The front gives us all the necessary logos, telling us who is inside, and displays the figure nicely and tries its best to contain all the accessories within.The back gives us a look at other figures in the line, as well as gives us an all new bio for Rattlor, tying him into both the Snake Men and the Evil Horde.

SCULPT – Rattlor’s sculpt is 100% unique from nearly every single other MOTUC figure out there. Technically, it was first used on one of the Snake Men army builder figures in the 2 pack. That came out first, and Rattlor came out after that. It was clearly Mattel trying to get the most use out of the brand new body, and I’m very glad they went the extra mile to give us this new body, because it’s beautiful and gives us an accurate recreation of the vintage figure.

He’s got amazing textures all over his body, with lots of deep scaly ridges, and larger patches of smaller scales. There’s not a single part of his body that’s smooth or reused from the standard MOTUC buck body. You can tell a lot of 2012’s tooling budget went into making this guy. His belt and loincloth pieces are also brand new, giving us that awesome WWE-looking belt that the vintage figure had, with a cool winding snake emblem.

Rattlor’s tail looks great, and is actually a separate piece from the main body. It’s not removable, but it is a separate piece. I really love the way it blends into his back and continues that amazing scale pattern.

Rattlor’s head looks fierce. It really looks like a big snake head, and he looks really angry. If being an anthropomorphic snake wasn’t enough, that head lets you know it’s not a good idea to get near him. I really can’t go on enough about how great the sculpt on this figure is. The Four Horsemen outdid themselves here.

PAINT – If the sculpt wasn’t good enough, the paint job is also really amazing. He’s got this beautiful, but deadly look about him that some of the most dangerous snakes on Earth have. He’s mostly this rust color, with light tan accenting. The light tan is on his chest, and runs along the underside of his tail, and down both arms and legs. There’s this great, subtle air brushing around the edges of the tan scales on his torso that really adds a good level of detail to him.

The arms and legs also have blue going down a smaller strip of scales inside the tan. It’s a strange juxtaposition of colors for sure, but the result is fantastic. It was reported that because of the way action figures’ paint jobs are cost out, each scale counted as a different paint app, making Rattlor a rather expensive figure. Again, I’m very glad Mattel decided to go the extra mile, because it really pays off. His belt is this dull gold color, with metallic accenting on the rivets and edges, with the snake emblem painted green.

His head is the same rust color as most of his skin. The inside of his mouth is pink and red, and has this cool gloss coating over it that makes it look realistic. I love his eyes too. They’re yellow with red horizontal slits in them, that really help make him look like this completely cold-blooded killer (eh?). I inspected the figure for a while and couldn’t find any paint flaws. No messy edges, or bleeding into another color. Everything looks great on Rattlor.

ARTICULATION – Rattlor has what you’re expecting from a MOTUC figure in terms of articulation. He has a ball jointed neck, ball jointed shoulders, bicep swivels, single elbows, wrist cuts, ab crunch, waist swivel, ball jointed hips, single knees, ankle hinges and pivots (rockers), and even has a cut in his tail that allows it to swivel side-to-side.

I didn’t have a problem with any of his joints. They’re all functional, and nice and tight. Even his ankles were, which have become the go-to problem joints in Masters of the Universe Classics, but they hold up Rattlor fine. He has a good range of motion in the head, allowing for up and down movement, as well as side-to-side.

His scaly texture doesn’t get in the way of his articulation at all, and it’s really awesome that you can swivel his tail around as well. It adds to the display options, and makes space more manageable if you have a bunch of figures on one shelf; you can just fold his tail to the side to help give yourself more room for figures.

ACCESSORIES – Rattlor comes with two accessories: the standard serpent staff that comes with all the Snake Men, and an elongated neck attachment. Both accessories are awesome.

With the vintage figures, all of the Snake Men came with appropriately colored serpent staffs, so it’s something Mattel is trying to recreate in the Classics line as well. Rattlor’s has a golden staff, with a brown-rust colored snake winding around it. It’s the exact same sculpt as the one that came with King Hsss. Now, it’s awesome they included this, but for my display I think I’ll only have King Hsss with a staff, since he is the King after all. It just seems weird if they all have a staff.

Rattlor also comes with a removable Horde arm band, in case you wanted to display him your other Horde members. This is an homage to the She-Ra cartoon, in which Rattlor was a member of the Horde. It’s awesome that Mattel gives you that option, for those who are only familiar with Rattlor through that cartoon.

His neck attachment is a perfect way to recreate the action feature of his vintage figure, without compromising the sculpt or articulation of the Classics figures. You just pop his head off, pop on the neck attachment, and then pop his head onto the neck. And it pulls off an awesome illusion that Rattlor can extend his neck to strike at his victims. I love it, and Rattlor looks awesome with the elongated neck. It continues the exact same paint pattern from his body, right down to the subtle orange air brushing on the edges of the tan scales.

Now, something I’m sad we didn’t get is the recreation of his 200X armor, to make him the General he was in that series. Originally it was reported by Mattel that the armor had been sculpted by the Four Horsemen, but it didn’t cost out since Rattlor was already so expensive. Mattel did accidentally post a picture of Rattlor with the armor on Mattycollector, though. I’m sure they’ll find a way to include it in the next Weapons Pak since the last one was used to give us previously cancelled accessories. Still, it sucks they couldn’t actually include it with the figure.

FUN – Rattlor is a lot of fun. He’s a big, anthropomorphized snake, and if you can’t find fun in that, then you may be dead inside. He’s got all the articulation you’d need to pose him pretty much any way you wanted, and the neck attachment gives you some great display options.

What’s even more fun about Rattlor, is that Mattel was even able to recreate another one of his vintage action features: the tail rattle! The vintage figure had a ball bearing of something inside the figure, so when you shook it, it sounded like a rattle. Well, Mattel included a small ball bearing inside the rattle of his tail to do the same thing. It’s not loud, and it doesn’t actually sound like a rattlesnake, but it’s just so cool they thought to do that. It really takes an already great figure, and goes one step further.

QUALITY CONTROL/THINGS TO WATCH OUT FOR – No problems with Rattlor whatsoever.

OVERALL – Rattlor’s sculpt and paint job are equal parts amazing. The level of detail in both areas is incredible and really shows off what this line is about. His articulation is standard and works great, and the accessories he comes with are not only character appropriate, but his neck attachment helps recreate his vintage figure’s action feature. Add to that, Mattel was able to actually make his tail rattle, and you have a recipe for a truly great figure.

I am bummed that they weren’t able to include his armor, if for no other reason that to have more display options (and that Mattel teased us by showing us what it looked like), but it’s not that big of a deal since this figure is meant to be a recreation of the vintage. And in that regard, it does so beautifully.

Rattlor may be far from my favorite character in Masters of the Universe, but what Mattel was able to do here has made Rattlor one of my favorite figures in the Classics line so far.

FINAL SCORE: 4.5 / 5

Where to buy: Rattlor was originally sold on Mattycollector.com, and is now sold out. However, you can still find him at the following websites.

• Amazon has him in stock.