Ripley - ReAction Alien

Ellen Ripley is the strong female lead from the classic horror / sci fi film Alien. This figure from the ReAction toy line is made using a mold sculpted by Kenner back in the day. Parents revolted over the first Alien toy released by Kenner because it was too scary. Hell, the movie was rated R. So these 3 3/4" figures were never released.

Ripley is dressed in a dark blue jump suit with white sneakers. Ripley has a few details inclduing her white shirt under the jumpsuit and red arm patch. She has curly dark brown hair and comes with a light blue flame thrower. I want to know when were are going to get the sexy Ripley in her underwear figure?

Christmas came late

Since my initial Christmas Haul post I received two more really cool presents. First up is a carded Battle Corps Roadblock from the tail end of the original 3 3/4" GI Joe toy line. The Battle Corps figures all had really nice sculpts, but their cookie cutter accessories and bright paint apps kind of sucked. Roadblock was a gift from one of my toy collecting buddies, Mike.

The other present I received was a hand decorated mug featuring Batman. One of my former students who's become a good friend made this form me. She used sharpie markers to draw Batman on the plain white mug. It's pretty awesome.

Flea Market Finds #34

Over the weekend I stopped by an indoor flea market with some toy collecting friends. I think I was the only person to buy anything there, I sent $0.50 on a Robbie Sinclair figure from the Jim Henson Dinosaur show. These figures were made by Hasbro. As a kid I had Earl, Fran, Baby, and Earl's boss. I never had the two teens, but not they are the only ones I own. It's cool that Robbie came with a skate board and basketball, but he doesn't interact with his accessories very well.

I love the Rampaging Trilobites detail on the back of his varsity jacket.



I used to pretend that the Ninja Turtles figure of Mondo Gecko (who also came with a skateboard) was Robbie when I played with my Dinosaurs.

The Toonseum on NBC

If you've been reading my blog for a while you've probably seen a post or two about the Toonseum. This comic and cartoon museum is one of many gems the city of Pittsburgh PA has to offer.

Here links to a few of my previous posts... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

 

So during the Sunday Night Football game between the Steelers and Bengals they showed some footage of the Toonseum while display the sponsors of the game. I'm happy to see them getting some press. It's such a cool place to visit. I've only visited a handful of times, since I live 6 hours away, but I hope to get out there again soon.

 

All the footage they showed focused on two different super hero exhibits. Too bad they didn't show off their amazing displays of original comic art and animation cels.

 







Christmas Haul

What else could anyone possibly blog about on the day after Christmas other than their Christmas Haul. He's the stuff I got worth mentioning here on Action Figure Adventures, and some of it's still a stretch. Top row includes a Cartoon Network JLA Unlimited style plush Batman with plastic head, a Darth Vader Mask, and a comic of DC Universe Origins. Right in front of the DC Comic there are two Galactic Hero figures that came with a board game, a Clone Trooper from Episode 2 and a Super Battle Droid, along with Gumby. The next row has an Autobiography of Bill Peet, children's author and head animator at Disney for a time. One of his children's books is also there along with a how to draw Marvel Comic Heroes book. Last but not least the two things I asked for for Christmas... Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy on DVD.

Cobra's Christmas Patrol

Cobra's Christmas Patrol is a series of photos I took in the snow last winter. The figures feature 25th Anniversary GI Joe figures as well as one figure from the Rise of Cobra line.

 Snow Serpents lead the pratrol. These elite artic troopers are cross trained as Eels.

If the GI Joe team is spotted, the Snow Serpents will rain down mortar fire.

The Tele-Viper is arming Cobra's new Ski missile.

Snake Men 2-Pack - MOTUC

The Snake Men 2-Pack was another army builder pack offered on Matty Collector for the MOTUC line. Taking a lot of inspiration from the 200x cartoon by MYP, the set contained two Snake Men warriors with various armaments. The two Snake Men used some existing parts and features some new parts. Any true Masters fan would recognize that some of the tooling created for this set was designed to be used for future figures like Rattlor.

The two Snake Men had slightly different skin tones and each came with an open an closed head sculpt. One Snake Man came with brown armor and the other blue. Both sets of armor feature the green Snake Men logo.

The set also included several weapons. A spear, sword, mace, and shield were all included in the set. The blades on many of the weapons feature a wavy snake-like design.

I bought two sets and mixed and matched the armor and weapons between the two. The Snake Men were the 2nd Army Builder set in the line. The first was the Palace Guards for the good guys, The third set was the Horde Troopers. Man did those guys sell out fast. 2015 is supposed to bring us a three pack of Skeletor's Hover Robot Knights as a traveling Convention Exclusive. I hope I don't have an issue getting a few packs of them.

Hope everyone has a great Christmas Eve to those of the Christian persuasion. Everyone else, have a great Wednesday night!

Banshee - X-Men Generations

Today's post is about Banshee from the X-Men Generations line, but first...I've been a naughty boy this Christmas Season. I haven't been updating Action Figure Adventures like I should. Sorry about that, I know everyone is busy, but I really appreciate my readers and especially all my frequent commenters, many of which I consider to be friends.

Banshee was always an interesting character to me. He was from an era before I read the comic series, but I had a few older issues that featured him. He has a cool screaming ability that can even be used to allow his to fly. In mythology Banshees are girls, so I did think that was kind of funny as a kid. This figure was not the first Banshee figure to be released by Toy Biz, but it is the first one I've ever owned.

 Banshee is dressed in his traditional blue and yellow uniform. His "wings" are actually a cloth accessory that clips to his arms and legs. This figure is from the tail end of the Toy Biz X-Men, and there for has some really nice sculpting. I especially like his boots.

Banshee comes with an interesting accessory, that to me seems like something that should come with Professor X.  It's a silver blaster connected to a Cerebro helmet. I don't remember Banshee ever using an item like this in the comic, but there are a lot of issues I've never seen.

In addition to the the blaster, Banshee also came with a large "X" figure stand. Banshee has the standard 5 POA plus knees for a total of 7 points of articulation.

Wonder Woman

I picked up this Wonder Woman figure at my local comic shop when they were running a sale on carded figures in beat up packages. I picked up this figure because despite how important Wonder Woman is to the DC Universe I don't have many figures of her.

This figure has pretty limited articulation, but her sculpt is great. Just check out the detail sculpted into her hair. So much wave and curl. The figure also has extremely toned legs.

Wonder Woman came with a black and silver JLA stand. She also came with a Lasso of Truth accessory.  It can be plugged into a small hole on her hip or held in her hand. The lasso is molded in a solid loop.

Toys for Tots

Like every year, my woodworking students at school have been building lot of wooden toys to give to needy kids. We hit our goal today of 50 wooden cars, trucks, helicopters, puzzles, and tic-tac-toe boards. So today I dropped off all the wooden toys a long with a big box of store bought toys that I picked up over the past few months. I got some of this stuff real cheap at Toy R Us when they were getting really for a reset. I like to try to stretch my money as far as I can for Toys for Tots. There are a lot of needy kids out there. Toys are so important for fostering an imagination.

Some Dolls, Mike the Knight, and Kre-O sets.

Ben 10, Hobbit figures, and Wolverine figures from the most recent movie.

 

This giant monster comes from the True Legends toy line, which I usually pay no attention to in general. The basic figures are not supported by any kind of media and have limited articulation and movement. This thing instantly reminded me of the big Inhumanoid monster from my youth so I grabbed it for the toy drive. He looks really cool.

B-Daman was a line of ball launching figures that look like Japanese robots. I assume they were imported by Hasbro like Transformers. The line didn't do well and I think I ended up paying like a buck a piece for the figures and maybe $5 for the playset. I would have had fun with them as a kid.

I also sent some money to the Breaux Show to support their Toys for Tots effort. #JustBreauxit

Black Series Jabba the Hutt

The Star Wars Black Series Jabba the Hutt figure is the first Black Series toy I've purchased. I've been trying to avoid the line, just because I can't justify buying yet another version of the same characters. I admit the 6" figures look great, but I'm sticking with 3 3/4" figures. I do like that the large Jabba kind of works with the smaller figures.

Here is the 6" Black Series Jabba with several 3 3/4" figures from various other lines from the past.

We shot an SEO Toy Review of this figure, and I think it's my favorite video I've shot for them. Most of these reviews contain a short "skit" and I really like what we came up with for this video.

SEO Toy Review Christmas Special ft. TMNT & Olaf

The made for TV holiday specials from my youth, including the Rankin/Bass stop motion and Charlie Brown specials, all had a huge impact on my as a kid. To this day I love watching these specials. I've been trying to capture some of that holiday magic in the SEO Toy Holiday Specials I've been creating. I really like this new Christmas one. I've really fine tuned the story and upgraded the equipment I'm filming them with. I hope you take the time to watch and let me know what you think (it's aimed at kids btw).

Join the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as they build a snowman.

TMNT Movie Turtle Attack Van Review

I got a chance to review the new TMNT Movie Turtle Attack Van for SEO Toy Review.  It's a really solid vehicle and I'd recommend picking it up. It even works great with the Nickelodeon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

I actually made up the little Pixel Dan shirts back in late October, but the review didn't get filmed right away and then even once it was uploaded i didn't make it into the review schedule until December. It cracks me up because I sent Pixel Dan that package, I posted about earlier this week, in late October but due to the flood in his basement he didn't open it until December. It's weird how things work.

Now, if you want a really nerdy/weird toy connection... In the 1990 TMNT movie, Leo picks up a Bingo "Bet-It-All" Beaver toy in April's antique shop from the Get-Along Gang. The little shirts that I "modified" are from two 80's Get-Along Gang figures. Raph is wearing Bingo's shirt.

Recent ReAction Purchases

Here are some of my recent ReAction purchases. I really love the idea of these figures. I bought a huge batch of ReAction action figures over the Summer at FYE. Now, I've been picking them up slowly as I find them. Most of these were bought at Toys R Us.

 

I picked up three Pulp Fiction Figures so far. I love that I now own a Quentin action figure. I love that he cameos in that scene. The next figure I picked up was Sloth from the Goonies. I bought all the other Goonies this Summer. It took me a long time to find him.

 

I finally found a 2nd Alien. The Alien was actually the first ReAction figure I ever bought. I wanted one loose and one carded, so it took me a long time to find one I could open up.

I'm a huge stop motion animation fan, so I can't pass up Nightmare Before Christmas figures. These guys are very different from the other more traditional ReAction figures. Sally and Behemoth are both more stylized.

I also picked up the masked and unmasked Predator. Both of these guys look pretty good. They have tons of details sculpted on them. I really like the barbed spikes on his arm.

Flea Market Finds #34

I almost forgot to post these pictures of my most recent flea market finds. I was out last Saturday morning in the cold with my flea marketing buddies. I was so excited with my first find. I picked up a vintage Landspeeder. It's in pretty nice shape, not perfect, but the wear adds character to a clunker like Luke's speeder.

I walked a few more tables down the row and found a farm boy Luke Skywalker with lightsaber! Wow what are the odds. It turns out he's the 1995 re-release of this figure, but he's still cool. I also picked up an Extreme Ghosbuser and a PotF2 Stormtrooper.

Eduardo the Extreme Ghostbuster has a proton pack and trap on his back. No neutrino wand. I'm not really sure what he originally included.

I spent $8 total and I feel like it was a pretty awesome finish to flea marketing in 2014. I may go out once more this year, but I'm not sure. My weekends have been pretty busy lately.

A package to Pixel Dan from BuzzChuck

I sent a package to Pixel Dan a while back, but he hadn't opened it on camera until yesterday. So check out his video below. If you missed my post about the custom Power Swords I made, you can check that out here.

80's & 90's Mini-Comics Madness

Today's post is all about some 80's & 90's Mini-Comics Madness. I just got a new computer and I'm working on transfering files. I decided to show off these comics today because the images have been on my old computer for a while and I want to clean off some stuff. Better post them instead of having them hide out on the new computer. All these comics are from my childhood. They either came as a promotional item with some sort of tie-in or were packaged directly with a toy.

 Marvel and CD Mini-Comics from Cinnamon Mini Buns and Drakes Cakes

 Dino-Riders by Tyco

The Mattel Mini-Comics from Masters of the Universe are some of the greatest.

 

I really loved the art in the early Mini-Comics. They had so much detail and character. The more cartoony ones are enjoyable, but they didn't burn into my brain as a child.