About Me

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No Fixed Abode, Home Counties, United Kingdom
I’m a 60-year-old Aspergic gardening CAD-Monkey. Sardonic, cynical and with the political leanings of a social reformer, I’m also a toy and model figure collector, particularly interested in the history of plastics and plastic toys. Other interests are history, current affairs, modern art, and architecture, gardening and natural history. I love plain chocolate, fireworks and trees, but I don’t hug them, I do hug kittens. I hate ignorance, when it can be avoided, so I hate the 'educational' establishment and pity the millions they’ve failed with teaching-to-test and rote 'learning' and I hate the short-sighted stupidity of the entire ruling/industrial elite, with their planet destroying fascism and added “buy-one-get-one-free”. Likewise, I also have no time for fools and little time for the false crap we're all supposed to pretend we haven't noticed, or the games we're supposed to play. I will 'bite the hand that feeds', to remind it why it feeds.

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Ph is for Phollow-up to Phidel's Phormer Phollow-up

So; clearly someone failed to follow my detailed directions to Bracknell and hot-footed it over to Basingrad, so the other superhero set had gone, but I grabbed this one as it had looked useful in the shots Brian sent us, and even more so in the hand or 'in persons'!

We've seen the box/book already, here it is again! With the various super hero figures and the Frozen stuff already 'in the bag', I can see myself getting most of these in the next year or two just to 'complete'!

Again; £5.99 in TXMaxx, £9.99 in WHSmith's! That's the same WHSmith who just posted a profit-warning because their Famous Five and Ladybird parodies didn't sell well enough over Christmas!

The more useful figures - I'm assuming (again? What am I like!) the middle girl is Belle (by a process of elimination), despite the figure not being illustrated (in the modelled outfit) anywhere in the book. My lack of firm knowledge in the matter being worn as a badge of pride; in going some way as to prove I've not actually seen any of these pastel-hued, mawkishly sentimental, saccharine productions!

Marida is 61mm in total, Cinderella 67, as they are [all] youngish women, this gives a scale-size requiring males of at least 70mm, but that's not such a problem with all the Bully-Heimo-Papo-Schleich et al and Early Learning/Wilco/Blue Box knock-off stuff out there?

Looking for more round the charity shops the other day I saw something else with the Marida character, she has other names in other language-markets (at least three), and two equally flame-haired daughters and would therefore seem to be a referential-nod to Boadicea / Boudicca. Somehow I can't see Disney having all-three publically raped by Roman soldiers, but - like I say - I haven't seen the movies!

The slightly less useful figures - however the mermaid will go quite well with various others including Soma's and the Archie McFee/Accoutrements hag. Likewise the Mulan character would enhance a Samurai setting and Jasmine can be used with Arabian types. Even Snow White would be useful with a paint-job, as a medieval or Renaissance 'wench'?

Assuming (from the brown hair) that the middle figure in the second-from-top shot is Belle, that leaves two other princesses illustrated in the accompanying book; Tiana and Pocahontas (both black haired) but not represented among the models, even though they could have been instead of the two horses, or one of the horses and the idiot fish!

Speaking of idiot fish, this is the idiot fish! He's very small. Along with two markedly  different horses, one (Snow White's) being quite a reasonable sculpt (stupid expression and piggy-eyes though), and a useful mount for a 54-60mm knight, the other heavier and more cartoon-like, although a bit of surgery on the 'Disney' muzzle would improve him, and make for a half-decent heavy-horse.

The idiot fish seems to be called Flounder, rather than being a flounder, but maybe he's Flounder the floundering flounder! If these three had been dropped, you could have had Belle in her illustrated costume and the two absent 'princesses'; Tiana and Pocahontas while still hanging-on to a twelve-count!

And I'm sure it's pure co-incidence that it's two of the four 'ethnics' that have been dropped!

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