#862 HOOK - LOST BOY ACE (1991)

It surprises me how cheap are some figures of this series today... surely they produced way too many figures that remained unsold, despite the success of the movie.

I bought this figure recently for very very little money. I like the figures, and I wanted to have and look at one card. It was not in very good shape, but the price and my chance to open the package and have a figure with all its accessories made me buy it. Needless to say, that accesories from this toyline are very difficult to find, so it is better to buy the figures 100% complete.

Ace is one of the Lost Boys, and it looks very similar to the character in the movie, with its distinctive hat. The figure character seems slightly older, since the actor who played the role was a teenager, maybe 15 years old or so.

The figure came with a stab simulating being made of wood and a backpack of thin plastic that can spit water. The backpack will probably deteriorate after some years, but at the moment is perfect. I will not put water inside, because it will get dirty inside and then it will deteriorate faster.

The card is multilingual and has a back catalogue showing all figures, as well as the instructions for the action feature at the left side of the backcard.

I have taken a few pictures at the forest. Hope you like them.

You can also see two more figures in entry #440.

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: ACE (LOST BOY)
• Toy Line: Hook (Wave 1)
• Year: 1991
• Company: Mattel (U.S.A.)
• Size of the figures: Around 12 cm

#861 PLAYWELL - DOME-0 (Around 1982)

This car was presented a long time ago by mistake. I don´t know why, I presented it together with some Holly models, that, to my knowledge, has no relation to Playwell at all. I was probably confused by the scale, similar bulky construction and pull-back motor.

The car is very interesting, since there are very few reproductions of this car made in small scale. Actually, and to my embarrasement, I had never seen this car before, I didn't know it existed.

There seems to be two different Playwell companies separated in time a few decades. The first one, called Playwell Toy Inc. was based in Hong-Kong and produced all kind of times sometime during the 70s and the 80s. The second Playwell was based somewhere in the Middle East and started its production in 2001. The company we are talking about here is the first one, and this car is probably from the early 80s.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: DOME-0
• Scale: 1:45
• Year: Around 1982
• Company: Playwell (Hong-Kong)
• Size: approx. 9 cm

#860 GOZÁN - CAMIÓN CON CUBA - SERIE FURIA (Ref. 162) (Around 1980)

This truck is clearly inspired in the Tonka trucks, licensed in Spain by Rico and sold under the brand “Sansón”, “Mini Sansón” and similar names. I assume Gozán simply tried to compete with Rico producing a similar toy, with a more modern design. The Gozán series called “Furia” were also extremely robust, and made of similar components than the Rico toys.

 

My unit comes from an old toy shop, it is mint in its box, although the window is slightly broken.

At the back and sides of the box, there are other references. This list also includes references from other boxes.

• Ref. 160 – Camión Volquete
• Ref. 162 – Camión con Cuba
• Ref. 164 – Camión Grúa
• Ref. 165 – Camión Hormigonera
• Ref. 166 – Camión de Basura (same as 162)
• Ref. 167 – Camión  Excavadora
• Ref. 168 – Camión Lanzamisiles
• Ref. 169 – Camión Plataforma con 2 Motos
• Ref. 194 – Camión Plataforma con Bulldozer
• Ref. 195 – Camión Plataforma con Apisonadora

 
There were also other series with different sizes and lengths (some were longer trailer trucks, like a car transport that was loaded with nice Formula Ones from the late 70s, Mini 1000s, Motorbikes, Tanks and Jeeps, Renault 5s…).

Some of these include:
“Serie Tigre” (Around 1972)
“Serie Coloso” (Around 1972)
“Serie Bronco” (Around 1972)
“Serie Tigre 2000” (Around 1979)

All toys have the name of the series written in the tin in the front part, inside the cabin, and also in the base.

Do not mistake the “Serie Furia” by Gozán with the “Serie Furia” by Gusival.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: CAMIÓN CON CUBA - SERIE FURIA (Ref. 162)
• Year: Around 1980
• Company: Gozán (Spain)
• Size: approx. 12 cm

#859 G.I. JOE - BREAKER and ROCK ‘N ROLL (1982)

Getting figures from the first wave is not that easy. They are more fragile than the average figure, and are often found with broken thumbs, and include extremely small accesories (lots of transparent visors in their helmets, or like in the Rock´N Roll case, a small bipod that are easily lost.

I got Breaker a long time ago in an exchange with a fellow collector, and Rock ‘N Roll was recently bought to an eBay seller from Greece. With these two, I can already make one entry dealing with the first wave of G.I.Joe.

As in most action figure toylines, the first wave is rather small, toy companies do not want to make a great investment, if they do not know for sure that the toyline will sell well. Sometimes they use simplified designs to reduce costs, or even change some parts or make them with different cheaper materials.

In the case of G.I.Joe: ARAH, the first wave consisted of 9 figures, later expanded to 11, plus a few vehicles (with 4 drivers) and a mail-in figure. The way to save costs here was to re-use body parts from one figure to the next, and so, almost every figure has the same waist, there are only a few chest parts, and even some heads are used more than once.

Moreover, almost all figures are camo green and, still, it is possible to recognise all figures because of their distinctive features. At the beginning, G.I.Joe wanted to keep the spirit of the original G.I.Joes from the 60s and the 70s: they are all quite military, although with some news: Beside size, figure type and the obvious stuff, the most important is probably that now, there would be a group of bad guys belonging to a terrorist organisation trying to rule the world, and this opens the chance to introduce much fictional characters, plots and weapons. At the begininng it was maybe not intended, but as the waves were released, the characters and their bios were each time more and more fantastic.

Of course there´s the straight arms (and the not-yet-improved shoulders)... I guess Hasbro was thinking in saving some money here, since the swivel arm articulation was already used in some toylines before. The swivel arms requires a greater number of parts in the arms of the figure but it is more stable and has a better durability.

When the toyline proved itself to be profitable, Hasbro released all figures again with improved swivel arms and shoulders (the whole arms were new designed, and the crotch was made less bulky). That was in 1983, all swivel arm versions of the figures in wave 1 are known within collectors as v1.5, that is more or less a variation of the v1s.

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: BREAKER v1  and ROCK ‘N ROLL v1
• Toy Line: G.I. Joe (Wave 1)
• Year: 1982
• Company: Hasbro (U.S.A.)
• Size of the figures: 9,5 cm (3 3/4'')

#858 FX SCHMID - SUPER TRUMPF (MINIS) - FEUERSTÜHLE, ALLRAD, HEIßE ÖFEN (1988 and 1990)

And continuing the previous entry, here are three more mini quartetts from the same series, year and similar themes.

FEUERSTÜHLE (Motorbikes)

ALLRAD (4x4)

HEIßE ÖFEN (Motorbikes)

This set of cards seems to be an update of Feuerstühle, since most of the cards are the same. Probably this one was released a couple of years, later, maybe around 1990.

The instructions are printed at the back of the cover card.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: SUPER TRUMPF (MINIS) - FEUERSTÜHLE (No. 56513.1), ALLRAD (No. 56513.1), HEIßE ÖFEN (No. 56511.7)
• Year: 1988
• Company: FX Schmid (Germany)

#857 FX SCHMID - SUPER TRUMPF (MINIS) - GRAND PRIX, RALLYE, TOTAL IRRE, AUF ACHSE, JETS, TIERE AUS ALLER WELT (1988)

A few years ago, I found some more quartetts in a shop as they were getting rid of old stock, and I bought all they had (well, one of each kind). Most of them are technical quartetts, with the only exception of "Tiere aus aller Welt", that is a rather typical animal quartett, and whose cover card has a different design.

I already had some mini quartetts from FX Schmid, they were even presented in this blog a long time ago (see #197). Compared to those Mini Super Trumpfs, these have a different cover design, since they are a few years newer than the series that brought us the famous Horror and Spuk quartetts.

Interestingly, all other quartetts carry the same reference number: No. 56513.1, maybe because they were sold to retailers in one big package including quartetts of different themes. The "Animal" quartett does not have a reference nummer.

All quartetts are based in their "bigger brothers", and have been reduced in size, but also in number of cards, since this small decks count only 24 cards each (6 families instead of 8), plus cover card, and maybe some more with advertisements of other FX Schmid products.

The decks presented in this entry are:
Grand Prix (Formula 1)

Rally

Total Irre (Custom Cars and Vans)

Auf Achse (Trucks)

Jets

Tiere aus aller Welt

Some of the boxes still have the price tag in. 16 Austrian Schilling.

Note that Auf Achse is also a popular board game by the same company FX Schmid. It was awarded game of the year in Germany in 1987. See promotional card included in all quartett set except "Tiere aus aller Welt".

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: SUPER TRUMPF (MINIS) - GRAND PRIX, RALLYE, TOTAL IRRE, AUF ACHSE, JETS, TIERE AUS ALLER WELT
• Year: 1988
• Company: FX Schmid (Germany)