Gwildor - Vintage MOTU

After the Masters of the Universe movie was released in the late 80's, three characters were immortalized in plastic as part of the regular Masters of the Universe toy line. Gwildor is the first of these three character to be added to my collection. I bought him over the weekend at the NJCC. Gwildor, sort of like Orko, does not follow the typical MOTU figure construction. Due to him being a shorter character he doesn't have the typical MOTU hips. Gwildor has 7 points of articulation. His head, shoulders, wrists, and feet all rotate. The figure is nicely detailed and painted. He does not feature any removable gear like many of the early MOTU figures did.

 Gwildor comes with one accessory. His time travel device, the Cosmic Key, doesn't look exactly like it did in the movie. The red top can spin on the silver handle, in the film the key would spin and make musical sounds when it was activated.

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Gwildor decided to go back to the drawing board after the Cosmic Key turned out to not be very dependable. One day he slipped off the toilet and hit his head on the sink and when he awoke he invented the Flux Cosmic Capacitor.

Slaughter's Marauders BBQ and Spirit Carded

GI Joe subsets like Slaughter's Marauders, Tiger Force, and Python Patrol were all ways for Hasbro to save a buck by reusing old molds, but also allowed kids to pick up characters they may have missed if they didn't collect GI Joe from the start. As a kid I was a huge fan of the Marauders and had more from that subset than any of the other teams. Over the weekend I picked up carded samples of Barbecue and Spirit at NJCC.

I remember picking out SM Barbecue at a store called Best when I was a kid. I missed some of the best GI Joes on the first time around because I started collecting figures in 1986. Any of the earlier figures I had were second hand. I didn't have the original Barbecue, but had fun playing with him at my one friend's house. I was excited to have him and all his equipment. His little axe and spray gun are easy to loose. SM Barbecue only had a brief appearance in my stop motion animated show, Action Figure Adventures, but he has the last line in the final episode. This guy looks great hanging with other carded figures in my toy room.

 

Slaughter's Marauders Spirit was not one of the Marauders I owned as a kid. I passed up on him at first because I had a v1 Spirit that was given to me by a neighborhood kid who out grew his Joes. I wanted to get him eventually, because my bald eagle, Freedom, had broken talons. This subgroup of figures were out of retail before I ever got Spirit. I did not add a SM Spirit figure to my collection until I was in college. Now I also have a nice carded sample of him hanging next to Barbecue.

New Jersey Collectors Con

I went to the NJCC show today. This toy show has been taking place in Cherry Hill, NJ for several years. I meet up with some of my friends who I went to the Wayne Toy Show  with a few weeks ago. Tony and Rose were promoting their show Retro Con and Nick was buying of GI Joes like there is no tomorrow. I didn't see Mike buy much. It was a pretty good show, but I got tired of hanging out forever. NJCC was bigger than Wayne, but smaller than Retro Con. There really wasn't enough to keep my interest all day, but they had some pretty awesome door prizes, and that got me to hang out forever.

 Along with tons of vendors the show also had a few guest. I had fun talking to toy author Mark Bellomo again. I've had some of Mark's books forever, but I first got to talk to him last year at Retro Con. He told me that he is finishing up a book on the Vintage Star Wars figures. This should be a pretty awesome book. I could talk to that guy all day.

Some people from Boss Fight Studios were at the show. These guys do work for Hasbro for their modern GI Joes as well as sculpting the heads for the GI Joe Collectors Club figures. They do the heads for both the Joe Con Sets and the new Club Subscription figures. It was really cool to watch the guy sculpt a custom head out of wax using a hot tool. They had working drawings of some of their official released GI Joe items as well as lots of cool custom stuff they created for themselves.

 John Kent from ToyFinity was present showing off all the toys his company has to offer. They are responsible for the Glyos system used in various action figure lines that allow for all the parts to be interchanged. They also have the rights to some older toy lines that Ideal used to make and are slowly relaunching "Rocks and Bugs and Things" as well as "Robo Force". John even had some of the Four Horseman's Power Lords Prototypes available. The guys that sculpt the MOTU Classics and DC Universe Classics figures bought the rights to the old Power Lords line and are making all new figures. The Prototypes looked great.

There were some really great customizers at the NJCC, showing off their work. I really liked this vintage Masters of the Universe style Crystal Ball from GI Joe. The detail on the vest is amazing.

One of the guys was showing off a half dozen custom vintage Hiss Tanks. My favorite one was a Hiss/X-Wing Fighter. He made one that was the A-Team Van and one was a Chia Pet. He even did a Mr. Potato Head Hiss Tank. Pretty funny stuff.

 

I saw on the NJCC website that they were going to have Bumble Bee Camaro at the show, but I had to laugh when I saw three of them there.

 

 Over the next week or so I will be posting about all the toys I bought. I got some pretty good stuff today.

Movie Rouge - Custom Figure

After the first X-Men movie was out of theaters I picked up Rouge real cheap at Toys R Us. At the time my buddies and I were in the middle of creating our first stop motion animated series for our college cable stations. There were many occasions where we needed generic civilian action figures for the video segments. This young lady in a sweater and jeans seemed perfect. Now, straight out of the package she had long maroon gloves that went up almost to her elbows and a white streak in her hair. Both of these details are important for a Rouge figure, but not so great for your average teenage girl. I used my Dremel to sand down the ridge where here gloves ended and painted her arms flesh tone. If you look close you can see I should have sanded a little more, but in the videos you can't really tell. I also repainted her hair brown and gave it a nice dark brown wash.

Originally Rouge came with a long green coat and a scarf like she wears in a couple of scenes in the movie. They are laying around somewhere in a bin of accessories that could be useful as props for animating projects. I had planned to use this figure with her coat in a video called "Teenage Runaway" that never got past the brainstorming phase. The video would have used the song by the same name preformed by the Donnas. One of the things that kept that from happening was her poor articulation. Her hip articulation is terrible and her shoulders are her only joint in her arms.

 

We were probably already half way through production of the series, Animation Creation, when I picked up and customized this figure. She ended up making appearances in the last two episodes. In Animation Creation Episode 9 she is one of two customers at the bank that is being robbed by some Crooks in a musical bit about the adventures of the Millersville University Police Department. Rouge also apears as an interviewer in the "Public Relations" section of  Animation Creation Episode 10. It's funny that the customized movie Professor X figures shows up in the same two segments as the Banker and the Main Interviewer.

MOTUC and Blind Bag Power Rangers

I was out doing some shopping today and I picked up a few fun figures. First I stopped at Big Lots to see if by some odd chance they happended to get in more MOTU Classics figures. I had been going in everyday when the news first hit He-Man.org about the figures at Big Lots. The first case came and went in-between two of my visits. I walked in and they happened to have two Icarius figures. I looked around to see if they had anyone else. I've been hoping to pick up a Megator. I bought both of them, even though I don't really need them. I just wanted to own some $10 MOTU figures.

After Big Lots  I stopped at Toys R Us. They still didn't have the newest wave of GI Joes that I am looking for so I bought a few Blind Bag Mini-Figs. I bought a TMNT Mashems figure. They come in little canisters and mine contained Leonardo. I bought two Mega Blocks Power Ranger: Megaforce figures, and  K'Nex Mario figure.

The Mashems are rubbery figures full of some kind of gel. When you squeeze them they bulge in weird ways. I didn't really read the packaging very well. I thought the figure was going to be more luck a rubber ducky. Oh well... This is probably the only one of these guys I'll probably be buying. They have several different licenses including PR Megaforce and WWE Wrestling.

I previously bought a K'Nex Blind Bag and got a Luigi figure. This time I picked up a Boo. Now this one was pretty easy to figure out which character I was going to get buy just feeling the shape through the bag. He's pretty cool. I wasn't really expecting him to have little K'Nex sockets on the sides of his head.

 Troy: Hi-yah.... now kick... I-yah!

 Troy: Hi-yah

Gia: Hey Troy, what's up with the "little people"?

Troy: I call them Mega Mini Mes.

Gia: hmm... okay, but that doesn't answer my question.

Troy: Well... the Minis...

Gia: Oh, my Mega Mini Me is so cute!

Troy: umm...

Troy: I wouldn't do that if I were you. The Mini Mes hate to be treated like little kids!

Gia: What the Hell! My Mini pulled a Megablaster on me!

Troy: What are you doing?

Gia: Look, I'm a high school girl. I know how to deal with kids. I've done a ton of babysitting.

Troy: Come on... you have to be careful with the Minis.

Gia: Look, kids love me.

Gia: I have a question, Troy.

Troy: Okay, shoot?

Gia: Why does my Mega Mini Me have battle damage and your Mini is nice and clean?

Troy: Like me, my Mini is a better fighter than yours. I can't help it that you and your Mini take hits in battle once in a while.

Gia: Take it back or your Mini looses his head and you loose your nuts!

Professor X - Marvel Universe

I've previously posted about two other Professor X figures, I wonder if that's the most posts I've written about one character? Obviously once I post about every toy in my collection there will be lots of Darth Vader and Snake-Eyes posts, but I've only be doing this for a year and half. I own a ton of toys. Well, now that I think about it... I know I have posted about more than three Spider-man figures already... never mind.

Anyway, I've previously posted about the Toy Biz and X-Men Movie versions of Professor X, and the Marvel Universe figure is better than both of them. This 3 3/4" master piece is made by Hasbro. I'm a big fan of their action figures and I like the fact that this body was used for a convention exclusive Destro figure. I actually wanted to find a second Professor X so I could make a custom Destro.

Charles Xavier is dressed in his typical blue suit can comes complete with his hover chair that he has used off an on in the comics and cartoons for many years. I think the only complaint I may have about the toy is that the proportions seem off just slightly with the hover chair. The front seems a little elongated, but it needs to be the size that it is to accommodate the action figure rider.  The head sculpt is really great. I love that he has the extra long eye brows Charles always had in the early days of the comic. The figure and chair both feature nice detailing.

 Professor X: I'm picking up a psychic disturbance. Oh no, the X-Men are in trouble. They are up against the ultimate weapon in the Universe. I must help them... Use the Force, Jean!

Karatti - MOTUC

Karatti is an Evil Space Mutant originally from the New Adventures of He-Man toy line. I like to call the line "He-Man in Space". Karatti is a funky green skinned alien suited up in gold and purple armor. He has a little bit of a Predator look to him. He has dreadlocks and a face-mask similar to the classic movie villain. While not a spitting image, you can see that the designers were influenced. This figure is the updated Classics version of the character. Karatti reuses a lot of parts (like his arms and legs), but his head and armor which are new are just awesome.

 Karatti comes with two accessories, which unfortunately don't have any paint apps. He has a large knife as well as a blaster/axe. The second weapon can be held two different ways. He can hold it like an axe or sideways as a blaster. In the top photo Karatti is holding his weapon as a blaster. In the bottom photo he is holding it as an axe.

I only own two New Adventures figures from the 90's line, but all the updated versions from the MOTU Classics line are amazing. I actually can't wait for Hydron to be released as part of the 2014 subscription. If you are interested in getting another great year of MOTUC figures, and have the available funds go to MattyCollector and subscribe to the 2014 Club Eternia Subscription.

Power Rangers Megaforce Action Pack

As a kid I was a big fan of he Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers show. I was a little old for the toys (ha ha ha... since I'm buying PR toys in my 30's now) at the time. I only owned one Ranger figure as a kid. After the first few seasons I sort of stopped paying attention. When the show switch over to Power Rangers Zeo I stopped watching because I didn't like their helmets. I didn't like the "Star" and "Equals Sign" visors. Ever since then, I decide if I will watch Power Rangers based on the helmets. I watched some of Ninja Storm and Dino Thunder, but I was in college and had other things to do. I hadn't watched any seasons since then. Power Rangers Samurai had really bad helmets also. The Blue Ranger's visor looked like a pot leaf. When I saw an commercial for Megaforce I got really excited. It had a great vide to it. Megaforce felt like the original show. I loved their helmets and the add showed this massive battle with all the Power Rangers from the past. I set my DVR and have been watching the show since. The other day at Toys R Us, I saw the Action Pack that contained all the Megaforce Rangers and decided to pick it up.

The package nicely displays the six figures within. Robo Knight, Pink, Black, Red, Blue, and Yellow Ranger can all be seen inside. They are each holding their main weapons. The set also includes a Red Ranger Power Card and blasters for each of the figures are hidden in the package.

I pulled them out of the package and had fun posing them around. Each of the Rangers comes with three accessories. They has a blaster that can attach to their hip, a morpher that hooks on their other hip, and their main weapon. The blasters are a little over sized, while the morphers are much smaller than they appear in the show. The Rangers have pretty decent articulation. The boys are better figures than the girls. They all have articulation at the neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, knees, and boots.

As I mentioned, I really like the Megaforce Helmets. None of them have weird visors and all of them do a nice job of representing the "animal" that gives them their power. In the order they are pictured above: Phoenix, Tiger, Snake, Shark, and Dragon. The tiger is perhaps the animal/logo with the weakest likeness. I wonder what it was in the original Japanese series. Sometimes the translation isn't perfect. You can see that the girls are shorter and more petite than the boys.

 I have three complaints about these figures, I still like them but... I really wish they all had bicept cut articulation. I wish the girls hips were not made useless by their skirts and why do all the Rangers have numbers printed on their backs? It's most noticeable on the light colored rangers like Yellow.

   Red Ranger - Troy with the Dragon Sword         Black Ranger  - Jake with Snake Axe

Pink Ranger - Emma with Phoenix Shot       Yellow Ranger - Gia with Tiger Claw

 

 Blue Ranger - Noah with Shark Blowgun (holding Morpher)     Robo Knight with Robo Blade

I love the fact that just like the MMPR, the Megaforce team can combine their weapons to form a special Megaforce Blaster. The toy weapons all connect to form this weapon. I have always thought it was funny that the Rangers call each other by their names while in Ranger Mode. This is something that has not changed in 20 years. It cracks me up. It doesn't seem to hard to figure out who they are if they go around shouting their names at each other.

Here is an over head view of their weapons all connected. I had trouble figuring out how to attach the Snake Axe and Tiger Claw at first. It doesn't stay together real well. They interlock, but the slightest bump and they come apart. The Axe handle clips into a groove on the back of the claw while they both lock with the ends of the blowgun.

So far I haven't really talked much about Robo Knight. He is a robotic Ranger that was created centuries ago. We was dormant and recently awoke. He is programed to project the environment. He has his own special Robo Morpher and comes with two other accessories that are actually two different modes of the same weapon. Similar to the MMPR, Robot Knights weapon has a blaster and blade mode. In the show Robo Knight can morph into the Lion Zord. Troy, the Red Ranger has had several dreams about Robot Knight leading various Rangers into battle. Only time will tell what these dreams mean.

The first time the Ranger met  Robot Knight he made quick work of the monster that was kicking their ass. At the end of the fight the Rangers all commented about how awesome Robo Knight was. Troy tried to make friends with Robo Knight by shaking hands.

In a big F-You move Robo Knight turned around and walked away from the Human Rangers. What did this mean for the Rangers and their relationship with Robo Knight... well I don't want to ruin the entire show. It's been a fun season so far. Just slightly off topic, but I love this photo and I didn't photoshop it. That was all done in camera with depth of field and lighting. 

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Everyone: Go Go Megaforce! Earth's defenders never surrender!

Troy: Hold it everybody!

Noah: What now Troy?

Troy:  Ladies when we say "Go Go Megaforce!" everyone is supposed to strike a dynamic pose while the giant explosion goes off behind us. Are those really the best poses you can do?

Emma: Look Troy, with our cute skirts we can't move our hips at all.

Gia: Yeah, and you boys want us to look good right?

Jake: Well yeah. I mean, Gia you always look amazing.

Troy: Come on, every Mega Power Ranger has to be able to do a high kick! It's a requirement.

Emma: Okay, fine. Here are our morphers. You three will have to protect Earth from alien invaders without us.

Gia: Thank God, I'm off the team. Now I can wear something other than Yellow. Hey Emma, want to go shopping?

Emma: Do you even need to ask?

Jake: Umm... can I come with you? Gia, you know you're going to need someone to hold all the bags of stuff you buy.

Gia: Don't you need to save the world?

Troy: Fine, keep your morphers. We will change the requirements. Girls that look hot in and out of Ranger suits don't have to be able to do high kicks. Emma, I can't do this without you. We can't do this alone. We need you two to form the Gosei Great Megazord!

Noah: Yeah, Troy is right. We need the Phoenix and Tiger Zords.

Emma: Okay, but there is still the problem that in our skirts neither one of us can sit to pilot our Zords.

Jake: I can think of a solution to the skirt problem!

Everybody: Keep it to yourself, Jake!