Green Lantern - DC vs MOTUC

I really liked the DC vs MOTUC comic packs. I was sad to see them go, but I would have loved them even more if they were MOTUC vs MOTUC packs. I really liked the repaints of  the He-Man figures. These packs really did bolster my DC Universe collection. This Hal Jordan Green Lantern came with Zodac. He also came with a green gun "construct". He's nicely articulated and painted.

Kobra Kahn - MOTU

Kobra Kahn is a really well done vintage MOTU figure.. He had a cool action feature that was disguised in what appears to be a pretty standard MOTU body. His action feature makes sense for the figure and is fairly cool. He has a nice water spitting action that simulates a snake's venom. His head sculpt could have been a little more interesting had he not had the action feature, but his mouth forming a perfect circle doesn't really distract from him face too much. Fangs could have been cool, but were left off.

 Kobra Kahn came with a blaster weapon, but I don't have it. His head is removable so his torso can be filled with water. Sometimes I see just his body at flea markets.

Dr. Doom - Secret Wars

Dr. Doom was the only villain from the Secret Wars line that owned fresh from the store. The others I have were bought at yard sales. I really enjoyed this figure as a kid without really even knowing anything about him. I was aware of comics, but not really actively reading them during Secret Wars. The toy line and related merchandise is what introduced me to the Marvel Universe. I enjoyed reading Secret Wars comics later on as a child, and then again in college.

 Doom came with two guns and a silver shield. Only the smaller gun is pictured. The larger weapon was lost years ago. I like that the gun can be clipped to his leg or back. Dr. Doom has a nice jet pack sculpted on his back, He originally had black details on his torso, but they are almost completely rubbed off at this point. He looks a fair amount different from his comic appearance because he is missing his cape and tunic look. They used fairly standard parts for these figures. Most did not receive very many unique parts.

Doom came with several cardboard images that could be placed inside the shield. This accessory took advantage of lenticular technology that was popular at the time. Each piece contained two images that would appear depending on how you held the shield.The insert pictured above features a close up and wide image of Dr. Doom.

Dr. Doom and Snout Spout (from Masters of the Universe)

 must get their gloves from the same company.

30th Anniversary He-Man DVD

I just received my copy of the 30th Anniversary Commemorative Collection Masters of the Universe DVD. from Mill Creek Entertainment. I won a copy of the boxed set in their fan video contest. They didn't use much of my video in the documentary. Oh well.The boxed set contains the Filmation cartoon, MYP (200x) cartoon, and some of the New Adventures Cartoon. The box features a cool sculpted Castle Grayskull.

The box has cool art all over, even on the inside of the box. It contains the DVDs, 

a CD of some of the music from the Filmation show. and a booklet. 

 

The box set also contained a gold version of the MOTUC Power Sword.

If you want to check out my entry to the video contest follow the link.

Batman Mirco Vehicles - ERTL

In 1989 ERTL released a set of three small Batman Vehicles in the scale of Micro Machines. The set included the Batmobile, Batwing, and Joker Van. The Batwing was the only vehicle in the set to not feature rolling wheels.

 The Joker Van is a purple delivery truck with the Joker face logo on the side.

The Batmobile is nicely detailed, but is not movie accurate because it sports a 

Batsymbol on the roof. I had Batmobile toys in several scales at the time and would

often pretend the Batmobile was shrunk by various villains.

Much like the Batmobile, the Batwing has lots of sculpted on details and a non-movie accurate Batsymbol. I occasionally used this as a R/C drone for my Batman action figure when I was

 a kid. I never has the larger scale Batwing the toys could fit inside.

Custom "Tan" GI Joes

Anyone who is a fan of the Vintage 80's GI Joes knows about the Tan versions of Grunt and Clutch. I always wanted a set of the original Joes in tan. They even released some of the vintage weapons in tan as part of a weapons pack. They didn't make enough characters in tan costumes to easily make customs of the rest..

Tan  Hawk is an easy custom figure to make. He's a Hawk head on a Grunt body. 

I've given him a weapon pack back back as an accessory.

Breaker is another original character that is easy to make a tan version of due to all the part reuse in the first two years of the line. You need a Breaker Head, Tan Clutch Arms Legs, and Tan Grunt Torso. I've been sitting on a spare Tan Clutch for along time waiting for a second Tan Grunt. I eventually made the figure below.

Tan Flash is just a Flash Head on a Clutch Body. This is not accurate at all the the Green Flash, but their are no Hasbro made Tan padded chests and space boots. I painted a few brown details on his legs and painted part of his torso red in homage to his normal green padded self. He has a weapon pack laser and tan backpack. I even gave him a tinted visor since the tan figures are sort of desert themes I though he might need shades.

If I get another Tan Clutch I will swap parts around between Flash and the Grunt figure to give Flash long sleeves and free up the parts to make Tan Breaker. Most of the other original figures would require a lot of painting on green parts to make them into tan Joes. Stalker could be done with minimal painting, and Snake-Eyes could be done somewhat close to his original form. The main parts that where not made in Tan are Flash/GrandSlam/Snake-Eyes Boots, Zap/Shortfuse Torso, and Rock&Roll Torso.

Doctor Octopus - Secret Wars

I recently posted about another Doctor Octopus figure, so I wanted to feature this one as well. I bought this guy from a toy reseller at an indoor flea market years ago. He came with all his arms, but only one is actually still attached. This kind of sucks collect-ability wise, but added a lot of playability in some ways. His mechanical tentacles are made out of a soft plastic, but have no real articulation. I used to move the detached ones around and just pretend they were part of him.

The mechanical arms are just glued into his sides and often times broke off. It is not uncommon to find a Doc Oc at a flea market with only his four human appendages. Like the other Secret Wars figures his features five points of articulation and limited paint applications.

He-Man.org T-Shirt

I don't even know why I buy T-Shirts anymore. I have so many. Tons of Bulldogs shirts from work and lots of nerdy shirts I buy online. I just can't help myself. This shirt helps support He-Man.org and logically sports their logo across the chest.

 

 It's kind of old school with the way they did the printing on it.

Toys for Tots

As you can tell I love toys. I also love to give toys to kids and trying to foster a love for toys in them. For the past eight years students in my high school woodworking classes have made wooden toys to be distributed to needy kids in the area. We build lots of wooden helicopters, trucks, cars, checkerboards, and tic-tac-toe games. In the town I work and live in there is a place called the Ivins Outreach Center which primarily connects people in need with the appropriate available agencies. They are also one of the places that distribute the toys the Marines collect in their Toys for Tots barrels. The people at Ivins have distributed my students hand made toys along with the store bought toys each year. I always drop something in the Toys for Tots barrel every year at Toys R Us. This year I decided I wanted to get a bunch of stuff and take it straight to Ivins. It's kind of funny, but I like that I know it stays local. These toys could be going to one of my current student's little brothers or a future student of mine.

So here's what I picked up to give away. I got good deals at Ollie's and 5 Below this year.

 Two different Superman/Batman Public Enemies 3-packs.

(I wish there was a villain in both packs)

Three basic and three deluxe Green Lantern Figures. 

(I actually bought an additional basic figure who is not pictured on a different

 trip to Ollie's Bargain Warehouse)

Thundercats...Ho!  

The Tower of Omens was on clearnace at Toys R Us.

Lion 2.0, Tygra, Panthro 2.0, and Mumm-Ra were all picked up at 5 Below

Buzzsaw - Z-Bots

Z-Bots was a line of small robot figures made by Galoob in the 90's. As a special promotion Z-Bots were the prize inside the Burger King Kids Club meals for a time. The figures that came in the meals were not quite a well articulated and detailed as the normal Z-bots. They probably had to follow additional safety guidelines for the fast food tie-in. Buzzsaw is a black and purple robot with a lightning blue saw blade for his right arm.