The Best Of 2018 part 2

So it’s finally time to finish off this little experiment I started nine whole months ago when I set off to tackle my annual “best of” list in a new way. I have to say I really enjoyed building up to my best of 2018 list this way as it gave me a greater appreciation of everything I got in the past 365 days. I really hope it was as fun for you the readers as it was for me. So let’s get it on!

The Best Of 2018 part 1

Another year has come and gone. And before we move on to 2019, it’s time to look back at my favorite toy purchases of 2018 and do the near impossible task of picking out my top ten out of all of them.

Some "Big Love" To End The Year

In 1987, the first full length G.I.Joe animated movie was released….to video. Just like the animated Transformers movie that came out a year earlier, one of the main objectives that this movie had was to introduce new characters based on the toy released that year. Cobra’s back story was expanded upon with the introduction of the Cobra-La secret empire. And the Joes’ ranks were bolstered by the addition of some new recruits collectively known as the Rawhides.

A Story Arc for Angel

If you were to take the powers of the five original X-Men and ask people to rank them in terms of the usefulness and effectivity in battle, I think that it would be a safe to assume that the power of flight wouldn’t be on top of many people’s lists. I mean don’t get me wrong, flying is a cool power but I would take concussive energy blasts, telekinesis, ice generation and even enlarged hands and feet over it...ok maybe not enlarged hands and feet, but you get the point.

Recoloring From The Past

Like most things in life, toy production is an expensive business. Toy companies pump in a lot of money into their products and do whatever they can to maximize profits. Which is why it is a common practice in the industry to reuse as many toy designs/molds as they can, repackaging, tweaking or at the very least recoloring them in order to convince the consumer to keep buying more product while at the same time lowering production costs.

Some Customizing Action

If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you’d know that sometime back in 2004 up to around 2009, I was really into modelling 3D Transformers on the computer. I don’t think it was an exaggeration that I modeled about 80-90% of all the Transformers characters released between 1984-86 and a little bit more beyond that. I just loved challenging myself and seeing how my favorite robots would turn out under my 3D modelling interpretation. Pretty soon I was running out of existing characters to model...so what was there left to do? Well I started creating my own.

Hunting For Some Bounty

Considering the fact that they were literally on screen together as a group for less than a minute with hardly a single speaking line between them, it’s quite amazing how much of a cult favorite status the bounty hunters from The Empire Strikes Back have achieved amongst the Star Wars fandom. Possibly the biggest reason was because they included in their ranks one of the most popular characters from that galaxy far far away, Boba Fett. And as a result the entire group most likely benefited from that close association.

Covering The Girl

Like most toy properties of the 80’s aimed towards boys, G.I.Joe wasn’t known for introducing a lot of female characters into the line. To their credit though, they did a pretty good job at making the very few women that they did create into pretty well developed and memorable characters. Now while Joes like Scarlett and Lady Jaye as well as Cobras, Barnoness and even Zaranna have pretty much become iconic names within the property, there is one lady that wasn’t featured as much even though she was introduced fairly early into the line and it’s this specific girl that I’d like to….cover.

A Walking Fart Joke

No matter how successful a toy line gets, like almost anything in life, nothing really lasts forever. There are many reasons that toy lines end or get cancelled. Sometimes toy companies get complacent or focus their attention on a newer more lucrative property. Other times, media that the toy line is connected to doesn’t do well. And other times, they try to keep the ball rolling by introducing such outlandish new characters that literally well…..stink.

Disappointing The Phandom

Fandom is a funny thing, especially when pertaining to a major franchise such as Star Wars. When presented with a universe populated by hundreds of unique characters, you really cannot tell exactly which of the of them will “stick” in the hearts of the fans. Sure there are obvious characters like Luke, Leia, Han, Rey & Kylo, you know the main heroes & villains of the story. But every now and then you get other characters who gain their popularity not for doing particularly much in the movies themselves but for something as basic as just looking cool.

The Best of 2018: Third Quarter

And just like that, another three more months have passed and my toy shelf has become home to yet another bunch of new plastic heroes, villains, robots, aliens and everything in between. So here we go with part three of the best of what 2018 has to offer.