This Week In Your Plastic Crack, Action Figures and Toy Collection 26 26

[fantastic_four]

Why would Hasbro lose the Star Wars license?  I realize that sales on toys have fallen over the last few years, but is Hasbro to blame for that, or is the faltering popularity of the films with hardcore fans to blame for that?  I can't see what Hasbro has done wrong to make Disney want to look for a new company to make Star Wars toys; the figures themselves are certainly of a quality that I haven't seen other companies do better with.

People have been speculating this with Hasbro losing the Marvel license continuously throughout the year, but as far as I can tell it's mostly paranoia from fans who enjoy the Hasbro figures.  The only way I can see Hasbro losing the Marvel license is if Disney decides they want to produce their own toys.  If they move Marvel to Mattel or McFarlane it'd be a REALLY bad move.  Mattel's recent DC figures are MANY years behind the refinements that Hasbro has now achieved, and McFarlane's recent action figures have been even worse.

[fantastic_four]

1 hour ago, fantastic_four said:

On 12/7/2019 at 11:21 PM, Buzzetta said:

What were your top three 2019 pickups in your plastic crack, action figure, and toy collection? 

Almost every Marvel Legends figure ever made that I wanted.  Just started collecting them last December, and this year I bought somewhere between 150 and 200 from the entire 20-year history of the line.  I think I've got almost every one I wanted.  Certainly every major character I've ever liked I got, so any I get now are new releases or characters that I didn't know I would like that I learn about.  An example is Taskmaster from the upcoming Black Widow film...I decided I like the character so now I'm looking for a figure of him.

Oh, wait, you were asking for a top 3.  I'll give it some thought, not sure.

[fantastic_four]

For decades I've wanted to have some sort of dinosaur figure display, but I've always avoided doing it for one overriding reason--the scale of figures is ALL over the place.  One of the biggest dinosaur figure producers is Papo, and the scale of their dinosaurs is wildly inconsistent.  Scale is almost everything for me with dinosaurs.  If I'm going to have a t-rex on display, I want it to be appropriately larger than a utahraptor or smaller than an apatasaurus, and if I stick a human in the display I want them all to be appropriately sized in relation to the human.  But I've never found enough product in a consistent scale to achieve that, so every few years I look at what's out there, get disappointed, and give up.

Well I went through this again last week and while scale is still a HUGE problem, Mattel may solve both that issue AND the lack of articulation with figures all in one swoop with their Jurassic World Amber Collection line of toys.  They're making characters from the films as well as dinosaurs from the films in roughly a 1:12 scale all with great articulation.  So far only they've only announced a handful of figures, and the only ones out now are Jeff Goldblum and a velociraptor, but they've also teased Dennis Nedry (i.e. Newman from Seinfeld) and a dilophosaurus for next year as well.  If the line does well they will hopefully continue to build more of them.  My dream is that they get around to a fully-articulated t-rex.  

I bought their velociraptor last week and LOVE it.  The articulation and look of this guy is absolutely fantastic.    This isn't my shot, but here he is posed with the other recent highly-articulated dinosaur line that recently started, the Beasts of the Mesozoic version of a velociraptor that's far more true to the current look that paleontologists believe they had.  Spielberg made his velociraptors far bigger than velociraptors actually were and chose not to depict feathers because he thought they didn't look as good that way, so while the figures below look about the same size, the Jurassic World one is 1:12 scale but the Beasts of the Mesozoic version is 1:6 scale since velociraptors were thought to be sized about as big as a modern turkey.  The Mattel figure has an articulated jaw, neck, hands, arms, legs at every joint, an articulated killing claw, and a bendy-wire tail that can be posed in a huge variety of ways.  LOVE this guy.    I'm planning to pose these 1:12 scale figures along with Marvel Legends figures.

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by fantastic_four

[fantastic_four]

I also bought a Mattel Colossal T-Rex figure that's in roughly a 1:12 scale.  He's slightly big for that scale and is probably closer to 1:10 or 1:11 scale.  It's not part of the Mattel Amber line and has rather poor articulation, but the jaw, legs, and arms articulate, and that's enough for him to look bad-arse in a display.    Not my pic because I haven't gotten him yet as Best Buy has been slow to ship him, but here he is below posed with 6" DC figures that illustrate how well he scales with them.  He's got two features my kids will find fun--he roars when his mouth opens, and he has a 2" hollow space going from his mouth, through his stomach, and down to a trap door at the base of his tail that lets you "eat" other figures and "poop" them out.    I've seen people demonstrate sliding 6" Marvel Legends and DC Multiverse figures down through him without any issue.  His entire stomach is hollow and you can supposedly fit 20+ small 2" dinos in there if you want to.

He first came out in mid-2018, but he must have sold relatively well because I noticed that Target recently re-stocked this figure and every store near me has three of him on the shelves.  He's been EXTREMELY popular in toy and dinosaur forums since then because it's the largest widely-available t-rex that has ever been made, and his sculpt detail is fantastic for a mass market children's toy.  Target sells him for $50 with no roaring sounds, but Best Buy has him on clearance for $30 with the sounds:  https://www.bestbuy.com/site/mattel-jurassic-world-battle-damage-roarin-super-colossal-tyrannosaurus-rex/6376568.p?skuId=6376568 .  If you' have a Best Buy card they also have a 25% off of one toy member deal going on so I got him for $23.

Edited December 11, 2019 by fantastic_four

[STORMSHADOW_80]

Better pics from the other day now that everything is all cleaned up, and one I forgot from the other week

[followtheleader]

Glad to see the dino display!

Just picked this up the past weekend.  Real cheap. 

Nice to find an inexpensive toy or two now and then. 

Patrick

[Brandon Shepherd]

10 hours ago, followtheleader said:

Glad to see the dino display!

Just picked this up the past weekend.  Real cheap. 

Nice to find an inexpensive toy or two now and then. 

Patrick

Nice, I had that toy as a kid in ‘93. I also bought one in ‘94 to leave in the package but I sold it years later. Wish I would have kept it now. 

[Mr. Spider-Woman]

4 hours ago, Brandon Shepherd said:

Nice, I had that toy as a kid in ‘93. I also bought one in ‘94 to leave in the package but I sold it years later. Wish I would have kept it now. 

I had one, too. I still have my old Jurassic Park toys, actually. They're not in great shape from being played with but they're somewhere in my house.

I don't have a picture handy but a few months ago I picked up a 1994/1995 Toy Biz Invisible Woman action figure from the Marvel Action Hour line still on the card. For some reason I only had the clear "invisible" version when I was a kid. I got it for $10 at a video game convention. I can't decide if I should open it and pose it with my other Fantastic Four figures or leave it sealed on the card.

[fantastic_four]

On 12/11/2019 at 11:34 AM, fantastic_four said:

On 12/11/2019 at 10:11 AM, fantastic_four said:

On 12/7/2019 at 11:21 PM, Buzzetta said:

What were your top three 2019 pickups in your plastic crack, action figure, and toy collection? 

Almost every Marvel Legends figure ever made that I wanted.  Just started collecting them last December, and this year I bought somewhere between 150 and 200 from the entire 20-year history of the line.  I think I've got almost every one I wanted.  Certainly every major character I've ever liked I got, so any I get now are new releases or characters that I didn't know I would like that I learn about.  An example is Taskmaster from the upcoming Black Widow film...I decided I like the character so now I'm looking for a figure of him.

Oh, wait, you were asking for a top 3.  I'll give it some thought, not sure.

Since I've cherry-picked the best Marvel action figures ever made throughout the year, my top three pickups this year really are just what I consider the three best Marvel figures ever made:

1. A tie between the 2019 Marvel Legends 1:12 scale Wolverine from the "Love Triangle" 3-pack where he was bundled with Cyclops and Jean Grey along with the 2017 Marvel Legends 1:6 scale Wolverine.  Both are the best action figures I've ever seen in terms of articulation, sculpting details, and accuracy to the character, and they're almost identical except for scale as shown below.  I pick the Love Triangle Wolverine over the 2018 Apocalypse wave Wolverine only because they're basically the same figure except the Love Triangle version also comes with bone claws in addition to metal claws, two extra heads, and a folded mask to go around his neck along with the unmasked head.  They're both EXCEPTIONAL figures, and I'm not even sure which scale I like better, I love them both!
2. The 2011 Marvel Universe 1:18 scale Galactus.  Just an awesome depiction of one of the most iconic villains ever, plus it has a dozen or so voice sayings that are all great when you press the button on his chest.  Fits in just as well with 1:12 scale figures as it does with 1:18.
3. The 2019 Marvel Legends 1:12 scale Hulk from the Hulk/Wolverine 2-pack shown below getting blasted by Galactus.  Best articulated Hulk ever and an absolutely PERFECT rendering of his classic look.  Incredibly fun to play with and pose, and he looks gorgeously spot-on no matter what angle you look at him.

 

Edited December 13, 2019 by fantastic_four

[MetalPSI]

I love browsing this thread at this time of year

[MetalPSI]

On 7/18/2019 at 4:47 PM, Joshua33 said:

Thought I'd show some of these before I dust them off, re-bag them and store them in totes again. Cool thread I didnt know existed, or just forgot. I love me some plastic.

I had forgotten just how massive Predaking was

[Joshua33]

9 minutes ago, IkewithMike said:

I had forgotten just how massive Predaking was

Yeah, that's the die cast version. Tends to run a touch bigger. Weighs a lot.

[MetalPSI]

4 minutes ago, Joshua33 said:

Yeah, that's the die cast version. Tends to run a touch bigger. Weighs a lot.

Been a long time since I held a diecast in my hand, those were the best

[MetalPSI]

On 4/22/2018 at 11:38 AM, Parabellum said:

Recent purchases in the last year.

Star Wars 1979 Boba Fett, Robotech Lunk (only released in Canada), “The Blank”

 

 

Wow, I had every single Tracy figure, except Blank, I didn't think it existed

[MetalPSI]

On 5/13/2018 at 9:16 AM, srezvan said:

Slowly working on a full set of M.U.S.C.L.E.s as I can get them for cheap. Made these shelves to hold them. Unfortunately, I need to make one more.

I had like 10 of these, didn't realize there were so many

[Parabellum]

12 minutes ago, IkewithMike said:

Wow, I had every single Tracy figure, except Blank, I didn't think it existed

 

12 minutes ago, IkewithMike said:

Wow, I had every single Tracy figure, except Blank, I didn't think it existed

Yep, only released in Sears Canada.

[Joshua33]

31 minutes ago, IkewithMike said:

Been a long time since I held a diecast in my hand, those were the best

One of these days, I'll bust out the thundercats, gi Joe's, he man, tin toys, and the mego and put some pics up.

[Parabellum]

Just picked this guy up.  Perfect cobra logo.  He is a lot whiter than depicted in the picture.

[MetalPSI]

On 8/13/2018 at 9:08 PM, Buzzetta said:

The limbs finally arrived courtesy of BBTS... These five were one of my most favorite set of Transformers as a kid.  I sold off the G1 versions years ago... but jumped when I saw that Hasbro made a modern set.  This is currently inside the cabinet eventually to find a place in the office. 

Abominus!

[MetalPSI]

2 minutes ago, Joshua33 said:

One of these days, I'll bust out the thundercats, gi Joe's, he man, tin toys, and the mego and put some pics up.

Would love to see Thundercats, I never had those.