G is for Gygax Monsters - Part I - Introduction

The 'Monsters', with dinosaurs and the odd prehistoric mammal, actually came before Garry Gygax nicked them, or their designs for his fledgling monster list, published as a guide to his Fantasy Role Playing system; Dungeons & Dragons, which predates the Nottingham Mafia's Wotzit-40,000, by years (indeed, GW were involved with D&D at the very start), and specifically, the 'Advanced' (AD&D) version.

 

Originally a hardbacked volume on soft low-density paper, like comic/TV annuals of the time, the frontispiece carried an illustration of my favourite, a mutated kerthunkersaur, which, due to Gygax's adoption of it, has become known as the Bulette, which presumably must be said in an outrageously put-on comedy French accent, or Belgian, like the Policeman from 'Allo 'Allo! ?

 

Other people have done most of the legwork on this one, so have a gander at these links for a better story and background than I could rehash here; 

 

Wikipedia page on Gary Gygax 

 

Wikipedia page on the 'monster manual'

Gygax story on Tony Di Terlizzi's page

 

More on DM David's page

Gygax didn't use all the monsters, nor the accompanying dinosaurs, but alongside the Bulette, he would christen two others, the Rust Monster, a mutant crustacean, and the Owlbear, which defies description, but was clearly meant to be a Prehistoric Mammal, in the vein of Timpo's Megatherium.

 

Later versions of the book were actually a loose-leaf folder/binder, and I'm not sure how complete mine is, as I don't seem to have shot the Rust Monster from either tome, but these were all taken some time ago and have been sat in Picasa since March '23!

 

I don't have an Owlbear yet, so we won't see many through this series of posts (which I'd forgotten were nearly ready, and are very 'rack toy'), and no, I’m not going to pay $500+dollars for something Hong Kong and ephemeral, which will eventually turn-up in a mixed charity lot for 50p or a couple of quid, max'!

 

These both share features of some of the other models found with the three Gygax Monsters, and the Glabrezu is very close to several, but has, here, been given two extra arms!

 

It wasn't just Gygax who used the toys though, and this Gold Key comic-book cover for Dagar The Invincible (shades of Trigan Empire or Burroughs' John Carter?) from 1972, uses one of the non-Gygax 'Gygax Monsters', if that makes sense, and we'll be seeing it in the subsequent posts of this series.

 

Really? Because I used one Gold Key image, in context, for another subject altogether; small plastic monsters, you published, the next day, a whole pageful, garnered from all over the internet, in an exercise in quality plagiarism! You might as well climb to the top of Mount Everest, with the largest bullhorn known to man, and the largest loudspeaker, and shout "I'm really insecure!" at the whole world, 'cos that's what you just told us!

 

Some Bulettes, probably three Holly Plastics on the left, a later (?), smaller copy in 'aqua' and an even smaller sub-piracy to the right, but all five have the same treatment vis-à-vis paint application, and eyes, as well as similar gate-marks and such like, which is important, as while there will be six or maybe seven posts (hopefully by the end of the week!), the narrative isn't clear and many answers will remain.

 

I suspect that rather like Tai Sang, with their many farm and zoo animals, as early generics or later under Blue Box, Redbox and Sunshine Series etc . . . Holly may well have had more than one production line, or factory, or farmed some of the work out, to mates, or other enterprises, with duplicate tools, or permissioned copying, to fulfil orders?

 

This is my sample as at 2021, with the Lik Be (LB) minis in the top left corner, and most of the rest conforming to the general look of Holly Plastics, however markings are different and that's how they are sorted for now. You can see (it's not the best shot, and Picasa is currently refusing to open it?!) that most of the output is more conventional dinosaurs, and ones we have seen here before.

 

The big bag, bottom centre, for instance, is basically the same contents as the set Bran Berke found for a previous Rack Toy Month, years ago, in a seaside shop in Blackpool (I think, I did ask him, but it would take too long to find the eMail!), and were, therefore still around until quite recently, while others have had an over-marking, or re-marking with 'China', since the heady days of the 1970's.

 

Here's a mixed lot, also looking like Holly with no Gygax's, but it does carry the full size versions of the two mammals, also copied by LB as mini's, in the prehistoric set we saw here, while the arrow-headed amphibian (Diplocaulus) to the far right is another one (like the Owlbear) which seems harder to find than most of the others, suggesting a tool was lost or damaged, or lost a couple of cavities, early in the full set's run?

 

Awesome Kids recent'ish set of Britains Deetail knight knock-offs, with four of the 'winged wisker' monster (Glabrezu), upon which the artwork for the above Dagar #2 comic may have been based (there are three very similar sculpts, none of which Gygax used), so some of the tool's cavities are still around, even if the whole set, or most of its parts, are lost, or, just lost on a shelf somewhere?!

Again, no Gygax types, and while you might think this to be a generic for Woolworths or Littlewoods, the old catalogue people, they had 3-spot ladybirds, for the famous clothing range, until recently, while the equally famous, or even iconic Ladybird Books had a 7-spot, so I guess this was just bandwagoning, and I think they might have been in WHSmith around '78/79? But I'm not sure why I think that?

 

Anyway, there's lots more to come, and hopefully it will all start to fall into place, or at least, make a little more sense by the end of the week. So: not really 'Gygax' monsters at all, but always going to be Gygax Monsters now!