Toys

Legacy Shadowstrip

My Transformers purchases these days has slowed to an absolute molasses drip. There is a lot of “cool” stuff being put out, but I often already have “good enough” versions of these characters and the prices are getting a bit too much for my taste. I do still pick some up occasionally. One that’s been nagging at me a bit was the new Menasor in Transformers Legacy. The Stunticons are my favorite combiner team and up there on my favorite Transformers. I really like the Combiner Wars version of the team, though it’s not perfect. The new version is designed to much more closely resemble the jankey way it was animated in the original cartoon. Which means that Motormaster and his trailer just turn into a giant robot, that you can strap some deluxe sized Stunticons to.

I don’t object to this concept, but I also really, do not need another Menasor.

Then they put out this sub-line called “Velocitron” which included this random G2 Recolor of Drag Strip. He even got a new name of Shadowstrip. I can kind of get behind the “justification” for a second Menasor if it’s G2 colored. Especially because the non Combiner Wars aspect would kind of match with the G2 Bruticus I have from the War For Cybertron line (Different design styles for G2 recolors).

Now, there isn’t any guarantee or announcement they will ever complete this set, but a lot of people have also been praising Legacy Drag Strip as a solid Transformer, and the colors are nice, so even if Shadowstrip ends up being alone is his G2ness, I can live with that, he is a pretty neat little figure with some fresh gimmicks on his transformation.

I have some slight beef with his guns being the same, they would have been opposites in the previous world of not cost cutting at every turn, but I can live with it. You could technically stack them with each other infinitely too if you wanted. The split in half part for his combined mode is also hard to do without a tool. Maybe Motormaster has tabs or something that facilitate splitting them apart. Maybe I am missing something, but as it is, I have to use a screw driver or something to push the release tab.

Scott Pilgrim and Ramona Flowers

Dec 10th, 2022

by Ramen Junkie.

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Scott Pilgrim vs the World is probably my favorite movie, though the books are much better. However, it is decidedly lacking in figure based merch. I was pretty excited when I came across these figures from Bottle Neck Gallery. The site seems to specialize in limited run sort of niche merchandise, a lot of which is prints. Like the prints, these figures came in some mass release colorways, and a few limited color versions. Despite ordering on day one, I missed out on the limited versions, though I was more interested in the limited Scott, who had the PLUMTREE logo on his shirt, but otherwise seems to be the same as this one. The Ramona variants were mostly hair colors, but I prefer this color.

While they are “action figures” they are lacking in the “action” part a bit. I imagine this is partly to do with them being more art figures than straight action figures. Both Ramona and Scott sport the same articulation. The site lists it as “5 points” but its actually more. Both have ball socket head joints, which lets them look up and down and side to side a bit, and ball wrists, so they can swivel and bend a bit. The elbows have single joins, though the range of motion isn’t great and the shoulders are limited universal joints. There is also a waist swivel but it doesn’t really seem like it wants to go all the way around. The legs have no articulation, but both figures stand solidly, including Ramona on her skates.

Neither is going to be fighting any evil exes with any finesse, but that’s ok. The sculpt and paint make up for it a bit, they both look really good and the paint apps are solid all around. Each comes with some swap-able hands and accessories. Ramona fairs a little better than Scott in this department. The hands are relaxed, gripping, and fists for both, Ramona has her shoulder bag, and Scott has his guitar, both of which are removable. Ramona’s bag can slip on from the bottom but Scott’s guitar has to open the strap to go around his body. The head may come off, but I’d rather not risk breaking something, the strap has a removable peg for the strap. Ramona also comes with a bat and a package from Amazon.ca that she delivered to Scott when he was trying to meet her. The bat is from when Ramona battles Roxie in the comics (in the book she uses the Subspace Hammer to battle Envy not Roxie). This outfit doesn’t match that fight though at all, though it is one she wore.

Anyway, both figures are really nice, and I’d definitely be game for some other characters, maybe Knives and Gideon. The other members of Sex BombOmb would be fun, though I’m not sure Kim would work without her drum set, which means she gets to sit or maybe an alternate set of legs.

My Collection

Dec 7th, 2022

by Ramen Junkie.

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This was originally a thread on Twitter but I’ve moved it over to the blog. It’s a sort of virtual tour around my basement space and collection. We moved into our current home in 2017 and I’ve been slowly making small updates and upgrades here and there. It is not perfect, it’s still a sort of constant work in progress, but it’s getting better and better over time. My biggest gripe is the shitty ceiling. I have not come up with a good/easyish solution to the ceiling yet. I’ve had a few ideas but they all will take quite a lot of effort, money, and time.

Starting in the desk area, because it’s the place where I am a bunch. The desk itself is one I built like 15 years ago at our old old house. The skinny shelf in the corner I made as well, the other to the left are Ikea Billy shelves.

The computer itself. Mainly used for gaming. A keyboard I will one day learn to play.

Don’t look too close, you might notice that the other pics are a bit outdated because I moved the shelf that was behind the desk already.

Previously mentioned custom skinny shelf. Some Final Fantasy Figs here, a shelf of my more favored figs with Layton and Swerve and Master Chief. Some random memorabilia under that, a signed Sigrid CD, a Bernie Sanders Baseball Card, a silver coin from work.

Going down through the first Billy shelf. Top level is my Exosquad collection. They aren’t in perfect shape, but pretty good shape.

These shelves right next to the desk are mostly my more favored figures. These shelves rotate pretty regularly with whats on them.

My collection of Overwatch Nendoroids. I’m only missing Reinhardt I think. Also, Hammond is actually a Funko POP!, one of the only two I own, the other being DVA for the MEKA.

Below the Nendoroids is my Power Rangers Legacy stuff. This shelf needs some risers added for sure. Plus the cat is constantly walking by and knocking these over.

From the top of Billy number 2, my collection of Overwatch Figma and Hasbro figures. I never did get Academy DVA, Figma Solder, or well, most of the non standard colored Hasbro figs. I really like these though, part of why they get top center of this wall.

Below Overwatch is more Video Game figs, half of them old SOTA Street Fighter Figures

And even more video game themed figures (Mostly). Fortnite, Sonic, some Xevos.

Most of my Toybiz Lord of the Rings collection. I used to own a LOT more of these but many of them were lost when I had a break in in storage ~15 years ago.

Wrapping up this shelf I have a selection of MSIA Gundams, mostly. I have a few more, and some of these are not Gundams.

Topping Billy number 3, are some Transformers. A few movie verse Transformers and a collection of Autobots. I have probably more Transformers than anything else, but a lot of them are not on display anywhere.

Next up are my few GI Joe Classified figs and a selection of Mega Man figures.

Below those we have some old McFarlane Metal Gear Solid stuff and a good chunk of the Jurassic Park Amber Collection.

Next up is my shelf of DC stuff, that needs some work for sure.

And hiding at the bottom is a shelf of Decepticons. Like the Power Rangers shelf, the cat likes to jumble these up frequently.

In the corner of the room is a photo station/photo booth. This piece of furniture is another one I built when I made the desk. It was originally a TV stand.

Behind the curtain is a collection of larger stuff I use as back drops sometimes for photos.

Moving to the back wall from my computer, there is a large glass display cabinet I picked up at a resale shop. Top shelf has some larger figures that don’t fit well elsewhere, and a few miscellaneous imports that don’t fit elsewhere theme wise.

Next shelf down more import figures. This cabinet is pretty deep, and the mirrors and glass make it seem a little more cluttered than it is when photoed.

More (Mostly) Imports, these are all video game themed though. Mario, Zelda, Pokemon, etc.

The bottom of the cabinet has my small collection of Masterpiece Transformers. I don’t super collect Masterpiece Transformers.

Next to the glass cabinet is a shelf of Comic Marvel Legends. I used to have 4 of these shelves, identical, but two of them got damaged by water in another part of the basement.

Top Shelf, Fantastic 4, and Nextwave, Second is Spider-man and miscellaneous.

Below that a shelf of mostly Mutant Villains, followed by Mutant heroes (X-men) and a shelf of Spider-man rogues.

Spider-Man villains (again), “New Avengers” and the Comic versions of the MCU Defenders.

Lastly another shelf of mostly miscellaneous characters.

Wrapping around, there is a small built in bar that I use as a cluttered work table for projects. It does currently house this fancy dollhouse that I got on clearance at Target.

And below inside the bar, toy related, are these tackle boxes of sorted accessories. Most of the other drawers are electronics parts.

Next to the bar is another marvel shelf, that matches the Comics one. This one is all MCU figures though (for the most part).

A shelf of villains, a shelf of supporting characters, and alternate styles. Another shelf of mostly Ragnarok characters and the Black Panther guard.

Various versions of the core Avengers, in no real consistent “era” or style though, mostly just my preferred looks. The Guardians of the Galaxy, and various MCU Adjacent characters (Fox X-men). More “adjacent” characters, the Defenders, the Fantastic Four, a few others.

And finishing off the MCU shelf is a shelf entirely of Iron Man…. s? Iron Men? Iron Man?

Next to the MCU shelf is another glass case. The door does not completely open on this one, so it’s a later of glass and a mirror and not great lighting so the photos here are a little muddled.

Top shelf is model kits of various things.

Second Shelf is the majority of my Transformers Alternators.

Below the Transformers are some Playmates Star Trek figures. Unfortunately, my TNG Bridge Play set is too wide to fit, so it’s still in it’s box.

Below the Star Trek Shelf is another somewhat eclectic collection of stuff I just like.

At the bottom is an assortment of larger Transformers that don’t fit well elsewhere.

Swinging back around to the same wall as the Billy shelves, but behind the Computer, I think it might help to throw in another “establishing shot”.

This corner is the LEGO Table and shelves. The table itself is custom made from some pre-finished boards. At our old house, half of it was in my wife’s craft room, but she didn’t have a place for it after the move so I inherited it. Then made it twice as wide.

A closer view of the main City part. I recently dismantled and rearranged this city, as well as dusted everything with a small paint brush (which works well).

Left side LEGO Shelf

Right Side LEGO Shelf. Behind this shelf is the stairs going up.

Lastly, the end of the Table has some shelves on it. The sides also have shelves, but it’s mostly storage for loose LEGO down one side, and on the other is a hidden trash can and some totes of figures I like to keep handy.

Continuing around the room…

That game spinner in the foreground is another piece I built, though that one is like 20 years old now. The shelves are adjustable for CD or DVD cases.

The door leads outside to the backyard.

Currently in the market for a (used) couch.

My poor acrylic spinner case, which desperately needs some love, and a wall shelf that was originally built for 3 3/4 Star Wars figs but I don’t know that it was ever really used for that.

Instead the shelf is used for TMNT at the moment, plus some stuff that didn’t have anywhere else to go.

At least the TIE Fighter mounts work.

The BTTF Delorean and A-Team Van.

Another hand built shelf, this one full of Transformers.

I’ve been re-arranging these shelves a but lately so they are a little in flux.

The other shelf, on the right side of the TV, definitely in flux at the top with random TFs I pulled out to display somewhere.

Some Movie TFs and a shelf of Beast Wars figures from the current Legacy Line.

Finally a shelf of Primes and my collection of Nintendo Power Magazines.

And a wider shot of the TV Space. The consoles are all hooked up. Wii, SNES, Playstation Mini, Dreamcast, Playstation 3, Playstation 2, Genesis, and N64.

One last establishing shot, and in the home stretch here. Just off to the right of the door to the backyard.

This little Music Station I’ve been currently working on setting up. Currently plays music from Alexa or a Raspberry Pi connected to my Network share collection of FLACs. (Side Note, this has been adjusted quite a bit since these were original posted)

Next to the Audio Station is another Glass Case with Star Wars Black Series figures, mostly arranged by theme-ish.

Lastly, in the corner, is a dollhouse that we got at a garage sale that I sometimes use to take photos in.

No wait, actual Lastly, is the storage space of things I don’t have on display in the other half of the basement.

The basement has a second space as big as this one, but it’s slightly less finished so we use it to store totes of decor and off season clothes etc.

Star Wars Black Series – Chirrut Imwe

Sep 13th, 2019

by Ramen Junkie.

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I cannot, for the life of me, properly remeber Chirrut Imwe. I keep wanting to go with Churrit Imwe, or Chimwe Irrut, or some backwards variation. Last week I commented on his partner Baze Malbus.

So Chirrut Imwe is the closes thing Rogue One has to a Jedi in it’s cast. Ok, technically Darth Vader is in the cast, but he’s kind of a minor character who mostly exists for fanservice. It’s never super clear if Chirrut is force attuned or anything, though given his martial arts skills adn that his character is blind, it seems likely. Unfortunately for Chirrut, he lives in a time without Jedi, so no one was able to train him. He is sort of a Jedi sympathizer monk of some sort.

Where Baze Malbus is kind of a stocky brick of a figure, Chirrut Imwe is considerably less restricted. This is great since he is sort of a martial artists character. He has a nice cloth skirt that allows his legs to still be posed in kicking or jumping poses without limiting the articulation. His torso doesn’t have anything particularly glaring that gets int he way of the arms either.

Chirrut comes with an small assortment of weapons. First is his staff weapon. It’s pretty straight forward. He also includes his crossbow, blaster, weapon thing. It’s kind of hard to describe. It’s basically a space rifle, but it has an extra handle piece that can slip over the barrel with little fold out bits that make it look sort of like a bow or a crossbow. It’s a laser gun though, so it doesn’t exactly shoot bolts. Then again, we are talking about a series that includes a Wookie that wields a bowcaster crossbow.

Chirrut Imwe is probably the most exciting figure to come out of the Rogue One series of figures. It’s a shame that he was hard to come by for a long time and it seems like a lot fo people kind of forgot Rogue One even was a thing.

Star Wars Black Series – Baze Malbus

Sep 6th, 2019

by Ramen Junkie.

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Star Wars: Rogue One gave us a nice interesting ensemble cast of heroes. What it didn’t really produce was a particularly great line up of figures. A couple of the more interesting characters in the movie and figures are Baze Malbus and his partner Chirrut Imwe. Both of these figures were actually kind of hard to come by for a while, partially because wave 1 of the Rogue One waves sold incredibly poorly. For a good while, you basically were looking at paying a ridiculous mark up on either figure on the secondary market.

I’ve seen both show up at Five Below, at least in the states, so, they are considerably more affordable these days. This is extra nice since these guys certainly work better as a pair. Unfortunately for Baze Malbus, he is the weaker of the two.

The basic sculpt is pretty nice, his outfit is interesting and he has a nice stocky build that’s not too common in Star Wars figures. He also sports a pretty hefty backpack to support his heavy gun. While the backpack is a cool design, it really hinders this figure all around. It’s very heavy and Baze can hardly stand up on his own without falling over. His bulky design already hinders his pose-ability to begin with.

To top it off, his head suffers like most of the Rogue One figures with a very soft sculpt and paint job. There was definitely something weird going on with the production of thee figures that didn’t help them look exciting when on the shelves.

If you’re not a big Rogue One fan, you’re not really missing out on anything skipping Baze Malbus, but he does compliment Chirrut Imwe nicely in a display, and chances are both will be available together.