toyboxdx toy blog brog: is graceful art of daily expressing japanese toy  

THE BULLMARK “BIG” VINYLS OF WARREN SCHWARTZ

It’s been an incredible year or so in the land of vintage Japanese toy collecting.. It seems new discoveries and purchases are happening every week as opposed to only several per year in our little circle. Wether it’s the economy or just dumb luck, we have seen some very rare pieces come up for sale over the course of the last two years. From vinyl to diecast, and from jumbos to tin, just about everything once totally coveted is popping up on the regular for all to have a crack at.

Uncle Warren Schwartz, aka as the Jock Ewing (of Dallas fame) of our little clan, has been lucky enough to score several of these rarities as of late, and he is no way hesitant to share the love with us here at TBDX.com. So, here’s a quick blurp and some really great pics of two of the greatest vivntage Bullmark vinyls ever created! Enter.. BULLMARK’s BIG vinyls.

Per Warren (with a little backstory about his vs. mine):

“The BIG Blazer landed on my house a few years ago. I thought this was probably unique which is to say, no “series”. I became aware of a large Zaboga which has been listed on eBay by a guy from Hawaii off and on for a long time. Then you scored the Big Zaboga (under the radar) a couple of months ago. Since then I’d been searching for why the belt had “buttons” on either side at the waist, but the guy from Hawaii said he knew nothing of any missing parts to the one he had on auction. Both this one and yours was listed on eBay, but I’d never seen one on Yahool. This one appeared in November 2009, with a box, holsters, and missile firing mechanisms attached to the waist.

It turns out that it was another “BIG” in the “series”, if there is a series. No missiles though.

When it arrived, the mechanism turned out to be the same one for the Blazer (duh) in a different vinyl housing. Since the Blazer had the missiles I tried them out in the Zaboga, and of course they fit like a glass slipper, ref Cinderella. The missiles were big-sized like the vinyls, and I’ll send you a picture of the standard rubber-tipped Bullmark yellow missiles for comparison, but more interesting is that the missiles have an internal spring for firing instead of the spring being attached to the firing trigger. This is cool.

So for the record here are the TWO AMIGOS side by side. For some reason the Blazers are not exactly abundant, but you can find them. And I have no idea why the Zabogas are hard to find, why they are usually missing the holsters, guns and missiles, and why we haven’t run into any other boxes except for this one with water damage. Mysteries are good, and usually someone knows the answers.”

Well, there you have it. WAIT….. Hold the presses. We think there might be a Mach Baron. You heard me… If so, we’re no doubt looking at another $5K toy. Below is the picutre featured on the Blazer box:

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A quick side note, I know Bullmark made "Big" kaiju aka Kanegons, Baltan, Pegassa and Garamon. I don't think these were sold under the same moniker but I'm not 100% on that. Feel free to hit me up with info. Thanks! ES esjoen@toyboxdx.com

Sifu Mike Parisi dropped by the TBDX west coast headquarters tonight with wonderful new years gifts in tow.

Aside from his lovely family, who are above and beyond a gift within themselves, Sifu Parisi brought some big ass guns along with him to our underground secret lair. He surprisingly laid the grand-daddy of inflatables on us, and “we” just don’t what the hell to say.. Only pictures can speak the greatness of his contribution to the vintage Japanese toy inflatable lineage.

Sorry Sanjeev. Not trying to steal your thunder here, but.. Ladies and gents, I give you “Astronave”!!” 38 inches wide..

OK.. Well as you can tell, I have an incredible love of inflatable Japanese robot character toys.. Not like you couldn’t clearly see from my “stash” (pictured above)… Yeah.. I need help. So what?!

Anyway, the “Astronave” is an actual licensed product, as we come to find. Toei Animation Dynamic Production made this behemoth a reality back in 1978.

Ah… To be a child in Rome swimming in a pool the summer of 78 right? Right??? OK, nevermind..

Thanks MP!!!

Sjoen

…and again a double-post. I’m not sorry for that ;-)
While shooting some fotos for my own “toy archiving”
I thought, why don’t make a little BROG. X-mas is coming
and this Bullmark  Rockbat Meka Machine could be an
excellent gift for your kids…nooooo…for yourself.
If you want to see this great toy in motion, presented by our
chairman Mr.Sjoen just klick here.

Lets start with Mr.Nice Guy Rockbat.

…or Mr.Bad Guy Rockbat. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang…

Don’t have to say much about this Meka Machine Rockbat.
Great box design, lots of great action features, great toy!
Is there any Bullmark Meka Machine that isn’t great?

Now I show you some detail shots of Rockbat.
Push the buttons on his chest and his “hat” will be shoot into the air.

Rockbat has a lever on his back. You move his yellow wings with it.

He comes with rockets for his gun and he has wheels on his heels.
“wheels on his heels” sounds like a trucker song …argh…howdieee

Rockbat has lots of gimmicks. But he’s a real “transformer”.
Move his legs into position and another wheel pops out of his butt.
Ready to race!

Thats it.
I swear: No more Rockbat Meka Machine BROGS in the future!

More fotos etc in the BBS section.

Hedorah’s and Marusan originals beating down on a Nekosaur vinyl. USB Neko’s abound… More to come soon.

-Sjoen

In our last episode, our young hero idiots were buried under a pile of toys they stupidly thought they could catalog and identify at the rate of approximately 1 every 46.2 seconds. Thankfully these dumb fools had friends: equally stupid friends, who would blindingly sacrifice their lives for the same lumps of zinc and vinyl that the original idiots worshiped. And so it was that we found ourselves with a shitload of people all throwing down in a race against time, culminating in the vintage japanese toy wank of the decade:

ACTIVATING: SJOEN UP!

Friday am. An unknown location outside Philly.

My toy loving brethren have entered the Valhalla of Japanese toydom. Thrust into the unknown, a team of degenerate collectors hone in on Morphy’s with a serious vengeance and an aching to make it right with the world. Weeks of planning and back and forth have led to this pivotal moment and BAM!!

It’s GO:

Skivvies and a fresh beer greet the morn.. The Skype is a chirping LOUD.

“WHAT?!” I halfway croak.

“Sjoen, seriously.. We got problems! Check out this yellow missile. Daltanias or Godsigma? HEY!! Douchebag!?”

The dog that I so fondly thought a woman moments ago slowly wakes up, licks it’s ass and climbs out of bed before me. Two seconds ago I was conquering the world, Jessica Alba by my side. Reality bites. A pissed off pit bull, a warm beer and the toy geeks ringing off the hook. Welcome to my life..

“Daltanias…” I mumble.

Throw on the newly pressed Bullmark Tshirt and bring the macbook to the back yard. 65 in SF, 100 outside Philly… Poor bastards must be hot as hell… Well, poor probably isn’t the right word.

“What else you got?” I spout, head in hand. “Bring it!” I say, ego abounding as I lift my eyes up to view the 13 inch screen before me embedded with the pillar of diecast pornography.

“HOLY SHIT!!” I shout looking out at the sea of boxes 1/2 a stadium deep.

Mark shuffles up, cheeks clinched looking like he just drank a pint of bacon grease. Either that or a pint of JD.

“A Real Color God Mars, BITCH!!!” He says winking..

“Seriously? You really want to do me like that right now?” I plead.

He’s taunting me. That little jerk. “I NEED THAT..” I think, imagining my God Mars collection in all of its completeness. “I NEED…”

Eyes blurred from seeing what I think might just be a lucid interpretation of last night’s dream seeping into the real world, I figure I need to make a decision on the quick. A valuable decision. A non toy related decision.

I figured “I NEED” more sleep.

THE END. — Erik

ACTIVATING: ALT UP!

The chogo-phone rings with savage urgency as I wipe the sleep from my eyes. Here in Tokyo, the first rays of a bright morning are filtering through my blinds. But meanwhile, on the other side of the planet, Team TBDX is knee-deep in Popy cardboard — and they’re in trouble.

“Operator 3G! Come in! We need an ID, stat! For God’s sake, COME IN!” I can hear the barely-masked terror in Alen’s voice, digitized and reconstituted here, thousands of miles from the danger zone. He’s got a problem and he’s called in the Internet equivalent of a UAV drone for an immediate informatiostrike on his position. I’m happy to oblige.

“Transmission acknowledged, Alen-One. Target acquisition uplink ready, over.”

The photos begin arriving at once. First one, then five, then nearly a dozen. Each of them filled with uncountable, unknowable bits of plastic, metal, even twine. I’d seen attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, but nothing prepared me for the glittering darkness filling my monitor screen.

“My god. It’s full of toys….” I find myself involuntarily muttering into the commlink.

“All… after… incinerators? I didn’t get that last bit, 3G. You’re breaking up!”

“Forget it, Alen-One. Target acquired. Maintain current position.” Long hours of practice masked the extreme unease I was feeling at the photos. I recognized the propeller from the Takatoku Omochama, and a few of the other missiles, but what about the dozens of others?”

— Matt

* * *

Well, we know how the story ends. Erik and Matt threw down huge on getting 300 or so entries tidied up. Thanks to the ass-kicking skills of Jim Maitland, the vinyl id’s were completed on time. Brian Flynn from Super7 had a hand in the vintage vintage. Robert Duban went savante on the final catalog descriptions. Geoge Samson rewrote our Valkryie gibberish.

Without Warren and Steve Saperstein, we wouldn’t have been in this hell/paradise.

Finally, we want to thank THE.C. who helped us with the brute force assembling of all the stuff there…

WITH (4) DAYS TO GO BEFORE THE EVENT, IT’S NOT TOO LATE TO BUY YOURSELF A CHEAP-ASS TICKET TO GET TO PHILLY. CATALOGS ARE SHIPPED, AND IF YOU GOT YOUR NAME IN WITHIN A WEEK OF THE ORIGINAL INVITE, AND RECEIVED THE FLYER, YOU SHOULD BE ALL SET.

TOYBOXDX TEAMS ARE PACKING AND GETTING READY TO CONVERGE ON THE K.O.P. KEEP YOUR EYELIDS PEELED THIS WEEK FOR SOME MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENTS WHICH WILL CULMINATE IN LIVE SHOW AND TELL THIS WEEK!

THIS IS GOING TO ROCK!

TALK IT / BBS

• Approximately 2000 vintage japanese diecast and vinyl toys
• Location: Denver PA
• ToyboxDX to cosponsor event on the 13th
• More ToyboxDX exclusive backstory on the catalog on its way

DENVER, Pa. – Dan Morphy Auctions ventures into the fantasy fringe on Nov. 13-14, with an extraordinary sale of robots, space toys, and Japanese superheroes, die-casts and vinyls. Internet live bidding will be available from anywhere in the world through www.LiveAuctioneers.com.

The comprehensive sci-fi toy collection of nearly 1,500 lots was consigned by Mark Solondz, a New Jersey-based collector who “flew under the radar for years and made very smart buying choices,” according to Dan Morphy Auctions’ owner and CEO Dan Morphy.

“Although both Mark and his collection later became very well known, he formed the core of his fantastic collection quietly, and made many trips to Japan to purchase superhero toys that were not available to buy in the United States,” said Morphy. “We believe it is the largest single-owner robot, space toy and superhero collection of its type ever to come to auction. It stands apart from any collection we at Morphy’s have ever seen before because it contains so many of the great die-cast pieces made by Bandai offshoot ‘Popy,’ in boxes with Japanese writing that are so desirable to collectors.”

The collection consists of five basic categories: robots (tin and some plastic), space vehicles, Japanese superhero toys, die-cast toys by Popy and other Japanese manufacturers (e.g., Bullmark, Takatoku, Ark, Grip, Marusan, etc.), and Japanese vinyls (both vintage and contemporary). A bumper selection of very nice-quality comic character toys is a compatible bonus.

Robot highlights include an X-27 Explorer, Telephone Robot and Mighty 8 – all of which are boxed. Also in the group are a Change Man Robot with lizard head that opens to reveal a man’s head, and a Mr. Atomic. The collection includes Masudaya’s Gang of Four robots: Lavender, Giant Sonic (Train), Radicon and Target.

Top lots among the space vehicles include a Space Patrol Car, boxed VW R-10, a boxed Super Cycle Space Patrol and a rare, smaller (9-inch) version of the Space Patrol Car, a toy that has sold at auction for as much as $10,000 in the past.

Tommy Sage Jr., Morphy’s chief operating officer and an expert in postwar Japanese toys, said he believes the superhero category will put in a very strong performance at auction. “It runs the gamut and is about 80 percent boxed,” said Sage. “To list just a few examples, there’s a Golden Bat, Astro Boy, Masked Rider, Barragan, Moonlight Man and Super Kun, plus quite a few Godzillas and Batman toys. There’s also a giant Mirror Man – the mask comes off and there’s a head inside – and a scarce, hand-painted Jetter Car. There are lots of really unusual vehicles in the collection, including airplanes, submarines, speedboats and motorcycles.”

The November auction at Morphy’s will mark a milestone, since it will be the first time a Japanese die-cast and vinyl collection has come to auction. Most of the Japanese die-cast pieces are boxed, and the vinyls are in their original plastic packaging.

“This represents a unique opportunity for collectors, especially those who do not live in Japan. These toys just don’t turn up for sale in the United States,” said Sage. “They have to be bought there and brought back, which is what Mark Solondz did.”

Die-cast toys made by Popy during the company’s golden era (1970s to 2000) are especially desirable to today’s collectors, since Popy was considered the premier brand of its genre. Popy was a trailblazer and even coined the now-mainstream terms “Chogokin,” which means “super alloy metal;” and Popinica, which merges the name “Popy” and the Japanese word meaning “mini-car.”

ToyboxDX.com founder Alen Yen, and ToyboxDX members Josh Fraser, Mark Gradwell, and Sanjeev Selvaraj, were the specialists who cataloged the die-cast and vinyl toys for Morphy’s onsite. ToyboxDX’s Matt Alt, Jim Maitland, Warren Schwartz and Erik Sjoen provided expert consulting from Tokyo,the West Coast, and Boston.

Yen is quoted saying the Nov. 13-14 sale of the Solondz collection is especially significant because it is “the first time anyone has formally cataloged and priced these types of toys in a public auction of this kind, which finally legitimizes what has been going on for 20 years. There have been private sales in the past, with collectors selling to dealers, or collectors selling to other collectors, and of course eBay and YahooJapan, but there has never been an entire collection offered at auction like this.”

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Yen noted that Solondz’s massive collection of toys from Popy’s 1970s Chogokin and Popinica series includes several items of extreme rarity – a gold-leg version of Mazinger, a black Reideen, complete series of Ninja Captor and Robocon, and Godaikin deluxe sets, including Combattra, Voltes and Chokinzoku Tetsujin 28. Another prized catch for any collector is a very seldom seen intact example of Takemi Sandaio. Whenever an example of this toy is offered for sale – which is not very often – it almost always exhibits some form of damage.

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“There are over a dozen Jumbomachinders, too, for those seeking the 2-foot-tall masterpieces,” Yen said, observing the auction lineup. “These include Getta 2, Dol, Pegas and all of the Shogun Warriors.” Productions from the 1980s are found in the collection, as well, and include Takatoku Valkyries in their pristine original boxes. A headliner within this niche category is a very rare Elintseeker.

There are many highlights among the grouping of vintage vinyls. Some of the top lots include a King Bockle, Karly-seijin, Pegila, Kendorus and Wakuranba, as well as a rare orange and red version of Supersol Kanegon.

The bonus selection of comic character toys to be offered in Morphy’s Nov. 13-14 auction exhibits excellent condition throughout. “Mark’s buying choices were excellent,” said Tommy Sage. “The collection includes a lot of Popeye, Frankenstein and Batman character toys, and all of it is really nice. Collectors will be pleased.”

The buzz in robot and superhero circles is that collectors from Japan and Europe are already lining up to buy airline tickets so they can fly to the United States to attend the auction and other auxiliary events planned by Morphy Auctions.

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In association with ToyboxDX.com, Morphy’s will host a reception for the visiting robot community on Friday evening, Nov. 13, at The Black Horse tavern and hotel in Adamstown. As an added attraction to their impromptu robot summit, many collectors will be paying a call to The Toy Robot Museum, which is less than a five-minute drive from Morphy’s gallery.

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“This is turning into quite a destination event,” said Morphy. “We love it when collectors use our auctions as a hub for their gatherings and conventions, and that’s what this is turning out to be – an international convention .”

Auction & Preview Details:

Dan Morphy Auctions’ sale of the Mark Solondz Collection will take place on Friday and Saturday, Nov. 13 and 14, with Internet live bidding through www.LiveAuctioneers.com.

More than 600 Japanese vinyl and die-cast toys will be auctioned in the Friday session, followed by robots, space toys, superhero toys and character toys on Saturday. Both sessions will commence at 10 a.m. Eastern U.S. Time. For questions on any item in the sale, call 717-335-3435.

The electronic version of the fully illustrated catalog will be available to view soon at www.LiveAuctioneers.com, where you can also sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet during the auction.

[Discuss it in the BBS]

Hello Guys, it’s time for my first “BROG”, so bear with me.

As some of you may or may not know, I’ve done quite a bit of Machinder restoration. I’ve also been playing with molding and all that for quite some time now as well. Since then I’ve always had in mind that I need to do some replica and push this a bit further.

2 Years ago I heard about a new technique for creating industrial prototypes (Stereolythography), and that this technique was usable for doing characters affordably. The technique consists of UV lazers tracing hundreds of layers in a liquid epoxy resin and the liquid solidifies where the lazers are tracing. Everything is computer generated and it uses 3d files. I know I don’t have Tom’s skills for sculping but I’m really familiar with 3d modeling and it seemed like something really
interesting to try one day.

Out of all the Jumbo Machinder Vilains, there are three that I’m just a big fan. Doublas M2, Garada K7 and Rokuron Q9. I was lucky enough to be able to grab the first one from a YJ auction. The second one I had to fight a bit to get. The Garada is one of Tom’s replicas and I’m realist when it comes to the fact that I’ll probably never own a real one, which is the case also for the Q9. You all know that this one is rare but it’s also very damn expensive. I had the opportunity to hold a real one in my hands not so long ago and from that point on I decided that I needed to make a replica myself.

The first step was the 3D model. With the help of an amazing 3d modeler, I was able to have a 3D file looking really good. I cleaned it up and adjusted it to match the real thing as much as possible.

I then searched to find a good company to build it in Stereolythography. Budgets where really high, like almost twice my budget. Then I came accross a Belgium Company called Materialise who turned out to be the European leader in this field. I received very good feedback from them, and they where ready to drop the price a lot to help me with building this project. They were really amazing and helpful.

The second step was the casting of the replica. The result and material where perfect.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to go for the full finish look (cash is not falling from the sky at the moment..), so I had to do all the cleaning of the pieces and sanding to make everything smooth and perfect looking.

I received all the casted pieces a week before I was going on holiday, so I took them all with me to spend my holidays next to the swimming pool,under an umbrella, with my sand paper, cleaning a part each day. All the little rivets needed to be done after as it would have made the 3D file very heavy and it was easier to do them
after. Thanks to Dave, Tom and a lot of pictures from theirs, that became easy to do.
So, after a week under the sun, everything was clean and all the rivets where done.

Now, the third step was the painting. This step was really difficult as it’s almost impossible to know what’s the right color of each part based on pictures. I’ve collected a lot of pictures of several different specimens, and they all look different, depending on your camera setting and lights conditions, sometimes the heads look blue/green, sometimes
blue. So after collecting more pictures and with the help of Dave who took some extra pics for me, I had a better idea what color it should be. I decided to do it with spray paint, but here also, it’s impossible to know exactly what color will come out of the spray, internet references are not the same color as what’s on the spray itself and the color that comes out is always different. So , I did some quick tests and it turned out that most of them where ok. Ready for painting! This toke me more time than I was expecting. But finally with a lot of patience, masking tape, and good weather conditions, the paint job was finish.

One piece was missing and I decided that I will build it by hand, the connection between the two necks. So after assembling all the pieces together, I built this little piece like the little cherry you put on top of the cake.

At the end I’m really happy with the result and the experience was fascinating. It really gave me tons of ideas for the future. The company who did the casting have other techniques to duplicate a model after with a run like 25 pieces. I’ve ask for a quote to do like 25 Rokuron and it seems that it will cost something like 850 Euros for an
unpainted specimen and if I do 25 of them, less is of course more expensive and you have to add the time and material for the painting and assembly.

There’s also the copyright issue. For one single piece for personnal use, there’s no problem, but if I start selling copies I guess there could be an issue.. So I was thinking that maybe I can design my own Machinder and Vilains in the pure style of the old guys we all love. I can maybe get the price to drop down because the design will be more simple . But, it
will turn around 850 Euros for a finished specimen of a personnal desing. What to you guys think of this? Are you going to be interested in sometthing like this? At that price??

Alas, here is the Rokuron Q9 with my other Jumbo Machinders.

Here’s a credit list of all the people who helped me in creating this replica. I want to thank them a lot:

Nekrodave, Tom Franck and Erik Sjoen for their help and pictures.
Kazunori Saito for letting me play with his Q9.
Vincent Boutry for the 3D modeling.
Materialze for the sculpt.
Erik Sjoen for helping me put this Brog together.
And my girlfriend for her patience and understanding.

And thanks to all of you for your motivation even if I don’t get the time to contribute that often.

Cheers from Belgium!

Mike

PS: Wow that was long.. Sounds like I’ve won the NY Marathon or something like that hahahahaha…..yeah but I’m so happy that it’s finally finished.

The birthday haul.. AWESOME. Just wanted to give a public shout out to all my pals here for spoiling me rotten. I’m not bragging here guys, I’m just pointing out how much this community throws down. After all the great summit stories I thought I would throw another positive example into the mix. Our community ROCKS!! Here we are 10+ years into this, a 1000 in internets years, and we just get closer. Grab your tissues kids..

Thanks again to everyone for not only the good wares, but good wishes and thoughts as well. You all know who you are. Love.

Sjoen

I love Tekkaman: The Space Knight (宇宙の騎士テッカマン UchÅ« no Kishi Tekkaman). 1975 was a good year, for humans as well as for toys. I’ve aged a bit I guess.. Roughly 10lbs a year, thanks to Budweiser and a rigorous 12 hr a day schedule of surfing Yahoo Japan auctions. This lil’ guy on the other hand hasn’t aged a day. Just look at him:

Tricycles are typically not a part of my day to day toy diet, but this one for some reason tickled my fancy. I loved it. I needed it.. Little did I know this particular trike would turn out to be a bit of a mystery..

The following debauchery ensued:

Friday night 8pm. On the road feverishly texting back and forth with Brian Flynn about just who the hell made this little bastard. I’ve just got to know. Sideswiping cars while throwing beer cans out the window, my wife SCREAMS “Don’t text and drive!!”. Yeah, yeah..

“No markings, nothing on the box, nada.. It’s definitely NOT the Nakajima version, which has a solid colored plastic trike. This one sports a clear trike, gears exposed and all.” I tap out over the course of two city blocks.

“Listen, Sjoen, I’m breast feeding my kid right now.. I told you I can’t be your plus one tonight. Call Hiro.” BF texts.

“WTF!! I’m asking about the trike not the show.. Forget it.. Later.”

You would think the MASTER collector of the bastards of Japanese toys would know. I mean c’mon, let’s face it, tricycle toys are the red headed step children of not only vinyl but tin collecting as well, and Brian knows more about them than anyone else on God’s green.

“Sorry man, I was a little busy BREAST FEEDING my kid!! Seriously!? Anyway, let’s go with Aoshin. I’ll check tonight and get back to you when I have time. Fucking freak… Please don’t ever text message or call me again. EVER!!..” he types with clear hesitation in his taps. Right? Right.

We both scratch our heads (cyber like) and loosely decide on Aoshin. But, it just doesn’t feel right to me somehow..

Back at the pad later that evening the late night emails are sent to my man on the inside, prof. Robert Duban.

Come Saturday morning 6am, the Moscow to Washington “red telephone” rings. Wait, I mean LA to San Francisco “pink telephone” beeps of the hook.. It’s Prof. RD. He reports that he feverishly spent the last 6 hours scouring the un-datafiles and the internets for proof of this elusive Tekkaman’s lineage. When suddenly the line goes silent.. “Clickity clack click clack..” Moments pass and I finally hear him mutter “check messages stat comrade!”. And voila!

Mystery solved.. Or is it?

Believe it or not, later that morning there were several attempts made on my life and currently the tricycle in question is no longer in my possession. Upon arriving home that fateful morning I discovered that the vault I had entrusted the safety of this rarity to had been professionally compromised and the tricycle liberated.

The mystery continues..

After a long day at work and a dreary rainy drive home, I was pulled out of my slump by a small package on my bed. Seemingly zooming across the country from California in record time, this little guy was just what I needed. Thanks to a fantastic tip from Chairman Sjoen I snagged this little guy on ebay without any fuss at all. As a Macross fan from right around my initial discovery of mecha anime, I have spent plenty of money on various Yamato and Bandai items all vaunting their Perfect Transformation and incredible details, and listened to plenty of fans complain about line-art accuracy or how company X is giving us a sub-par product on purpose. Look more than ten years ago, however, and these complex toys are just a glimmer in some toy maker’s eye.
This is my first TT Macross vinyl, and it’s bigger than I expected, but still small enough to fit in a pocket and provide endless entertainment anywhere. Without being concerned with lots of articulation or line-art accuracy or complete painted detail or any transformation at all, this little guy hits just the spot, allowing for a great playable TOY to pick up a dreary day.
Thanks Erik!