M is for Mean Marine Machine

I think I have Peter Evans to thank for two of these, I say 'think' in that grudging way, what I mean is I know I have to thank him for at least one of the carded sets, but can't remember if I picked the other one up or whether he in fact gave me both...but thank you Peter!
Baravelli were to Italy what Giant were to the US...no they weren't, they imported all manor of stuff, and held franchises for Fujimi and other household names, so were much bigger than Giant ever were. However in the Toy Soldier world, they were very similar; a limited range of Hong Kong imported figures in various packaging formats produced between sometime in the 1960's and the late 1970's.

Before the Airfix rip-off boxes similar the the Atlantic 'blue' boxes, they used rack-cards like these, and a peer into the gloom of ancient worn bag reveals a right old mixture of figures, but we'll look at them in detail below.

Another set, only two figures this time along with the quite common HK ships they turn-up all over the place and a couple of hard plastic MTB's

The later boxes for 50460 American Marines, I don't know where I got the Blue-box artwork from but if you recognise it let me know and I'll remove it if you wish, sadly it hasn't reproduced well but the later 'red' box is a lot better, being a direct scan.

The full set of poses as found in the upper bag, all 7 of what would (at the time) have been the 54mm Airfix US Infantry, along with a couple of Russians and a German also from the 54mm range. The others are a French WWI standard-bearer and one of Monty's Desert Rats.

The contents are all the more confusing as they - Baravelli - did produce a set of the 1st version Marines in the later boxes? The real similarity with Giant is that they used one supplier (apart from those ships at least!) so they have a certain Baravelli 'feel' to them, slightly better than the average HK figures and with decent Airfix style bases, glossy plastic which rarely brittles- if at all?