S is for Swings & Roundabouts

An odd one here, and definitely from that 'We buy this shite so you don't have to' department, which has brought you so much quality tat over the years, I literally bought these knowing I was likely to be disappointed, but as they were so cheap, willing to take the hit if I got a Blog post out of them . . . this is a Blog post, but I was a bit disappointed; so - swings and roundabouts!

How they arrived, five novelty pens of Egyptian gods, in a fetching gold sprayed hard-placky, probably a cheap 'styrene, but I'll chuck ABS in the tags to cover my arse! 

There were branded to Toyvian but came [unbranded] from an Amazon warehouse so technically a  'generic' in phantom branding, and the photo's on the listing showed five different gods, but then stated they would be sent as a "random pattern", so a classic flagging of likely shite'ness in the 'small print' there!

Has it happens, getting two Bastets (insert your own joke about Amazon here), or two anything's is not so bad if you want to pair them-up either side of a doorway or something, but just annoying when you know there are other sculpts, and in fact three of the sculpts from the listing are missing!

Not strictly rack-toys, but priced in the same pocket-money / novelty brackets. And with both Anubis (jackal) and Bastet (cat) missing from the sales ads', I really can't bitch as much as I already have - here and elsewhere! A Pharaoh and Ra make up the four different ones I got, but that only brings us to problem number two.

The Pharaoh was broken! How? How do you break one (sealed) out of five (sealed together) and not the others? Probably because it was broken in the automated assembly and bagging process of a Chinese factory thousands of miles, and many months away from the ultimate delivery to my door, is how!

So, if we take the duplicate and the broken one out of the equation, only one of the five illustrated survives, with two newcomers! Suddenly seven-quid something starts to look pricy . . . we buy this shite so you don't have to!

From the back. If I wanted to use them as pens, obviously the Pharaoh's innards could be transferred to one of the others to extend their life, after they and run out, but pens, or 'more pens' is the last thing I need and they were purchased as novelty statuettes with a view to war-gaming scenery and that's where, hopefully you can see their potential . . .

. . . as here, where Atlantic's Pharaoh 'Ramses' is waved through the starg... err . . . portal to his throne room! Swings and roundabouts, init? They are what they are, and with a sand wash and matt repaint might be useful to someone! They do free-stand, without extra work, after the barrel and gubins are removed, but you'd need to fill the hole at the top.