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01-09-2012, 04:21 AM | #1 |
Space Ninja
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: Baltan Star (or Maryland)
Posts: 1,193
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Before S.H. MonsterArts and Ultra-Act, years before Bandai, your only hope for giant monsters in toy form was vinyl. Five points of articulation if you were lucky, and only swivel joints, and incredibly light for the size, but fun and bright colors and certainly durable. The variety was nearly endless between all the classic film and television monsters out there!
Over time, the vinyl got smaller, but more detailed and show-accurate. This was the new era of giant monster love, an explosion in the 80s led by Popy and Bandai; Ultraman begat the return of Godzilla, and so the others followed. Just after this new era began, the children of the 70s grew up still loving their monsters of old and you had big figures again... and with price tags to match. These are the cream of the crop, the ridiculously expensive, but masterpieces in their own right. Whether it's an original Hawaiian Bullmark Hedorah costing more than your student loans or the latest 6" Bandai Ultra Monster Series toy for 840 yen, all discussion of sofubi (soft vinyl) toys goes here!
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Last edited by Baltan II; 01-09-2012 at 04:30 AM.. |
02-18-2012, 08:26 AM | #2 |
Uchu Kaiju
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: South Carolina
Posts: 1,669
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I for one still love vinyl toys. I have a decent collection of Goji series monsters in that form and have been looking into picking up a few Ultra monsters as well.
I also a nice little set of SDs both for Goji and Gamera daikaiju, which I am crazy about. I totally dig those cute little guys! Currently I am looking to buy an Ultra Series Bemular. Possibly as a treat to myself since I am working at a project site and working 7 days a week this month! A question: do you leave the tags on your Bandai vinyls or remove them? All of the ones I have still have their tags if they had them when I bought them. But lately I have been consideirng cutting them off because from what I can tell there's not much of a secondary market for most of these figs and the tags interfere with display. Thoughts?
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Check out my Japanese giant monster podcast --Earth Destruction Directive! |
02-18-2012, 11:32 PM | #3 |
Space Ninja
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: Baltan Star (or Maryland)
Posts: 1,193
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Personally, I used to have some awesome vinyl figures, but many of them were sold off over time. Still have a couple of the old X-Plus Gameras, several Godzilla figures in 6" and 8", and a metric buttload of Ultraman figures.
I remove every single tag from my figures because I'm not planning on running a museum with them as my centerpieces. The people with the truly fat wallets and rooms they can fill to the brim with toys can do all that if they like. The key I've found is to heat up the figure where the tag is injected (a blow dryer works best) and when the vinyl is hot and most malleable, pull it out by the hook. You remove the tag this way, but the plastic hook isn't broken, you don't have bits of plastic rattling around inside your toy, and you can repeat the process to retag the figure later if you prefer. Win-win!
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02-18-2012, 11:47 PM | #4 |
Uchu Kaiju
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: South Carolina
Posts: 1,669
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I will try that with the hair dryer. Good call!
I am trying to remember exactly which vinyls I have. I know I have Burning G, MOGUERA, G2000, G94, Destoroyah, Bandai Creation Gigan, and the large Bandai Creation Millenium Gigan. I think I am forgetting one. As for the SDs I have bunches of them, heh. G63, Rodan 56, G94, Gigan, Barugon, Viras, MOGUERA, Space Godzilla, and some others as well.
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Check out my Japanese giant monster podcast --Earth Destruction Directive! |
02-14-2013, 10:39 PM | #5 |
Uchu Kaiju
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: South Carolina
Posts: 1,669
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Ultra Kaiju Bemular is all sorts of awesome. I've got my eye on Melba and Tyrant, and I've love a Jamila, but he is very pricey...
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Check out my Japanese giant monster podcast --Earth Destruction Directive! |
02-14-2013, 11:02 PM | #6 |
Stronger Than You
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: nyet
Posts: 25,326
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That Megalon is freaking sexy.
Vinyl toys aren't my thing, and I've never been interested, but they do look damn good.
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02-14-2013, 11:19 PM | #7 |
Sentai of the Ages
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: Pennsylvania
Posts: 16,715
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Japan does love it's capsule monsters.
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02-15-2013, 08:13 AM | #8 |
Uchu Kaiju
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: South Carolina
Posts: 1,669
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You know what I just found out? That the Bandai vinyl monsters are sold on pegs, which is why their cards are attached with the little hooks.
It seems SO DANG OBVIOUS but I never put two and two together until I saw a picture online of a Japanese Toys R Us. (Reminds me of a funny story. A few years back, the project I was working on had a Japanese client. A big Japanese client. As in their name starts with "to" and ends with "shiba." Anyway, we had meetings at the office, and we were taking the clients back to their hotel to get ready for dinner. Across the street from my office is a Toys R Us. The two clients asked to go in so they could pick something up for their kids, so we obliged. It was amazing watching these guys pore over the "import toys" that were for sale, and talk about how their kids would love this or that because "you can't get that back home." It's always funny to remember that "import" and "domestic" are a matter of perspective! )
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Check out my Japanese giant monster podcast --Earth Destruction Directive! |
02-18-2013, 09:13 AM | #9 |
Uchu Kaiju
Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: South Carolina
Posts: 1,669
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I'm torn right now.
I was playing around on eBay and found some decent prices for the Ultra-Acts of both Seven and Ace. And Leo can be found relativey easily as well. So I am champing at the bit, ready to buy them. But then I think about it -- for the price of any one of those Ultra-Acts, I can get three vinyls, be they daikaiju or Ultra Heroes. Yeah, the Heroes won't be poseable, but the daikaiju are perfectly compatable (for the most part) with their Ultra-Act brethren. So what's a fan to do? These are the vinyls I am leaning towards. Gomora: Red King: Baltan: Windam: Black King: Tyrant: Eleking: With Baltan, given his humanoid structure, I'm considering just getting him as Ultra-Act. So, yeah. Hrrn. Maybe I'll buy a bunch of monsters and then get Ultras to fight them. Eleking or Windam for Ultraseven, Black King for Ace, Tyrant for Taro... heh.
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Check out my Japanese giant monster podcast --Earth Destruction Directive! Last edited by ljacone; 02-18-2013 at 09:28 AM.. |
02-19-2013, 03:10 PM | #10 |
Junior Member
Join Date: Jan 2012
Posts: 153
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Sounds good, but I would probably pair up Black King with Ultraman Jack, as I don't know that he ever actually faced Ace. For Ace, there's Ultra Act Ace killer, but if you want to go the vinyl route probably one of the Chouju (Velokron and Vakishim are both pretty easy to find) or even Giant Yapool.
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