Toy-Ventures: Maskatron (Kenner Six Million Dollar Man)

 Toy-Ventures this week looks at what we believe to be the greatest villain action figure of the 1970s and perhaps the best action figure of the decade as well.

Kenner's Maskatron, the robotic face changing robot from Kenner's Six Million Dollar Man toy line is a wonderful bit of toy magic when some licenses a property but takes artistic license (anticipate a callback joke) and sets out to also make a toy with tremendous play value.

Bionic Jump over to our facebook group PodStallions:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/podstallions

Toy-Ventures Magazine is coming this month:

https://plaidstallions.com/reboot/magazine/

Bionic Lady!

Oh Sure, Steve gets a rocket car and a space suit but Jamie gets pretty clothes and lounge chairs?

Check out our Instagram

Get the expanded digital edition of Rack Toys here.

Bionic People in France

Steve Austin and his crew were truly an international hit as evidenced by this wonderful catalog page from France. I love how Jaimie is now "Super Jaimie" but Maskatron? That's multilingual baby!

Like our Facebook Page

Check out our Instagram

Get the expanded digital edition of Rack Toys here.

Bionic Classroom

I was slightly deceived by the title "Bionic Classroom" as a kid, I assumed it would be a playset where Steve and Jaime did cool Bionic things.

Nope, it's just Jaime's work, a school that seems to be located at the airport and judging by the chalkboard, she's blown her cover.....

Bionic Marvels!

That communicator works up to ten feet away! I'm telling you technology will never get any better....

Vintage Toy Store Pictures Volume 18

For this year's last Friday feature, I bring you my favourite of all sections of PlaidStallions another volume of vintage toy store pictures!

Celebrating the time when we had unique independent retailers dotting our landscape and came up with colourful and and interesting ways of selling us toys.

Volume 18 is our biggest yet and loaded with shots across the USA dating from the 1970s to the 1990s. Maybe even your favourite childhood toy haunt is included in this mix!

Notable sites include Kenner Six Million Dollar Man, Barbie, Hot Wheels, Mego 2 XL, Muppets, Fisher Price Little People, Electronic Games, Atari Consoles,  Kenner Star Wars, Gabriel Lone Ranger and much, much more.

"Take my advice kids, keep one of these in the box!"

Vintage Toy Store Photos Volume 18

Don't forget to visit our archive of Vintage Toy Store Photos, it's a timewarp!

Vintage Toy Store Photos Volume 17

Yes! A new installment of  one of my favorites, vintage toy store photos. A journey back to the days of oddly named department stores and independent mall toy stores and chains that are fondly remembered but sadly mostly gone.



Vintage Toy Store Photos Volume 17 covers the US and Canada this time and features appearances by Big Jim, Kenner Bionic Woman,  Barbie, Shogun Warriors, Mego Star Trek, Space:1999,  Ideal Star Team, Mattel Donnie and Marie and Kenner Star Wars.

I hope this edition brings back some powerful memories like it did for me.

And hey, check out volumes 1 through 16 when you're done.

PodStallions 21: Bionic Man-ia

It was bound to happen, episode 21 talks of the Six Million Dollar Man television series which slow motion ran across our television screens (and our collective hearts) during the Polyester decade.

In this we discuss the series itself, the spin offs and the crazy/wonderful merchandise that made Christmas more memorable. We go through the fan club kit, discuss favourtie episodes and villains. Jason also gets to relay his experience working with the license some 30 years later and even 

Of course, that being said we get off track into discussions about Mego, Star Wars, West World, Penny Dreadful,  the career of John Saxon, Star Trek the Motion Picture , David Carradine and other things completely unrelated to our subject.

Episode 21 will have you looking your Bionic Eye.

Download the Show Here

Listen here

Show Links:

• The Japanese Spider-Man figure by Popy we discussed.
• The very first episode of Kamen Rider V3 sees his whole family murdered by a villain called Scissors Jaguar.
• The Ark diecast ad we discuss on the show that features Jason's beloved Baltan toy.
• How Star Wars figures were sold in Japan.
• The Captain Scarlet model kits Jason mention.
• Denys Fisher Cyborg toys based on Henshin Cyborg.
• A website devoted to the Shinsei UFO Commander toys.
• The Kamen Rider Henshin suit that keeps Brian up at night.
• Drool over the amazing Jumbo Machinders!

Plenty more content on the PodStallions Facebook page!

We'll be adding Bionic Man collectible photos to Facebook.



PODSTALLIONS ON ITUNES
PODSTALLIONS RSS FEED

Vintage Toy Store Photos Volume 16

In an effort to combat the end of summer blues, I've dig deep to the days of Pegboard and regional toy stores to bring the 16th edition of our vintage toy stores feature.

Installment 16 features old favorites such as the Bionic Woman and Six Million Dollar Man, Barbie, the Osmonds, Atari, Fisher Price, Mego Diana Ross and much more.

We explore such long forgotten chains such as Bambergers, Two Guys as well as local toy emporiums such as The Toy Shoppes and Youngtown.

Check out Vintage Toy Store Photos Volume 16 here.

Super Size Bionic Woman

In 1977, the British Distributor of Kenner toys Denys Fisher, produced an 18" tall version of Jaime Sommers and marketed more like a fashion doll. Pity they didn't do a Steve as well.

These little foreign variants are what drew me into toy collecting in the first place, I loved discovering what's out there and what i missed as kid, so to speak. Even though my collection is "Bionic Woman Free" for the most part, I can really dig and appreciate cool grail pieces like this.

Sonic Woman

I am pleased to reveal the latest update to our Tomland galleries, the copyright infringing superheroine herself, the Sonic Woman!

Tomland was more well known for their Star Raiders and Famous of Monsters of Legend action figures, which both demonstrate how little they thought of paying for licenses.

I've known about these particular figures for a few years but never knew their actual names, below are a set of loose "Sonic People" featured here earlier. They were also shown in Rack Toys. It wasn't until a kind soul contacted me about this figure did I finally have a clue.

The arrival of the carded Sonic Woman clears the name mystery, thanks internet!

As obvious as this "fully jointed woman from the future" is she's not the most blatant Bionic knockoff by a mile, that will be revealed in a new list this Friday. Please check it out.


Also, please check Ebay as I'm selling a loose Sonic Woman right now. This is the only loose one I've ever seen, so if you're into this like I am, this is your chance.


I'm always buying Tomland Monsters, click here to email me.

More Tomland Galleries:
 

Bionic Bikes

I was thumbing through the Kenner catalogs a while back (I know how to spend a Saturday night) and I came across these, very odd tie ins that I hadn't included when I built the Bionic galleries. It's Steve Austin for the preschool set, a bike (cause a Bionic man needs one) that makes the same clicking sound the doll does and it has a TV screen.

Ladies, don't feel left out:

Cause it comes in Jaime too! When I'm old and relying on a scooter, I'm totally doing it up with the Bionic people logos...

More Bionic Joy:

Kenner TTP goes Bionic

In 1977 Bionic Man-ia (get it?) was still running so high that kids everywhere were asking Santa for a doll of a middle aged man in a bad sports coat (self included BTW). So the only logical thing to do was expand upon the licenses offerings (I'm writing this sipping out of a Bionic Man travel mug so hey, still works!).

So Kenner took the brand and stapled it to their popular concept of "Turbo Tower of Power", so Steve, Jaime and even Big Foot got some shiny motor cycles and went cruising. Sure, they all were super humans capable of running faster than a car,  the upside is this is the closest we got a 3 3/4" Six Million Dollar Man line and it's pretty darn cool.




Click here to get in all the Bionic Action.

The End of the line for the Bionic Man and Woman

1978 saw the end of Kenner's wildly popular Six Million Dollar man line. Despite dwindling sales, Kenner revamped Steve with "Bio Sonic" power and gave him a new villain to fight in the form of the Venus Space Probe.

So while Steve Austin might have been on his way out, he certainly went with a bang or at least a very loud "dun-nuh-nuh-nuh".

Check out the 1978 Kenner Six Million Dollar Man Catalog Here

Trading Cards Again...

When I started out doing trading card #9, I wanted to do something for the ladies. The Fembot seemed like a great start, sure she's a girl but also a robot whose face comes off, total win/win.

For card #10, I felt the need to do something that wasn't action figure based, the Green Machine is by far the most demanded trading card so it was an easy fit.

As previously shown, Godzilla made it into the mix because he's just so awesome. This toy gave me chills as a kid.

Finally, it was time to give some love to the Atomic Man with the final card of the year. While a lot of Joe collectors don't like this chapter in the character's history, I cherish it. Atomic man was a pretty darn fun toy, sorry for the curse words...

DVD Releases:

Even though I don't own a Blu Ray player, this ultimate edition of the Planet of the Apes series is pretty tempting as I love all things associated with Planet of the Apes. So much so that I've bought the movies on nearly every format produced.

The extras for this set are pretty intense, lots of commentary, behind the scenes features and little fun things like public service announcements from ANSA.

Colouring Book Theatre: The Bionic Woman

This week's book comes courtesy of Sharry, who tells me the book is filled with several goofy mini stories.

As a kid I never much dug the Bionic Woman, mostly because I was forced to sit through it thanks to an older. bigger sister.


This 1976 opus is by a company called Treasure Books, I like the concerned look Jamie has on the cover, she probably can't remember where she parked.

Anyway, Sharry has chosen a story you make up yourself, which while kind of daffy considering you don't have much choice in it's direction, it is still MILES more interesting than the Six Million Dollar Man Colouring book we featured a while back, mostly because something happens.

A little caboose shot to start off with.

So we're supposed to write your own narrative here, so I guess "Jamie goes out for a jog" I haven't got an ounce of clever in me today, I'm tired and "Fraggle Rock" is blaring behind me, so I'm going to phone this one in.

"colour this page last"

No good can come from this!

"Mashers! Mashers"

"Wa-Bam!"

"Wa-Boosh" I don't remember the Bionic Woman being this violent, I like it!

"Courtesy of your friendly Neihbourhood Bionic Woman"

Thanks Sharry for a colouring book that made sense and was mildly interesting, next week we'll be back to the pain with Benji.

Previous Colouring Book Theatre Entries