D is for Deinos Sauros

Three quickies tonight, long day and I need a shower!

 

I shelfied this back in August and I can't remember where, but it might have been the big farm-shop up at Borden? I was tempted as I have a couple of 'dinosaur' vehicles in the stash, from the die-cast dino' collection from Matchbox back in the 1990/2000's, but I didn't, although Maisto's idea that a Honda Acty is the best thing for carrying a 22-ton dinosaur is rather amusing!

These were in The Range around the same time, and were so cheap I bought one of each, but left them on the cards, as they went straight to storage, a week or so later! A bit cartoony, but in that small bracket, where there are so many to ID one day, I thought it expedient to tick a box while I could!

While I paid too much for these, the other day! They are firmly glued-on, so not really designed for play, or at least, designed not to be pickpocketed from display-cups! Also, I don't think either would actually stand free, the raptor looks front-heavy, while the rather cow-like triceratops has uneven feet. Branded to Depesche, and out there now, as are the others.

V is for Very Fine Sight!

During Brian Berke's recent sojourn in Italy, he bought this pair of larger scale items, as rather brilliant toy-related mementos of their visit, and nothing more iconic than a Vespa moped . . . with added babalicious babe from Babalonia!*

 

In Brian's own words;

"The two wheeler riders in Naples and surrounding area are positively demented.

This may be part of the universal road rage post Covid lockdown, though I suspect they were this way before.

The roads are narrow, which does not deter 2 wheelers from passing cars both into oncoming traffic and curbside at the same time. They go down pedestrian only streets. There are the equivalent of Zebra crossings. The custom is walk across and ignore traffic? Do not make eye contact. It was quite unnerving. Two wheelers don't stop they weave around you as you cross.

So I had to purchase this as it represents the most notable memory of the trip. The scale is larger than I would like but I wanted to buy it in Italy rather than later. The figure was the only one I could find, bought in the US which surprisingly it pretty accurate in terms of rider dress code near the beach!

It has gone on display temporally while the trip is fresh in the memory."

For a speculative purchase, they work very well together, and at 1:18th scale (approximately 90/100mm or 3-inches) the bathing beauty from American Diorama looks perfect on the Maisto moped, and one can imagine her posing in the warmth of the evening's setting sun, in one of the Piazzas, while her beau fetches a soft-scoop ice-cream cone!

We have a scaler, with the Crescent shooter, it's a trope which has rather fallen by the wayside in the last few years, not least because of everything else which has been going on, but I intended to have a couple on the planned, dedicated photo-station, once I'm fully settled, and we'll get back to 'berserker' comparisons!

As part of an eclectic display of odds and ends!

Brian shot an actual one in situ!

Many thanks to Brian for these, it's nice to have something a little left-field, and with a first for American Diorama (poured PU resin), it also adds to the underused Maisto (doe-cast) Tag . . . and, it's a babe in a bikini!

* I think I nicked that from Bill & Ted!

M is for Maisto's Military Mystery - Cubeville Cary Cases

Fun one this, but a bit mysterious, I picked it up from a dealer in the market area at the Hop Farm, Beltring's big week-long combat-wombat shindig 'Trucks & Tracks' back in 2008, he only had these, but he had a mountain of them, like half a van-load, still in the outer, manila cartons.

The box shows three sets, but two of them come with the same truck, either tilted or tiltless! And I wouldn't exactly describe any of them as particularly inspiring? The feeling being that 'Military Cubeville' was a live market-test which sank with little trace!

The one I bought; Cubeville Outpost, there are elements of the much older (1970's) Monogram Pocet Force & Battle Link sets about this, but where they had a PVC or latex scenic base which squidges-up and folds away into a smaller case, the Maisto sets are larger due to the rigidity of the scenic diorama/vignette contained within.

Which - the scenic item - is a reasonable ruined dwelling with watch-tower, sandbag piles and a rather formal stack of bright-silver 'jerry' cans! I think the access ramp also has a secondary role of joining multiple units together but I might be wrong on that one?

This was placed above the carry case with a top/side right-angled window in the other side of the box (I didn't shoot it; I'll scan it sometime) and you get two quite nice figures in the 25/28mm bracket and a M2/M3 (I still don't know which is which; I think the difference is mostly on the inside?) Bradley IFV, and it's the early, pre-Gulf Wars upgrades version.

Close-up's of the two figures (it's a figure Blog!), the box isn't clear, but there seem to be six to collect, possibly seven, but it may only be four or five? ATGM looks like it might be an M41A7 Saber (improved BGM-71 TOW system), while the squad-commander with radio is pretty stanndard, post-Cold War fodder.

The mystery is they are hard to find on the Internet and there are none currently on evilBay, although other Maisto military are easier to locate, all small ranges (G.I. Joe, Military Force (upper shot), All Stars and Kid Connection), along with odd  military finished vehicles in the normal 'Matchbox' style range, most of the bottom row above.

Some, like the 'Electronic Warfare' truck above (or was it a fire appliance first!?) reappear in the other brand-marked ranges, in the truck's case as a fully camouflaged version in the G.I.Joe series . . .

. . . or even as Jurrasic Park knock-offs in the Dino Adventure line! Maisto also do military vehicles in other scales, including 1:35th and 1:16th, I think I saw a 1:48th one as well. But as to Cubeville, pulled quickly from the market I fear?

T is for Toy Fair 2019 Reports - Tobar & Schylling - Tin Plate, Rack Toys, Novelties and Die Cast

I say Schylling, but it was Tobar's stand, just that they have a close relationship with Schylling in the US (not Germany Mr. Sell; definitely not Germany) and carry each other's stuff, they also both import from Supreme (SP Toys) but more on that in a minute.

The main direction of the tie-up this year is a range of retro tin-plate, these may well be from the same source as the tin-plate tree-hangers carried by both Shylling and Ingo Roggaz's ^Z_Z (not George Zimmermann Mr. Dildobrand; definitely not Zimmermann) back in the 1990's? Particularly the small hot-air balloons? The duck on a tricycle is a timeless novelty, while the three robots cover all the tropes of their 1950's forbears.

Radio Control is getting very interesting, with new digital tech', miniaturisation and lessons learnt in the mini-drone sector being converged into smaller and more sophisticated toys at affordable prices, here a set of two 'firing' tanks are more traditional, while who could resist a digger which digs!

On the subject of construction vehicles; Maisto (a Thai-centered, US headquartered group of Chinese factories and brands) who I think now own the Bburago name (ex-Italian; Mebetoys) are another one probably coming to Tobar via Schylling or as a joint-purchase with Schylling; and here we see various die-cast construction sets in two scales and several formats along with dinosaur play sets.

Counter-display cases of more traditional clockwork wind-up and squirty-toys! Not really 'my thing' but it's nice to see these things still out there; they are the 'meat & two veg.' of toy sellers; the everyday earners.

I thought this was a lot of fun; a mini or nano-bot cockroach, with a very small motor driving (or jiggling) tiny hidden legs to propel a larger 'rubber-jiggler' shell across surfaces - what's not to like?

You can tell from the above that there wasn't much to excite plastic figure collectors on their stall this year, but it just so happened that the managing Director of Schylling was on the stall at the same time as me, and the lady from Tobar offered to get me a slot with him, I explained he probably wouldn't want a farty, middle-aged, toy-collector/Blogger trying to confirm or deny Erwin's bullshit with him (slightly more politely than I've just written-it, of course - I know how to behave in public!), however she confirmed that both companies import from Supreme (indeed; looking at Supreme's 1986 HKTDC year-book advert', the cockroach may well be theirs), have done for years and that Supreme are a stand-alone toy manufacturer.

[latter offices: Room 504-507, Tower B, New Mandarin Plaza, 14 Science Museum Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, Hong Kong]

Now most of you already know this, it is - after all - a good decade since Plastic Warrior magazine was carrying editorial provided by Tiger Hobbies on their importation of Supreme's 60mm figures, and longer since the figures were first covered there.

Tiger had through the 1980/90's being importing the first series 54mm knights and Wild West (Deetail style bases) with Strawberry Group (who further worked with 3-D Licensing) and (or alongside) Toy Major, Simba carried them too. While Ackerman and Halsal/HTI are known importers of Supreme, as are Titan, while they are now also re-packed for on-line platform Sunjade and, through Schylling via-Tobar, are - as I write - now probably in Hawkin's Bazaar?

Yet Erwin, who, electing to start pontificating only in 2015, and who clearly wasn't around to read 'from the horse's mouth' a decade ago, has decided to make Supreme his second favourite go-to brand-mark for bullshitting-about - after Blue Box!

He has variously claimed Simba 'designed' Supreme figures "...first" (with no quoted source or empirical evidence), that Supreme are actually Schylling (while trying to flog his own Schylling stock), that Supreme are a sub'er for Sunjade (when the opposite is probably true, despite Supreme having their own wholesale unit) or sub' for Schylling (who admit the opposite) and that Supreme are 'just' an exporter and x all else. Oh . . . and that Schylling - with a 'y' - are German! And while his utterances are spread over many comments, posted over four years - he managed to repeat most of them in the single comment above!

I could do a word-by-word autopsy with lots of screen-cap's, but this isn't the post, suffice to say wherever you find Mr Sell pontificating on any of the above, know that he doesn't know what he's talking about! They are all getting this product from an old, established Hong Kong toy maker; Supreme/SP Toys. Luckily for the hobby most of his nonsense-utterances are hidden in Shitestuff's comments or on the locked Vichy-forum; both places ignored by the Googlebots - phew!