C is for Crazy Bones

The first images in this post were going to be part of the main 'News, Views . . . ' which has been building for a while, but as often happens they sort of grew a bit and became a post in their own right which -as with the Leprechaun, the Lego stuff and others - helped retain manageability in the News folder!

Originally sent in by Konrad Lesiak as examples of his recent purchases, there are three different sets of figures represented in these shots;

·         a Disney 'Frozen' Prince on the far right of both line-ups - there seem to be at least three different sets of these capsule toys/capsule-type toys around at the moment, one set was covered complete in Plastic Warrior magazine; I think I looked at another here on the Blog and this chap would appear to be from a third.

·         In the middle are what look to be three TV-related figures, Konrad reports they are marked TM & © '05 Fox Made in China, which I assume is Fox TV? Can anyone ID them?

·         The other pair looked both interestingly like 'designer toys' with a kaiju/manga look, and slightly familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on them? So I told Konrad I'd pop them into 'News, Views . . . ' and see if anyone could help.

Konrad has provided the markings on one of his as PPI 30 Worldwide (the other looks to be 33) but in both cases (and it's the left hand 'Fox' one that still needs a full ID) they were hard to shoot being grey-scale which always goes either bright white or dark charcoal under flash or in Picasa!

So, while they (Konrad's) sat in the news folder, I picked these two up in a mixed bag from one of the charity shops in town, and as well as just being two new examples, the familiarity - with a bit of colour - was greater and I thought "I'm sure I've got some of these in the attic somewhere from another mixed lot?", so off to the attic the other day where I found the rest of the post in a tub of similar mini-super deforms (Star Wars in a few days), Zomlings, Fungus Among Us &etc.

The two new ones are marked with a number and Magic Box International

By now I thought they were probably called crazy bones which was at the back of my mind, due to the fact that while the obverse's are all different, the reverse's are all similar and look a bit like vertebrae - or molar teeth-roots!

Now; I don't have a folder on the dongles for 'Crazy Bones' and the PPI folder only has a few PVC-looking LRG's of a Halloween type from evilBay, but I do have a Magic Box International folder - with only one document in it . . . Soupie's post from a few years ago.

Therefore everything I know about these comes from there, or the links already posted there, so the rest of the post will just look at these as examples - follow the links for more info. if you need it.

The above are - obviously - the yellows! From the left, the first is a sort of 'Mecha' with tampo-printed highlights in two colours, then we have what can only be described as a tracked, US-style, fire-hydrant! And; the only one here without a bonelike obverse - having full mirror-symmetry; front-to-back and side-to-side.

The last two are disembodied faces, one similar to 'The Mask' with sort of hand-feet, the other more like Laurel from Laurel & Hardy!

The odd shapes/odd colours, I call the green one 'Arrow-dildo' - ouch! The weight-lifter on the end is similar to a Zomling I picked-up in a mixed lot, but the copying will be the other way, crazy bones are earlier. The blue one is very 'designer' in execution and of a very different quality to say the silver one next to it. On the left is a telephone?

Colour-transparent red ones, we have a sort of ghost, a pumpkin and something I call 'Underpants Face'!

The metallics; another 'sort of' ghost on the left, a surprised pig in the middle (I love the colour) and the new one, a sort of designer Dunny-Bunny thing? A Wilt Dismal Manky Mouse!

Two designer types and a clear one which is so clear it's unclear exactly what it is!

I don't know for certain anything about Konrad's two grey ones but I wonder if PPI are a local Polish licence holder for these globally available lines, there are certainly limited editions, national lines and fast-food tie-ins available as reported on Soupie's post, so I suspect they might be less common ones?

I would love to spend some time following-up the links myself, but I have another 25,000 posts to get out and only the one lifetime (don't laugh - I've done about 6%!), so if anyone else does do a bit of digging; let us know what you find!

However, I'm pretty sure A) I've a similar-sized sample in storage and B) these have become/will remain common in mixed lots for the next few years/decade or so; so we will return to them, despite the fact their presence here almost certainly upsets the 'Toy Soldier' purists, but I don't call myself an iconoclast for nothing; there's no sacred cows 'ere! And it's four new tags!

Thanks to Konrad for kicking-off this little journey and if anyone can help with the Fox figures or his Gogo's Crazy Bones pair I know he'll be grateful.