P is for Prehistoric Party Packs

Right, I'm two days behind, not that there's ever much of a plan here, but this should have posted later the same day as the previous post, with Dan Dare returning by now (hopefully tomorrow/later today), but I realised I hadn't shot the contents of one and had forgotten the origin of the other, so among other rushing around's in the last two days, I tried to track-down/tick-off those queries with little luck (I bought a duplicate of the one I have shot properly!), so I'll chuck the images I do have, here, first, and tie them together with a bit of blurb at the end!

The set with the blue ones, which I found second, was from/is from The Range, while the other set were from Home Bargains (the budget end of the TKMaxx empire), The Range still have them on display, the HB ones have disappeared, whether because they've taken them off for the Christmas season (the party bits seemed denuded) or because they've sold out (they are perfect Christmas stocking fayre) I don't know, but worth checking your local store/s, if you're taken by them.

 

The really noteworthy thing about them is that after years of the tired old Tim-Mee, MPC or Marx knock-off mini's which we have seen here before, that have been the staple of Hobbycraft and the party shops for years now, these are two sets of new, realistic, well sculpted and cut models, in the same bright colours and small sizes as those older ones.

And I use size because scale is a moot point at this size, and with the varying final size of the different species, these are all juveniles or babies in 1:76th, but artistic licence is allowed when you bring this stuff together!

The sealed set (Home Bargains) has eight different, slightly larger models, in a harder polyethylene, paired in four colours, while the other set, also four colours has only seven sculpts, which are more randomly packed (in both colours and pose numbers) as tens, of a modern, softish, PVC-replacement polymer.

P is for Prehistoric Paint-Your-Own

Checking the 'Paint Your Own' Tab, I see we have seen quite a few PYO dinosaurs over the years, and none of them seem to be the same, although I'm sure many of them get more commercial, decorated issues too . . . a comparison job for another day! In the last few weeks I've encountered two new lots, and bought one sample, so here's a quick report.

 

I'm pretty sure I shot this set in Smyths, as part of their small early-learning/craft section as you enter, four reasonable sculpts and six paints including all three primaries, only a fiver here, and Google says they can be found in Giant Tiger and Walmart over the pond.

 

These were in The Range, where we've seen PYO dino's before, but these are new sculpts (or new packaging?) and there were three sculpts, different from the previous pair. A T-Rex and Dippy/Bronty type were left on the shelf, but I got the third . . .

 

 . . . a Kentrosaurus or Chungkingosaurus, I think? It's not stipulated!

One of the new style of two-halves, glued together in the factory, soft polyethylene hybrid PVC replacement polymers, it's a lot of dinosaur for a pound-fifty, reasonably well-detailed/sculpted, and while a bit big for a Christmas-stocking, would fill a small hole under the tree!

Paints are a rather more specific set of pre-mixed shades heading toward the kingfisher school of decoration! But the brush is actually quite good, with a well-formed soft-bristle head, although the shaft is cheapo-styrene.

C is for Colouring In!

Mentioning - as I did earlier - circa-1975 colouring books, this is dated 2024!

 

Note the rockets! I popped into McDonald's back in the spring, and found a bunch of these left on one of the tables, presumably some kid's party had been and gone, anyway, the girl cleaning the floor said I could have one if I wanted, so I did!

 

In my dotage I may even have a crack at it, but with proper pencils rather than the supplied set of four wax-crayons, (ham-fisted, for the use of), which bear a remarkable resemblance to those seen from Henbrandt in a previous post here at Small Scale World.

F is for Follow-up - Starmen and Sticklepins

So, I went back for the third spaceman bauble, and have picked up a couple more hedgepigs in the last week or so, I think when I finally get the tree up again it will promptly collapse under the weight of its decorative load!

The new one is in the middle, giving a decent idea of the size difference between them, plastic on the left (fourth colourway now) and two blown-glass traditional.

 

He's a Gisela Graham, so should be available in most of the larger garden centres, mine came from the Edwins in Woking, on the Guildford road. Gisela Graham are also responsible for the rocket, which I rejected earlier in the season, and rather regret getting now, so it's probably going to charity, for next year.

 

Wrapped in the moment, and rushing about, I didn't see or remember from the previous viewing, that the jewels are glued-on appliquéing, as are the resin fins, which aren't even straight, and have poor glitter flocking, so all a bit cheap and tacky, but it's there, if it presses your buttons! The body is blow-glass, and it's sort of half Wallace & Gromit, half Tin-Tin and all kids colouring book, circa 1975!

 

I've also given home to three more hedgehogs! And my maths was out in the previous post, I had eight, and added four, now here's another three, making fifteen, or five per turn, six or seven on view at any given moment - we turn the tree regularly so it never gets boring! With an albino (from Alderney!) on the left!

W is for Wildlife at The Works

I haven't visited The Works much in the last couple of years, what with everything else that's been happening, but I managed a visit the other day and came away with five inexpensive rack-toys which may interest you, especially if you're looking for Christmas stocking-filler ideas that may help nurture the next generation of 'plastic warriors'.

 

 

Three 'standards'; Dinosaurs, Zoo and Sea Life, no Farm, strangely, nor Insects or Reptiles (the other common subjects in these cases), or Birds, but as a Brucey Bonus the fourth set - in different graphics - is Unicorns . . . of course!

 

The first three are pretty self-explanatory and seem to be new models in the 'mini' oeuvre (we may have seen the dinosaurs elsewhere?), while the Unicorns are rather simplistic sculpts, and poorly bagged, so need to be examined to ensure a decent colour spread with both (yeah! Only two) poses, but all good fun for kids.

They also have, unrelated to the previous quartet, a carded set of rubber-jiggler finger-puppet dinosaurs (which have their own page in preparation), but nice to see such traditional fayre available at this time of year. All five in The Works now, ten-quid, the lot!

R is for Rake of Rack Toys!

I mentioned, after the mad rush to collect and post the horror sets in time for Halloween, that David DeSoto had sent other figures too, and while I shot them at the time, I've only just got round to posting them, here, now! A bit more 'khaki' sneaking into the festive season!

An Imperial set, which, interestingly has those copies of New Ray, which I got quite excited about a few years ago, dating the set, as David writes; "The Imperial set with the New Ray knock-offs came out right before or shortly after Imperial Toys filed for bankruptcy under Chapter 11 here in the U.S.  [2020, ed.] As you may know, Ja-Ru, Inc. bought Imperial's assets and entered into a separate arrangement to purchase their operations in Mexico", David adds; "The two places where Imperial soldiers were once abundant, Wal-Mart and Dollar Tree, have not had soldiers on their pegs with any regularity since the transition."

Another, slightly older (?) Imperial set with a mix of the old, much pirated Tim Mee GI's, which I've always liked as they are 100% depicting the Vietnam era, along with some mof the more modern-looking GI types, straight outta' China! Colours are donor-specific, so it's Vietnam v's Gulf!

This is one of the more current generics, which we've seen a few of, in recent years here, however these are interesting for being the ones I've only shown as an online image, courtesy of Amazon or Ali Baba, and are the figures where each comes with his own larger-based scenic vignette of street-furniture or defence work! I will get them out and look at them properly once I'm settled.

Another generic, but this time a 1970/80's original, useful for being the copies of Britains/Lone Star swoppet Wild West, another long term project is to try and ascribe as many of these as possible, and while they are dead-common in lose lots, they are always mixed-up by the juvenile original owners, and sets like this help you work out which is which, as far as base-type, ethylene or PVC body parts or accessories, or even poses are concerned. Credited to a Triple D importer/Jobber.

 

These look to be the current (ish) copies/homages of Supremes hearald'esque Wild West, now credited to DL / Du Liang Toys (previousl;y Maxxi Toys, Stobok, Funtastic, Aliki, Liberty Imports and PMS-McColls), and consist of just the foot figures with a play-mat in that strangely metallic, slightly crinkley plastic.

 

I've also left this in the bag for now, as I've never seen one over here, and I don't think Steve Weston has them either, so I'm guessing these are a US 'show exclusive' whereby AIP (Armies in Plastic) get to shift end of line, over production or test-shots in mixed bags at an affordable price?

There's Colonial/Boxer rebellion, some ACW, WWI and a few Marlburian/AWI types I think, and a nice introductory sample to AIP's stuff, of which I don't have a lot, and what I do have is mostly WWI, I think.

There were also these lose AIP figures, which I know I didn't have, sold variously as Gulf War Infantry, Marines and US Peacekeepers, depending on the plastic colour, each in a set A and set B, of six poses each. I think these are the former two, and between them seem to be all the poses*, which some other-colour duplicates, so again a nice sample, and they are - undeniably - very nice sculpts, well animated.

 

It's not that I ignore this new stuff out of some misguided principle, but simply that A) there's so much else to find of either a vintage or more ephemeral (rack toy) nature, B) it's priced to sell-to, and does sell to adult collectors, so will probably always be around, in quantity, and C) as new production, it does get covered-well, elsewhere, not least Plastic Warrior magazine, but all samples are gratefully received nevertheless.

 

And many thanks to David for all the above, and the previously-seen Halloween bits, that's two additions to the Tag list . . . and archive too; DL and Triple D!

R is for Ravensburger's Rake of Role-Play Recreations!

And so to TKMaxx, where a relatively expensive (but cheaper than the toy shops) purchase (we buy this stuff so you don't have to) led to three board games currently on the seasonal displays, and all containing nice figure sculpts in that mid 40mm-50mm size bracket. Each licensed from a different studio.

 

From Universal Studios we have this game based upon the better known characters from the horror oeuvre, some of whom are not even Universal properties, but hey, who's nitpicking Hugh? From the left in the above line-up we have The Wolf Man, Dracula, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, 'Frankenstein and The Bride (obviously, actually - Frankenstein's monster!), The Mummy and the Invisible Man.

To which is added a sheet of card-flat 'standee' civilian victims/secondary players, I don't know for sure, as I haven't read the rules; I would hope by now, you know these game posts are about the figures, other Blogs do games better than I ever could! The coloured ones look like they could be used in Cludo!

The second game is from Warner Brothers, and takes us to the Emerald City via a pair of red shoes and a wicked witch! I was going to weave the Kansas gag in here, but it's on the box, which rather stole my thunder, there! I assume you don't need these Wizard of Oz characters identified, but they are quite accurate to the original movie, and Dorothy is carrying Toto!

Finally, a Disney vehicle gives us five named Gargoyles, a human helper and two baddies, reduced to standee flats! The Gargoyles are rather nicely done with little contrasting flecks in them to suggest stonework, while the human (Elisa) is flat red. You'd have to be a fan of the movie to ID the individuals, or read the rules properly, which - we've already established - I didn't do! But there's a Goliath, Brooklyn, Broadway, Lexington and Hudson, in there somewhere!

 

Feelin' blue - a sizer, with the Invisible Man, Dorothy and a Gargoyle, the Invisible man is touching 39mm with his base, the 'Monster' heading toward nearly 50-mil, but most are around 40/45mm. Out there now, two are £14.99, the other (Gargoyles?) £12.99.

P is for Pulp Fiction

How have I not had that title before now? I'm not sure if these are Giles's work from Dorset Toy Soldiers, or Ron's from Good Soldiers, but as they are the Crescent sculpts it's all a bit academic and I'll Tag all three, just to make sure they can be found, no matter how future browsers are searching for them! On the Dan Dare Tag you'll find a larger sample of these from Brian B which we saw a while back.

The reproduction label is actually quite faded on my sample, and I've enhanced it in Picasa, to give a better feel for the original, the trouble with home printers is that the ink fades quite quickly, as anyone who's put stuff up at work, or on the fridge door, will attest! The yellow tissue apes the yellow card the originals are often found tied-to.

 

Box is in Dorset's style, but the subject is more Good Soldier'y, while the contents are the same as the Crescent toys set. Colours are best described as the common schemes, with the suited Dan being also found in dark blue, sky blue, red, metallic red, a pinkish metallic, and silver, with the Treens also having a fair few paint variations in the original, in this version it's supposed to be the Venusian character Sondar.

Some sources state the sky blue were only from an RAF set (which they certainly appeared in), and which includes blue versions of the two green service dress figures (Digby and Dan), while others claim blue spacesuit for Dan and yellow for Sir Hubert Guest? With Professor Peabody also getting red and silver issues, I suspect it was down to the out-painters or packers, on the day, and of little other significance?

 

The ship could be all red, split red/yellow, or red with a silver nose in the original, here the repro' has a segment of yellow running back from the centre of the cockpit, and again the launch-frame follows Crescent's blue, although orange and brown-red can be found.

 

Red Wing! That's three mini/micro spaceships, joining the stash, in a few weeks with a rather Tin Tin'esque rubber rocket pencil-top and the little novelty UFO in polystyrene alongside the Dan Dare whitemetal ship.

S&S is for Scale and Size!

 Can you see what I did there! As well as our regular visits to the canyons of New York, there has been this for . . . about seven or eight years now, I think - the annual Christmas toy-related display by the Fleet & Crookham Local History Group in Fleet library, which this year is all about size/scale of like subjects.

Another 'lazy' post, in that it can be blurb-light, it is what it is! I would add that the FCLHG do other presentations through the year, local development, the medieval period, how the maps change, that kind of thing.

It's getting like we've seen most of it before, hence a different theme every year? I think the Furby's are new this year, they used to be called Gonk's, when I was a lad, and were made by Travellers on old loo-rolls for the fairground-prize trade. They were a good introduction to loss and death, as their little paper faces slowly dog-eared, ripped or even slid off, and eventually damp got to their cores or an adult's foot or arse flattened them!

 

The Exhibition normally comes down in the first or second week of January, so if you're passing, worth a quick visit.