Giveaway has ended!
The Power of Grayskull has designated the winner... and the winner is...
(drum roll...)
Aveweto
who chose Orko and Evil-Lyn as his favourite characters
and
Bloodrayne as his gift.
And now a bit of summing-up...
Among the good guys, the most voted was He-Man with 7 votes out of 31; honorable mention goes to Orko, with 5 votes, and to the chicks, Teela and She-Ra, with 3 votes each. On the dark side of the force, Skeletor wins hands down with a whopping 16/31! You could say that was easily predictable. At a distance follow Trap-Jaw (5) and Evil-Lyn (4).
As to the explanation why He-Man is not recognised as a scantily clad Prince Adam, a user pointed to a difference of attitude and body language, while another thought of some sort of hiding spell put into action; but the explanation most accounted for was that they actually all know and don't want to make Adam feel stupid...
Or maybe it's just He-Man's gorgeous suntan, granted him directly by the Power of Grayskull.
Now maybe you want to know something about my choices...
I confess, as a kid a favourite of mine was Mekaneck. I don't know why, maybe I found the pointed helmet with triangular lenses very cool, a thing of geometrical beauty; I liked the blue red and silver colour scheme, and the yellow mace, although it didn't appear in the cartoon. But I liked a great deal also Man-E-Faces and of course that egregious badass, Fisto.
Roboto is a somewhat obscure figure that will always hold a special place for me. It appeared only once in the cartoon, if I remember well. Inside of its transparent body you could see little gears turn and he opened and closed its "mouth". You could even change weapons on its right arm! I got it one lucky Christmas together with Kobra Khan, another cool figure you could fill with water and then squirt around.
Nowadays, I could lean towards Orko, maybe with age you come to appreciate more the comic sidekick, the ironic counterpart of all those heroic figures. And Teela, obviously: back then my brother and I never wanted her nor the other female figures but now I can see she's actually smokin' hot.
Ram-Man I found stupid but now I can appreciate his devotion and self-sacrifice to take all those tremendous blows on the head. And Moss Man: in days of yore I didn't like him but I'm sure he's a very nice guy, if you don't mind that intense bodily odour.
We never had Skeletor and strangely we didn't miss him that much, although of course he makes for a heck of a villain. I go for Trap-Jaw: the robotic arm, the working jaw, the details and colours, and you could even append the spare parts to his belt! That was classy.
Tri-Klops is another cool character that hasn't been mentioned: a consummate swordsman, he can look in any direction; in the cartoon he even fired different beams from his rotating coloured eyes.
Two Bad was another favourite, because of his bizarre and garish appearance.
But one I really loved was Modulok, that sort of combined MotU with LEGO. It was fun to go from a "full" configuration with three pairs of legs and arms and two heads to a "minimal" one with just a head, two legs and a tail!
I was attracted by Clawful, and Leech and Dragstor of the "Evil Horde" but I never got hold of them.
And then there was that Stinkor guy. I never liked the idea of having a stinking toy and I spent a good part of my childhood wondering if it really stank. Now I read that it reeked of patchouli; not that I know what patchouli smells like anyway...
As for the vehicles, Wind Raider had a cool design and even an anchor that coud be unwinded and winded: but what purpose does that have in a flying vessel? The Battle Ram had a spring-loaded cannon whose spring, unlike that of similar toys, was actually very strong and could shoot projectiles at quite a distance!
I found Dragon Walker and Attack Trak a bit goofy... aren't they?
In the end, thanks to all that have participated, hosting this GA was a fun and enjoyable experience, and an occasion to take some steps down that old well-trodden memory lane. And it was a way to thank the community.
Now I know that it's true what they say, that making giveaways is addictive – I would start another now! I already have some nice (I think) ideas. But alas, I'm not exactly drowning in money, and I could have to meet considerable expenses in the coming months, so my next giveaway will have to wait until the last months of the year, or maybe the first of 2015.
So until then, bye bye, good luck and may the power of GOGskull always be with you!