Standing in the Stranger Things aisle of a Target, I was reminded that I said was gonna try to stop buying action figures through the rest of 2025. Ironically, it was Cyber Monday and I was standing in a brick and mortar store looking at toys. Earlier in November, I visited Lost Toys and Comics for their opening, made a trip to Cruz’n Retro, and was invited to buy from Cruz’s personal collection. That added some fantastic vintage Cowboys of Moo Mesa figures along with filling the last gaps in my Bucky O’Hare collection and vintage Masters of the Universe. If that wasn’t enough, I took advantage of Big Bad Toy Store’s deep discounts. There were no more toy shows or flea markets scheduled for the rest of the month.
It’s also finally looking like I’m actually gonna complete the house move that I’ve been prepping for since May. Most of my collection has been in boxes for months, and I’m beginning to fear what the actual size of the action figure library will be once it’s all unpacked!
With all that in mind, I was staring at Mattel’s Masters of the Universe x Stranger Things two-pack with Hordak and Hellfire Man in my hand. Of course, I gave in. Rules are meant to be broken, right?
Each of the MOTU x Stranger Things two packs is a repainted existing figure along with a new Stranger Things-inspired figure. The Demogorgon was sold with Skeletor, Vecna sold with He-Man, and Hellfire Man is sold with Hordak. Let’s call this the Casual Fan Tax.
My path towards collecting MOTU Origins was mainly the TMNT crossover figures, but I also made an exception for the Stranger Things x MOTU Demogorgon Skeleton two pack because I thought that the Demogorgon figure looked badass. Through my own experience, I don’t begrudge getting one new figure along with a repaint because there are bound to be new people being exposed to the MOTU Origins figures through this and the repaints haven’t been low effort in my opinion. Plus, I can’t be upset about a repaint after how much I loved the NECA Bellybomb color variant.
Hellfire Man feels like as much like a mashup between Gwar and MOTU as much as Stranger Things and MOTU. The combination of the physique with the cartoonishly large bicep armor, wrist spikes, chest armor along, the over the top weapons, and head sculpt gives me heavy Gwar vibes. I know that Trick or Treat Studios is making Gwar action figures, but I’d love to see some Scumdog Masters of the Universe in the future.
Hellfire Man is the new figure, like Vecna and the Demogorgon before him. The paint job on this figure is absolutely fantastic. With each of the new Stranger Things figures in the MOTU line, Mattel’s done a great job with the paint application. He’s sporting a yellow to red flame-inspired gradient on the body which we don’t usually see from Origins figures. The head and weapons both match the Stranger Things Hellfire Club t-shirt design and fit within the Masters of the Universe vibe.
Hellfire Man has a new head sculpt, spiked wrist cuffs, and a sign of the horns hand. He’s also got a few re-used pieces. His chest armor is from the 2009 Masters of the Universe Classics Tri-Klops and then the Bret Hart Masters of the WWE Universe and the spiked bicep armor comes from the same line’s Braun Stroman figure. While I love the general aesthetic that they’ve built with the figure, I have some complaints about the decision to use Bret Hart’s chest armor for this figure.
The chest armor includes an upside-down Skeletor belt that worked with he Bret Hard figure because the base figure didn’t have a belt. Hellfire Man uses the Skeletor crotch, visually doubling up on the belt in both directions. Had they used a belt-less crotch for the base of the figure, I think we’d have been in better shape because the belt would actually be upside down. The armor interferes with the arm articulation if Hellfire Man is still wearing the armor. The armor doesn’t have a connection between the top and bottom in the back and as a result the armor seems to ride up. The armor riding up wasn’t as much of an issue with the Bret Hart figure because Bret’s hair held the armor down. I don’t have a Classics Tri-Klops to make the comparison between body types, but my understanding is that the legs are larger but I also have to think that the torso is slightly larger, leading to this visual looseness.
The figures come with a Hellfire Sword, a spiked D20 flail, a guitar, and Hordak’s bat. The flail and Hellfire sword match the Hellfire Club shirts from Stranger Things and the guitar is an obvious ode to season four’s Master of Puppets moment. The flail is updated to be based on a D20, similar to what we saw with the Demogorgon/Skeletor two pack. Poor ol’ Hordak might be the leader of the Evil Horde, but he’ll go down in history as the first MOTU x Stranger Things figure to not have a dedicated weapon.
Hordak and Hellfire Man are a hell of a pair. Hordak comes with a glow in the dark head and bat accessory and his body is a dark, but translucent, purple. I’ll be honest, from the moment that I saw this pair get announced, it was Hordak that sealed the deal for me.
I really like the translucent body and limbs, although the photos don’t really do it justice. It’s not easy to see through the figure but it gives some visible depth to the parts that you don’t really get with most figures and you wouldn’t get if it were black or a similarly dark solid plastic. It’s kinda funny that we get this awesome coloring on this figure when most of it is covered up by Hordak’s armor and cape.
The armband on Hordak’s arm is on his opposite arm from the last release and it comes upside down the traditional figure. I haven’t noticed a difference in the sculpt otherwise and I’m not sure an armband being applied on an opposing arm counts as a different sculpt.
Hordak glows. He glows! In the dark! Glow in the dark is the number one feature that would make me buy a toy. I almost grabbed a glow in the dark Rainbow Brite toy off a WhatNot stream the other day only because it glowed. In terms of the actual glow, it’s okay. I appreciate the plastic being glow in the dark instead of the paint, but like the Necro Conda figure, I’m left wanting more glow features on the figure. Hordak’s head and bat accessory are the only parts that glow. Alas.
Hordak. I love you. Translucent and glowing? You flatter me.
A few days after announcing the Masters of the Universe x Transformers mashups in September 2025, Mattel announced a third Stranger Things crossover two-pack. Unlike the Thundercats, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, or Transformers lines, the Stranger Things crossover has been limited in scope and only to non-human Stranger Things characters. I can appreciate that Mattel not giving us something like Will Byers dressed as Zodac or Jim Hopper as Man At Arms or Eleven as Teela. Instead, we have a very focused line of figures. Demogorgon, Vecna, and Hellfire Man.
This two pack is a full priced purchase and I have zero regrets. Neither figure is perfect, but they’re both great. I’ve been growing my MOTU Origins figures this holiday season, but these are two figures that stand tall above the rest due to how uniquely fun they are. Mattel has tapped into something fantastic with their Stranger Things crossover figures and if this is the end of the line, it’s one of their best.