Dr. Scarab - Bionic 6

Dr. Scarab, the main villain for the super powered family of heroes know as the Bionic 6. As a kid I enjoyed the Bionic 6 cartoon immensely. I only ever had Meg, the sister) but a friend of mine had several characters and I remember paying with them a lot. Dr Scarab, and Mechanic, fascinated me because they were such heavy toys. The die-cast metal figures, especially the larger ones were just really unique.

This is actually the 2nd Dr. Scarab to enter my collection. Bionic 6 figures a prone to major paint wear due to them being made of die-cast metal. This figure represents an upgrade to the Action Figure Adventures collection. He originally came with two accessories, a belt and a tool... but I'm still searching for them.

Bionic 6, Thundercats, and  Advanced Dungeons and Dragons were all fun toy lines from LJN.

Flea Market Finds #32

I've been super busy lately and I feel bad that I keep missing blog posts. Yesterday I came home from work with a really bad headache. I sat down in front of the TV and ended up sleeping for 12 hours (6 PM to 6 AM). I guess I needed it. If I try to have a normal life as well as work at the haunted hayride I really don't get enough sleep on the weekends. For instance over the weekend after getting home from the hayride after 1 AM (and not going to bed right away because I'm hyped up) I go up at 8 AM to go out to some yard sales on Saturday morning. Boy was I glad I did. I haven't been out to the flea markets on Sundays with my buddies in a couple of months. I was very excited to go out and to find some cool items.

I was at several yard sales in my town and then I went to a couple multi-family yard sales and communitiy flea markets 20 minutes or less away. I found a whole buch of 80's goodness.

 I got a Sectaurs character with his belt. Rowdy Roddy Piper with his cloth kilt from the LJN Wrestlers line. I picked up Extendar, Stratos, He-Man, Prince Adam, and one of the Rock People from Masters of the Universe. From the Real Ghostbusters line I picked up Dracula and Madame O from Bionic 6. I got a Visionaries figure, Captain Power bad guy and a villain from RoboCop. In addition I also picked up a mini-figure from Star Comm and a small bendy E.T. figure.

I also found a My Pet Monster Lunch Box complete with thermos. All these toys and the lunch box came to a total of $20.75. I'm pretty pleased. I have pretty much all the He-Man figures already, but I might use them for custom figures, or just to practice replacing the leg rubber bands before I try it on my broken Faker.

Jack Bennet - Bionic 6

I was happy to find a Jack Bennet from LJN's Bionic 6 toy line at NJCC this summer. He has some paint chipping on his chest, but that is common with these die-cast metal figures. Jack features a lot of clear plastic on his limbs. These are all his bionic body parts. Jack operated under the call sign, Bionic-1. Jack is a test pilot and field agent for a technology company and has secret bionic upgrades. After his family is trapped in an avalanche the rest of them are given bionic upgrades to save their lives and then form the team Bionic 6.

Jack and his wife Helen. I like that Jack's eyes are not the same color as his hair.

Jack comes with a black and red scuba mask and tank.

Mechanic - Bionic 6

Mechanic was Dr. Scarab's main muscle in the Bionic 6 cartoon. He's a huge hulking man and since the Bionic 6 figures are made out of die-cast metal he's a hefty toy. In the vein of classic architypes, since Mechanic is very large and strong he's also dim witted. His only accessory is his rubbery tool belt. It's made of a flexible orange plastic and has several tools sculpted on it, including a hammer and pliers. In the cartoon he was seen using a nail gun and throwing saw blades for weapons. I bought this figure at NJCC and he looks pretty good. Loose Bionic 6 figures are tricky, the paint chips easily on these metal men and they often time look rough when found in the wild.

 When I was a kid, my mom did in home day care. Meaning that every day four or five kids would get dropped off at our house and my mom would look after them and make lunch and what have you. This meant that there were always a lot of kids around to play with. One of the boys my mom watched for a couple of years seemed to get a new toy every week. His mom would show up to pick him up from our house and she would have bought him a new action figure. Mechanic was the first Bionic 6 toy I ever saw, and this boy brought him to my house so we could play. We pretended that he offered to help some GI Joes fix a broken down vehicle, but then it turned out her really worked for Cobra and made their vehicle even worse. A week or so later this kid had a second Bionic 6 figure and we started playing out scenarios that matched that cartoon more closely.

Look out Helen! The Mechanic's got a grip like a vice.

Helen - Bionic 6

Helen Bennett is the mom from the 80's cartoon / toy line Bionic 6. On the team her call sign is Mother-1. Bionic 6 was a toy line produced by LJN in 1986. There were 13 figures and some vehicles and a playset. The unique thing about Bionic 6 figures is that they are made mostly out of die cast metal with a few plastic parts. Due to being made out of cast metal it hard to find loose figures with nice paint.

I picked up Helen at the Wayne NJ Toy Show. I bought her from Steve from Toy Hunter. He had a big bin of loose figures that I was digging though. There were a couple figures I was interested in, but for loose incomplete figures I felt like he was kind of asking to much. So Helen ended up being my only purchase from his bin of figures.

Originally Helen came with a blue backpack. It sort of clips over her shoulders and then there is a strap that goes around her waist. She didn't come with it, but I previously bought a complete set of Bionic 6 weapons on ebay. Even though the auction didn't mention it, I am 99% sure that the weapons I picked up were reproductions. The more rubbery accessories like Helen's backpack just aren't quite flexible enough. It's really hard to attach the belt. I have an original Meg (the daughter) belt as well as the one that came in the set I bought online and they aren't the same material.

Check out this awesome 80's commercial for the Bionic 6 toy line. I always liked how the figures started out as metal in a mold in these ads. There is a little bit of stop motion animation in the ad also.