B is for Battle Figures

We've seen them before, but it was eight or so years ago;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2018/01/s-is-for-shelfies-2-imperial-walmart.html 

 

And they are both carded, and several pages down the Tag results, so we'll look at these from Peter Evans, as an overview, Imperial's twin-set Battle Figures - proper rack toys!

 

Zombie Responders Vs Zombies, the zombies being unique sculpts only seen in the Imperial sets, while the responders are clones of those old favourites, Tim Mee's later 54mm Vietnam era GI sculpts. In their separate bags, the GI's look bigger, but it's because they are copied from more animated and gangly figures, and as you can see they are all the same height.

 

Ninjas Vs Pirates! I guess they could have met, on the high seas at some point? Again we have unique sculpts in the Ninjas (possibly a pose missing?), while the pirates are taken from the Hing Fat set, but reduced slightly in size. When we saw these as shelfies from Brian Berke in New York, way back when, I tagged them 54mm, but they are closer to 50mm.

 

Army Men Vs Cavemen, again did they only get five poses, or is one missing? Their foe were more Tim Mee knock-offs, but they were in Khaki, and almost certainly seen in one or two posts here at Small Scale World, back in the twenty-teens. Worth noting that while the new sculpts are all marked Imperial China, the GI's only have the China mark.

 

Not from these sets, and not Imperial, but in the same lot from Peter, so I'll chuck them up here as a possible complete pose count! I think we saw them recently, from Chris Smith, also as a 9-count, so that would seem confirmatory, and as I said then, I think they may be ID'd elsewhere on the Blog?

 

That's it, rack toys in Rack Toy Month! Thanks to Peter for these, and Brian and Chris for previous help with the same subjects.

T is for Tyo Typical Types

Well? A sort of theme was the space-sets I managed to pick-up over the weekend, and the matching loose figures, from two genres we've covered here recently, so a quick post on them, and the bonus was getting two-more brands associated with them both.

 

Haglon taking the Lik Be clones, and Trafalgar the MPC copies, Trafalgar Toys (better known for their tie-ins with LJN, Mego and the Hong Kong subsidiary Lion Rock) would have been a rival to WHC, Grossman and the like, and, indeed, this card may be in the archive as LJN?

 

But Haglon (Hagemayer) were more of a shipping operation, as far as I understand it, like with container ships, port space and warehouses in Holland, shipping all over Europe, and apparently adding their moniker to some of the stuff they shipped-in, that would have extended far beyond toys, which were probably a minor concern among all the household and garden goods, haberdashery, pet supplies and the like? And I'm sure I've seen this card as a generic. We also saw them as Woolbro a while back;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2023/07/lb-is-for-lanky-bods.html 

 

As supplied by Haglon! The 50mm knock-offs of LB's finaest, apparently limited to four poses (did they pantograph one of the Clifford sets?!) are not hard to find, although it took me a while to garner a decent sample, I'm now going for one of each colour! These came from four sources over the weekend.

 

MPC originals, in two slightly different shades of red, we looked at their oeuvre here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2024/04/mpc-is-for-many-plastic-cosmonauts.html

 

and these are grist to the mill, but again, there comes a point when you are just looking for individual 'better' figures, or a specific pose-colour combination, and these are clean!

 

Seen in the link in an unreadable, but probably generic set (next to the Payton bag), the Trafalgar ones are the better versions, very close to the MPC, solidly formed and with thicker bases than the other three or so variants.

 

While these are the Henbrandt/Hing Fat third-generation (like Payton's, but worse) sub-piracies, and again, of limited use, but they'll all be sorted into the master collection, before any are passed on, probably to charity, but that's all a few years away, still.

 

Tim-Mee, so keen to cash-in on Star Wars (AND Battlestar Galactica, everyone forgets that was a year later), grabbed one of the MPC sculpts, with the barest of modification, and there was one in the plunder, last weekend, which was lucky for the completeness of this post!

 

Which gives us, from the left:

• Haglon-Hagemayer/Woolbro (and others?)
• Tim-Mee
• MPC
• Trafalgar Toys (et al)
• Hing Fat/Henbrandt (et al)

Making more and more sense, every time we visit them, and thanking Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin, for their input on the day or over the weekend.

M is for May's Visit - Combat Troops

Sand, green and field-grey, the proper 'toy' soldiers, and there were a fair few in the bag, along with several paratroopers, who are always welcome here!

 

The blow-mould has suffered from a bit of a facial collision, but might be a new colour, the other three have probably all been seen before, but it's all grist to the mill, and there's always new colours, or new-sized copies-of-copies to be found.

 

China copies of Tim Mee's Cold War warriors, possibly a new colour in the washed-out sand, but they'll need to be compared with the existing samples before I know for certain.

 

Modern mix of Matchbox and newer sculpts.

 

Modern, and dodgy hollow-backed rack-toy rascals, but with several sizes, a few poses and severl colour-ways, it will be a while before I've got all of them, or even most!

 

Japanese infantry from Rado or Hing Fat, covered before.

 

Odds and sods, the interesting one here is the chap in the middle who would appear to be one of the Pioneer die-cast accessory figures in soft rubber, and a new pose, to his left, our right, a less common Manurba-Tallon in grey.

 

Seen on the respective Airfix Blog pages, the yellow figures are new to the collection, and that's the beauty of these lots, there's always something new! Many thanks to Peter for most of these, one of the paratroopers was a purchase, I think.

A is for At Bloody Last!

In all meanings of the word, because I've only got an hour to post this, I'm knackered, and may well hit 'publish' sometime before midnight, with half the text missing! Because this is the post which has been held over for at least the last two years, and because this is it for ITLAPD 2025!

 

And, before we start, many thanks to Adrian Little, Brian Berke, John Begg and Paul Stads for help, contributions or stuff for this year's International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

 

So, I got me the Tim Mee Pirate Fortress! More of a Wild West frontier/cavalry stockade fort, but as a bolt-hole in Hispaniola, up some coastal creek, sheltered from the open sea, both weather-wise and line-of-sight wise, it'll do, and timber's easier to replace as the jungle damp rots things!

 

Big Bags!

 

Lots of 'stuff'! 

 

Assembly - shades of Marx's earlier sets are hard to ignore!

 

Believe it or not, the Tee-Pee 'sticks' are actually supposed to be a stack of muskets! And the moulding on the water-pump leaves nowhere for the water to flow up the stand!

 

The pile of logs, and the well, have more Marx DNA than Tim-Mee's!

Dark-brown accessory pack has a secret island, treasure chest and little jolly boat!

 

 

 The secret island stash!

 

Once it's all been 'de-sprued' (removed from the runners) it fits into half the box!
 

In the full figure count, I seemed lucky to get the yellow captain, or maybe you only get one per set, which would mean either a lot of captains going back as re-grind, or a much higher captain-count in the figure bags?

 

Only seven poses?

Yeah? I took 'em, . . . but I can't remember what point I was trying to illustrate? Maybe that you can fit a figure on the lid of the island! And I don't know why I collaged two shots of the same figure's back?

 

 Playing with the other accessories!

Rack-toy figure bags were available without accessories.

 

My original shot, posted elsewhere as a "Who are these?", Paul Stads put me right, although I had them on downloads of Sprecher's site, but I had been looking in the wrong place, namely Shaun's Fantasy Toy Soldier Blog, hoping they were there, as they look very Toy Major/Hing Fat/Red Box!

 

In fact, that's the earlier Hing Fat, there, to the right in green, and the Tim Mee's are more compatible with the later smaller set of limited pose numbers, so around 50mm, but I'll Tag 54mm too!

 

Sticker sheet

 

Instruction sheet

 

Well me'arties! That be it furr anotherr year! Oi managed ter get the lot out on time, but nut'un in the booty-bag furr next toim - avaarrst me blue blistering barnicles, oi'm away to hunt for morr Poirate Plunder!  

I is for Irreverence!

Time for another collection of Internet memes I've sidled away for such a rainy day, and it was a very rainy day today! I nearly published than last night, but gave up and went and did something else, somewhere else (photographed toys), however I found the last one, just now on Faceplant, and it spurred me to action!

 

Can't shoot, won't shoot!

 

The revenge of Tim Mee was brutal!

 

There are several R2D2 one's like this kicking about, but Bungle is priceless!

 

Noooooooooo!

 

I love his grin!

 

One of my oldest friends is taking parcel after parcel of HO-OO stuff in, for his brother, so the brother's wife (no names, no pack-drill!) doesn't cotton-on to how bad it's got, they are both in their 60's, so it's no great crime, but I immediately thought of them when I saw this!

 

Ooops!

 

Hot off today's internet, I thought the following comment, from a Gary Karst deserved to be wider-shared;

 

"It's commemorating the courageous efforts of the U.S. Army Corp of Landscapers in this underwhelming battle. Semper Ficus."