Beast Raider - Warriors of the Savage toy

Beast Raider – ring any bells?  I hope not.  If you asked me a few weeks prior what I thought those words in conjunction meant, my first guess would have been the possible name of a bestiality website.  Although in reality these action figures aren’t quite that offensive, they’re certainly best enjoyed in private.  Nobody’s out there salivating over news tidbits regarding these, instead, they’re gathering dust on dilapidated store shelves.  If you’ve got a heart, surely you’d consider buying a few of these and freeing them from their plastic tomb, unleashing their mystery and adding them as morsels of joy in your sheltered life.  Or, you could just have them pillage and plunder your little sister’s collection of dolls – and in that case, bonus points for rebelliousness!  Per usual, I’m getting modestly sidetracked – let’s get focused on these toys.

Upon closer examining, the packaging is altogether confusing; a strange array of fantasy genre jargon containing not a single coherent thought is presented in the mess of text on the front.  The back is plain cardboard – I used it to draw a man with a funny mustache.  One thing those with a more trained eye, or just fellow pop culture geeks, will notice is that these are poor imitations of the much heralded He-Man and the Masters of the Universe series.  He-Man has a lot going for it, in that it not only had fantastically realized toys, but a brilliant animated series that spanned hundreds of episodes, a live-action film adaptation, and tons of other assorted merchandise.  The only thing Beast Raider has to offer is that you can add some of their meager toy offerings to your collection for a measly $1.99.  The question is, would you rather have an unhealthy burger for lunch, or own a sword-wielding psychopath with green tits?

Here’s what I can only assume is the lead villain of the series.  Going back to He-Man, this is an obvious homage to its beloved bad guy, Skeletor.  Upon doing some research, and no I’m not kidding, there’s actually one or two fan sites in existence for these, I found out he’s named BladeKiller.  Talk about unoriginality – it’s like the guys in charge of creative just put a punch of sci-fi and fantasy buzzwords on a wall and threw darts at randomly assembled words to use as potential names.  If talk around the water cooler can be trusted, apparently at last month’s corporate bachelor party for Edwin Michaels in accounting, the same geniuses threw strippers at the wall in a similar fashion.

BladeKiller strikes me as the kind of guy you don’t want to bum change off of.  His left hand is encased in gold armor, which is topped off by a hook-like blade that most assuredly isn’t used for horticulture.  If that’s not scary enough, from his ballsy (in terms of fashion) blue belt dangles three skulls.  This, mixed with the black cloak and lack of a stomach (where’d it go?) make this dude about as frightening as the prospect of watching your grandparents having sex.

His right-hand man is this goofball, lovingly named Slime, again by the aforementioned idiots.  Besides having a cliché villain alias, he’s also a weird amalgam, or hodgepodge if you will, of assorted genre staples.  From the goofily big teeth, to the metal combat boots, and overall dumb expression on his face, you know Slime’s role is to accidentally bungle his master BladeKiller’s plans for domination.  I’m sure he excels in this position.  Notice too, the gold bullets proudly adorned on his green torso.  These strike me as particularly odd, seeing as in all the Beast Raider toys nobody’s equipped with a gun of any kind – well, besides Slime’s affectionately dubbed “love gun”, but that’s neither here nor there.

Here’s the weapons and a shield that looks strangely like the generic ones polluting stores around Halloween time.  They’re all way too big and look overbearing when held by the figures, which is sort of endearing in its own unique way.

BladeKiller: I’m Bladekiller… bitch!

Slime: That line is so played out.  You’re not half as creative as Dave Chappelle, although you do like to quit in the middle of things like he does.

BladeKiller: This coming from an impotent imbecile with fin-ears and a serious case of overbite?  What’s the matter… was your Mommy fucking a walrus?

Slime: I hate being me.

Overall Grade: C