Wednesday, May 27, 2015

The Best of The Rest

When it comes to toy purchases in 2014, I guess it’s no surprise that I didn’t just stick to my main three of Transformers, He-Man and G.I.Joe. I got married last year and after the wedding followed trips to Singapore, Hong Kong and the US with my wife. And of course that meant a whole bunch of toys to catch my attention and bore new holes into my wallet.

Marvel Universe
When it comes to Marvel, I used to exclusively collect their smaller 3.75” Universe/Infinite line and stayed away from the 6” Legends line. Lately though it seems Hasbro has been trying to steer collectors towards the Legends line and simplifying their smaller line to appeal more to kids. So while I did my best to stay away, little by little, the Legends line started luring me in.

this is ALL I collected
I finally caved when they released their excellent Guardians of the Galaxy movie wave. I found the entire wave, which included a personal favorite of mine, Nova, Richard Rider and not that cheap replacement Sam Alexander that Marvel is trying to shove down our throats (I digress…that shall be a topic of another post) in a hobby store in Hong Kong. And my wife agreed to get it for me as a belated wedding gift.



This was my first taste of Marvel Legends and I liked it. I continued to pick up others in my US trip that I found at retail & clearance prices, like Black Widow, Black Cat and Agent Venom, stuff that were being sold at ridiculous scalper prices back home.


Star Wars
Now Star Wars was another toyline I collected as a child that I did my best to stay away from as an adult. If you discount the period where I went crazy and built an entire ewok village, and picking up a random character here and there, for the most part I pretty much stayed away from anything else.


Yup! this is ALL the Star Wars I have...

Once again though, Hasbro managed to find a new way to take my money by starting their 6” Star Wars Black line. When I saw a bunch of them selling at practically half off in an HK Toys R’Us, I didn’t hesitate and got myself a Han Solo, Slave Leia and a Bespin Luke (my favorite version Luke)….ok ok I got myself a young Ben Kenobi as well….but I DID resist getting myself a Greedo, so there.


In the US, I also found myself a Chewbacca to go with Han, not knowing that he’d eventually be warming pegs in Manila, oh well. But my prize get for Star Wars Black would have to be everybody’s favorite bounty hunter, Boba Fett. Like many, it was love at first sight with this bounty hunter and when I found him at a decent price online I didn’t hesitate to grab him.



Knock Off Minifigures
Ok so this was another thing I really went totally crazy on in 2014. I’ve already written about how crazy expensive Lego sells for here in Manila. So no matter how cool all those superhero minifigures looked, the fact that most of them came with Lego sets, made collecting them pretty much a pipe dream.


Anyway I it wasn’t long before those toy manufacturers from China caught on to the potential market and started producing knock off Lego minifigures based off those hard to get superheroes. And since they were knock-offs, were sold at really cheap prices. I saw a bunch of these guys in Singapore, I scooped up quite a lot…enough to complete my own Justice League. Now I don’t know, Lego purists may sneer at these knock offs, but for me, for the most part they look pretty great and are good enough for me!

Walking Dead
I am a HUGE fan of the Walking Dead, both the show and the comic that it is based on. But for some reason I never felt compelled to get any of the fantastically sculpted toys by Mcfarlane. I dunno, I just couldn’t get into a line that featured characters that could easily end up as zombie chow in the next episode or issue of the comic.


In 2013, I did cave when I got myself a Michonne figure set that came with her 2 pet zombies. And in 2014 I caved again when I found myself a Daryl Dixon set complete with his motorcycle. I had been eyeing this for quite some time but couldn’t bring myself to pull the trigger at the $30-35 price it was selling for online. I finally saw one for sale at a booth at New York Comic Con for $20 and that was it for me.


I figured of all the characters in the show, the chances of either Michonne or Daryl dying are pretty slim to none (knock on wood), so I’m ok having them on my toy shelf (although my wife draws the line at displaying Michonne’s zombie pets in our living room ha ha). Now all I need is a Rick Grimes….and Glenn & Maggie, and Carol and….

The ONE and ONLY Nova