My original intention was to finish off December with one more Ewok entry…unfortunately, the holidays got in the way and before I knew it, December was over. I’ll eventually get to that last Ewok entry but in the meantime, I figured I’d do what many bloggers do or have done to properly cap off their 2012. At the end of every year, It seems almost obligatory and expected to look back at the year and recall all the significant events that happened. So I’d like to join the trend and present to you my top 12 toy purchases of 2012.
There really isn’t any official criteria or formula on how I came up with my top 12, in fact, I literally looked at my collection and listed down all the toys that immediately caught my attention. Then I whittled down my list to the top 12. I’ll try and keep each entry brief because I’ll probably end up writing about each of them in more detail at some point down the line. So enough with the intro…I now present to you my top 12 Toys from the Toyshelf for 2012.
12) Beast – The Marvel Universe line was a little quiet in 2012, not many memorable characters or sculpts were released in my opinion. This one almost feels forced just so the MU line would have “some” representation on this list, but in the end one can’t deny, it’s about time we got a Beast figure! This one almost took too long for such a main character of the X-Men, but the result was well worth the wait. He’s easily one of the best sculpts the MU line has come up with…ever, and they get bonus points for placing extra toe articulation on a 4” figure.
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| Meet Pavel |
11) Hockey Lego Minifig - 2012 was the year I finally caved and bought my first Lego Minifigures. While they were meant to be a one time gift to my girlfriend, they ended up becoming quite the obsession for both of us. While I didn’t HAVE to have them all (like my girlfriend), I did indulge myself and put together my own “mini” minifigure collection, mostly based on all the violent ones and monsters ha ha. Being a fan of hockey, I immedeatley gravitated to this guy…whom I named Pavel, after one of my favorite players, Pavel Bure. I mean how could you NOT like this guy with his cute iddy biddy skates! Anyway in my attempt to put together my own minifigure hockey team, Pavel was soon joined by Marcus (Naslund) & Kopi (Kopitar) but unfortunately the well has run dry as the hockey player has become rather “extinct” in the wild…so these 3 will just have to do for now.
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| and his mates Marcus & Kopi |
OK, these next two entries technically aren’t Transformers since they aren’t officially licenced Hasbro products. They are produced by third party companies who have so far managed to avoid Hasbro’s legal department...call them homages or *not* Transformers if you wish, but nobody is being fooled, we all know who these guys REALLY are supposed to be…
10) Brawn / Hench – I’ve always liked Brawn. The fact that he was a small Transformer who could probably beat up any of the bigger Transformers and throw Optimus Prime in the air, always appealed to me. Unfortunately, the original Brawn toy released in 84 looked nothing like the cartoon character. And since then, not many Brawn toys have been ever released. But thanks to iGear toys we have “Hench” or *not*Brawn, the perfect rendition of Brawn that I knew and loved from the cartoon.
9) Fireflight / Phantom – Of all the Transformer Gestalts (geek mode on: Gestalts are sub groups of Transformers who combine to form one big robot. Geek mode off) The Aerialbots and their combined form Superion has always been my favorites. So when third party company TFC toys started their own modern version of the Aerialbots/Superion towards the end of 2012, I knew I had to complete it. So far only the first character has been released, Phantom, who is a homage to the Aerialbot Fireflight. On its own, Phantom, I mean Fireflight, is a great figure with a great robot and jet mode. Now the rest of the team will follow in 2013. They have all been shown (including combined form) online in various prototype stages and I have to say, it looks EPIC. Expect this guy and the rest of his team to top (or at least be close to the top) in next year’s best of list.
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| Coming in 2013.... |
8) Rattlor – Great sculpt and great paintjob, what else is there to say. The original figure was actually pretty plain sporting no armor. This was added when he was redesigned for the 200X cartoon. So in order to keep costs down (which was raised due to the very detailed paintjob), a modernized version of his armor was left out. Luckily I had the 200X version as well and his armor was removable and fit nicely with this newer version. The end result placed this guy on my list. Oh and did I mention his tail actually rattles?
7) Ewok 5-Pack – 2012 will be forever known as the year I went all in with the ewoks. I bought tons of those little furry dudes and even built them a village. Now of all the ewoks I got, this 5-pack has got to be my favourite. You get 5 ewoks and tons of ewok accessories to give to the other ewoks on your tribe. And as for the lineup of the ewoks in the pack, you’ve got 2 iconic nameless ewoks from ROTJ who’re finally given names: Flitchee, the ewok seen celebrating with a Storm Trooper blaster in hand, and Nanta…the only ewok who …. well, died onscreen. We also get Tippett, who sports a killer sabre-toothed skull cap. Kneesaa, Wicket’s partner from the ewok cartoon. And finally my favourite ewok, Teebo, the ewok scout unfortunately known most for being blasted in the butt by R2-D2.
to be continued...
