Nov 5 2012

Doctor Who: “Pyramids of Mars” Collectors Set by Character Options

There’s something comforting about having a new classic Doctor Who action figure set after the news that the modern figures are changing to 3 ¾” scale. Even though this set was planned long before the demise of the 5-inch modern figures was announced, I still find it something of a reassurance that this line will go on. While I’ve still got a couple of past Classic Who sets to pick up, I had to buy this one right away simply because “Pyramids of Mars” is one of my all-time favorites. Not only is it Tom Baker and Liz Sladen at their best, but it has a great story, superb acting, and it even looks fantastic. Even in the dark days when most of my Who collection consisted of scratchy recordings off of PBS, I always had an official release of this one on VHS or DVD.

This set comes in a nice window box with a printed backdrop inside. It uses the new classic-style box deco, although the “Doctor Who” logo looks different from the ones on the last classic sets I picked up. The window shows off the figures very well and the back panel of the box has a blurb about the story. Oddly enough, the set is called “’Pyramid of Mars,’ Mars Collectors Set.” At first, I thought it could be to distinguish it from some “Pyramid of Mars” figures that were released a while ago in the UK, but those were released in a “Fourth Doctor Adventure Set.” More likely, it’s part of the double-dipping shenanigans that I’ll touch on later. The set includes an unmasked Sutekh the Osiran and his two Guardian Mummies. Let’s bust them out and see what we’ve got!

Let’s start with Sutekh. If you aren’t familiar with the story, Sutekh is a very powerful and very evil alien being kept prisoner in a kind of stasis cell on Mars. He spends the bulk of the episode trapped in a throne with a mask on. It’s not until the end when he’s free that he reveals his “Jackal” face. [I should note here that he’s freed because a possessed Egyptologist and his force of robot mummies build an interplanetary missile and use it to destroy the power source of the prison on Mars. God, I love Doctor Who! –FF] Here’s where those shenanigans come in. It’s probably a safe bet that most collectors were hoping to get the more iconic version of this figure with the mask on. When the set was first revealed, the optimistic speculation was that he would have interchangeable heads. Alas, this is a case where CO is going to force us to double dip by undoubtedly releasing a masked Sutekh later on. And naturally they release the less desirable one first so collectors will buy it just in case it’s the only one released. If this were any other line of figures, this sort of thing would enrage me, but I’m willing to do whatever it takes to keep the Classic Who line afloat. If that means I’m going to buy another masked version of Sutekh later on down the road, then so I shall!

As for Sutekh himself, he’s a relatively simple sculpt but he suits the character’s on screen appearance quite well. His sculpted robes are nearly all black with a little red piping and red gloves. His head looks a lot better than the prop that was used for the actual character in the show and the glowy paint used on his eyes is pretty effective. Seriously, when I first saw them I thought there was some light piping going on.

Sutekh looks like he has pretty good articulation in his legs, but it doesn’t really matter because his sculpted robes renders all articulation below the waist useless. The arms, on the other hand actually have ball jointed shoulders, hinged elbows, and swivels at the biceps and wrists. Sutekh can also swivel at the neck and waist. All in all, not bad. Sutekh doesn’t need to be able to do acrobatics.

And then you have the Guardian Mummy Robots! Hurray for Classic Who army builders, especially when you can get two in one box. The regular flavor Mummy Servo Robot was originally released as a single carded figure. The ones in this box are the special variety and identified as such by their snazzy gold wrappings. I was expecting these guys to be straight repaints of the original Mummy figures, but there’s actually some re-sculpting going on here. All of the gold bandages are newly sculpted onto the old body making them stand out pretty nicely, and they still have the control pyramids on their backs.

The Guardian Mummies feature the same articulation as the old one. The arms rotate at the shoulders; have hinged elbows, and swivels at the wrists. The legs rotate and have lateral movement at the hips, hinges at the knees, and swivels at the ankles and thighs. He can also swivel at the waist. For a lumbering mummy robot, the articulation is pretty good.

The “Pyramids of Mars” set retailed for $29.99 at WHONA, my favorite Doctor Who e-tailer. It’s not a bad price for three figures, but then this set may really divide collectors who are waiting for the masked Sutekh. More than anything else, I’m anxious to see what or who he will be released with, since CO rarely releases single carded Classic Who figures anymore. Personally, I’d be fine if they released him with two regular Servo Mummies, because having the Guardians outnumber the Servos in my collection, well that just seems wrong.

Nov 4 2012

It’s November… It’s 4th Quarter… Release the hounds!!!

Technically, it’s been 4th Quarter for a month now, but November is when things start to get ugly. Yes, my job tends to put me through the ringer this time of year and when you add that to the fact that the Holidays have a way of draining me both emotionally and financially, it can sometimes have a negative impact on the doings here at FigureFan.

Last November, the FigureFan bus not only went on hiatus, it actually hit a speed bump, lost control, swerved off the road into a pile of babies, blowing up that pile of babies, and then sank into a flaming tar pit. This place came to a dead stop for the entire month of November and most of December. It was because my life was the Perfect Storm of stress and complication. Work was running me ragged, there were relationship issues, and the Holidays were seriously stressing me out. When I wasn’t at work or fighting with my psychotic ex, I was planted on a barstool somewhere drinking myself into oblivion and watching cat shows on Animal Planet. Folks, you know you’re spending too much time at a bar when you can ask them to turn the channel from Football to Animal Planet and they’ll do it for you.

Patron to my left: “Hey! I was watching that! What’s with the cats?”

Bartender: “Are you going to drink an entire bottle of Glenlivet? No? Well this guy is, so shut the hell up and watch the cats!”

I don’t think that’s likely to happen this year. I’ve made some positive adjustments in my life. I’m a lot higher up on the food chain at work and my ex has thankfully fled the state to locations unknown. Sure, I’m still bound to get preoccupied with work here and there, but I really plan on using this place as a safe harbor in the stress storm. I also plan on doing most of my medicinal drinking right here at FigureFan Central with FigureFeline so I can positively channel my drunken ramblings into content.

Ok, so with that behind me… let’s talk some toys…

November also means Marshalls and Ross set up their super clearance toy departments! Yes, these havens for budget clothing and home décor expand their usually pitiful offerings of clearance toys just in time for cheap well-intentioned grandparents to get their grandkids all of those toys that were on their Christmas lists… and by that I mean last year’s Christmas list. Last year, these stores were an absolute cornucopia of things that I needed to fill in my collection. Not only did I find almost every Reveal the Shield Transformer I needed, but I also got all the GI Joe 25th Anniversary vehicles and comic packs that I was missing. It was amazing!

Well, I dropped in to both stores on Friday and was pretty disappointed. Ross was just like Ross at any time of the year. It’s always hit or miss. The only thing they had of note was some of the 6-inch Thundercats. I blew out of there pretty quick hoping for better luck at Marshalls.

Last year, Marshalls was the better of the two. They had about six tables loaded with cast offs from the big box’s  action figure aisles and the usually sparse shelves of their Toy Graveyard were now bursting. This year? Not so much. In fact, it wasn’t much better than Ross on a really good day. They only had a few extra tables set up and those were all devoted to Barbies and other dolls. The action figures consisted of a metric shit ton of Iron Man 2 figures, a bunch of Dark of the Moon Voyagers and Deluxes, and more Ban Dai Thundercats.

I was going to pick through some of the Iron Man 2 figures and get a couple of DotM Voyagers, but for some reason the lines were ridiculously long, even at 10:30a on a weekday. I decided that I’d poke around a little more, but unless there was something better, like something I absolutely needed, I would just come back another time and see if they put more out.

Yeah, I did find that one item that made me stand in the line, but I’ll get to toward the end of the week. This week’s features will be back to a state of glorious randomness. Look for some Star Trek, Transformers, Hot Toys, Doctor Who, Star Wars, and even some GI Joe. For now, I’m going to go brood over the fact that my three-day weekend is more than half over.  

Nov 3 2012

Transformers Fall of Cybertron: Jazz by Hasbro

With my Xbox still on the repair heap, I haven’t progressed past the first four levels of Fall of Cybertron. At this rate, I may just Red Box the PS3 version so I can do it. In the meantime, I continue to experience the game vicariously through the toys. Today, we’re checking out Jazz, who was a pretty cool character in the game… at least what I’ve been able to play of it.

Jazz is branded as part of the return of the Generations line. We last saw this packaging when we looked at Fall of Cybertron Shockwave, and I still love it to pieces. I fully approve anytime Hasbro uses the old G1-style grid pattern on their packages and the character art is pretty great. Jazz comes carded in his robot mode with his blaster pistol beside him. The back of the card has a little bit about his character and Tech Specs. Hurray for Tech Specs! Everything about this packaging is love, so much so, that it almost made me buy that shitty new dumbed down version of Cybertronian Optimus Prime. Almost. Instead, I just ran home and hugged my beautiful but overly complicated War for Cybertron Optimus.

 

Let’s start with Jazz’s alt mode. I really dig the various Autobot Cybertonian modes in these games. They walk the fine line of being sort of alien and yet still reminiscent of the Earth style alt modes that we associate with these characters. I’m not crazy about the way the unpainted white plastic looks, but I do appreciate all the sculpted panel lines in the mold. Jazz’s weapon plugs into the top of his vehicle mode, allowing him to dish out a symphony of hurt even when he’s not in bot form.

Transforming Jazz into robot mode is pretty simple in theory. Swiveling around his torso into the right configuration is kind of fidgety at first, but everything else is woefully simple for a Deluxe Class figure. I’m pretty sure I could come up with a handful of recent Scout/Basic Class toys that have more involved engineering. That could be good or bad, depending on how much you want your Transformers to challenge you.

In robot mode Jazz is… ok. I’m still not at all happy with the look and feel of the bare white plastic. It kind of feels cheap, although again the detailed panel lining in the mold helps a bit. The biggest flaw with the figure is the way Jazz’s head just kind of hangs there in midair. It just looks odd. Also, I really don’t get what Hasbro is doing with the extra fake wheels in the robot modes these days. I just saw this in TF Prime Cliffjumper and Bulkhead, and here it is again. The only difference is these are actually painted and more obvious. Why have three pairs of wheels showing on the robot when the vehicle only has two pairs? Why, Hasbro? WHY? Hang on, I need a sip of Jameson. Whiskey makes everything better… let’s move on.

Jazz features serviceable articulation, and a brand new style of ratcheting joints that I have not seen in Deluxe Transformers before, nor do I really see the point. They’re not as versatile as ball joints, and considering how small the figure is, I don’t see the need for the stronger ratchets.

I think what disappoints me the most about Jazz is his size. In the game, he’s paired up with Cliffjumper and he’s a bit too small when standing next to my War for Cybertron Cliffjumper. To be fair, the problem lies more with the WFC Bumblebee and Cliffjumper molds being too large when compared to the other Deluxes, like Optimus Prime and Megatron. So it’s not all Jazz’s fault and the two bots certainly look great hanging together on my shelf.

One might argue this could be a conspiracy to sell collectors a new Cliffjumper figure, but I doubt he’ll be remade in the Fall of Cybertron line. I don’t think Hasbro could possibly make that design work with the cuts they’ve been making to the Deluxe figures these days. Even if they did, I wouldn’t pay more money for an inferior figure, and that’s why you won’t see me feature the Fall of Cybertron Optimus Prime here anytime soon. That figure is a joke compared to the War for Cybertron version. I know what you’re saying, you’ll buy him when he’s repainted as Ultra Magnus, won’t you? Shut up!

In fact, while we’re on the subject, it’s interesting to stand Jazz and Cliffjumper together and compare them to see just how many cuts Hasbro has had to make in the line as of late. Cliffjumper isn’t quite two years old (I bought him in December of 2010) and at the time he was about $13 at Walmart. He’s bigger, his plastic feels better, the paint apps are more intricate, he uses some translucent plastic parts, including two built in retractable energon blades, the engineering is far more complex, and he has far more articulation, and he came with a gun. Even if we write off the two dollar price difference to inflation, you were still getting a lot more toy back then for the same price.

It should also be considered that no one really expected War for Cybertron to be the runaway success that it was and Hasbro never really committed to backing the game with a lot of figures. It was something of an experimental side line and only produced a handful of Deluxes. The success of Fall of Cybertron was all but guaranteed and Hasbro expanded the line with a lot more figures. And yet still, the limited, experimental line of figures, from two years ago, is far superior.

Sorry, Jazz, I didn’t mean to use your spotlight to get on my soapbox, but I thought it was an interesting illustration of just how much toy companies, particularly Hasbro, have to cut back on what we’re getting. There’s a reason Hasbro is pushing the Cyberverse line so much, because the figures use less plastic and less engineering. Of course, we’ve also seen it in the articulation in lines like GI Joe Retaliation and Avengers, and it seems particularly obvious in lines like Transformers where you can’t reuse parts like you can with Marvel Legends, Marvel Universe, or DC Universe Classics. All that having been said, Jazz is a solid enough figure. I don’t hate him, but he certainly has his issues, probably the biggest of which is his price tag. At $15, he’s just not a terribly good value.

Nov 2 2012

Charmed Series 2: Paige by SOTA

And we’re back to check out another one of the lovely ladies from Charmed, a show that I have never seen and know next to nothing about. But, hey, if I could do this for Xena’s figures than why not for these gals? Series 2 sees the same three girls in some kind of skimpy pagan witch outfits, and who am I to argue with that? This time we’re checking out Paige, and she comes with a piece of the Series 2 display set.

SOTA has changed up the packaging a bit, but as we’ll see, there are a number of significant differences between this Series and the first one. This time, the figure comes in a sealed clamshell, which displays everything quite nicely. Originally, I was under the impression that these were some kind of convention exclusives, but the $14.95 price tag makes me think otherwise.

According to the great celluloid oracle known as IMDB, Paige is played by Rose McGowan and amazingly enough this isn’t the first time the actress has been given the action figure treatment. I guess SOTA’s figure looks a little bit like her. I’ll confess she looks rather stoned, but otherwise, she has a pretty good head sculpt with some precise paintwork. The hair is sculpted and left just above her shoulders so as not to interfere with the neck articulation.

The rest of the body sculpt looks like Paige is cosplaying Leela from Doctor Who. Her outfit consists of a necklace, a leather bikini top and a soft plastic skirt. She has wrist bracers and armor plates on her boots. There’s nothing outrageously noteworthy here, except for maybe the boots that really capture a kind of calfskin finish particularly well. The aesthetics of the body sculpt are definitely affected by the increased articulation. And speaking of articulation…

Yeah, the first thing I noticed about the figure is that SOTA didn’t half-ass the articulation in this second series. Paige is fully articulated, and I mean fully. You get ball joint in the neck and shoulders, and the arms now feature double hinged elbows, as well as swivels in the biceps and wrists. Below the waist you get ball jointed hips with swivels, and the legs feature double hinges in the knees, hinged ankles, and there are even hinges in her feet. The elbow and knee hinges are constructed with plates to try to lessen the unsightliness of the hinges, but because this figure shows a lot of skin, points of articulation really intrude.

The paintwork here is pretty iffy, mainly because I’m not at all happy with the flesh tone, which looks more ashen than natural. In fact, it makes her look sort of dead. The paint also flakes and rubs quite a bit near her joints. All of these issues conspire to make what could have been a very attractive figure rather awkward.

As with the Series 1 Phoebe figure, Series 2 Paige is almost overshadowed by her diorama pieces. You get a dungeon-like stone wall with a torch, a floor piece, a box, and a chair with a pillow. According to the pics on the back of the package, the three girls are supposed to sit on their chairs raised up on the box. I’m thinking the dungeon backdrop will make for some good Classic Who dioramas, which brings me back to the real reason I probably bought this figure.

These Charmed figures definitely illustrate the fact that you can’t always have it all. Phoebe was a better looking figure with severely limited articulation. Paige is a superbly articulated figure, but the aesthetics suffer for it. Honestly, though, if Paige had been given a proper flesh tone paintjob, rather than looking like she’s either made of stone or grey zombie flesh, I think she would have been greatly improved. As it stands, I’m just glad to have her display pieces. Now, whether or not I’ll ever pony up for the other figures to finish it, well that remains to be seen.

And that wraps up my Toy Show Excursion Week. I didn’t get to everything, but I’m anxious to move on to some other things, so I’ll be parading out the rest of the stuff in the weeks ahead. I do have a few other themed weeks planned, but I’m holding off for a while because it’s been a while since I just spent some time randomly whittling away on my pile of new acquisitions.

Nov 1 2012

Charmed Series 1: Phoebe by SOTA

Toy Show Excursion Week continues and today it takes a weird left turn with a couple of the odder purchases I made. Yeah, two of the in-package figures I got were from SOTA’s Charmed series. I had no idea what they were at first, having never seen the show, but when I saw the SOTA Toys logo, I went crazy looking through this dealer’s stuff, hoping to find some SOTA Street Fighter in there. Everything on this guy’s table was marked at $5 or less. But, alas, no. The bulk of his wares were an odd mixture of some more McFarlane figures, a bunch of Power Rangers, and lots and lots of carded Phantom Menace figures. Nothing else held any interest for me, but I did wind up buying the Charmed figures. I’m not gonna lie, I was going to flog them on Ebay, because they aren’t terribly common and they usually go for about twenty bucks each.

Unfortunately, when I got them home I saw that they each come with parts for a playset/diorama and I got to thinking how cool it would be to have those for my Doctor Who figures, especially the Attic one, which when complete looks like it would be just big enough to put the TARDIS in, and maybe if it seemed cool enough I could find the other figures to finish it up. So, unfortunately, the figures each come from two different series, which build two different displays, which means that to complete them both, I’d be looking at getting six more figures. Sigh.

We’re going to start with the Series 1 figure, Phoebe. So, I gather this show is about three hot chicks who happen to be witches and fight evil? I probably should have done this yesterday on Halloween. Anyway, I’ve seen adverts for the show and it always struck me as being very Buffy-ish. I dig Buffy a lot, but I never tried watching this one, so I’m going to have to skip any commentary on the source material and get right to the figure.

The packaging isn’t bad, although it’s mostly functional and lets the product speak for itself. You get a massive bubble on a cardback. The bubble has to be huge to hold the base and accessories, which honestly uses a lot more plastic than the actual figure does. The back of the card shows the four figures in this series and the completed display. The figures shown on the back are earlier prototypes, missing most of the articulation in the final products, but they give you a good idea of what else was available in the series.

According to IMDB, Phoebe was played by Alyssa Milano. As a child of the 80’s I certainly know who she is, but is the likeness here a hit? Hmmm. Not really. The head sculpt is a bit too angular. If you showed me all three figures, I could probably have picked this one out as Milano, but I wouldn’t have bet on it. That having been said, it’s still a fairly attractive head sculpt with good paintwork. The hair seems like it might have been sculpted in a separate piece, but either way it works.

The figure’s body is a pretty solid effort. She’s wearing a denim half-jacket, a white boob tube, sandals, and what look to be leather pants. The jacket is sculpted as a separate piece, although it seems to be permanently attached to the figure. The little details here are good. She has some subtle muscles sculpted into her midriff, and you can see some stitching on her jacket and pants. Phoebe hands are sculpted so she could hold something, but she also comes with a second pair of swappable hands that are more open. I kind of prefer the second set. I don’t have many complaints, but in the end, Phoebe is just a figure of a girl in regular clothes. Not that exciting for someone who hasn’t seen the show.

The paintwork on my figure was tacky out of the package. Actually, to be more specific, the brown paint on her belt and on her sandals was tacky and even came off a bit on my hands. Apart from that, the paint on the figure is quite good. Painted flesh tones can often come away smudged and dirty, but hers is pretty clean. The only problem is that it does flake off a bit near her joints when you pose her. There’s a gloss black used for her pants, and even her individual fingernails and toenails are painted. All in all, this is a good looking figure.

All of Phoebe’s articulation is from the waist up. The neck is ball jointed, the arms have ball joints in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps and wrists, and hinged elbows. The figure can also swivel at the waist. From the waist down, she’s totally static, and since the bottoms of her feet aren’t even and there are no joints to tweak, it’s hard to get her to stand. It’s kind of a shame that SOTA went through all the trouble of crafting such a great looking figure, giving her solid articulation for her upper half and then skimping out on the legs. A couple of simple cuts in the hips and knee hinges would have gone a long way.

Phoebe includes one of four pieces needed to complete the Attic display base, although it’s designed so that it could be used to display the figure by itself. I’ve got to hand it to SOTA, this is one impressive extra. It comes in two pieces, so you just have to secure the wall to the floor. There are screws included, but they really aren’t necessary. The wall includes a stained glass window in semi-translucent plastic and a chest of drawers with a box on top of it. The floor has a partial rug painted onto it. Both the floor and the furniture are wonderfully sculpted with wood grain patterns. You can actually see all the floorboards. It’s really nice work! You also get a book stand and a spell book.

In the end, this figure is pretty good, but the extras are fantastic. It seems crazy to me that SOTA put so much work into this line. I know the show ran for a while, but to go all out like this for what they had to know would be niche collectibles even by action figure standards. I’d kill to get a piece-together display like this in one of the figure lines I collect. Hell, look at what I went through to finish the Hall of Justice! Unfortunately, I’m now faced with the decision on whether or not to hunt down the other three figures in this series. I can take or leave the figures, but for some reason, I really want to build this fricken Attic. In the end, though, I think the high prices of the figures will keep me in check.

Tomorrow, we’ll check out the Series 2 figure, Piper.

Oct 31 2012

Vintage Vault: Transformers Collectors’ Case by Hasbro

Hey look! It’s another Collector Case! Yeah, I picked up two of these at the Toy Show. One was for Playmates’ Star Trek line, but this one holds a lot more sentimental value for me, because as a kid, I used a case exactly like this one to cart around my Transformers. A lot of these vintage Collector Cases were more about form over function, as they didn’t tend to hold a lot of figures, and the Transformers case we’re looking at today was one of the least efficient in terms of carrying capacity. I bought this one to repurpose as a modern Transformers case, so let’s see how that worked out.

There were a couple different “official” Transformers collector cases on the market back in the day, but since this was the one that I had as a kid, it was the one that I was really gunning for. What’s here is pretty simple, as it’s just a vinyl briefcase style case with a handle that slips through a slot in the flap to hold it together. A lot of these things had snapping lock, but this one just made due by pushing the handle through a slot in the top. It’s not quite as secure as the ones with the lock, but so long as you were carrying it by the handle, it couldn’t spill open.

The artwork consists of the glorious panoramic battle scene that graced the back of the earliest G1 packages. I absolutely adore this piece of art, because it shows us that very rare peak into the franchise in its purest form, before it got so heavily influenced by the Sunbow cartoon. I got my first Transformers toys before ever seeing the cartoon, so this character art never looked odd or different to me. In fact, it took me a little while to get used to the cartoon versions of some of these characters.

Originally, the case came with a fragile, molded plastic tray that was segmented to hold certain figures If memory serves there were four slots for Minibot Cars, there were a few more slots for the regular Autobot cars, a couple for accessories, and two big ones, which would fit fit Soundwave. For my purposes, the tray was way too limiting, and I was able to get one without the tray for less. That’s a win-win.

The case worked out really well for my modern Deluxes. I was able to fit sixteen of them in there along with their accessories, and a couple of the Legends style Minibots. It’s a cool way to store the figures, and easier for me to get at the ones I want than if they were just piled in a small tote.

My case also had a sad little G1 Bumblebee rattling around inside of it. The dealer pretended he didn’t know it was in there, and tried to get a couple more bucks out of me for it, but when I told him he could keep it, he tossed it in anyway. He’s actually in ok shape, although he does have some chrome wear to the area around his head and some cracks to one of his tires. Damn, I completely forgot these little guys had real rubber tires!

Oct 30 2012

Vintage Vault: Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back: Bounty Hunters! by Kenner

“Bounty Hunters? We don’t need their scum!”

Well, apparently, I do, because against all reason and sanity, I bought a heap of vintage Kenner Bounty Hunters. It’s been about four years since I kicked the Star Wars habit. Oh, sure I’ve picked up a figure here and there, a vehicle now and then, but they were exceptions. And just because I’ve been pulling some of my left over POTF2 stuff out of storage and maybe buying some of the ones I’m missing to fill out my collection, it’s not like I was going to go back and start buying the vintage stuff again. And then this happened.

This dude at the Toy Show had one serious collection of vintage Star Wars figures laid out on his tables. All of them were in Ziploc bags with index cards saying what they were, and it seemed like all of them were in great shape and complete. He had them all neatly fanned out across two 6ft banquet tables. I think it was the mere spectacle that brought me over and started looking. I picked up a Zuckuss, (or 4-LOM, as Kenner called him) and checked him out. He was in pretty good shape, just a little bald spot on his left sleeve, and he had his distinctive weapon. I flipped him over and saw he was marked $7. Obviously, I’m not up on Kenner Star Wars prices, but it seemed like a good deal to me, or at least it would be for someone looking to buy a vintage 4-LOM.  I most certainly was not.

“Hong Kong. 1980. He’s seven bucks” the guy said, as I was looking at him. “You need any of the other Bounty Hunters?” He was grabbing other baggied figures and putting them in front of me. “You can take all five for $25. They’re all complete. The only one not in there is Boba Fett, I’m all out of The Mr. Fett!” (Yes, he said “The Mr. Fett!” …I liked this guy.) Before I knew what was happening I had Bossk, IG-88, Zuckuss, 4-LOM, and Dengar all in my hands, and I was giving the guy $25. It was like an out of body experience. In a few minutes, I had destroyed four years of abstinence.

It’s a self-contained little sub-group, I told myself. I mean, sure now I’m going to have to track down a Boba Fett to go with them, but that’s it. I have a nice little band of vintage Bounty Hunters to stand on my shelf. But then I’ve already thought about picking up a set of vintage figures to display on my Tattooine Skiff. So at this point, anything is possible.

I’m not going to say my piece about each individual figure here today. I’m saving that for when I can take the time to do some proper comparisons between the vintage figures and the ones that have come since, and quite frankly that’s likely to be a week all to itself.

So there you go. Was it a momentary lapse of reason? Well, I’d love to say I regret buying them. I’d love to say that I got home and dropped them into a tote to forget about them because they don’t fit anywhere in my collection. Instead, they landed on my desk, and that’s where they still remain. No, I won’t lie; it’s a hoot having these guys lined up beside my computer. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen any of them in person and I thought they’d look dated and primitive, but they don’t. They look great, represent a huge part of my childhood, and I’m actually amazed at how well they hold up.

Tomorrow we’ll keep the vintage ball rolling with a quick look at a piece of G1 Transformers goodness…

Oct 29 2012

DC Universe Classics Wave 18: Toyman by Mattel

I was really hoping to snag some of the older DCUC figures at the Toy Show, as there are still quite a few missing from my collection. I figured at worst case, maybe I could get Etrigan or Orion, or best case snag Giganta. Unfortunately, the DCUC pickings were slim, and what was to be found was crazy expensive. Someone had $25 on an Eclipso! When I asked the dealer, “what up with that?” he merely informed me that Mattel don’t make DCUC no more. Yep, I got schooled! Anyway, I did manage to pull Toyman out a bin where he was chilling with some Biker Mice from Mars and vintage He-Mans, and miraculously enough he was still clutching on to both of his accessories by way of invisible rubber bands!

So, no packaged shot, although I should have taken a picture of the tote he was lying in. I’m not worried about missing the packaging or the C&C part. Despite growing up with Super Friends, I absolutely hated Wave 18 of DCUC and skipped it entirely when it was released. The only figures I was interested in were Captain Boomerang, Black Vulcan and Toyman, and I sure as hell wasn’t about to buy the rest just to build Apache Chief, so I always planned to pick up these three later on, loose, and cheap.

The Toyman character is certainly a distinctive enough looking fellow and from sculpt to coloring, this guy is a gorgeous figure and totally hits the mark. The torso and legs are pretty standard DCUC buck, but Mattel went with the longer, lankier, double-hinged arms, which are more in line with the character. The cowl is a separate piece, which flares up at the shoulders and mates very nicely with his crowned jester hood to look like it’s all one piece. Naturally, they went with the pupil-less eyes, and the exposed lower half of his face is just perfect.

Toyman’s coloring is as bright and gaudy as it should be. The unpainted yellow plastic on the torso and arms looks great. Sometimes, I have issues with the yellow plastic used by Hasbro and Mattel, but it looks fine here. His vest is painted with a matte black to match the hood and cowl. He’s got a red and yellow belt, and his pants are orange with blue boots. I wouldn’t have changed a thing.

Oh look, accessories! Toyman comes with a toy top grenade and a spinning yo-yo of death. The grenade is brightly colored and looks great. I also love how his left hand is sculpted so that he can hold it in a tossing position. The yo-yo is also excellent and includes a string attached to a plastic ring that can slip over Toyman’s hand. The figure would have been fine on his own, but these extra accessories are so well executed they really round out the package nicely.

Toyman features most of the standard DCUC style articulation, but as already mentioned he does have the atypical double-hinged elbows. As for the rest, his arms have ball joints at the shoulders, swivels at the biceps and swivels and hinges in the wrists. His legs have the usual DCUC universal joints in the hips, swivel cuts in the thighs, and hinges in the knees and ankles. His head is ball jointed, and he has a swivel in the waist and an ab crunch in the torso.

The tub that I got Toyman from wasn’t priced, and I thought it odd that a modern figure would be in there with all the older 80’s and 90’s stuff. I asked the guy how much the figures in the bin were and then found out that it was one of these bullshit, show me what you want and I’ll tell you how much it is deals. In this case he glanced at the figure while in the middle of another transaction and just said ten bucks. Not exactly the deal of the century, but I was cool with that and Toyman was dropped into a plastic bag and added to my haul.

Tomorrow, not only is Star Wars back again, but vintage Kenner Star Wars… I knew this was going happen sooner or later…

Oct 29 2012

FigureFan’s Collectibles & Toy Show Excursion Week!

[Hey guys! It seems like an eternity since I was at this Toy Show. You see, this week was originally supposed to be last week, but with the Matty Collector Haul coming in when it did, I bumped it from last week to this week. Got it? Good! Let’s go…]

Toy Shows are a pretty big deal for me, because I live in a pretty crappy area for toy hunting. Every once in a while the local Expo Hall or Fairgrounds does an Antique/Collectibles/Flea Market type show that advertises toys and I go and have a gander. These almost always turn out to be a huge disappointment, with tables of cobbled together 12-inch GI Joes, incomplete Megos, and lots of beat-to-hell metal trains and cars. If I can find a dealer selling figures, I’ll sometimes wind up buying a couple things just so I don’t leave empty handed, but for the most part, all I get out of it is a cold hot dog and a warm can of soda. One of the few things I miss about living in the Northeast was you could find shows like this every couple of months, but down here? Bubkis!

This show, however, was considerably better, as this was an actual “Toy & Collectible Show” and it lived up to its name. There were tables with shiny mint-in-package goodies, totes full of loose crap, and everything in between! I found some really cool stuff that I needed for my collection, and some other stuff I bought just because the prices were really good and I thought I might like writing about them. A couple of weeks ago I covered about half of my Star Trek haul from the show, so this week I’ll be covering some of the other stuff I picked up.

On a depressing side note, I had a chat with one of the fellows that organized it and he said it was unlikely to be a repeat performance. He said it was a big hassle to get the dealers to come and that the first day of the show produced disappointing interest and not much in the way of sales. I can’t say as I’m surprised due to the geriatric nature of the community here, but I would have been really happy had it blossomed into an annual gig.

Oct 28 2012

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder (Nickelodeon) by Playmates

Ok, folks, I’ve had a long week and it was a busy day of debauchery yesterday, so I’m going to try to salvage what’s left of my weekend to actually rest. Nonetheless, I promised TMNT goodness, and TMNT goodness you shall have. Let’s look at Shredder.

 

Yuppers, it’s the same packaging we just saw with Splinter. I love it to pieces, while not feeling guilty about ripping it open to get at the action figure center.

Much like Splinter, Shredder’s new design threw me for a bit of a loop. It’s obviously Shredder, but I was pretty iffy on his boxy arm and leg armor. Now that I have the figure in hand, I’m still not entirely sold on it. They kind of make him look like he’s cosplaying a Transformer.  Still, there is a lot about the figure that I do like. The head sculpt is fantastic. The iconic helmet is there, and Shredder’s got some seriously mean looking pupil-less eyes gazing out from behind his face mask. I really dig his shoulder armor, and the way they float on hinges so as not to impede his arm movement. Even the scaled pattern on his chest is plenty cool.

On a side note, it looks like the leg and arm armor can be pried off of the figure pretty easily, but I don’t want to damage my only Shredder. Considering the cost of these guys, I may pony up the extra eight bucks for another and see how much better he looks without it.

Another thing Shredder has in common with Splinter is limited articulation. He has ball joints in his shoulders and hips, his head turns, he can swivel at the waist, and he has hinges in the elbows. I’m really missing the lack of hinges in the knees on this guy. I can understand Playmates investing more articulation into the Turtles, but I seriously wish they had extended that to Shredder too. He’s certainly fun to play around with, but every time I pose him I just keep thinking, “hey, dude, where are your goddamn knees?”

Shredder makes out a little better than Splinter in the weapons department, but not by much. He comes with a katana sword and two throwing stars. The stars are cool, and I’m actually surprised at how well he can hold them. The sword, on the other hand, needed to be a bit more substantial. It looks puny and the hilt rattles around in his grip when he’s holding it. Also, the lack of a simple loop on his back to store it seems like a missed opportunity.

I’m obviously at a point with this TMNT line where I am so smitten with the figures that I’m willing to forgive a lot. Shredder’s design has some issues, and his articulation and accessories are lacking. And yet I still love playing around with him and I think he looks just fine on my growing Nickelodeon Turtles display shelf. Maybe it’s the reasonable price point or just the fact that these figures are making my nostalgia senses tingle, but each figure just makes me want to get more.  In fact, if I weren’t so hungover, I’d probably head down to the store and get some of the new wave right now.