TOYS: BOOTLEG TOY SPECIAL

When ever a great toy line is released there will always be dodgy Mexican and Chinese companies that will make knock off versions of them. It is kind of like piracy in the form of toys. To avoid any legal issues these companies change the spelling of their toys and do all sorts of other customizations which more often than not, end up in disaster. Some times the toys them selves are great and you would not know the difference but in most cases these products are poorly made to the point where hilarity will always be prevail. The funniest thing is that these toys were made by non English speaking countries so most of the time they will be named in broken English. Even though these toys were fakes they are highly collectable and I have seen some go for fortunes. Here are some examples of some classic bootleg toys.

ROBERT COP 2

This is a great bootleg toy of Robocop except for one thing.. the packaging. They could have called this toy "Robot Cop" or "Cyborg Cop" but fucking "Robert Cop" is probably the worst thing that anyone could suggest. When I was a kid I spent a lot of my childhood abroad and bootleg toys were available everywhere. I picked up my Robert Cop in Gozo which is one of the smallest islands in the universe.

OP"THOMAS" PRIME

Cashing in on the Transformers wave that swept the planet during the 1980's and also the fact that everyones favorite train will always be over, some weird Japanese company made this classic knock off. I named this one Op"Thomas" Prime and I don't know what the original toy was called. If you think that this cross over hybrid is bad then the next one will amaze you even more.

GOD JESUS

Ever wondered what would happen if you mixed Jesus and God together? Well this is the shocking result! A crucifix wielding robot from Japan. I have no idea what so ever what God (if that is his real name) or Jesus have to do with anything but it works as far as I am concerned. I wonder who would win in a fight between God Jesus and Robert Cop 2? I don't know if God Jesus is a bad guy or a good guy as he looks quite menacing. Also who would his enemies be? A bloke dressed as a scientist called the Atheist? Hang on one minute I have the answer!

OCCUPY CYBERTRON

Now these are blokes in suits with the heads and legs of Transformers. Corporate greed mixed with cyborg technology makes these figures the ultimate bad guys. I blame them for JFK and September the 11th. These figures are so bad that they are almost modern art.

 MR T BOXING PUPPET

The Mr T boxing puppet was a classic. With Mr T being the most famous guy on the planet in the 80's he also became the target of many bootleg toy makers. There were many of these puppets released of all sorts of different characters and celebs but the Mr T one is the most remembered. The puppet had levers inside which when pressed would make the puppet throw some punches. This was an amazing bootleg toy but shame about the dodgy Islamic robe..

BA VAN

This is a hideous bootleg A-Team van from the 80's. If you couldn't afford a real A-Team van then I guess this would have been your only option. There's not much I can say about this really, its just a shit van with some stickers on it.

MR T

I am not sure if this is a Mr T bootleg figure or a Mr T tampax device? Either way it is proper rubbish. Maybe the string is meant to be a pony tail like that bloke in Kickboxer had? Or it is a Christmas tree decoration.? It looks like he has a glass eye as well. I piity the fools who can't make decent Mr T knock offs.

GAME CHILD

This is a god awful Nintendo Game Boy rip off. Yet again the wells of originality and creativity run very shallow when it comes to naming this product. God awful thing that made any long car journey and plane ride ten times worse.

INCREDIBLE HULK

This is a really bad Incredible Hulk knock off but as a kid I would have been happy with this. I must say he is rocking a pretty badass afro.

I actually like this bootleg Hulk figure. It looks like Lou Ferringo but also looks like zombie on steroids. Actually the more I look at this figure the more it scares me. Kinda has the same vibe of a cursed painting.

SHITTY FAKE HE MAN

This is a classic example of a shitty bootleg He Man toy. With the popularity of the Masters of the Universe line a few decades back He Man bootlegs swarmed like a plague of Locusts. Some of them were cool and were welcome additions to your home made Eternia. Others were welcomed to being set on fire and other means of torture.

TOY STORY WOODY

This is a knock off Woody from Toy Story. You can tell by the sadness of this Toys eyes how he hates being a bootleg toy that has been frozen forever in a suggestible pose. Bend over a Barbie in front of this toy to see what I mean. He should be casted for the next Toy Story movie.

NIGHTMARE FEDDY

Just like Robert Cop 2 Nightmare Feddy is a brilliant knock off apart from the terrible naming on the package. What the fuck is a Feddy?? 

MONSTER

Here is another knock off Freddy figure. This came from a line of toys that also had a Dracula, Frankenstien and another weird monster. I painted the white stripes on my one green because it really bothered me! After that it didn't look to bad.

THOMAS THE TANK ENGINE

These are not as epic as the Thomas the Tank bootleg I mentioned earlier. These knock offs that have used the exact moulds of the real Thomas the Tank Engine toys and just re-sprayed them in horrible greens and brighter colors. Insert Thomas the Wank engine joke here..

SUPER HERO BOOTLEGS

Finally we come to the Super Hero section of the bootleg toys. Super heroes are the most targeted group when it comes to bootlegging exploitation. Most of the super hero toys I owned as a kid were bootleg copies. Sometimes they make decent ones but like usual 90% of them are dog shit rubbish! Look at the above picture for an example. Not only is Supermans costume the wrong colors but his eyes are crossed as well. The "S" on his chest must clearly stand for "Spaz" in this case.

SENSE OF RIGHT

This 6 pack of decent figures also shares the curse of Robert Cop with the broken English packaging. Sense of Right? Actually its growing on me. I love how the yellow Ranger is thrown in the mix also.

SILVERBAT

Silver bat is Batgirl riding a horse. It is battery operated so God knows what this thing does when powered up. More than likely kicks its legs and plays the theme song from Spider Man!

SUPER BAT

Super Bat is a radio controlled skateboard with Batman riding it. If you cant afford a Tony Hawks game then I guess this could come in handy. 

SPECIAL MAN

This is a decent Superman figure but "Specialman" is probably the least flattering name of the lot. 

I am not going to even say anything about this one.

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TOYS: COOLEST MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE FIGURES!

Back in the early 80s a cartoon was released which served as more of a sales pitch for Mattel action figures. After the success of the Star Wars franchise He-Man and co were next in line to dominate the toy markets for almost an entire decade. A live action movie (which will be reviewed here at some point) was made and He Man fever was a global phenomenon. What was cool was how they made up new characters in the cartoon just for an excuse to make them as toys. 

The characters were colorful, the stories had good moral value (if not somewhat homo erotic at the same time) and the possibilities with the toys was endless. I had most of the figures and playsets not all of them I know some kids that did but it was hard going getting everything. So here are some of my favorite figures of all time.

Beast Man

Beast Man was Skeletors dumb ass side kick who used to just hang around a lot doing nothing apart from listening to Skeletors racist jokes! Dont believe me? check this out

Beast man was really cool for kidnapping the female action figures and holding tbem down while Grizzlor interfered with them. Beast Man stars in one of my favorite CKY sketches along with his master Skeletor check it out

Grizzlor

Grizzlor was a member of the evil Horde who were the badass crew that even Skeletor was shit scared of. Grizzlor was just like a really ball of fur with fangs. He survived after going in the bath so this guy is a winner!

BLADE

Blade was from the He man movie and was then made into an action figure. Blade was one of the coolest guys in the movie with his eye patch and double sword wielding skills he was a bad man. The action figure was cool as fuck with spinning action so his swords would tornado anyone out of the room. A top contender for lead bad guys in your action figure adventures. I turned him into a good guy once after seeing the error of his ways and he became allies with He Man. However this didnt last long after he found out Greyskull wasnt as cool as the Snake mountain or hordes playset so he went back to being a cunt!

HORDAK

Hordak was like the main bad guy from Masters of the Universe. He kicked Skeletor out of the horde and Skeletor was just his bitch (just a small fact that many people didnt know) and they used him more in the She Ra series than they did He Man. She Ra should never have fucked with the horde she would have got raped and all kinds of fucked up coz shit these guys wernt playing around they meant business!

BUZZ OFF

Buzz off was a cool figure to have and had moveable wings. I always thought it was strange that he was a good guy just look at him he looks like a baddie. I know I will get people saying that Bee's are misunderstood good guys of nature kinda like great white Sharks and Zebras, but I dont eat Honey, I hate flowers and I got stung by a Bee once so fuck them they are cunts!

DRAGON BLASTER SKELETOR

This was the Skeletor I had as a kid as I never had the normal one. Skeletor comes complete with battle armor which has a dragon water pistol attached. I used to squirt it at He Man and he would just be like "a water pistol? fuck off!" and then bash Skeletors brains in. Skeletor when you think about it was a really toss bad guy. Nothing he ever did ever worked yet no one questioned his leadership so he's kind of like John Terry in his role as England captain!

FISTO

Here with a man called Fisto... whether hes gay, straight or swings both ways that iron fist is gunna hurt more than a pineapple. His arm would punch if you pulled it back. But Fisto? really? no other names Mattel? what next rim job? 

HE MAN

Ah yes the main man himself! The thing that has always bugged me (well amused me more) is that in the cartoon He Man was ginger.

SEE these locks are more orange than Beast Mans nut sack!

Yet the action figures and comics made He Man blonde. You can kind of see what happened there though. Mattel marketing meeting someone brings in the prototype He Man figure and one half a second later the other company bigwigs are saying "ITS GINGER! REPAINT IT!" " HOW WILL WE SELL THAT WITH GINGER FUCKING HAIR" so thats why I think He Man got a blonde make over. 

PRINCE ADAM

Prince Adam! He Mans secret identity.. even though He looks the fucking same as He Man and is still a brick shit house. Not even a pair of glasses or a mask nope just looks the exact fucking same but with a white jumper. Maybe the people of Eternia are complete spastics or that its such a good disguise that it actually works. I will try robbing the off license at some point dressed like it and see how I get on.

MOSS MAN

Moss Man is a cool figure and has a furry body. He looks really immense even if his get up is he is a damp  garage roof! The moss on my moss man didnt survive the bath so thumbs down fucker!

JITSU

Now this is one cool as fuck guy. Looks like a young evil Mr Miyagi and just looks badass as fuck. Unlike Fisto Jitsu didnt have a sketchy iron fist no no he had a gold hand with karate chop action. Jitsu is a badman!

LEECH

Leech is about right because this figure sucked literally! It had a rubber suction face with a button on the back and when pressed up against a flat surface like a window it would stick to it. It had hand suckers also but pretty pointless just a gimmicky toy from when the line was drawing to an end and they were just releasing anything as they were running out of ideas. This toy is ideal to give your self love bites with and then go round boasting to everyone you have a real life girlfriend with a head and everything!

MAN E FACES

Man E Faces was a figure that had a face you could rotate round and why would you want to do that? because it was kinda fun! this was one you could turn into good guy and bad guy all the time. He was the most mentally unstable of my figures with which side he was on it got ridiculous by the end no one wanted to hang out with him by the finish!

MEGATOR

Megator was a giant figure that was like 4 times the size of the rest and bigger than castle Greyskull. This is like the Holy grail of He Man figures and is ultra rare. I was fortunate enough to have this but by the time I had it Masters of the Universe was out and Turtles was in so it didnt get played with much. I never knew what happened to it which makes me mad because these go for absolute fortunes on ebay.

MER MAN

Mer Man was one of Skeletors more colorful sidekicks who used to spy on people from lakes. He told Teela she was adopted in one episode the guy is funny as fuck! 

RIO BLAST

Rio blast was a country and Western type guy (yes I guess there is a scene for that shit in Eternia to sadly) who really looks like Jesse Ventura from Running Man

and Rio Blast then became Captain Freedom!

While I am on the subject Jesse Ventura also looked a lot like fisto in that movie as well! Brilliant!

SCARE GLOW

Scare Glow was a rare mail away figure which made a good contender for top guy if you questioned Skeletors place on the throne. He glows in the dark and in the 80's anything that glows or was of the hologram nature immediately becomes cool. It was the rules back then!

SPIKOR

Spikor had a retractable fork thing and was covered in Spikes (maybe thats how he got his extremely creative nickname?) so he was really dangerous. This meant he must have been a hit with the ladies as women love danger and a man covered in Spikes must make them go weak at the knees and if he has got a few quid then well.. its a promise!

STRATOS

Stratos was one of He Mans cool buddies who could fly and had a grey beard which covered his entire body. Nuff said!

CY CLONE

I cant remember his back story but this figure ruled. It had spinning helicopter like action and had an awesome motion sticker on his chest. Up there with the top boys for me!

TITUS

Titus was another giant figure but he was one of the good guys. Extremely rare and valuable with real hair.

WEBSTOR

Webstor was one of Skeletors mates who liked nicking stuff and spying on people. He had Spider powers and was a complete cock. Was cool to let your other figures beat on though!

"Me as child playing with Masters of the Universe and Thundercats stuff"

So that brings this article to an end I hope you enjoyed it and it brought back some good memories or that you learned something. I will be back soon with more nostalgic bullshit for you to enjoy including a review of the movie.