You will know you are awesome when 25+ years later they’re still making knock-offs of you

Was he an advanced engineerper or just a crazy cybertronian invehter?

If imitation is indeed the sincerest form of flattery, then knock-offs of 25 year old+ toys must be the ultimate compliment. The fact that anyone actually gave enough of a damn to still make something that hasn’t been in a toy store since the 1980s, not even as an official reissue, is pretty awesome when you think about it. I say this because the other day when I was in Toys R’ Us looking at all the new Transformers on the pegs, I thought to myself, “I wonder if in another 25 years there will be knock-offs of any of these on the internet?”  Like the G1 Mirage and Wheeljack I just bought from a personal favorite gray market toy supplier.

When you really think about it, knock-offs are even more committed to creating a facsimile than some reissues. The knock off G1 Mirage, for example, to the untrained eye one would possibly think that this was indeed the real thing from 1984. And, no, I’m not even going to get into the shyster types who takes these things and stick them on eBay demanding vintage-collectible prices, either. Just that there is an obvious collector demand for the original toy, which has never officially been reissued due to the mold being lost.

I guess what I’m getting at is in the day and age of better articulated toys, with possibly even more popularity than ever before, will anyone still be willing to buy these as facsimiles of their original forms, even as knock-offs?

I’m not sure if anyone would know the answer right now. In 25 more years will toy robot enthusiasm die off again?

Buying new toy robots may not ever bring back 1984, but that’s OK when 2010 can also be awesome

Where have all the old toy stock rooms gone???

For quite some time I’ve been very aware that the nostalgia I always blamed for my ungodly toy robot accumulation had been futile. Futile in the sense that it really didn’t matter how many Optimus Primes or Soundwaves I ever bought, 1984 wasn’t ever coming back, and my local Lionel Play World from the ‘80s is now a Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

But, you see, yesterday changed my feelings when I went into a Toys R’ Us not too far from me and was actually greeted with swelling racks of toys rather than baby clothes and video games. Pegs and shelves filled to the friggin’ brim with plastic love. And I even bought a new Optimus Prime and Bumblebee at damn near 1980s prices thanks to the rare Toys R’ Us sale. It might sound absolutely beyond retarded to the non-robocentric folks that may have accidentally found my blog, but for me it was a glimpse of bliss.

I hadn’t enjoyed a toy store on that level in quite some time. If I wasn’t so skint and I actually owned a cell-phone with a camera, I should’ve have taken pictures of the scene. But this little episode got me thinking—where the hell are the pictures of old toy stores from the 80s? Plaid Stallions seems to have the corner on the market for awesome old toy store pics, but they are definitely of the 70s variety. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but what I wouldn’t give for just a tiny glimpse of an awesome toy display or shelf from a Lionel Play World in 1985.

So I really think that cool toy display pics are what I must seek. I’ve got to get cracking on asking the interwebz peoples out there: “PEOPLES, GIVE ME SOME OLD TOY STORE PICS FROM THE GOLDEN AGE OF AWESOME!!!”

Perhaps that should be my focus. Danny Choo has OTACOOL. Perhaps I should start something similar, only instead of people with ungodly amounts of anime goods and moe hookers with swords, it will be people with their toy robots collections. But most of all, pictures of an aisle of Zayre right before the fall of the great toy robot wars of the 1980s and pictures of people with their toy robot sickness on full display.

Damn, I’ve got to get cracking, and perhaps with a blog name change to boot.

Stay tuned…

P.S.: Whoever found my blog by searching for “werewolves fighting tigers”, I believe you and I could be great friends someday.

Well, the first stage is denial…

Just what the hell is wrong with me? For a long time now, I’ve been very down on the upcoming Bay-formers movie debacle and the fugly damn toys that accompany it for like, A YEAR NOW! And yet, guess who’s been on a frakin’ Transformer Movie toy spending spree/binge. Damn it!!!

 

I’m a truly sick man, for in the last two weeks I’ve bought:

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Sideswipe

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Sideways

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Breakaway

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Rampage

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Desert Brawl (a frakin’ repaint!?)

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Bumblebee

 

Revenge of the Fallen Deluxe Sideways (darker variant)

 

Revenge of the Fallen Voyager Starscream

 

Revenge of the Fallen Voyager Demolishor

 

Revenge of the Fallen Voyager The Fallen

 

Revenge of the Fallen Leader Megatron

 

Movie 2007 Premium Deluxe Barricade

 

Movie 2007 Premium Deluxe Jazz

 

Movie 2007 Lawson’s Japanese DVD Exclusive Blackout (cost me a damn pretty penny, too)

 

W…T…F!

 

All this from a guy who didn’t want anything to do with the damn things and was all butt-hurt with the shelving of more Animated toys!

 

My robo-plastiholism runs DEEP. I’m so very, VERY DOOMED. My wallet weeps…

 

Drugs aren’t that much more expensive than toy robots, are they? 

 

Pictures of my toy robot crap coming soon…

On the Journey to Toy Robot Nirvana

In Buddhism, Nirvana is the state of perfect peace reached by not wanting more than you have. It is every Buddhist’s goal to achieve Nirvana. The Buddha described it as:

“the far shore, the subtle, the very difficult to see, the unaging, the stable, the undisintegrating, the unmanifest, the unproliferated, the peaceful, the deathless , the sublime, the auspicious, the secure, the destruction of craving, the wonderful, the amazing, the unailing, the unailing state, the unafflicted, dispassion, purity, freedom, the unadhesive, the island, the shelter, the asylum, the refuge…” (SN 43:14)

What does this have to do with my unhealthy obsession with toy robots? Well let’s just say I finally saw me some Macross Frontier. I saw the insanely awesome new Valk fighters. I more importantly saw both the Bandai Chogokin toys and the 1/72 scale transformable snap kits. Let’s just say I’m getting the snap kits. I’m going to assemble the said kits and I may be retiring from obtaining new toy robots indefinitely. For I will then already possess the Alpha and Omega of plastic robot love.

 

Yes. That’s what I’ve been up to lately. The end of the journey. Will you join me in this enlightenment?

 

 

This ET will kill you

Flickr is the greatest. Where else can you find evil ET pics?

This photo is by Flickr member daedicurus. Very evil. And he has some great toy pics as well. I need to take more pictures of my collection.

I like!

 

Visions of decapitated air fresheners danced in my head

Good old Moss Man from the original Masters of the Universe figure line. Oh, how I remember that musky scent so well, and my parents amusement at both the name and the concept. I never played much He-Man as a kid, but this figure was nothing, if not memorable. When I found this guy on eBay, I’m half tempted, if the price is right, to pick him up, decapitate him, and use his pine fresh scent on my truck’s rearview mirror. I mean, my truck doesn’t exactly smell bad, despite its age of 12 years, but it does have “the old car smell.” That’s inevitable. What better way to combat that than with a Moss Man severed head air freshener!?