H is for Hexbug Space!

So the reason I knew about Hexbug (previous post), to spot them at the Toy Fair, in a way that without, I would normally have walked straight past them, zoning them out as multicoloured plastic shite - how many other useful things have we missed that way, like looking for your key by doing 'Radar' eyes on the hall and somehow failing to register them on their hook by the door! . . .

 

. . . is - I digressed a bit there - because a few months earlier I had found a nice little spaceship in a Charity Shop's 50p bin, and taken it home to ask the wise coves of Brain Heiler's Faceplant group if anyone knew what it was and/or who made it.

 

The turret was a plug in and there was clearly room for more.

 

 Amelia A. Baranet answered the call not only with an ID but also with a link to the Hexbug Nano Space Cosmic Command Habitat review, which seems to have been deleted, a small chat ensued and it turned out several 'Stallions' had them, or their kid's did, and loved them, but I had already gone-off to evilBay, where I found one going cheap!

 

 

 

Turns-out, all the blue and orange bits are interchangeable with the mounting points of the buildings, vehicles and 'ship'. While, you get two Hexbugs, in way cooler colours than the everyday ones we looked at in the previous post. It's all a bit Lego or Tente, but without the studs ruining the lines of the finished constructions.

 

There are other sets, and because this one then went straight to storage (autumn of '21), we will have a box opening post in a year or two, perhaps when the existing Internet images have died-down a bit, but for now, there's tons out there if you look, and I think it'll go well with the little 20mm'ish Giant spacemen and bug-eyed Aliens?

H is for Hexbug!

Just a quickie before I go to work, a post from 2022's Toy Fair, which clearly I haven't got out in a timely manner, because it really doesn't matter! I won't be going this year at all, although I think it was last week anyway, so I didn't go this year!

Hexbug and Hexbug Nano (or Nano Hexbug) are brands of Spin Master, bought by them with all properties this time last year, from Innovation First International, who continue to trade with other non-toy brands, and which has, at its core, small battery-operated 'robotics' which move about and provide motive power for various lines, aimed both at STEM for younger kids, more generl fun toys, and pet novelties.

I'd become aware of them a year or so earlier, following a charity-shop purchase (more in a subsequent post), so was interested to see them at the show, but as you can see, little to interest Loyal (or casual) Readers, beyond the insect carcases being quite realistic as stand-alone models, without their Hexbug 'innards'.

Catalogue imagery, well, more of a trade 'flyer' really!

Packaging of the basic Hexbug units, in one's or sixes.

The insects

As you can see they are very good, and follow real life patterns of 'wee bestie'

Larger arthropods, and a sort of gecko-dragon thing!

Insect packaging also comes in singles or multiples

Cat toys!

T is for Two - Tiny Forts!

A real picasa clearer this one, but it all has to go here eventually, so let's get the box ticked and move on - unlike a policed traffic accident - there's always "Plenty more to see here"!

I bought this 'Rescue Knights' set, with a PVC dragon and no knights, while I was in a supermarket a while ago (checks image - no, there's no date!)  . . . photo says this-last May? I thought it was earlier than that!

The mag' is credited to Viacom (owner of the Paw Patrol property) and Spin Master, who might be responsible for the toys, while the toy's card is actually credited to Story House Egmont Ltd.?

It's a bit of fun, and you can see there's provision for up to three placings of the flag (the only connection with Paw Patrol being the sticker), or up to three flags. Quite sure this is bought in by Egmont from an anonymous factory in Guangdong or Szechwan and has no connection with Spin Master! Equally sure it appears on other-branded kid's magazine elsewhere in the world with other flag-stickers, and maybe toys other than a dragon?

Puppies, kittens, foals and piglets all being popular, if my non-scientific, and erratically occasional surveying of the kid's magazine-rack in supermarkets or newsagents is anything to go by! Indeed, the provided dragon doesn't fit in the locker behind the folding walls (the door is non-functional detailing), but other figures/accessories would?

Similar to a small fort made by Lido in the US, but unmarked and with different joints - slot & tab rather than Lido's opposing studs - but also sourced in the 'States, is this rather too-bright to photograph little fort. Sheet polyethylene, about 5-inches on a side with another non-working door sculpted in one of the sides; can anyone put a name to it?

M is for Monster Jam

Very much 'Bread & Circus' is the phenomena of monster trucks, or theatrical wrestling, both of which fill stadia with people who need simple, choreographed, but apparently (in the case of monster trucks - actually;) violent and relatively pointless entertainment of little consequence.

As with the various wrestling circuits, there are travelling 'circuses' of monster trucks and one is Monster Jam, whose efforts (through TV and sites like Youtube) have (like WWF) raised them to toy-worthy status, a baton Spinmaster have picked-up to run with, the interest to you - loyal readers - is that each model in the range comes with a driver figurine.

They were cheap . . . 'ish and I was feeling flush so I grabbed a couple of contrasting ones as a sample and shelfied the previous pair (we buy/shelfie this shite, so you don't have to!) and here we have Grave Digger with a vintage (Dodge?) body-style and The Ice Cream Man with an H2/Hummer type body - as both are probably large GRP 'fibreglass' mouldings, I guess that's the least salient point!

I've found three sculpts so far, a standing male, the girl on the left here holding her steering-wheel and the waving male. This one has been painted as a Neapolitan ice cream . . . geddit! . . . like I hinted-at above, it 'aint high-brow sophistication!

These will turn-up in mixed lots going forward, and probably won't feature here again!

B is for Blind-Box Buccaneers

Peter Evans either sent me these in January, or put them in the big-bags at PW in may, I can't remember, but either way; kind of him, and while deforms are even less of a 'my thing' than resin [ . . . used to be!], they are toys, they are figures and they are pirates, so Spin Master - Blind Boxes!

Like blind-bags, except they are in a box! I'm not sure if they are still in the shops but there are always a few on feebleBay, blind or opened. Obviously tied directly into the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise from Disney.

I'm guessing the gold one is a less common / limited edition thing? But the Skullopus Squidington is brilliant, he would make an excellent additional piece for fantasy role-play gaming, as a daemon of some sort, and while I'm sure the Nottingham Mafia would hate it, I think he could slide (or slither?) into a Tyranid Genestealer army effortlessly?

Can't say much else about them, if deforms are your thing you probably already know more than I ever will! Cheers Peter - loving ol' purple eyes!

T is for Thar'be Dragons!

Train failures today forced me into a toy-shop in Reading (The Entertainer) and a quick perusal left me with  a tub of shite; I mean - of course - quality vinyl shite!

Previously Blogged by Shaun at Fantasy Toy Soldiers as a movie tie-in; How to Train Your Dragon, these have been reissued to tie-in with the TV animated series.

Note that it says "1 SET". Otherwise very little on the packaging; Spin Master licensed from DreamWorks, as per the 2010 sets on Shaun's Blog. A change of title and a silver lid instead of a gold one.

Because of the three large stickers on the tub and the two card baffles within, it was not terribly easy to see the contents except insofar as there were vinyl monsters of some sort! Not being even vaguely familiar with the films (there's two now - Oscar nominated - with a third on the way!) I was none the wiser and nearly put them back on the shelf with a mental note or a quick mobile-phone photo' for the archive...

...and it was only the obvious green figure that clinched the purchase.

Once I'd got it home and open this evening, I found a descent enough pile of figures (the advertised 25), and a lid which I can see being useful in some sort of Games Workshop thing, floor, altar, shrine?

The entire contents of the tub; Shaun has a figure in his 'Movie' set I don't, but I have two copies (in two colours) of a figure not in his set? As everything else seems to tie-up, with five dragon poses in three's or four's of two colours, I'm wondering if this is due to the difference between movie and TV versions/characters?

Now that I'm familiar with the contents of one set, I'll have another look at others in different branches and see if there's an obvious variation in colours/pose numbers, or the human figure contents...but I suspect there won't be and I would have to track-down a 2010 set to get the other figure and some dark green or bright mid-blue dragons &etc...?

Top, on the left, both sides of all figures with more than one example. On the right, some of the figures are clearly marked on the bases, others aren't, even the same pose, and while the numbers are similar with the same suffix; there's no apparent sequence.

Below; Minor rant...all these companies are 'partners' with Dreamworks on this franchise...not one of them is offering figures or figural premiums with their 'tie-ins', indeed, apart from the Michaels' craft stuff, none of them is even offering playable merchandise of any kind, it's all quizzes, free cinema tickets (mail away or presentable codes) and the like...now 20/30 years ago, only one or two companies would have 'bandwagoned' something like this and they would have had physical 'toys' involved...flats, figures, badges... something! I think that's sad, it's a triumph of marketing (admittedly very successful) over service to the consumer you want to buy into this stuff.