lost punk rock time capsule. It oozes of eighties goodness with the sound and type of songs that I feel have been missing largely from the band’s last two albums. 

    It also Clearly is oozing with teen angst, nowhere to be found are songs about getting too old or not being able to eat the greasy food you want anymore. Instead we get a batch of snotty love songs and angry punk ragers clearly fueled by a hefty dose of caffeine & french fries. This is the exact way that I love my Descendents, drenched in the 1980s sunshine and no filter.  It’s also notable that the sound comes full circle with the original lineup intact even though sadly guitarist Frank Navetta passed away not long after this was recorded.

    Jam packed with classic guitar riffs with plenty of their nostalgic attitude & the sweet melodies of their original bassist Tony Lombardo bring me back to simpler times. This  album IMO is an absolute dream come true for hardcore fans who grew up listening to them in the 1980s. The anthems of those awkward teen nerds come alive one last time with this latest release from the Descendents! Mmmm…TOTALLY!

  • Luke Skywalker & Grogu set to RETURN With New Mandalorian Promo Art!!

    Yowza!! So it looks like we have some more good news on the Star Wars front for everyone who was disappointed with The Sequel Trilogy!! This new official poster just dropped today as promo art for the next season of The Mandalorian. It’s clear that Luke Skywalker and Grogu Will officially be back for swashbuckling adventure together. This brings more questions though who will be playing Luke Skywalker this time? It sure does look like Mr. Hamill himself! However I’m fully prepared prepared for Sebastian Stan to step into the role so bring it on!

  • Stan Winston’s Incredible Forgotten Monster Creation in 1998’s ‘CREATURE’!!

    So I really wasn’t expecting much at all when I came across this dvd in a bargain bin, but dammit 1998’s ‘Creature’ somehow delivered exactly what I love! With a run time of almost 3 hours long I really expected to be bored out of my gord, but with a solid cast of great actors like Craig T. Nelson, Giancarlo Esposito & Kim Cattrall it was off to a great start. Taking place on a beautiful breathtaking Caribbean island also sealed part of the deal as well, but really what immediately caught my eye in the opening credits was Stan Winston being credited with the creature fx! Still though a tv mini-series from 1998 would more than likely end up being a snoozer, quite the contrary!

     

    We have two shark researchers, Craig T. Nelson and his ex-wife Kim Cattrall, as beautiful ever, along with their teenage son ready to get into some serious trouble in paradise. A rogue great white shark is killing people around the island, but this one’s ready to eat “Jaws” for breakfast. The secret weapon of what might have been a forgettable mini series if of course Stan’s mutant monster shark!

    This creature is one of his best creations too and luckily it doesn’t just stay hidden until the very end. We get plenty of monster mayhem to behold and also a great performance from Giancarlo Esposito, of recent Mandalorian fame to up the ante here even more.

    Even with its rather hefty run time it never drags, likely due in part to its charming cast of characters, bad Caribbean accents and of course some gooey creature craziness make this an entertaining little adventure. It’s also got decent production value, sweet cinematography, the lush setting of St. Lucia in the 90’s along with some pretty well done action and genuinely thrilling moments of horror. It’s stunning too that somehow one of Stan Winston’s coolest creatures made it into this forgotten gem. All practical fx too! I didn’t see a lick of CGI here.

    If you dig his work this is simply a must watch. I did it in two sittings and after the first half I was hungry to finish the second half. This actually already has a blu ray that’s quite easy to get, I also think it’d be pretty sweet if someone trimmed it down with a lean edit to an hour and a half or so. There’s a pretty rad monster “movie” that could be crafted from the miniseries. Still tho at its current length even, it’s a fun, creepy, carribean vacation that monster flick fanatics should embark on!

  • Comic Cover of the Week: Barry Windsor Smith’s Post Punk X-men!

    Simplicity often times is the best strategy for constructing an amazing comic book cover. Also having the artistic charm and skill of icon Barry Windsor Smith definitely helps too! Well here today I am featuring one of my favorites from Barry, a simple bad ass line-up of everyone’s favorite webhead and the X-men back in the 80s when the characters had a sort of punk rock weirdo mystique to them. Check out Marvel Team Up #150 from 1985, bsck when the X-men still had an edge and life was a bit simpler…

  • IRON MAIDEN Returns With Animated Metal Mayhem!

    Legendary epic power metal band Iron Maiden has just dropped a brand new god damn song called ‘The Writing on the Wall’ which is accompanied by a brand new fully animated video that channels the cult classic style of the 1980’s movie ‘Heavy Metal’!

    This 7 and a 1/2 minute long fully animated music video showcases a post apocalyptic distopian future with warring global factions hellbent on  ending all civilization. It also features plenty of action, cyborgs, monsters and ghostly motorcycle riding wraiths. All with a soundtrack by the epic band. It also features their mascot Eddie in a battle to the death against the evil forces that plague the planet!  At this point we can only speculate and hope that a new album is right around the corner- Maiden fans rejoice! 

  • U-Dork & Movie Melt Go on a Rad 80’s ‘ROCKIN’ ROAD TRIP’!

    Check out the latest episode of the ‘Movie Melt‘ podcast where Universal Dork joins the conversation to cover an obscure summer blast of punk rock shenanigans with 1985’s ‘Rockin’ Road Trip’! 

    Yes! We get down to the nitty gritty of this lost 1980’s summer road trip comedy adventure but also spend some time chattim’ about a ton of other weird-o movies, stupid demonic sex and more useless cinematic information than the human brain can comprehend!

    Check this ridiculous shit out right HERE and check out the trailer for our wild ass feature presentation!