Today we’re going to party like it’s 1984.
I have to admit upfront, I didn’t intend on getting into this line. I’ve dabbled in retro-styled figures here and there, and I even went fully into the recent Marvel Retro figures and picked up all of them. But I don’t consider myself a “retro figure collector” as such.
Buuut…
I did end up picking up Rocketeer a while back. This was after Fresh Monkey Fiction lost the license to produce Rocketeer figures, and they put up a handful on their site. I was already buying a few other things, so I added a Rocketeer figure just because.
And it…spoke to me.
Not in a literal sense—toys haven’t actually talked to me since I was a kid—but I really dug the Super Powersiness of it. Those 7-points of articulation popped me right into a nostalgic time warp.
So, I immediately went to BBTS and preordered a few of the characters I had already been a fan of. Why not?
“Why not?” is the question that precedes all of my financially ruinous decisions.
Once I had another group of them in hand and was able to get a better look at them, I was entranced by the super-colorful retro feel of it all. Even the back of the package with its ready-made wishlist drew me in. I went ahead and preordered the few figures I have no previous relation to: Cassie Hack and Mr. Monster. I threw in the Madman Adventures variant of Madman while I was at it.
Since I am a chucklehead that flew by the seat of my dumb stupid pants, I failed to realize that the only way to get Airboy was in a set…a set of which I already had several figures. I wasn’t about to pay for figures I already had, so it looks like Airboy will be the lone holdout in my collection.
Carded, I love the look of them. I’m an opener, so there was no doubt I’d be opening them, but this is the type of cardback that I was very careful with while opening so I can keep all of them. With individual artistic renderings of the characters and a bio on the back—along with the wishlist that would have ended up in mom’s purse way back then—it feels straight out of 1984.
The sculpting on all of these is quite detailed, staying in the retro lane without feeling watered down. Madman gets your standard super-heroic body while Grendel gets one with baggier, looser fitting clothes. Where there is reuse, it makes sense; The larger Tick body is reused for the “other” Tick, Barry, and that makes perfect in-universe sense. The Goon gets a completely original body as well. But they all feel as though they fit into a shared toy universe.
The articulation follows along the Super Powers standard for the most part. There are cut joints at the shoulder and neck, a swivel neck, and then a disc hinge at the knee that allows for some minimum rotation. I’d have liked a little more clearance on the knee joint for the Tick body as he suffers the most in terms of knee bend.
But otherwise, these replicate that childhood feeling well. No, you don’t get the dynamic posing ability of modern toys, but these designs are for holding in your hand and punching the other guy. There’s a streamline simplicity in the play value here that doesn’t require excess fiddling.
But even if you’re not into that, they look great as retro toy pieces. Even if the style predates some of the characters, it still feels like the thing we used to play with. If you’re not into that, that’s cool, these aren’t for you. But for me, I dig them quite a bit.
All figures come with a Longbox Heroes stand. Grendel comes with his forked staff. Goon comes with a wrench, a lead pipe and an axe. The tie on the Tick in disguise figure can be removed by popping off the head and sliding it off.
I need some sidekicks and villains in this line. I need an Arthur for Tick, and a Franky for the Goon.
Very cool toys!
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