Stupendous Series #13 - The Steel Claw in "City Beneath the Sand"

Johnny Arab is kidnapping various top British boffins to work on an A-bomb, and only the Steel Claw (currently working for top black ops bods the Shadow Squad) can stop them. 120-ish pages of nerve-jangling excitement.

"An exciting Steel Claw story!", it says here. Personally I've always found the Claw to be a little whitebread compared to the pomp and insanity of the Spider, but it's still not bad. I've had the scans for this one floating around for ages, but have only just got around to tidying up the last handful of pages (I've even included the somewhat dated quiz - do you know what shape a Chinaman's eyes are?) in between overhauling the site's extant content. As the original pages of these Super Library comics don't really stand being blown up to full resolution, the scans are paired, so you need to read down the left side, then go across to the top of the right. I'm sure you'll pick it up.

- Stupendous Series #13 - City Beneath the Sand

G.I. Joe 30th Anniversary - Lifeline

Next up in the list of new G.I. Joe figures I keep calling 25th Anniversary figures despite the fact the 25th Anniversary was in 2007 - Lifeline.

I always liked the guy despite his irritating overstated pacifism (the overstated bit irritated, not the pacifism itself... Well, maybe both), must've been something about his funky red suit. I was a bit miffed he wasn't done earlier, but then the shiny new 30th Anniversary version is very good, and probably better than an Assault on Cobra Island-style Frankenstein effort.

- G.I. Joe - Lifeline toy review

Transformers: Dark of the Moon - Leadfoot

Anyone after this toy at a sane price owes me a huge favour. Panic-stricken by the thought the fat, violent English Wrecker might not get a Western release at Deluxe size, I bought the Takara release for silly money. This precipitous action guarantees that the figure will be given a widespread release in the West in, at most, a week, probably with the most comprehensive paint mask ever seen on a regular retail figure, no doubt in a gift set with Dino and Brains. This will also mean the Japanese version suddenly becomes available in much greater numbers and at much reduced prices.

At least I hope that's the case, as Leadfoot's a fine figure, and it would be a great shame if he stayed the preserve of nutters with no sense of value for money. Like me.

- Transformers: Dark of the Moon - Leadfoot toy review

Robot Archie

I've taken the opportunity to fix up and dust down the Robot Archie page. While there's not much in the way of new text, I have put up all the stories I currently have. I rather lost track, but I'm fairly sure there are some there I haven't put online before, though I can't speak for anyone else.

They're almost entirely taken from the annuals (exceptions are from the specials); the Vulcan serials should return when I get around to uploading those to the excellent Mirrorcreator. Until then, enjoy Britain's foremost robot hero barrelling into things and hitting strange animals.

- Robot Archie

G.I. Joe 30th Anniversary - Sci-Fi

I thought I was over my G.I. Joe addiction, especially when new cartoon Renegades really irritated me (a big disappointment compared to the superb Transformers Prime). However, while most of the show's central characters look dreadful, the accompanying line has been partly hijacked by the 30th Anniversary figures.

These are basically thus far most of the guys I really wanted the 25th Anniversary/Pursuit of Cobra lines to do, guys lumbered with obsolete figures up to this point - Airtight, Zandar, Lifeline and Mercer being the main drool-inducing ones to date. It's almost enough to make me forgive them remaking Dial-Tone as a preposterously-expensive club/convention exclusive I'm never going to own. Sci-Fi wasn't one of my most lusted-after choices, but a symptom of my disease is that I just bought him anyway.

- G.I. Joe - Sci-Fi toy review

Transformers: Dark of the Moon - Que

My latest Dark of the Moon purchase is Que, the Autobots' slap-headed random-accented sort-of inventor with a habit of disappearing for ensemble scenes. I really didn't take to the character, finding him much more irritating than Skids and Mudflap combined, with the result that his tragic death scene brought a smile to my face. Especially when his stupid head bounced along the ground like that. Silly Que.

So the figure would be up against it, and Hasbro/Takara (I'm not sure which version this is, it came loose from a Hong Kong seller... I'm not even sure if there are any changes) would need to wheel out a classic to win me over - their prime objective in business being my happiness, naturally. Instead they didn't bother. He's bloody awful.

- Transformers - Dark of the Moon Que toy review

Transformers in 3-D #1-3

In the mid-1980s Stereoscopy briefly became a fad in comics. And by "fad in comics" I mean "a gimmick tried by a few also-rans in the hope it became a fad in comics". Primary offenders were Eclipse, who specialised in applying the process to vintage comics, some of which they might have even owned the rights to (the most famous of Eclipse's efforts being Miracleman 3D #1).

Blackthorne were a slightly different case. They actually had a bit of a link to Eclipse - they were formed in 1986 by the former owners of Pacific, who went bust in 1984; Eclipse took over many of Pacific's properties, including the negotiations to import Alan Moore's reinvented Marvelman serial from the classic British anthology Warrior. Like Eclipse they also plundered cheap old comics, but also managed to get licences for several toy properties like G.I. Joe, Robotech and Transformers. Marvel already had the Transformers comic licence (and G.I. Joe... was it Valiant that had Robotech? Never cared for Robotech...), of course, so Blackthorne arranged what can be described as a 'secondary licence'.

Marvel had little interest in 3-D, their comics selling fine already. Blackthorne had no interest in colour comics, their various attempts selling badly for the most part. So, there was no real harm to Marvel for Blackthorne to sling out the odd 3-D comic book. They also produced a tutorial series called How to Draw Transformers.

What Marvel did own and weren't about to share were the negatives to every Transformers comic published up to that point. With no public domain newspaper strips to prey on, Blackthorne would have to do some work - coming up with original black-and-white strips to Stereoscopy.

This resulted in three of the most bizarre Transformers comics of all time. Both staff and storylines showed no real continuity. The first issue, cover-dated Fall 1987, seemed to be taking most of its' cues from the cartoon continuity somewhere around "The Rebirth", albeit with Scorponok and Fortress Maximus appearing despite the text making it clear the Headmasters process was still in development. All this is enlivened by some quirky, fun art and some endearing characterisation - Ratbat appears to be a blend of his comic and cartoon personalities, while it's undoubtedly Searchlight's finest moment. This issue is quite common second hand.

The next two issues are rarer. In the case of the untitled story in #2, dated December 1987 - featuring an all-chance creative team, a random appearance by Ironhide, some annoying kids, several complete logic breakdowns and next to nothing in common with the first issue - this is probably a blessing.

It's a shame for the third issue, though. Featuring a third batch of hapless Blackthorne staffers, it's not quite in the same vein as the first issue, but still interesting thanks to the debut of the made-up-on-the-spot-after-too-much-coffee Destructons - a menacing race of aliens. Their names, in ascending order of awesomeness, were Medusa, Bruton, Psychokhan and - best of all - Lord Imperious Delirious. It again featured no significant connections to the previous two issues.

It came out in March 1988, and was intended to be the first installment of a three-part storyline. By then, Blackthorne were in severe financial trouble after sinking much of their money into the licence to produce the 3-D comic of Michael Jackson's Moonwalker film. The film tanked, which obviously did the 3-D comic no good. Both originated material and licenced titles rapidly disappeared from the Blackthorne roster. The company limped on into early 1990 before finally folding.

So no more Destructons - though considering the scatter-shot nature of Blackthorne's material up to that point, there's no guarantee any Transformers in 3-D #4 would have picked up the story anyway...

Despite the rights having presumably reverted back to Hasbro and then included in the rights reprint bundles rented to the likes of Titan and IDW, surprisingly (well, maybe) no-one's reprinted these things. These scans will have to do for now... The ones for #1 aren't by me, those for #2-3 are. The 3-D effects have been removed and flattened to make a halfway-presentable set of black-and-white pictures.They were hosted on the main site until they fell by the wayside, but I've had a few emails asking for them to be put up somewhere. The files are showing their age, though, as a word of warning - I sold the comics some time ago, and the scans are about half the resolution they need to be.

- Issue #1 - The Test!
- Issue #2
- Issue #3 - The War Against the Destructons, Part 1 of 3

Golden Warrior Gold Lightan Episode 1

Continuing in the vein of strange things I have uploaded, here's the first episode of the Gold Lightan animated series - the full name being the somewhat clumsy Golden Warrior Gold Lightan. It's nothing compared to the episode title - "Demon of Mechanic Direction". Nice.

I'm afraid the episode is raw, with Japanese audio only. Bah. Sadly, being the first installment of a Super Robot anime, it features very little mental robot action. Bah.

- Gold Lightan - 01 "Demon Mechanic of Direction" (full episode)
- The last ten minutes of episode 8, "Subway Centipede Panic"
- A TV spot for the series
- The commercial for the Chogokin figure

Shogun Warriors #1

Continuing with the random scanning (I will do some proper updates at some point), here's the first issue of Marvel's Shogun Warriors series. For those who don't know, Shogun Warriors was Mattel's attempt to sell Popy toys to the American public - comprehensive coverage of the toyline can be found at Wildtoys' Shogun Warriors Page.

They roped in Marvel to produce a comic to help promote the line. In practice - either for legal reasons (the legislation that would allow G.I. Joe and Transformers was still a few years down the line) or by choice - only three figures from the line appeared: Raydeen, Combattler and Dangard Ace. Just as much focus was given to their human operators and the Followers of Light organisation responsible for the Shoguns in the end. The series - unlike its' 1980s descendants - took place in the main Marvel Universe, leading to a crossover with the Fantastic Four when sales slumped. The pilots would even turn up in the F4's own comic after Shogun Warriors was cancelled for an epilogue to their adventures.

Licencing issues (obvious even in the F4 wrap-up, where the robots were unnamed and had their appearances modified) mean the series is highly unlikely to ever be collected. There are scans of the whole run out there, but I've never found any in decent resolution. So I've scanned the first of my complete run. The age of the comics means the colours look somewhat washed out, but if people want more let me know and I'll add further issues to my "To Do" pile.

- Shogun Warriors #1

Lee's Guide to Gobots

I've had this kicking around for ages, it's a free supplement given away with some issue or other of Lee's Toy Magazine. It's not 100% complete (where's Spy-Eye?) and the potted intro does it few favours (notably being unable to identify Popy as the line's originator), but it does manage to be a respectable overview of the US Gobots line, with pictures of most figures carded or boxed.

High-Res version (~20MB)
Low-Res version (~5MB)

G.I. Joe - Z-Force Convention 3-pack

The reviews for these guys have been sitting on my computer for a while, so I thought I'd better upload them. The trio - issued at the 2010 International G.I. Joe Convention - are a homage to Palitoy's Z-Force figures from the 1980s. There's the mechanic Gaucho, electronics wiz Jammer and... eh... on-loan paramedic Lifeline. Click on the pictures to read each review.

Happy 2012

...and I hope you all had a good Christmas.

Apologies for the recent lack of updates, I've been busy with a totally unrelated project I'm afraid. Once that's dealt with I've plenty more toy reviews to come.

On a totally unrelated note, fans of Transformers might want to check out The Complete Works.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - Brawn

Brawn's a bit of a relic as far as my collecting habits go, coming from my "buy everything live action movie related" phase a year or so ago. The only reason he's still hanging on in there is because I keep meaning to review him before moving him on to someone who'll hopefully appreciate the figure a bit more.

There's not a lot wrong with Brawn - in fact, he's one of the better not-in-the-movies movie figures. For one, he actually looks like he could halfway-work on screen.

- Transformers - Revenge of the Fallen Brawn review

Transformers: Alternators - Sideswipe

After spending much of my Alternators reviews taking random pot-shots at Sideswipe, it only seemed fair that he got a review of his own. Yes, that's the reason, not my rampant completism (though I'm still holding out on buying the uninspired Decepticon retool trio of Ravage, Dead End and Swindle... well, I bought a Swindle, but solely to decapitate him...).

That and purchasing the original, or the dodgy, defective Chinese copy thereof, reminded me that any self-respecting group of Autobot cars need a Sideswipe. My Autobot Cars have a Sideswipe, my movie figures have a Sideswipe, and now my Alternators have a Sideswipe. Thanks to StoneCold Skywarp for the figure =)

- Transformers Alternators Sideswipe review