N is for November's Sandown Park - Sci-Fi &etc.

On to the odd-and-sods of the last show, and these are a bit of a mix, nothing exciting, but it's all grist to the mill, and there's always something new!

 

I think the devil is probably a rather naff Valentine's Day 'thing', but it IS a bendy! While the green chap, also a bendy, is probably more modern, and wasn't easy to shoot, but I decided to leave him in his crinkled bag for now. He has something of the Muppets about him?

 

Straight from a shop-stock / counter display box, three colours/poses of the Cherilea 60mm astronauts, interesting that the whole box, only had these three poses, the non-EM2 Bullpup armed chaps? And colours tie-in with the Tibidabo issues, so I think it's fair to say the Italians just bought-in the product, but never had the tools?

 

If there's anything exciting in this post it's the left-hand of these two from Yolanda, of Spain, being a large Anime/Manga type robot, Marked Toei, while the other chap is marked Troma I think, the US pulp-Video Nasty producer, and both are the earlier polyethylene, some Yolanda were later issued in a softer PVC-substitute.

 

Adrian gave me this, his head is broken-off, so will need pining at some point, but in the last few years several whole, and part, Cherilea Batmans and/or Robins have come in with one or two bases, so I'll sort them all into the best pair and Blog them again properly, one day!

 

'Gygax' spikey, one of the Crossbows & Catapults figures mentioned the other day, home-painted and play-worn, he needs a good clean, along with a Bandai Power Ranger's villain - I think!

 

What looks like a 1:48th scale aircraft kit's gunner, and one of the Aurora figures from the Lost in Space set with the rock-throwing cyclopean alien. He's lost his hand, but as a first sample, will do for now, although I may have these in white-plastic (Mobius) somewhere?

S is for Seen Elswhere - 40mm Comansi / Novalinea

These were not only seen elsewhere - on the intermawebby thing - recently, but are the shots (in colour) which illustrated my (black & white) article in One Inch Warrior magazine about . . . err . . . 20-years ago? I really don't know where the time goes, but I suspect Hell has played it's part in stealing the hours, days and years! Only scans, and lowish-res', so captions, rather than full blurb, they'll be looked at properly, again, another day.

 

Long boxes, I believe these were saved from a damp shed in Malta (?) or Cyprus, by that stalwart finder of nice things, Mike Harding, back in the early 1990's.

 

The box art from the three of them.

 

Loose figures as found in the sets, unpainted examples are from the later Novalinea branded sets, painted will be Comansi issued.

 

Horses, Indians get a quiver of arrows,

cowboys and cavalry get a sheathed rifle.

Accessories are the same as for the 54mm range.

Except the Teepee / Ti-Pi / Wigwam, which is downscaled.

 

Both sides of a flyer, which came in a larger set.

This was in the tub my loose samples came from, it went the way of all flesh, being very discoloured and brittle.

Comparison between the Novalinea box and one of Esci's classic red-box sets, a clear attempt to impersonate and (given the contents) mislead. And a bit naughty as Franco died in 1976, while Spain would join the EU in 1986, so there wasn't the 'Franco / dictatorship' excuse of being 'out in the cold' to justify such piracy against a near-neighbour?

Base marking of the 40mm figures.

I'll do a better job in the future with photography!

The Yolanda mark is the same 'Saloon' font, in the same 'TV' frame!

This was the label from a tub of 54mm figures, and the reverse of the sheet shows it to have been recycled from the Thunderbirds line, which included new character figures and some of the earlier Ovni ("UFO") space figures reconfigured as 'red-shirt' army-builders!

F is for Follow-up's to Donation Posts

A few things which have been raised after recent posting one way or another. The cream-white Cowboy flat's from Chris HAD had a mark, not only that but originally I had an email chat with Chris, in which they came up, so how I forgot I don't know, elsewhere it gets excused as brain-freeze I believe, I'm blaming the amount of stuff which has come in recently, and the fact that it keeps going to storage in dribs & drabs!

Anyway, I've adjusted the post and added Vortella Plastic to the tag-list, as that was the mark!

Further to Spectrum Steve's ID of the Pink Panther as being Dinky, I shot him with a few others which have come in recently, and so above, from the left we have Yolanda large and Yolanda small; both in the style of bendies, but actaully 'solids' from Spain, a duplicate key ring from a set we saw a year or two ago, another key-ring, probably Hong Kong, but new to me and then the Dinky, on the end.

While the bad guy from the Black Caldron cereal premiums in the same post hadn't been undercoated for painting, well, actually he had . . . but that wasn't the comment-worthy thing about him - he was a home-cast copy in solid pewter/whitemetal!

A comparison between the new - white - duck and the older 'Hubley' one in red, except all the Hubley's I can find are shades of brown, or white, while I have black, red and yellow, so possibly a European mould-swap or license involved there? The new one is a nicer sculpt with better wing-definition, and feet - more realistic overall.

I've also had a few more of the approximately 54mm Xandria's come in since Theo's stuff was posted, I think I said four were in the post at the time, but I forgot I'd had a fifth come in with a mixed Key-ring lot, a while ago; the lady on the left.

From the left; Unknown (Cinderella trying on the slipper from the fairy tale 'Pixies'?), Krent Kruidenier (Krent the grocer. a De Betuwe jam premium, seen before), Pied Piper of Hamlyn (Grimm's?), Bertje Big (Bertie Pig (?), another De Betuwe jam premium) and a Witch - another fairy tale Pixie?

Note Bertje's over-all PVC-vinyl trousers, the pattern making him look just like Podgy Pig from Rupert Bear, in his tweeds, who - when rendered in colour - is also often drawn as white, rather than pink? As Rupert dates from the 1920's, any plagiarism is Dutch I'm afraid! But, 1950's fashion on the farm, where you find pigs . . . I suspect more of a parallel evolution, there's only so many ways to anthropomorphise an animal so it's still recognisable!

H is for How They Come In - Another Box From Peter

Mr. Evans, co-founder of Plastic Warrior magazine, has kindly sent the Blog another box of goodies, this time with no warning, and my assistant didn't allow time for full opening of the treasure-chest either; before she downed-tools and went to sleep in the lid!

It comes before I've had time to fully sort-away the last lots from Peter, Chris and Jim, and a frantic photo-session left another bunch of fledgling articles in the queue and a host of mental notes to dig-out this or that for more expansive posts at some point.

The trouble is - and it's a nice trouble to be in - I'm adding lots of nascent articles to the queue, photographing loads, bringing the two collections together and such like, but . . . time moves on with hideous rapidity, it's only a few months to RTM, ie; a year since I got everything out of storage, it's already four months since Christmas!

Yet I've barely begun to get on top of the consolidation task (I've been sorting Hong Kong AFV's this week, alongside the Peter parcel, an eBay lot and several charity-shop finds) while those who have contributed stuff will know how much of it has yet to appear - I can only say what I've said before - it all will, eventually!

What I finally recovered from under the nose of my sleeping assistant! You will recognise the vehicles as having previously been 99p Store or Poundland (about three or four years ago), now in new packaging/brand marks, the animals in the other blister-card seemed - from a cursory glance - to be from the old unpainted Rado Industries mouldings, but they are actually different, just similar, especially the big cat with spots.

In a plain-white polymer with some whacky paint (the elephant and lion are over-sprayed silver and gold respectively!); we will look at them closely along with the contents of the pack underneath in RTM - if I remember!

The Simpson's character set (some capsule toy/blind-bag thing?) is lovely; they are 'unit-scale' so Marge ends up smaller than her baby, due to her large beehive bouffant! And as Simpson sets go, a good selection of characters with 24 of the most common here in 25-35mm.

The two 'detective' rabbit babes (the one on the left is holding a magnifying glass) seem to go with the Sherlock Homes type in orange with the gun - all three are PVC and marked Yolanda. The 'mouseketeer' is a crumbly-rubber and unmarked, he's lost an arm and his sword, but goes with another - already sorted - in blue or green somewhere, so a growing 'sample' nevertheless!

Some other highlights include a couple of Phidal princesses we may or may not have seen here. It's a fact that those who worry about the state of the 'hobby' need to understand the hobby is a collective of 600-2000 individual ideas about what 'The Hobby' actually is, while the toy industry is quite healthy and full of figures - Phidal are producing more new sculpts per year than Airfix ever did, that they aren't WWII combat troops is of no interest to today's kids, who want TV/movie related stuff!

Three Crocco for Wheetabix figures are next to the Phidal's and a blob of Fischer PVC is on the end of the upper row - Paulinchen from Fix und Foxi's Pauli family.

The lower row consists of mostly older characters, including another of those French (maybe Pif Gadget) figurines, two Kinder Smurfs, a Miss Piggy from The Muppets a couple of unknown (to me)'s and the annoyingly sensible one from Scooby Doo as a pencil top. The key ring is from one of several anthropomorphic insect movies (Bug Life, Antz, or the other one!) from the rush of them awhile-back.

These are interesting in that I have a London Toy Fair report in the queue for a Totaku, which shows another healthy aspect of the 'industry', with the Schleich/Papo/ELC (et all) action-figure sized, synthetic-rubber solids, and here are two others, obviously based on the worst franchise ever (I saw the first and they can't have got better!) - Alien V's Predator.

Further - on the subject of 'hobby' health - consider the vast ranges of incredibly accurate and beautifully decorated animals (wild, domestic and prehistoric) from Schleich, Papo, Safari, Plastoy, Wild Republic, and so on, and measure them against the staid and eventually stale offering from Britains? Or the simplistic sculpts of Charbens, Starlux or Reisler . . . nothing wrong with the Britains range - for or in its time - or any of the others, but the picture is vastly improved and far more dynamic now.

Cheers Peter, another eclectic collection of things to entertain loyal readers going forwards!

C is for Coral Cougar!

Following my find of the foot-balling PinkPanther back in June (actually I think it was May . . .mas nicht!) I had a quick search on-line and found a bunch of them going cheap, so grabbed them while I could and they were going to be a quick follow-up, but got lost on the PC.

I found them again but rack-toy month had got going and I was running-about with the move and stuff, then they sort of got forgotten in September, by which time I had found another!

I've since seen several sets of four, various odds and another larger lot, so not rare, but fun! Baseball, basket ball, footballer (seen before) and a surfer-dude; Panthers pink from head to toe.

There appear to be two versions, one fully stamped with licensing stuff, the other blank, and at least 20-years old, so probably actual PVC not one of the modern synthetic substitutes.

I picked this-up as a make-weight in a mixed handful at the recent Sandown Park show, Yolanda's err . . . Orange Panther! Full evening dress, spats and a bunch of flowers, he's clearly off to woo a lady-girl panther - is she pink . . . or orange? I'm guessing he's from a set of more than one pose!

T is for Top-up

Another of today's quicker posts, a top-up for-/addition to- the Yolanda tag!

These two came in with a mixed lot a few weeks ago and with one appearing to be Dracula; into the Halloween folder they went! The other seems to be some sort of club-footed Mr. Toad . . . "Poop-poop" . . . with a bionic/android arm - he's from the Toxic Crusader line, covered by Soupie (over on his MXD Blog back in 2012!) and is called Psycho

An equally brief comparison shot with their close relatives, a Monster Wrestler In My Pocket (MWIMP) on the left and one of many Millions of Uscles on the right, also showing that they are smaller than the Super Monsters from Yolanda we've looked at previously.

M is also for Monstrous 'Monstruos'

Last post for Halloween, and the earlier unpainted issue of Yolanda's Monster set, again Gog has also blogged these images, with additional poses, so there'll be a link at the end.

A rather nice Wolfman and a figure which troubles me; Jack the 'Ripper', although popularised in the media (and look what populism does for people - Trumpton and the Brexiteers!), he was actually a real character, who got his 'nickname' for doing unspeakable things to young women, there's no place for a character like that in a toy-line, is there? Is it just me or has a line been crossed there?

We're on safer ground with a white bed-sheet and another Fly; you can never have too many flies, except at a picnic, more that no flies is too many at a picnic!

The Dracula definitely needs painting, without paint he looks a bit daft, while the ape from the Planet of Them looks just as good unpainted as the painted one did, but begs a professional paint-job!

We've seen these recently, one (zombie) a couple of hours ago, the other (pirate) just over a month ago and that's it for Halloween this year - unless I was lucky on Satyrday at the Toysaurus!

Link to Gog's article;

http://toysfromthepast.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/258-yolanda-super-monstruos-standard.html

I think I've said before I'm no fan of Halloween, but if you're celebrating it, have fun in what's left of it (the Devil needs those vibes!), and thanks to Juan Angel and Brian Berke for the contents of today's posts.

M is for the Monster Mash!

So, I've cobbled together four posts for Halloween, all due to donations/contributions from other people, but this and the next post - last today - raise a point for comment . . .

. . . Juan Angel (known to most of you as 'Gog', the vintage Spanish toy Blogger) sent me these in conversation ages ago 2009/2010 (?), and I just stuck them in the A-Z archive and rather forgot about them. Found them a while ago and thought: "Ahh! I could use that Pirate on TLAPD", permissions were sought and the figure was Blogged with a plan for these two posts.

So far so good, but, as we saw with the Preiser Band, I have quite a bit of this type of contribution in the archive, I've always sort of assumed if someone sends me something in a private eMail, it's private!

Now, some people send stuff specifically stating it's to blog, and it get's Blogged, but a lot of it hasn't been, so . . . if you have sent me something (since 2008) by way of an image or images over the years and you expected it to appear on the Blog and it hasn't, LET ME KNOW!

Remember; I'm a scatty-git at the best of times and with the Asperger's have two excuses! But, if it was more that about 18-months ago you may need to resend it, trying to find the originals I've found Hotmail stops storing them after a while? And all contributions are gratefully received - weather they are intended for Blogging or not, whether they get Blogged or not; it's only through wider dissemination that the whole picture gets clearer.

Anyway - onwards and upwards . . .

Gog has now blogged these and I'll put a link back at the end of each post, so just for fun with minimum blurb: the Yolanda Monsters; in this case painted, I'll schedule the unpainted set for a couple of hours time.

These are actually a really nice set of figures, and I agree with Gog, almost better painted. It's an eclectic set of mostly TV/Movie-related monsters of popular characters from fiction or the big-screen, here we have The Hunchback of Notre Dame (that's darhm not daym, guys!) and Death, good old death, comes for all of us so learn to love him!

The Fly, a very movie-based figure, and expertly sculpted I think? The other lady - called 'Vampiresa' on the original sheet - could be a generic vampire, or a more specific Elvira, Vamparella or Countess Bathory type?

The Phantom of the Opera is another from popular culture, but my favorite has to be the ape from the Planet of Them! It's really good and he looks fine next to the old MPC (and Larami?) stuff, some of which was Blogged the other day over on Plaid Stallions  if he wasn't a tad bigger, these figures are around 110mm or just over 4"

The Devil and a witch; the Devil is probably the weakest sculpt in this line-up, he looks a bit comedic, and she's hamming-it up a bit, but neither are common figures in these scales

Painted versus unpainted - "He lives!" - There's more after the link-jump and further links are there to other articles - bookmark it!

http://toysfromthepast.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/123-yolanda-super-monstruos-serie.html