#744 UNKNOWN MANUFACTURER - BASKET FEVER PVC FIGURES (1993)

This plastic figures were made in 1992 and are marked (C) D´Ocon 1992. Interestingly, there is no manufacturer marking on the back of the figures and collectors in Spain argue if the manufacturer was Comics Spain or not. The figures are identical to these: same plastic, same paint, similar design, but the company in 1992 has some economic problems as I explained in entry #267. This would make some sense if they did this figures using a second company in order to cash the money and avoid paying other debts. One detail here is that in 1997, together with Comics Spain there were other two companies that were precincted and closed.

Curiously, that same year it would be another D'Ocon production (Delfy) that would cause the end of Comics Spain.

It will probably take a few years more until we find somebody involved in the casting or manufacturing of these figures and we know the rest of the story. No matter what, the figures  are really great and represent characters from the Spanish cartoon series "Basket Fever" or "Locos por el Basket".

This series was produced by the Public Spanish TV (TVE), the ACB League (professional basketball league) and the Spanish Basketball Federation to promote basketball and sports among children. The main character, a grasshopper was also the official mascot of the ACB league.

Charlie and Hooper

The cartoons´ script dealt with two rival gangs who instead of fighting decide to play sports for the control of the block. One of the gangs is formed by respectable, nice and kind dogs, and the other one are crook and troublemaker dogs. The grasshopper arrives and joins the first group, and will have the idea to play basketball with the rival gang.

Linda

The good guys gang is called "dinamics". Although in the original series there were more characters, these are the ones made in PVC:

-Mike (a.k.a. Boss): Gang Leader

-Linda: Gang member

-Hooper: The grasshopper, newest member of the gang

-Sargent: Trainer (I do not have the figure yet!)

The bad guys gang is called "quebrantahuesos". This name literally means "the bonecrushers", but it is also the common name in Spanish for the bearded Vulture, a bird that can be found in many places around Spain.

-Charlie (a.k.a. Kilo): Gang Leader

-Yvonne: Gang member and Charlie´s girlfriend

-Rapper: Gang member

-O'Rejas: Trainer

Boss and Ivonne

Unfortunately, there are other characters that do not got their figure. In the dinamics gang: Freddie (a.k.a. Krueger) and Plasta, and for the Quebrantahuesos team: Paccino and the Destroyer. With these figures we would have 2 five member teams and two trainers, and thus we could have played 5 on 5 basketball games.

Rapper and O'Rejas

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: HOOPER, BOSS, LINDA, CHARLIE, YVONNE, RAPPER and O'REJAS.
• Year: 1992
• Company: Unknown Manufacturer, maybe Comics Spain (Spain)
• Size of the figures: Around 7 cm (between  2’’ and 3’’)

#524 COMICS SPAIN – FLASH GORDON and TERMINATOR (1990 and 1992)

The Terminator figure is one of the most interesting figures in the whole Comics Spain catalogue. It does not belong to any series of figures, it is the only figure made from the Terminator movies. The cast is great and represents Arnold Schwarzenegger as seen in the movie Terminator 2: Judgement Day from 1991: black leather outfit, face half human, half machine and shotgun on hand.

The figure is licensed by Carolco, and has a copyright from 1992. It is not very easy to find nowadays. Being a cult carácter from a very famous film, it is very sought-after.

Flash Gordon is another carácter that does not belong to any series in particular, it is again the only figure made of him. It is difficult to identify at first sight, because he seems to be wearing a different outfit, than the one we usually see in the movies or in the comics, maybe the reference was the Revell model from 1965 shown here. The figure carries his helmet on one hand and has a pistol in the other hand.

This figure is copyrighted in 1990 and is licensed by K.F.S. (King Features Syndicate).

More information about Comics Spain/ Comics Figuras is coming to light in the last months. The guys frorm Star Wars Spanish Stuff uploaded this video in February 2014. It explains some facts about the company, shows the facilities located near Barcelona, and also explains how did they build the figures: from casting to painting. In the final part of the video, there is a parade of several figures that were available back in the days.

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: FLASH GORDON and TERMINATOR
• Year: 1990 and 1992
• Company: Comics Spain (Spain)
• Size of the figures: Around 7 cm (between  2’’ and 3’’)

#267 COMICS SPAIN – MUPPET BABIES (JIM HENSON) (1986)

I finally found plenty of information about Comics Spain! Last time I tried, I couldn’t, because the company that manufactured these plastic figures is not called “Comics Spain”, but “Comic Figuras S.L.”.

Comic Figuras S.L. was a Spanish plastic (PVC) figure manufacturer settled in Granollers, a town near Barcelona. The company was founded sometime by the early 80s. Unofficial sources say the company was founded after two store owners travelled to one of the big toy fairs in Germany (Nürnberg, probably) and discovered Schleich’s Smurfs. They bought some boxes of these small plastic figures, and sold them in their store with great success, so they decided to become themselves manufacturers. Without any license they produced unmarked Smurfs as well as other toy figures. These unmarked Smurfs are called among collectors “CNTs”.

It seems that Yolanda acquired the rights to sell Schleich’s Smurfs in Spain, so they sued Comic Figuras S.L. and won the case. The production of Smurfs stopped, but Comic Figuras tried to find other licenses to keep producing figures.

The first known catalogues of the company appeared in 1985, and back then, it had already purchased some licenses and was producing figures legally. This was the situation for the next 3 years, but in 1988, Disney decided not to renew those licenses.

Up to this point, the story of the company becomes quite blurry: in 1992, the company went into receivership, with an asset of 232 million pesetas and a debt of 148 million pesetas (La Vanguardia,25th January 1993). This triggered some legal investigations that did not discover anything illegal.

The company produced figures after 1992 for which they had lost the license years ago; according to La Vanguardia, the 9^th of April 1997, police confiscated 10 tons of plastic figures for piracy and falsification. A few days before some investigators discovered in a shop unlicensed figures of “Delfy and His Friends”, a Spanish tv-series. After some enquiries, the police found the storehouse of Comics Figuras and closed it, confiscating the figures. Another two companies were also closed after they found the casts to produce the figures. If the production was made by Comics Figuras or one of the other companies, it is unknown to me. Police arrested the owner of the toy store and other three people, while the person in charge of Comics Figures had fleed around 7 months before.

Among the confiscated products there were Disney and Warner Bros. characters, as well as characters from the Spanish publishing house “Ediciones B” (Clever & Smart) and even the Barcelona Football Club. The confiscated figures had a value of 2000 million pesetas (around 12 million Euros).

(La Vanguardia, 10th April 1997)

(La Vanguardia, 1st May 1997)

The figures have enormous quality, and today they’re pretty scarce. Many collectors are trying to get them, and the prices are quite high… mostly considering that all company stocks were presumably destroyed. Their Smurf and Superheroes series are maybe the most popular, but as you could see in the catalogue images, there were many series made, I do not really how did they select which series would be manufactured or which wouldn’t, I guess they would simply produce figures from any tv-series, comics or films that were popular (or were supposed to become popular, but didn’t) back then. As a result, there are some really weird series, like 11 figures from the comic books “Shoe” by Jeff McNelly. Never heard about them  before…

By the way, most figures have (many) colour variations, what it's normal considering that they were hand painted and that they were produced during many consecutive years. Here's for example a variation of Rowlf the Dog.

Figures are marked (C) 86 HA! Comics Spain plus the CE mark.

And to finish this article, I will leave here the pictures of all catalogues I could find. I thank Sergio for them. You can visit his store at todocoleccion. Resolution of the pictures is not very good, but good enough to recognise most of the figures.

catalogue - around 1985

catalogue - around 1985

catalogue - around 1991-1992

catalogue - around 1991-1992

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Names: KERMIT THE FROG, MISS PIGGY, FOZZIE BEAR, ANIMAL, ROWLF THE DOG and GONZO.
• Alternate Names: LA RANA GUSTAVO, SRTA. PIGGY, FOZZIE EL OSO, ANIMAL, RUFO EL PERRO and GONZO (Spanish - Spain) LA RANA RENÉ (South American Spanish)
• Toy Line: Pequeñecos / Muppet Babies)
• Year: 1986
• Company: Comics Spain/ Comic Figuras S.L. (Spain)

#192 COMICS SPAIN – CAPTAIN AMERICA, SPIDERMAN, SUPERMAN, STARFIRE and AQUAMAN (1990, 1992)

Comics Spain is together with Yolanda, the most important manufacturer of Plastic (PVC) figures from Spain. Unlike Yolanda, Comics Spain disappeared by the mid 90s (some say 1996). Although there are many webpages and photo albums depicting the figures, you won’t find a single bit of information about the company in the whole internet… nothing. That’s why I have been skipping this article for so long. 

A few days ago, I contacted a seller of these figures who claimed to have met a salesman of the company, from whom he got a catalogue, bought some rests, and so on… but he never replied to my message. I contacted him a 2nd time, but he simply ignored me. Maybe it’s a good idea to publish an “empty” entry about Comics Spain with an open request: “please provide me information about Comics Spain!”

The company, as well as it’s concurrent Yolanda, made figures out of famous TV series, cartoons, comic books, and toys, everything that was popular among children had its place here. Most celebrated lines include My Little Pony, Star Wars, Ewooks or Marvel and DC Superheroes. And among Spanish television programs and cartoons (very unknown outside Spain): Capitán Trueno, Zipi y Zape, Don Quijote, Un, Dos, Tres, los Fruitis...  As said in the Yolanda entries, these figures were sold in toy stores and bakeries, since they are used to decorate birthday cakes and Easter Monas.

You might be asking yourself, what's that Batman figure there... Some Comics Spain figures are copies of (previously) existing Bully figures, and although I do not have the Comic Spain's Batman Figure, I have the german one. If I ever get it, I'll make a better comparison. Here are Comics Spain's Batmen (among other Superheroes).

In the last months, I managed to acquire a couple of figures by this company. Mostly superheroes, like those three I am presenting today.

An interesting article about Comics Spain's Superhéroes was published in the F.E.A. Magazine from December 2014 (in Spanish).

UPPDATE (Feb/2018): Two more characters: Starfire and Aquaman.

 

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: CAPTAIN AMERICA, SPIDERMAN, SUPERMAN, STARFIRE and AQUAMAN
• Alternate Names: CAPITÁN AMÉRICA (Spain)
• Year: 1990, 1992
• Company: Comics Spain (Spain)
• Size of the figures: Around 7 cm (between  2’’ and 3’’).