Louis Tully (Vinz Clortho) - Ghostbusters

Vinz Clortho, better known as Louis Tully was one of the many cool Ghostbusters figures released by Matty Collector a few years back. The need to reuse parts and the rather limited number of characters in the films really hurt this line. There were just too many repaints and releases of the main four Ghostbusters. So this figure represents Louis during the part of the movie that he is possessed by Vinz Clortho, the Keymaster!

 Louis is dressed in a blue shirt and gray pants. His entire outfit is very disheveled. He even has a hint of odd posture line the character in the film.

Vinz / Louis comes with a Terror Dog mask that fits nicely over his head. This allows you to recreate the moment the Ghostbusters find him after defeating the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

In addition to the Terror Dog mask, Louis also includes many accessories from the scene in which he is in the Ghostbuster's Firehouse while Egon questions him and takes readings. The figure includes a second head that is wearing the colander brain wave scanner hat. He also comes with a slice of pizza and a container of popcorn.

I don't have the complete line. I never had a Ghostbusters subscription, but I did pick up figures from time to time when extra stock was available. I'd still like to pick up an original movie Egon and Winston in their jumpsuits.

Crystal Dragon & Lava Dragon - Crystar

The Saga of Crystar was a short lived Marvel Comic that was supported by a toy line that was actually released before the comic book. The Saga pits an army of Crystal Warriors against an army of Lava Men. Last year sometime I picked up two really cool pieces of the toy line on ebay. Toy author Mark Bellomo was selling some duplicates from his collection and I bid on a bunch of items.

The Crystal Dragon is molded in translucent blue plastic. The Dragon originally had large blue wings, but mine is incomplete. The Crystal Dragon also came with a warrior. The Crystal Warrior is molded in a more green plastic. He's armed with a sword. The set also came with two hook (one pictured) and some string to make the dragon fly. The set also included one of the prism staffs that all the Crystar figures came with.

The Lava Dragon is not quite as cool as the Crystal Dragon. This Dragon is molded in a solid orange plastic with the painted shading. The Lava Dragon did not come with wing. Interestingly enough the Lava Dragon has six legs.

The Lava Dragon came a Lava Warrior who is molded in solid yellow plastic and is armed with a red whip. I believe the Lava set also included a prism staff. I think this pair looks awesome displayed riding into combat.

200x Battle Cat - MOTUC

Clearly I'm a big Masters of the Universe fan. I really enjoyed the 200x cartoon, it's got great stories and stellar animation. The 200x toy line is cool, but I wish the y had a little more articuation. I love when Mattel puts out 200x characters for the Masters Classics line. With the recent release of Battle Lion, fans can finally create a 200x Battle Cat. This is the standard classics Battle Cat wearing Battle Lion's armor.

Riding on Battle Cat is my home-made 200x He-Man. I keep hoping Mattel will release a 200x style head, with longer spiky hair. He is made of a He-Man head with a King Grayskull body. He is armed with a King Grayskull chest harness, He-Man's shield and ax, and the Techno-Power sword that came with Man-at-Arms.

If I ever get a spare 200x He-Man shield I might give it to this figure. The classics shield and ax doen't really match the Techno-Power Sword.

Captain Hook & Tick Tock

I have always had a soft spot in my heart for Disney Villains. When I went to Disney World for the first time at the age of two my parents said I made them chase down Captain Hook and the Big Bad Wolf over and over again. They couldn't get me within a hundred feet of Winnie the Pooh I was so terrified of him.

Here we have little figures by Fisher-Price based on the hit show Jake & the Never Land Pirates. Captain Hook and Tick Tock were available together with hooks looking glass or in a three pack that replaced the looking glass with Jake.

  Hook has some minimal articulation in his arms while Tick Tock is a solid block. Both are done in a cutesy style, like the show. I've never seen the show, but since I love Captain Hook so much I had to get him. Really until I saw this set I never knew the crocodile had a name. I'm not sure if they named him Tick Tock for the show, or if he had that name before and I wasn't aware.

Singapore Disguised Elizabeth Swann

Today's post is about Keira Knightly's character Elizabeth Swann from the 3rd Pirates of the Caribbean movie series. Elizabeth is the only action figure I bought from any of the PotC films. I bought her mostly for two reasons. She's a decent generic female to use in stop motion animations, and she has cool accessories. Elizabeth is dressed an all green tunic and has her hair pulled back in a pony tail. She comes with a removable holster that can hold her two pistols on her back.

In order to hide her pistols and disguise herself while sneaking around Singapore, Elizabeth also comes with a removable robe and straw hat. I really liked the Chinese straw hat, and that is something that attracted me to the figure. I always liked the "heroes in disguise" figures like Princess Leia in Boussh armor or Luke Skywalker in Stormtrooper armor. Even the GI Joe Spytroops were a neat idea even if they weren't executed that well.

Battle Lion - MOTUC

This month Mattel released an all new beast for the Masters of the Universe Classics toy line. Battle Lion, the mighty steed to He-Man's ancestor King Grayskull. Both characters were introduced in the 200x cartoon show but did not receive figures in the corresponding toy line. King Grayskull was the first figure in the new Classics line, so it's cool to finally get Battle Lion.

Part sharing was an important part of the vintage He-Man line, and it continues with Classics. Battle Lion is based on the Battle Cat body. Unfortunately that means he is much smaller than he appeared in the cartoon. Still, he is a very nice looking toy.

 

Battle Lion's armor is just like the 200x Battle Cat armor. I bought an extra Battle Lion to make my own 200x Battle Cat (more photos to come soon). Here you can see Battle Lion with Battle Cat armor, BC with BL armor, and BL all side by side.

 I snapped a photo of King Grayskull on Battle Lion wearing the Battle Cat saddle. King Grayskull's cape gets in the way a little with the real Battle Lion saddle, but it fits worse on Battle Cat's.

 

Battle Lion's Mask and Claws just snap in place. They fall off a little too easily when you play with the figure. They stay on fine when he's just on display. The saddle has a flexible strap that hold it in place nicely.

Flea Market Finds #26

I hit the road this morning with my usual flea marketing buddies. We went to two different markets in New Jersey. I had never been to either one before. It was nice to see some different vendors, for variety's sake. I bought a nice toolbox and another circular saw. More importantly I bought some toys!

I picked up a vintage Princess of Power figure, Perfuma. I got the Dragon Walker vehicle from the 200x Masters of the Universe toy line. From the Fisher Price Muppet Show Players line I picked up a Kermit and Gonzo that are in nicer shape than the ones I recently bought. The last figure I picked up today is Stink from the 90's Land of the Lost.

I picked up a vintage Masters of the Universe story book and two issues of the Marvel run of GI Joe.

Below are two photos of the Dragon Walker with 200x He-Man going for a ride. These machines allowed He-Man and the Masters to battle real dragons in the cartoon series by Mike Young Productions (MYP). I think it's missing at least one gun. I haven't figured out how to put batteries in it yet to see if it still works.

There was one vendor with a large lot of modern TMNT figure, vehicles, and accessories. She was asking $20 which was a good price, but I have pretty much everything from that line. I went back later to offer $15, but the stuff was sold. I was going to use them for animating or possibly take them to school for the kids to use when they animate.

Battle Shell TMNT

The Nickelodeon based Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV show and toy line has been going strong for a while now. When these new figures came out I quickly began to collect the line. The one thing I told myself when I started this new collection, was that I was going to skip the endless Turtle variants if this line followed the path of the original toy line. For a while I was good. I skipped the turtles with spy gear and the ones who looked like Ghostbusters. Then the Battle Shell Turtles we announced and I felt my resolve weakening. The original Nick Turtles are great, but these are even more cartoon accurate. The shape of their faces better match the way the look in the show. Donatello even has the gap in his teeth.

In addition to being more show accurate, you can open up their shells to reveal a ton of extra weapons! I had a vintage storage shell Donatello as a kid. I really like the cartoon style head sculpts these figure have. From a design and engineering stand point I enjoy seeing what kind of weapons they chose to give the turtles and how they packed them into their shells.

Unfortunately, while taking photographs for this post Leonardo's shell broke. This is the first time I've had an issue with a modern Playmates Turtle toy breaking. I tugged on his shell to open it up and the catch piece that holds his shell closed snapped right off.

Hordak - Vintage MOTU

Hordak was the coolest villain to be introduced into Masters of the Universe after the release of the original 8 figures. He was the leader of an all new team of bad guys. The Evil Horde was made up of the craziest and most monstrous action figures released in the 1980's.

Suited up in black boney armor with a crimson red bat logo and armed with a crossbow, Hordak is a bad-ass. He looks even cooler with his vinyl cape. Unfortunately mine is missing that piece. You can see that the cape attaches to small slits in the back of his armor.

A slightly different version of Hordak was featured as the main villain in the She-Ra cartoon. This is where Hordak really got to shine. In the show he had a very distinct voice and the ability to change his form.

The Flash

This Flash figure was from the tail end of the DC Signature Collection He is molded in a extremely glossy red and has nice painted details including his chest logo and lightning bolts around his waist and cuffs..

Flash doesn't have very much detailing in his sculpt, but the "ears" on his mark are nice. He came with no accessories, but what would he really need... a cosmic treadmill?

Mr. Wu - Men In Black III

Here we have Mr. Wu from Men in Black III. I still have not seen the film so I don't know much about this alien character. I picked up this figure a while back when all the MIB3 figures were on clearance just because he looked interesting.

He is a human torso on a slug like body. He is wearing a shirt decorated very nicely with a Chinese dragon.  He has a wonderful face sculpt that includes little antenna. Mr. Wu came with a butcher's knife accessory.

The Asian Alien also came with a weird spherical device that looks like a ring a kid could wear. It has handles on one side and fits around his waist.

The ring also opens up to reveal a device within. Just like the character, I don't know what role the device plays in the film.

Birthday Bash - Photos

On Saturday I attended a Birthday Party for myself and three other friends with birthdays in May. We all met up at Arnold's Family Fun Center in Oaks, PA. The theme of the part was based around the annoying She-Ra character Kowl. There has been a joke online between a few people about Kowl being banned from Retro Con. This joke has grown into a huge thing within our group.

Rose posing her vintage Kowl figure on my head.

The Kowl cake with four clusters of candles. One for each birthday in May.

The Kowl joke went so far as to have everyone trying to kill Kowl. He eventually died, a casket was built for him, and photos from his funeral were posted on facebook. Mike brought the dead kowl and casket with him to the party.

Here's a shot of Tony and Nick playing arcade games.

Michael Breaux of the Breux Show fame was the champ on the air hockey table.

The group spent a lot of money on the giant claw machine. Nobody got anything out of it.

 Jen, Mike, and Rose all taking photos of the Kowl cake.

 

I was shocked at how awesome the presents were the everyone got for each other. Here you can see the '66 Batman & Robin 2-Pack Connie gave me.

Rose, Mike, and Jen are all holding up the Kowl wrapping paper I made for their presents.

Oh no, the Mon-Star that Rose and Tony gave me has captured one of the Kowls.

Silverhawks to the rescue.

Tony being eaten by a shark

Mike climbing the rock wall.

Everyone lining up for Go-Karts

I got two awesome 90's carded GI Joe figures. Flak-Viper from Nick and Destro from Mike

 Here's a better shot of the Batman pack from Connie

Along with Flak-Viper, Nick also gave me some pieces to the Water Moccasin and Mobile Command Center that I need for my GI Joe collection.

Mike and Jen Breaux  gave me a set of GI Joe Kre-O and two mini-figs. 

The set contains mini-figs of Stormshadow (v2) and Beachhead (my favorite Joe) 

and the blind bags contained Scrap Iron and Torch.

Here is a better shot of Mon-Star, Steel Will, and Bluegrass from Tony and Rose. Mon-Star and Will include their companion birds. Tony knew I had a complete Blue Grass, but this one is in nicer shape than mine.