O is for Odd Ossuary

OK, so to the last post on the Gogo Crazy Bones from Magic Box which have been in Picasa for too long (as have lots of other things, and they're still there!), not least because they have limited pull for most Loyal Readers, beyond this box-ticking exercise!

 

So, I bought a final big lot which came with a Gogo's tin, I didn't shoot these as to a certain extent they were much of a muchness, both with the ones in the original post, and the first few of this sequence, But note, in answer to my comment in the preceding Crazy Bones post, here we have a decent number of dark greens in both opaque and transparent. Likewise with the blues and a bunch of candy-mice and bubblegum pinks.

 

There were also a lot of the glass-clear ones, with more transparent in the reds and oranges, but it was the odds which proved more interesting and are looked at below, by visible marking, the reason being, I didn't look so closely at the original post's figures/bones;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2017/10/c-is-for-crazy-bones.html

 

. . . but suspect a few of the undecorated ones in that lot were from the groups below. It should be noted that the link in that original post also talks of Coca-Cola premiums somewhere, but below are various issues/tranches of their offerings.

 

Apparently issued by Imperial, who pops-up here, regularly retailing novelty tat, and things which look like other people's things, those non-Brabo bendies, for instance, and here they have gone to Israel of all places, and found a Laor Toys, to make several tranches of their Jojo's, over three or more years in the mid-nineties.

 

A whole set of T-Shirts?

 

I assume Tim Foot is the 'designer', however, I don't know the significance of 'Haxey', but will put it separately in the Tag list for those who do! And these seem to predate Gogo's by a year at least, however the collector's wiki, seems to have various producers of these 'bones', before Magic Box blew the gaff wide open?

 

Metallics, China, not Israel, and not of the same quality as the later Magic Box ones; quickly worn away with play, likely a high shine spray, rather than a genuine heat-coating or dip-plating?

 

Don't know?

 

So, we have a kid's craze in the mid-1990's, major player is Magic Box, an unknown Spanish company who will become a global giant off the back of them, who call their product Gogo's Crazy Bones, and which are designed to be used like Roman or pre-Roman knuckles, in a variety of games, rules for which were included in the blind-bags they were purchased in.

 

Flat colours, Metaflek, clear, semi-transparent, metallised, decorated and undecorated, possibly used as premiums by Coke-cola, Hubba-Bubba and others, rival brands, unique sets per. Country, special issues for smaller organisations (UK's FIFA World Cup team), convention and swap-meet exclusives (usually an existing moulding in a special finish), there must be several thousand to find, I've picked up a couple of hundred or so now, and that's too many!

 

A couple of useful links for those who are really interested;

 

Fandom

https://crazybonespedia.fandom.com/wiki/Crazy_Bones_Pedia-Wiki

 

Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gogo%27s_Crazy_Bones

C is for Charity's Colourful Carrion

This was a smaller purchase, around the same time as the others we've seen, i.e., more years ago than I care to remember, or have actually remembered! Nothing new with these, but the last post is interesting . . . ish!

 

Anodised metallics, with a transparent blue monkey on the left, it's actually one of the more realistic Crazy Bones so far, with the yellow tiger/cat (2nd post) a close, but demented, second, then I think we have a butterfly, a Hitler Dog (it's just the flash!), another animal and two pirate skulls.

 

Pastels and purples! See; not really a Hitler Dog!

 

Everything else Gogo! I quite like the ghost, bottom-right. Overall there haven't been many dark green ones from Magic Box, have there? The last post in this sequence will add further to the story, then we may have a more rambling post on all these blind-bag things, then there's more from Brian and some larger ones, before maybe some more Kinder and Lego?

D is for ♫♪♪ Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem . . . Crazy Bones! ♫♪♫

Another quick box-tick of colourful weirdos, this was a charity bag in 2018, I can't believe I've been threatening to post these on and off since 2016, I knew I'd put it off for a year or two (it's hardly high priority), but a decade? How fast has that gone!

 

Playing!

 

Blacks, whites and greys.

 

Some proper reds.

 

Greens.

 

Tart's nail-polish colours!

 

Camel dung!

 

Blues.

 

Oranges, yellows and caramels. 

 

Another factoid to add to the previous stuff, this was the first one with Metafleck type glitter inclusions, in a semi-transparent polymer, I have no idea if that has any significance beyond a new variant, but it might have!

B is for Bones, Box-Ticking Crazy Bones!

This is from the folder 'Crazy Bones II', except they have five mentions in the Tag list already, but some of those mentions are in passing, of the Magic Box stuff in these next few posts, when they came-in, and are now all part of the capsule and blind-bag Picasa clearance exercise!

 

The original post was here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2017/10/c-is-for-crazy-bones.html

 

And, because I've learnt very little more about them, nor given them much more thought, beyond editing the posts in vaguely artful ways (by colour, alright! I sorted them by colour!), they really are just box-ticking, so any genuine fans who might find them, might feel inclined add comments of merit (like - are there any rare ones!), for those of us who remain no more than mildly curious!

 

Metallic finished ones.

 

Comparison between the 'traditional' ones and the metallics of the same moulding.

 

Blues.

 

Reds, yellows and oranges.

 

Pastels, purples and greens.

 

A couple who came in around the same time with more mixed lots, and this was all happening back in 2018, the flood of these to charity-shops seems to have receded, but for a couple of years I was picking up huge bags of them for pennies.

 

Something to add to the previous post's info' is that it seems that a late (or even 'contemporary' a few years ago) issue of Gogo Crazy Bones had these flat, triangular bases with curved tips, I don't know the significance of them, or whether they all had them, but it was taking them further from the original 'bones' concept, which, of course goes back to antiquity and a dice-less, dice-like game played with knuckle-bones, as is Jacks!

D is for Donation - Peter - Books, TV, Movie and Licensed

OK, so we're on to recognisable characters, although these days, they are coming so thick and fast, from so many streamers, with all the old favourites getting darker (Batman) or lighter (the dreadful Disney Pooh) makeovers, alternate universe versions, good and bad clones (Spider-Man, or should it be Spider-Men now?), indeed, the whole Marvel/DC thing is disappearing up its own arse, as Andy Warhol once predicted, albeit with choicer language!

 

Another Smiley (we've seen one or two recently), but this one has some age, and unlike the modern ones with their overprinted faces, his facial detail is sculpted-in. A Batman keyring, a bit of a caricature, this one, and a Gamorrean Guard from Hasbro's Star Wars Command.

 

This is an interesting one, on one level it's a teeny novelty rack-toy from China in a generic bag, but it's in the style and material of, and the same size as, the Phidal interactive book figure Duke Caboom (Captain Canuck knock-off from Toy Story), and the suspicion is it might be from the same source/factory, maybe a cancelled order, on clearance, and is compatible with the better-known figure? We can compare in a later post of this series!

Disney . . . for girls! And we have two from Frozen, Kristoff and Elsa, both capsule toys, one Kinder the other a lesser make I think, possibly both seen before? Bo Peep from Toy Story, a larger figurine from a source unknown to me, and a less definite 'fairy' like figure, almost certainly a Kinder something?

Some Japanese Anime/Manga thing, don't know anything about him, but nice figure.

Alternate Hulk in red? Actual Hulk from Phidal, we saw another recently, but they are very different shades of green, a Hotwheels figure from Mattel, shades of General Grivous in him, a damaged LB knock-off in 50mm (in the wrong post!) and a stamper;

 

I searched 'yellow suit' and 'horns' for both Marvel and DC, and couldn't find anything looking like him, although I knew several of the new characters have a similar look, then I remembered the flyer from the Fortnite post, and there he was, top left in the 'legendary' section, so a Fortnite character.

 

Current, or very recent Kinder, in two separate lots from Peter here, and interesting as they seem to be copies (fully licensed, the Playmobil logo is all over the packaging) of the children from that toy line, but with clip-together waists, to get them into the eggs. DC Superheroes, they have all the better ones! And, I guess, you add them to your Playmobil tub, as children dressing-up as DC characters? No accessories, but the hands are full-size for standard Playmobil stuff, and - with these - there's already a lot of value packed into the standard-priced eggs.

 

No idea on the Superman, the diver is also in the wrong group-shot, but hey, there he is, definitely to be further sorted (he's probably still in a bag with the other three!) a modern stretchy-smiley, with the over-printed face and a Homer Simpson of the size of, but not from the Monopoly set, so maybe a lesser capsule toy egg issuer like Zàini - LZ or Maraja, like the Kristoff from Frozen above?

 

I suspect these are from a kid's comic or magazine/periodical, they are that two-halves-of-substantial-polystyrene, glued together, which you see with a lot of the cover-presents, we've seen Clangers, Peter Rabbit and Octonauts here so far, this is the Fat Controler from Thomas the Tank Engine I think, and clearly two different issues, one realistically finished, one all in silver?

Super-deforms, I recognise a couple of the recent Marvel Spider-People, don't know the other two. They might be from a blind-bag set Brian Berke sent images off, but I can't find them on the Blog, and I can't find them in the ever-growing Picasa queue, so possibly badly tagged, however, the search did reveal how much of this blind-bag stuff is out there, and how much we've seen, one way or another!

 

Two more, not much idea on the issuers, I think Chewy may be Kinder, the sucker Captain America is the first licensed figure of the type I've seen, but there is a growing bag of the generic cartoonish sucker 'monsters', in the style of Shopkins, Moshlings, Smashers, Ooshies or Superzings, from which he's taken!
 

On the left another superhero I think, but I don't recognise him or his line/make, then a Barbie, which looks Kinder, but is a whole figure and wouldn't fit in an egg, so some other cheap bagged, capsule or rack-toy line? Disney dwarf, and another Fortnite stamper, easier to ID, as most of the female characters seem to have those armoured knee-pads!

 

Thanks again to Peter for saving all this for the blog, quite an eclectic mix!

A is for Another Retro-Rocketeer!

This one's courtesy of Peter Evans, I said we'd probably see more, before the end of the year, and this is current, PMS carried, and a slightly different take on the pull-back motor/white-button oeuvre, but again following the trend this year, for deformed NASA astronauts, and/or cartoon spaceships.

 

You push down on the Rocket racer's head, and an energy storage spring is set to fire, a quick release and off he whizzes, release slowly though, and you get a limp phutt! It's a bit of fun which will probably get passed-on to charity, but imagine getting this in your Christmas stocking, as a kid!

R is for Retro Moon Man

If you have a theme - stick to it! This is actually the last one in the queue for now, but that's not to say I won't find another in the next few weeks, or certainly over the next few months. We're back to Legami, with another retro/deform/NASA astronaut, and this one is a pencil sharpener, with a shavings-collecting back-pack/life-support unit!

 

 

  

He also has one of those movement-triggered LED lights, hidden behind his opaque visor, so when you pick him up or shake/move him, he lights up, like some near-critical loon, about to go nuclear!

L is for Late Layabouts Languishing in Limbo!

As well as lots of old Charity shop stuff, there's also a lot of toy show/toy fair stuff, which will probably be broken-down into box-tickers, or thematic posts now, and a few Shelfies which seem to have missed previous round-ups, including these, most of which are from the Autumn/Christmas just-gone, despite the fact we did have several 'shelfie' posts from both my Camera and Brian Berke's? But there you are, they hide from me!

This is actually from 2021, so a real hider! It was, then, the latest iteration of the rather generic and poorly-detailed/sculpted 30mm'ish figures Mark, the Man of Tin, has such success, and apparent delight with, in turning them into spacemen, monsters, Napoleonics and colonial thin-red-lines, among other things!

 

We've had various shelfies of these, over the years, since they started appearing, not long after this Blog was born, and Poundland, Poundstreatcher, the defuct Poundworld Plus and 99P Stores (along with others), have all carried them, often in more than one packaging, while Amazon has carried dozens of generics and phantom-branded stuff, tubbed, carded, bagged, blistered and clam-shelled!

 

Which is why I only shelfie them, I have samples of various sizes, in dozens of colours, and they will be findable, mint, on evilBay for decades to come, as ex-stock, if you really need them in packaging! 

I hate this shite, I phuqing hate it with a vengeance, and to be fair to my sensibilities, I hated the big-head/bobble-head/nodding crap of our childhoods, and I hated the Corinthian cricketers and footballers of the 1990/2000's, it's awful stuff. I think it's an extension of clown-phobia?

 

I even hate the 'Nutty Mads' from Marx . . . "Let's apply teenage, 50's surf-culture to World War Two murderers, shall we? Make them look silly! The Butchers of Nanking will look harmless after we've given them some racially-profiled extremities!", said no sane person, ever. Garbage!

"Yeah, but the kids like them", go the supine, brain-dead, left-of-bell-curve parents! Because unethical, immoral, capitalist Toymen, who have a greater love of money than the future mental well-being of the human race, have sold them the concept, while you were getting drunk and watching porn, to blot-out current-affairs and drown the misery of your existence, you dullards!

Deep breath Hugh, take a moment, and then see if you can find some nice dinosaurs . . .

Self-branded/in-house from B&M, I think these are the latest from HGL (Grossman) or HTI (Halsall), repacked for B&M, and at less than the price of a single larger Schleich or Papo, a bloody bargain! Who wouldn't like this under the Tree on Christmas morning?

 

These - Wenno - might be a phantom brand (also for B&M) or an actual brand mark for a China toy maker (I haven't seen them at the trade-fairs?), but they seem to be newish sculpts (albeit, maybe copies of other makers) and relatively well done for the price-point, which, again, beats the big-names hands down, and I thought the giraffe was particularly well done, compared to the rack-toy giraffes of our youth!

 

 

 

We're on safer ground with Teamsters, having seen them several times before, an imported sub-branding of HTI, covering a variety of die-cast or 'toy car' lines, and I wouldn't buy any of these, new, but they will help ID loose dinosaurs at some point in the future! Also shot in B&M.

And finally a similar set, in B&M packaging, really a generic, but helping to pinpoint an origin for some of the many teeny dinosaurs, if no better candidate comes forward in the future.