Toy Fair 2012 Updates, Part II

February 12, 2012 | Poe

There’s already a ton of news and the damned show hasn’t even started yet (though it will have by the time I get this post up). On a side note, the Mattel collector show–and subsequent MOTUC reveals–will be at 3pm ET today.

JediCreeper is going to do a write-up tonight, including the Mattel event. In the meantime, he’ll continue to tweet all day.

I’ve also uploaded a ton of Hasbro press pics of yesterday’s reveals, which you can check out on my Flickr account. If you want to see pics of the Horsemen event, including pics of the upcoming Raven and Vampire Queen figures from FANtastic Exclusive, I recommend this gallery from PCN.

Updates from Hasbro Collector’s Event

February 11, 2012 | Poe

Just a reminder, Poester JediCreeper is reporting for PGPoA from the Hasbro Collector’s Event at Toy Fair today. Follow his tweets here.

Pics to come!

Poest Office > How Durable Are Rubber Hoses on Toys?

February 10, 2012 | Poe

Poester SF writes in:

“I’m a collector and I know you have a lot of experience with figures so I hope you can help me out. I’ve got a quick question about rubber parts used in toys. I am looking specifically at figures like Transformers Dark of the Moon Shockwave and McFarlane’s Call of Duty Marine Corps with Flamethrower figure when I ask this. Those figures have rubber hoses (at least Shockwave does) and I’m wondering if these rubber parts can become worn from taking them out of their sockets and re-inserting themtoo many times.  Have you had any experience with this?”

Thanks for the note, SF. While I don’t own either of the toys you specifically mention, I have had a number of toys over the years with rubber parts, and in general I have found that the durability of such hoses depends a lot on the design of the hose itself. For example, I have a Mutagen Man figure from the vintage Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles line whose hoses are still tight and strong, but I’ve had other figures who tubes have been so thin as to be easily ripped.

If your question is whether removing and replacing the tubes frequently will weaken their ability to hold tight in the socket, my gut feeling is that the answer is no. Rubber is fairly flexible and will simply squeeze to fit the hole, rather than getting scratched away.

That said, if you’re really concerned about durability, it’s never a good idea to repeatedly remove and replace parts on a figure, especially if they’re made of rubber.

But since, again, I don’t own those two figures, I invite my readers to weigh in with their own experiences. Do you find rubber hoses to be durable or easily ruined?

If you’d like to ask Poe a toy-related question, send an email to poe@poeghostal.com. Please include “Poest Office” in the subject heading.

Figure It Out #2 Winner

February 10, 2012 | Poe

Bruiser the Berserker Baboon

As many, many, many (deep breath) many of you correctly guessed, the toy in this week’s Figure It Out was Bruiser the Berserker Baboon from Hasbro’s short-lived Bucky O’Hare line–a fun, quality line that I’ve always seen as an attempt to lure in kids who liked the Ninja Turtles, but that’s neither here nor there.

I ended up choosing a winner from the correct entries at random: Heli. Heli will receive a Poe Prize in the mail next week.

Gonna have to pick a harder one next time…but not as hard as the first one.

Review > Queen Marlena (Masters of the Universe Classics)

February 10, 2012 | Poe

When He-Man and the Masters of the Universe was on the air, the series often followed a pattern: a new character would be developed as a toy, then added to the cartoon. It was rare for it to work in the opposite direction, though it occasionally did: Prince Adam, Cringer, Orko, King Randor, and the Sorceress were all characters that were either created by Filmation or were best known through their depiction on the cartoon. It seems unlikely that Mattel would have created a Prince Adam or Randor figure–or perhaps even the Sorceress–without the character’s popularity on the cartoon to sell the toy; and Orko was created by Filmation, so he wouldn’t have existed at all.

There were a few glaring omissions from that list, though. One was Adora, from sister show She-Ra; and the other is Queen Marlena. Wife to King Randor, mother to Prince Adam, former astronaut and queen of all Eternia, Marlena appeared in many episodes of Masters of the Universe, yet she didn’t get an action figure until last summer’s San Diego Comic Con exclusive. (more…)