On this bonus episode we are without co-host David Tavolier but we do have returning guest, television and movie reviewer, LUCY WITSAMAN!
This time Lucy is dissecting SHE-RA AND THE PRINCESSES OF POWER the newest incarnation of the Masters of the Universe Etherian heroin from Dreamworks and Netflix!
As always co-host JOSHUA WITSAMAN holds our guests to the strictest standards of authenticity and expertise, putting this particular critic’s opinions through the wringer!
Tune in to this bonus episode to hear their thoughts on the show, find out Lucy’s favorite character, what she thought were the most frightening moments, and precisely which toys are the most distracting when giving an interview!
Below is a poem I recently wrote simultaneously with a short horror story. The short story was read on Trio Simpatico, the podcast I co-host. We produced the reading for our string of horror themed episodes in October, and a portion of the poem is used to close out that piece.
Both the story and the poem are based on a dream which my wife relayed to me one morning. Her dream was splendidly cryptic and contained some really frightening imagery. The short story, called Ghost Storm, is an elaboration of the nightmare as my wife told it to me, while the poem is more of an interpretation of the same basic ideas though most of the details are transferred to a completely different time and place.
If you’d like to hear our audio production of Ghost Storm click HERE I’ll most likely be posting the text here in the weeks to follow.
20 years ago Pokémon was introduced in the United States with the release of Pokémon Red and Blue.
At the time I was 15 years old and probably skewed a little old for the games target audience. (Nintendo was clearly trying to corner the 10 year old asexual Venusian subterranean crabling demographic, of which I was obviously not a part of.) Regardless I quickly came to love the game and its concepts and have been a huge fan ever since!
The original Gameboy games were genius, entertaining, strange, and fun.
The first cartoon series was goofy, endearing, and hilarious. (Also quite a bit was lost in translation which only seemed to make it better.)
The wave of countless Pokémon merchandise which followed was impressive, of course including some great toys which I also partook of.
The Team Rocket Meowth Balloon vehicle. Which I personally own.
My personal interest in Pokémon can be traced back to a single specific moment which I distinctly recall. I was in my bedroom at my childhood home and was reading a magazine or comic book (most likely an X-Men title) and I turned the page to a distinctive full page ad. On that page I saw a crowd of small impish animals clustered together while a giant cartoon net was falling down over them. In parenthesis the phrase ‘Got ya!’ was scrawled nearby and in the bottom corner of the ad was the (now synonymous) title and phrase, ‘Pokémon: Gotta Catch ‘Em All!’
I instantly found the image very intriguing and I actually remember stopping to examine the ad, which was very odd for me at the time. As a kid when I was reading comic books the ads would, at most, get a brief aggravated eye roll as I disappointedly realized that my storyline had been interrupted. But there I was inspecting the cartoonish designs of these unknown creatures.
At the time I had no idea what any of them were. There was a little barking rat, a squat yellow squirrel, some sort of floating rock creature, a fire breathing dragon, an evilly grinning purple spiky thing, giant insects, a tortoise with guns on its back, and a large stoic faced teddy bear.
I immediately loved the designs and style of these things and whatever Pokémon was, I was already sold.
Pokemon really made me appreciate the aesthetic of ‘Demented Pet Shop’
That image was particularly difficult to find online and I have still been unable to find a clean image of it anywhere. Everything I can come up with is either a scan, or like the image below, a picture of the ad itself. (It is still one of my favorite Pokémon images and I’d love to one day get a print of it to hang in my office.)
Looking it over in my youth I saw that Nintendo was listed in the small print at the bottom of the ad I realized it was a video game of some sort which was exciting, however at the time I didn’t have a console, only the handheld Gameboy. So alas I thought I’d have to wait until a friend picked it up in order to see what it was about. Thankfully of course, that wasn’t the case.
From there it was a whirlwind of Pokémania!
I picked up Pokémon Blue first. However once I realized I’d have to trade between the Red version in order to follow the mandate of the game, and indeed catch them all, I wound up buying the Charizard emblazoned Red Version as well. (And although I eventually had several friends who played the game, initially I wasn’t sure I’d find anyone who was interested.)
Soon the Pokémon cartoon was in full swing as well, which became my first real experience with anime and the various tropes and staples of that animated genre. I found the show really zany and hilarious, I loved all the characters, and it helped to flesh out the pixelated world of the games.
For years Pokémon was steadily on my radar.
1998 – Pokémon Yellow launched, essentially combining the continuities of the cartoon and the first two games.
August 1998 – Pokémon Stadium hits the Nintendo 64. Probably my favorite Pokémon spin-off game ever made. Not only could you upload and battle your Pokémon with friends on glorious 3D rendered battlefields, you could also play the Gameboy games on the big screen. All that AND there were a ton of GREAT mini games that were fun, challenging, and really quite funny.
December of that year the Pokémon card game made its way into the mix joining the other card games I geeked out with, Star Wars, Babylon 5, Magic, and then Pokémon!
1999 – Super Smash Bros. hit the scene featuring the quintessential Pokémascot Pikachu. With whom I would regularly use to provide a Smash Bros. smack down.
November 1999 – Pokémon Gold and Silver hit the scene and a new Pokémon adventure was under way, beginning a regular pattern of Poké games which have found success and innovations to varying degrees through the years.
With the most recent Nintendo 3DS games the handheld Pokémon world has been completely rendered in 3D and fully animated. Pokémon are traded across the globe on international servers. And friends can talk smack directly through their 3DS, in real-time, from across the country when battling online!
It really is impressive to see how the Pokémon franchise has . . . . EVOLVED! (Get it?)
Well now we have Pokémon Go, the franchise’s first foray into the mobile gaming market.
At first glance Pokémon Go appears to be a bit of a downgrade in terms of gameplay, essentially a simplified cell phone version of the Pokémon Card Game. However upon closer examination it is much more than that.
From my experience with Pokémon Go so far, it appears to be a real world expression of the long established Pokémon universe and the best kind of fan service. I mean this property is now 20 years old and there are very few people, children and adults alike, who don’t at least know who Pikachu is and Pokémon Go lets you bring that world out into the real world.
Part of the enduring appeal of the Pokémon games is the universe in which the game and show take place. Across the various islands of the setting Pokémon and Pokémon training is a prevalent way of life and a common bond which the citizens of that world actively embrace. The Pokémon are fantastical companions, champions, and partners in that world. In the games there are people around every corner eager to show off their favorite Pokémon and put them to the test in battle.
Throughout the adventures of the games there are clumps of NPCs waiting to square off against you and your Pokémon team. There are ill-prepared school kids with weak little Rattatas and Caterpies that they’ve caught in the school yard. There are construction workers in hardhats working around cities with steely Magnemite companions. Groups of swarthy leather clad punks may try to jump you with their poison types. Cyclists and swimmers will challenge you along the way. Criminals, old folks, librarians, shop keepers, EVERYONE has Pokémon in the Pokéworld, and because everyone has them everyone has something in common.
It’s just one of those quaint, fun, fictional universes where any individuals who try hard and do good will win, and eventually defeat the evil shadowy organizations like Team Rocket and others who secretly work against the ideals of that world by exploiting Pokémon for their own greedy ends.
I’ve had several conversations with friends over the years that involved, in some form or another, the phrases “Wouldn’t it be great if Pokémon were real.” OR “If I could live in a video game universe, it’d be the Pokémon universe.” OR “If I could just have one actual Pokémon it would be X, Y, Z.” And watching the show those feelings are reinforced as you see the young idealistic trainers go off and adventure across the globe.
Now let me tell you a little story about Pokémon Go.
The other night at around 10pm I was letting my dogs out (my real life Pokémon, apparently I’m a terrible trainer though because they never battle for me.) and as the puggles were sniffing around I flipped out my cell phone and switched on Pokémon Go just to see if I might catch a Weedle or Bellsprout while I stood there in the backyard watching them pee.
Looking through the game I noticed a Pokémon silhouette nearby (for those who aren’t in the know that means there was a type of Pokémon lingering around which I had not yet captured.) Being the Pokémaster I am I immediately knew that shadowed figure was the shape of an Electabuzz, a fairly rare find and something I hadn’t even seen yet in the game.
After the dogs had completed their business I ushered them back inside and set off to find this fabled electric type Pokémon. Although navigating the in-game radar of Pokémon Go can be a bit tricky I was able to determine that the Electabuzz seemed to be on the next street over.
So I briskly began walking down the street and around the corner.
I could see the Electabuzz footprints diminishing, meaning I was moving in the right direction and getting closer.
As I approached the darkened corner I saw two other guys on bicycles come racing toward me up the street. They were maybe in their mid to late twenties from what I could tell and their sudden appearance put me slightly on edge. Although there wasn’t anything necessarily threatening about them, it was 10 at night, dark, the middle of the week, and I was now outnumbered.
However before I could let my fears get the best of me one of the guys held up his cell phone and circled around the end of the street on his bike.
“You playing Pokémon?” He called out to me cheerfully.
“I am actually!” I said relieved.
“Are you looking for the Electabuzz too?” He followed up.
“I am!” I quickly replied.
Both of the cyclists chuckled and again held up their phones. “It’s about three houses down this street!” They informed me.
I thanked them and they rode on their merry way while I marched down the street, ran into that Electabuzz precisely where they said it would be, and captured that sumbitch right then and there!
My Electabuzz cries himself to sleep every night because he knows he’ll never capture a gym
As I was smugly walking back to my house checking out the stats on my most recent catch I had a thought.
“That was a very Pokémon-esque interaction.” I thought to myself. “Just walking down the street hunting rare Pokémon, when suddenly I run into a pair of other trainers on bicycles, we have a brief encounter that sets me up for the big catch at the end.”
It was like something straight out of Pokémon Red/Blue like riding down Cycling Road or climbing the Pokétower.
“Maybe Pokémon finally is real?” I concluded.
Well done Niantic. Well done Nintendo. Keep it fun fellow players.
It looks like it’s about time for the next installment of my Eternia Restoration Project and if you’ve been waiting for a close up look at the individual action figures of my Masters of the Universe collection, then this is the post for you!
Cleaning up this group of figures wasn’t as nearly as difficult as cleaning up the mouse-urine-soaked hoard of GI Joes that comprised my Terrordrome Renovation Project a few years back. By comparison this toy restoration will seem as easy as a sparkling wave of magic issued from the elegant fingers of the mysterious Sorceress of Castle Grayskull!
To begin I separated all of the accessories and weapons, figured out exactly what I had, and (after a quick internet search) sorted them all out to the appropriate heroes and villains. Then over the course of a few days I gathered up small batches of the figures and gave them a dunk in a bucket of soapy hot water, gently scrubbed them with a toothbrush, rinsed them off, vigorously shook out any excess water from their hollow abdomens, then toweled them off and let them dry over night.
Like I said most of these figures were in pretty good shape, all things considered. Sadly several figures I thought to be complete were actually missing arms, accessories, or were just completely broken. Also there were a couple of otherwise flawless figures who had fallen victim to unprovoked pet attacks and were irrevocably scarred by dog teeth. Apparently the family dog at the time was deep in the puppy chewing stage when some of these figures entered my collection.
Battle wounds add character!
In a few of these cases I was able to take a very small pair of wire cutters and trim away some of the gnarly plastic snags and gouges. After some delicate snips and clips it actually helped shape up some of the nastier bite marks, making the figures slightly less disfigured.
As far as cleanliness went though there really wasn’t much to contend with. One or two of the Eternians had been tatted up with some marker at some point, a couple were just mysteriously sticky, but the only real troublesome figure was the legendary Moss Man.
Covered in a fine coat of coarse green felt, Moss Man not only had fur adhered to his stock Masters of the Universe body but said exterior moss was originally endowed with a distinct perfumed scent. All of that situation; a brillo pad fur, adhesive undercoat, and whatever chemical magic was used to induce that smell combined with years of play meant that Moss Man had gathered a lot of gunk, identifiable and otherwise, all across his namesake moss!
Even cleaning Moss Man however was not an arduous task, he just took a little extra time as I gently brushed out the years of embedded carpet fibers and pet hair.
All in all the best way to describe this effort is to say that I spent a few hours of my free time giving sponge baths to a large group of musclebound men in my basement.
But enough about that let’s take a look at the results!
Clearly Eternia has a shortage of shirts. Pictured are two average varietals of He-Man on the ends, Thunder Punch He-Man on the left, and He-Man’s alter ego Prince Adam wielding his fuchsia sword middle right. Thunder Punch He-Man is the most complete all the other He-Men pictured are missing most, if not all, of their accessories.
Here we see a group of recently washed heroes of Eternia: Mekaneck, Cyclone, Wundar, and Ram Man. Mekaneck is missing his armor, Cyclone is complete with his lenticular chest piece and shield. Wundar is actually a mail away promotional variant of He-Man given away from Wonder Bread. Fans and collectors gave the brown haired version the name Wundar and the name stuck!
More heroes! Fisto (you read that right!), the aforementioned Moss Man, Man-E-Faces, and Roboto with theme song by Styx. Moss Man is complete with his brown club. Roboto is missing one of his interchangeable arms. Man-E-Faces and Fisto are missing their weapons.
Childhood favorite Orco with his weird stack of coins accessory which features other characters pictures on them. (Of course most of those are missing) He also has a rip cord that would send him spinning. Also pictured is a random Orco stamp that was in my collection.
Baddest of bad asses SKELETOR seen here in his battle damage variety and undamagable original flavor! Although battle damage Skeletor is missing his accessories I was ecstatic to find that the classic version was 100% intact!
Four of my favorite baddies: Fakor, Trap Jaw, Stinkor (the villainous scented equivalent of Moss Man), and Tri-Clops. These guys were the best at being the worst! Whenever I was plotting evil deeds these would be my go to guys to make it happen. However in the process they lost most of their accessories. Except Stinkor, though at this point he has lost his distinctive scent.
Skeletor’s B-Squad: Mosquitor, Whiplash, Webstor, and Spikor. (I’m sensing a pattern here with the names.) Whiplash was one of the figures that received the worst of the canine maulings. Although you can’t quite see it in the picture his entire right arm is chewed all to hell. A lot of cool action features with these four though, dripping blood, whipping tails, zip lines, and retractable arms!
The Evil Horde! A revitalization of the Masters of the Universe meant new and better figures! Enter the Horde, these guys pulled double duty battling He-Man AND She-Ra. Who has the time? Seen here Mantenna, Hordak himself, Grizzlor, and Leech. Leech had a great feature, he had a vacuum sealing mouth. When you pressed a button on his back he could suction up to flat surfaces!
Let’s not forget about King Hiss and the Snake Men! Actually let’s go ahead and forget about them, I was never really much of a fan. But these two were pretty cool, Rattlor and Sssqueeze. In my story lines these guys were always on loan from King Hiss in order to repay Skeletor and/or Hordak a favor. These were the only Snake Men to ever grace my MOTU collection
Sadness. Let us not forget our fallen heroes (and villains). Here we have the broken toys. Clawful, Man-at-Arms, and Trap Jaw. Thankfully I had two Trap Jaws and the other was in fairly decent shape. Unfortunately Clawful is missing an arm, and that crazy crab curmudgeon was one of my favorites! Similarly Man-at-Arms has encountered an equally disarming fate. I’ll be vigilantly on the lookout for these missing limbs as I occasionally go through old boxes at home and at my parents house!
Once again we have my wife’s She-Ra collection, finally reuniting Prince Adam with his sister Princess Adora under the roof of Castle Grayskull! Pictured: SweetBee, Frosta, Perfuma, She-Ra, Bow, Glimmer, Castaspella, and the jealous beauty Catra!
And just for shits and giggles here is my small collection of Masters of the Universe figures from the early 2000’s as sculpted by the legendary Four Horsemen. As a kid I wanted the original Merman and Beast Man but they always eluded me but that all changed in 2003!
It should be stated that I have three older siblings. Much older siblings in fact. When I was born my two sisters had already moved out and the next youngest, my brother, was turning 18 and was on his way to leaving the house as well. Growing up I was essentially an only child, as such I quickly developed a love of toys. There was something great about being able to create your own entertainment through imaginative play which really clicked with me. Wherever I went I’d bring along a few cars or action figures for the trip in case things got boring or I found that the mood required a high speed chase or epic battle scene.
One of my earliest collections of toys were the Masters of the Universe figures and playsets. In fact it was probably one of the earliest fandoms to which I belonged. As a kid I loved the He-Man cartoon and would spend hours recreating the battles and adventures of that crazy post-apocalyptic fantasy world of Eternia. In the basement of my childhood home I had a large corner that was dedicated as a play area where I kept most of my toys and playsets. There were representatives from several classic toy lines lingering around in that basement. Star Wars (of course), Transformers, GoBots, Voltron, and even Rainbow Brite (I’m not ashamed!) but dominating the playscape was He-Man and the Masters of the Universe!
The art of the Masters of the Universe franchise is outstanding and this poster sums up my era of collecting the figures.
From around the ages of 4 to 6 Castle Grayskull stood at the center of my toy multiverse like a dull green beacon of adventure! I had what seemed like a legion of heroes and villains to choose from along with several of the zany and seemingly inefficiently engineered vehicles. Swords of power and magic staves were strewn across the carpet just waiting to be taken up in combat by the most worthy of heroes or misshapen of monsters. Skeletor, Hordak, He-Man, Buzz-Off. These were names of legend. The epic storylines I would construct would incorporate many of my other toys until seemingly every toy I owned had vowed their loyalty to one side or the other in the continuous struggle of good versus evil.
The laws of physics and rules of logic did not apply to my corner of the basement which made those epic struggles all the more fun.
However there was one rule to that play area, the rule of Mom! Specifically Mom asked that I keep my toys picked up and tidy when I was done. No doubt this was some attempt by my parents to teach me about responsibility and the importance of taking proper care of my possessions. Having children of my own now I completely understand but at the time it was really putting a cramp in my style, more importantly it was hindering He-Man’s quests which would often span several days, picking up where they’d left off during the previous afternoon.
How was I expected to pick up my things when Skeletor had just invaded the castle and was holding Ram Man hostage? Man-At-Arms just called in Optimus Prime for assistance and if I put it all away now I’ll never remember who had already been killed off and who was only slightly wounded?
However time and time again I was asked to keep my toys picked up and the basement tidy and time and time again I would forget, half-ass it, or outright refuse until finally my other had enough.
“Keep your toys cleaned up or I’m getting rid of your He-Man toys.”
Cue the Ennio Morricone music. A challenge had been thrown out. Our eyes locked in a silent but intense stare.
I feel that I must point out here that I would not describe myself as having been a defiant kid or someone who by any means challenged authority but I was, and to this day still am, extremely stubborn. When I feel like I’m being wronged I’ll double down and hold my ground. Unfortunately for me my mother is the same way.
Now I was young, I don’t recall the exact details of what happened next, but as you might expect I did not keep my toys picked up or at least didn’t keep them picked up to the standards of my mother. Believing Mom to be bluffing I was utterly taken aback when like a galactic crushing cyclone my mother came swooping down into the basement and began disassembled Castle Grayskull, the Fright Zone, and Hordak’s Slime Pit. She meticulously plucked up every multicolored weapon; melee, energy, or otherwise. He-Man, his friends, and enemies were unceremoniously bagged up together with seemingly no appreciation for their deeply ingrained and often conflicting friendships and rivalries.
In an instant Eternia was completely wiped out, it was like millions of plastic voices had cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. It was Alderaan all over again, if Alderaan were a series of techo-medieval kingdoms populated by barbarians and beast men. (Who knows, maybe it was, we’ve never had a real good look at Alderaan at this point.)
I was told my He-Man toys had been thrown away and that was the end of that.
In the intervening years other toys would come and go. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles would eventually rise to prominence and surpass He-Man and his friends in number and overall interest. But there was always a soft spot in my heart for the denizens of Eternia and the few small pieces of He-Man accessories and memorabilia which managed to slip through the cracks would go on to become artifacts of great import in my future play.
Whether or not that experience has left any indelible emotional scarring, who’s to say? I’ll ask my psychologist when I see him next week.
It wasn’t until years later, around age 9 or 10, when I was sent into our crawl spaces in search of holiday decorations, and I discovered the truth! My Masters of the Universe toys hadn’t been tossed out like so much fantastic garbage but had simply been stashed away, hidden from me and simply awaiting to be rediscovered. Occasionally afterwards I’d covertly work my way back through the racks of clothes and stacks of boxed junk in the crawl space in order to get back to my old friends. I’d pick through the toys remembering how awesome they were and matching them up with their distinctive armor and weaponry. Even at that time I didn’t dare take them out beyond the crawl space for fear that my mother might have simply forgotten they were up there and upon discovering them would finish the job once and for all!
Well now after all those years I’ve finally freed the citizens of Eternia from the bondage of those attic boxes and have decided to make use of them in a new series of blog posts I’m calling The Eternia Restoration 2016. If you’re familiar with my Terrordrome Renovation 2011 then you’ll know what to expect! The short answer is I’ll be going through these old toys, cleaning them up, putting them back together, and just generally restoring them to as much of their former glory as is now possible.
So let’s get right down to it!
For starters here are a few shots of the toys I’ll be cleaning up. These Masters of the Universe figures, vehicles and playsets have seen a lot of action and are far from complete. Overall however they were really in much better shape than I expected!
The heroes and villains directly from their cardboard imprisonment. For the record at this time they all smelled like a lovely melange of Moss Man and Stinkor odors.
The remaining accessories. Already we can tell there are a lot missing.
Next we have the vehicles and war machines of the Masters of the Universe!
The majestic Dragon Walker. The zaniest design for a vehicle ever produced and the best part is that it’s motorized! Here’s hoping we can get it to work!
Stridor. The mechanical mount of Eternia’s heroes.
Skeletor’s Land Shark. Watch out all you celebrity billionaire business folk, this is an actual Shark Tank!
The Wind Raider. This is the oldest of the vehicles I have. It’s missing several parts and is sadly in the worst shape.
Attack Track. Another highly illogical mode of transportation and it too is motorized!
Battle Bones. This has always been my favorite. Essentially the bus of Eternia but also a handy carrying case when visiting friends and family.
Finally here we have the big guns, the playsets. I was lucky enough to have not only Castle Grayskull, but the Fright Zone, and Hordak’s Slime pit as well! Still in pieces I really want to clean these suckers up before reassembling them.
Castle Grayskull. Surprisingly almost all of the castles parts and decals seems to have survived the years in exile.
The Fright Zone and Slime Pit also seem to be in good shape though I haven’t had time yet to pull them out and sort through to find out.
FINALLY we’ll end this with another bit of good news: I’m happy to announce the reunion of He-Man with his sister She-Ra! Huzzah! As fate would have it our house was already in the possession of a She-Ra collection which my wife saved from her childhood house a few years earlier!
She-Ra the Princess of Power and her pals. Although my wife Lauren kept these heroines hair on fleek she seems to have lost all of their accessories.
So before you read any further I must warn you that I am about to discuss some very obscure Star Wars material, and will be arguing a point that may very well only be important to me.
Now, when I say obscure I don’t mean a Wedge Antilles or Bossk level obscurity, think more obscure! I’m talking about a specific character so minor that they only appear on screen for a few seconds and have absolutely no dialogue. On top of that I’ll be nitpicking the details of that characters costume and posit some ideas which may go against the standard conventions for said character.
So if you’re not ready for some serious Star Wars deep cuts then get the fuck out!
That is a name which in recent years has become only slightly more recognizable with Star Wars fans. Before that Colonel Yularen was a character with very few background details and even fewer fans who seemed to give a shit about him.
In the original Star Wars (A New Hope) from 1977 Colonel Wullf Yularen appears in a single scene (though later in this essay I will put forth the theory that Yularen actually appears a second time in that film). The colonel’s only film appearance (though possibly first of two, see previous parenthetical) is during the infamous Death Star Conference Room scene where Grand Moff Tarkin informs his heads of staff that the Emperor has dissolved the senate and later Darth Vader chokes a guy. Sitting directly next to Admiral Motti (the haughty Imperial who gets Force choked by Vader) you will see Colonel Wullf Yularen in his distinctive white uniform jacket.
From the years of 1977 to 1995 the character was left unnamed and without a title or any background information whatsoever.
However in 1995 Colonel Wullf Yularen was first named and given a brief biography within the Star Wars Customizable Card Game put out by Decipher. At the time the names and lore text of those cards was considered canon and it was there stated that the colonel was a leader of the Imperial Security Bureau contingent aboard the first Death Star.
After his inclusion in the card game the character found his way into subsequent Star Wars encyclopedias and information tomes that would be published later but little was done to further his biography.
The Colonel Wullf Yularen card was printed in the original release of the Star Wars CCG
It was from this glance of the character of Yularen in the CCG and his concise but interesting biography which really made me a fan. I would often try to include the colonel in my Star Wars decks despite the fact that he was not that powerful and his abilities not all that impressive.
Regardless Yularen still intrigued me.
I mean this is the guy who was apparently briefing Grand Moff Tarkin on stuff and who was apparently in such good standing with the Emperor that he’s the one Palpatine sends to ensure everyone on board the Death Star is towing the Imperial line.
Eventually in 2006 an action figure of Colonel Wullf Yularen was created in a special boxed set of the Death Star Briefing Room.
It was a joyous day for Yularen fans in particular or Imperial officer completionists in general.
However despite my personal excitement I was confused by the look of the figure whose uniform was revealed to be entirely white, which is unlike any other standard Imperial uniform seen in the movies or the books.
In the expanded universe books Grand Admirals did wear all white uniforms but those uniforms were also adorned with golden epaulets and the corresponding double rowed rank insignia.
“Oops looks like my pants got mixed up in Thrawn’s laundry again and his with mine!”
A mystery and controversy had begun.
The controversy lies with the fact that Yularen was clearly defined in the lore as being part of the ISB, the Imperial Security Bureau. The uniform of the ISB would eventually become associated with the black cap, white coat, and black pants which is seen worn by various officers in various background shots of the first Death Star.
Conversely the black/white/black uniform of the ISB was always sort of a mystery because it only ever appears in the first Star Wars movie and is only ever seen on the Death Star. Until it was established as the accepted ISB uniform those Imperials were simply known as “Death Star Officers” or “Imperial Fleet Officers.” Now as stated before Yularen only appears in A New Hope and is only seen on the Death Star and was later established as a high ranking officer in the ISB.
Do you follow me so far?
So with all of that in mind shouldn’t the pants of the action figure for Wullf Yularen have been black, and not white?
To me the answer was obvious, and clearly Hasbro had made a mistake. That being said however he is such a minor character and the pants in question are never actually visible while the character is seated at the Death Star conference table, so there is really no way to prove otherwise. Oh well, what can you do?
The issue of the all-white uniform became further compounded when in 2008 a younger version of Wullf Yularen was included in the prequel cartoon series The Clone Wars.
In the series Yularen is given the rank of Admiral in the Republic fleet and works closely with Jedi knight Anakin Skywalker as they battle the forces of the Separatists.
Another banner moment for Yularen fans!
Who would have thought that we’d ever get more Wullf Yularen! But alas this inclusion in the Clone Wars brings with it further Yularen scandal.
The wonderful Dave Filoni, show runnder of the Clone Wars and it’s followup series Star Wars Rebels, has stated that they decided to include the character of Wullf Yularen as a nod to the original trilogy and gave him the rank of Admiral in order to show his rise through the ranks to the position of Grand Admiral, a rank which the show’s creators mistakenly thought the character had attained at the time of A New Hope as signified by his white uniform jacket.
Once this mistake was realized a good old fashioned retcon was deployed which stated that Yularen had retired from the Navy at some point after the Clone Wars with the rank of Admiral but was later at the time of A New Hope was personally asked by the Emperor himself to reenlist with the ISB in a new position as colonel aboard the Death Star.
However the damage was already done.
Despite the relatively unadorned rank insignia of Wullf Yularen (three red squares and three blue squares) along with a pre-established history, the idea that Wullf Yularen was a Grand Admiral at the time of A New Hope seemed to have found a foothold within the fandom.
Until now!
It is at this time that I would like to get to the point of this entire post and present my evidence of precisely how Colonel Wullf Yularen should be depicted and to firmly establish his position as colonel within ISB operations.
First of all as most of us know by now the Expanded Universe was completely wiped out just prior to the release of the newest Star Wars installment, The Force Awakens. That meant that pretty much anything was once again up for grabs in the Star Wars universe and unless something explicitly took place in the first six movies or the Clone Wars cartoon it was no longer considered Star Wars canon.
The first expanded universe book of this new canon was titled “Tarkin” and documented the rise to power of the titular character. In that book Wullf Yularen made a few very minor appearances and thankfully was firmly reestablished once again as a colonel in the ISB (and also, yay more Yularen!).
So that bit of business is taken care of.
Now for his uniform.
A couple of years ago I put together an ISB uniform of my own to wear to conventions, Death Star briefings, or fancy dinners. I figured an Imperial officer costume would be a nice alternative to my much more cumbersome stormtrooper armor. Wanting to do something a bit more unique then the typical grey fleet officer I decided to go with the Imperial Security Bureau look.
Black cap, white officer jacket, black pants.
As a fan of Yularen I gave myself the rank of colonel and adorned my costume accordingly but I wanted to examine the movie with a fine toothed comb and seek out as many of the ISB uniforms as possible in order to make sure the details of my costume were precise.
Through my observations I found that there are actually two variations of the ISB uniform in A New Hope. One with the typical imperial cropped riding pants and tall boots and another with a straight legged pant and dress shoes. Not a huge difference and from all observations my costume was spot on.
Below are most of the uniforms appearances in the film.
An ISB agent struts across a hall in the Death Star
An ISB agent walks along with a blue R3 droid in hot pursuit
TWO ISB agents in the same shot!
An ISB agent gets jostled around in the background
An ISB agent delivers some bit of news to governor Tarkin
An ISB agent goes about his business
An Imperial Security Bureau agent missing his opportunity to be a hero
Now here’s the big moment!
As I was going, frame-by-frame, looking for ISB officers aboard the Death Star I came across the scene where Han and Luke, disguised as stormtroopers escorting Chewbacca, are awaiting a turbolift to the detention area.
In that scene our heroes are passed by a pair of ISB agents. These two agents are actually the clearest examples of the uniform in the movie and as I was examining them I realized something.
The officer on the right is Wullf Yularen!
Could that be?
Is that Colonel Yularen out and about walking the Death Star corridors?
It certainly appears that way to me, despite the addition of the black cap everything is exactly the same down to the rank insignia.
Unless there were two actors with the same face and same pristinely trimmed mustache on the set of Star Wars then I had to be looking at what was essentially an unacknowledged second appearance of Wullf Yularen!
Here take a look at the side by side comparisons.
A second appearance by the colonel is completely in keeping with the rest of the film seeing as several of the Imperials from the conference room scene appear later in the movie.
Admiral Motti and General Tagge discuss the fate of Princess Leia with Tarkin and Vader after the conference room scene.
Chief Bast is seen in several scenes before and after, most notably as the officer who warns Grand Moff Tarkin that the Rebel’s attack against the Death Star might be more dangerous than previously expected.
What this whole long drawn out rant is trying to explain is that Colonel Wullf Yularen wears black pants and it’s irrefutably proven in one quick scene.
With the discovery of that full body shot of the colonel those black pants should now be considered official canon, despite the implications of the white panted action figure.
From everything that I’ve researched no one seems to have realized that one quick corridor scene is in fact a display of Wullf Yularen’s full uniform in motion.
So in the future whenever you’re discussing Star Wars or Star Wars Costuming with your friends, family, and colleagues and find yourself in an argument over the uniform of Wullf Yularen or of the ISB in general (as I’m sure happens on at least a weekly basis) feel free to point them in the direction of Mindless Philosophy and I’ll be glad to set them straight!
A piece of fan art in the Clone Wars style which incorrectly depicts Wullf Yularen wearing white pants.
Mindless Philosophy 