andraste

Hooray, eBay brought me T'Challa!

I had to resort to the internet, because he was sold out everywhere locally. Which is great because I'm delighted that Black Panther merchandise is selling and also irritating because I had to pay postage. However, the base price was reasonable and this was a good excuse to buy another figure.

( More photos below the cut. )

Meanwhile, I am trying to work out if the above characters would make the best or worst Defenders team ever. On the one hand: plenty of raw power and a wide array of useful skills. On the other: Jessica would not want to be anywhere near Charles and Charles would not want to be anywhere near Marc and honestly Marc should just not be allowed to join teams anyway and Charles and Stephen and T'Challa would eventually fight over who was in charge. (Meanwhile Jennifer and Kamala would get along fine and solve whatever the actual problem was.)

After months of putting it off, today I started the project of cleaning out all the boxes of toys in my cupboard. Which means that my floor is now covered in hundreds (many hundreds?) of action figures because obviously I had to take them all out of their poorly sorted, poorly labeled boxes before I could do anything about organizing them.

Because of this, it has come to my attention that I have TOO MANY TRANSFORMERS.

I mean, I'm sure most non-collector type people would look at my floor and say I had too many toys in general. (Meanwhile, the type of collector who keeps stuff mint in box would be horrified by the fact that they were on the floor at all.) But while I spotted a few duplicate characters among the Doctor Who, Marvel, DC and G.I. Joe stuff than can probably go, it's only the giant pile of Transformers that made me feel like I'd gone wrong somewhere.

The trouble with Transformers is that literally the whole point of the franchise is To Sell Toys. The fiction exists for no other reason, and the fact that it's sometimes good is more of a happy accident than anything else. And it is very good at what it does!

For example, when I first got back into the franchise a decade ago, I bought the version of Starscream that was in the shops because he was easily available. The Animated came out, and I bought Animated!Starscream, along with every clone I could get my hands on. Then I got my glorious Masterpice Starscream, who is perfect, only then Prime came out and I got Prime Starscream as well. So that's four Starscreams and a bunch of other Seeker jets.

Now replace 'Starscream' in the above paragraph with 'Megatron' or 'Soundwave' or 'Waspinator' and change a few details and before long it turns out I have multiple versions of a bunch of characters. Some of which I am totally giving to charity because that is TOO MANY TRANSFORMERS even for me. Maybe some actual children will play with them at some point!

... and maybe once I've cleared some room I'll finally get that Masterpiece Megatron.

(Look, I have Starscream and Soundwave in that size class and they'd make a really cool display that would fit on my shelf just right!)

The symbolic space on my toy shelf is no longer symbolic.

While watching the special, I only got as far as the War Doctor unpacking the Moment before I went 'dammit, I want an action figure!' I had no idea they were way ahead of me. Al Dewar posted a close-up of his boots and shin guards on Outpost Gallifrey and he looks gorgeously detailed.

Now I just need them to make a Capaldi and I'll be satisfied with the 5" line.

(Sure, I'd be happy for them to make a bunch more companions - especially Jamie and someone for the First Doctor - and monsters, and eventually the Entirely Hypothetical Post-Capaldi Doctors. Given how much space my collection takes up already, though, I'd be willing to live without them. Especially since there really isn't room for Entirely Hypothetical Future Doctors to stand in a line with the existing Doctor figures plus the War Doctor and Capaldi. By pure coincidence, it's exactly wide enough for all thirteen.)

... is that I could happily buy all eight of the main heroes. Well, I could if all of them were out already. Where the hell are the ladies, Bandai? You have released all the dudes but are not selling Team Girl Power yet! (Team Girl Power includes Nathan, naturally.)

And then I could buy them again in their civilian gear. And then I could buy Dark Bunny and Tiger in the crapsuit specifically so I could re-enact this. Which would be all very well if I had $500 lying around or anywhere to put them, but I don't!

Real Life has been chewing on me recently (although, touch wood, it seems to have stopped for now) but I had a lovely time at Armageddon this weekend. The shopping was good, the panels were entertaining and both Louise Jameson and Sylvester McCoy complimented me on my costume. (I was just wearing my LARP gear, but people seemed to like it. Got several photo requests, at any rate.)

Then I got online to check out the action figure news from New York Comic Con and discovered that they have FINALLY made this. Scroll down to see why I'm excited, as if you can't guess. Not that I'm not going to buy the hell out of Jubilee as well.

His head is on a little wonky in that photo but the production values on Hasbro's Marvel Universe figures have been good enough so far that I think it's probably just a bad camera angle/production sample. The facesculpt looks good, which is the important part. Now tiny Magneto will have someone to ~~make out~~ argue with!

Also, I arrived at work today to find my eleven Doctor mini-figures having sex with each other. Possibly the person who posed them this way did not anticipate that my reaction would be 'interesting pairings, but I'm not sure I follow your logic. Five should obviously be with Ten and not Nine. And I've never really thought of Three as a bottom, let alone someone who'd let himself be double-teamed by Eleven and Six.' Unfortunately, none of my co-workers will own up to re-arranging them so I cannot expound on my intra-Doctor pairing logic to the right person.

Day 12 – Whatever Tickles Your Fancy

Luckily, I have something new and Doctor Who related to post photos of:

Amy!!!

She even has green eyes and her necklace. Alas, I don't have an Eleven (waiting for the Eleven Doctors box to be released here) or a Rory (waiting for Character Options to make one) as yet. Still, Ms. Pond need not want for company as she waits for her boys to arrive ...

( Pictures below the cut. )

( The rest of the days. )

I cannot find the Fourth Doctor's head! Perhaps you are thinking 'have you tried looking on top of his shoulders?', but alas, it is not there. And no, Morbius is not directly involved.

You see, alone of all the Doctor action figures released so far, Four comes with swappable heads. (If you are now thinking 'wait a second, shouldn't it be Three that does that?' then we are probably about the same age *g*.) One is serious 'I walk in eternity' Tom Baker and the other is manically grinning 'nobody could be as stupid as he seems' Tom Baker. Mine has been wearing his serious head for a while, and tonight I have discovered that I CANNOT FIND HIS HAPPY HEAD.

It is not in the kibble box with all the other spare heads (and hands, and guns, and light sabers) which is where it should be. It is not in any of my other boxes of action figures. It is not behind or under the desk. I don't have any pets/children/house mates/leprechauns who might have moved it. I have a horrible suspicion that it somehow got mixed up with my parents' stuff when they were staying here last week :(.

Either the Fourth Doctor will have to serious business mode forever, or I will have to get another head from somewhere.

Now they can discuss Sun Tzu and argue about socialized medicine until their girlfriends arrive!

(This could take a while. I hope to get a Black Canary some time soon, but there is no DC Universe Classic Huntress as yet.)

On Tuesday, someone from my real estate agency is coming to inspect my flat. (For the second time in two months, for some bizarre reason. I guess they're making up for not doing any inspections for the first five years of my tenancy?) I'm going to visit my family that day, so I probably won't be here when they arrive.

Poll #1172 Srs Bizness

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 16

View Respondents

What part of my toy collection should I leave on display to greet my estate agent?

View Answers

Doctor Who
5 (31.2%)

Transformers: Animated
0 (0.0%)

Transformers G1/Movieverse
0 (0.0%)

Transformers Robot Heroes, also known as the Tiny Robot Army
2 (12.5%)

Justice League Unlimited
2 (12.5%)

My Little Pony
2 (12.5%)

Marvel Legends
1 (6.2%)

The current multi-source 3.75" display. (GI Joe, Star Wars, Marvel Universe, DC Infinite Heroes, etc.)
2 (12.5%)

A selection of things you don't have enough of to make a whole display (Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek, DC Universe Classics etc.)
1 (6.2%)

... you should hide them all in your wardrobe. You freak.
1 (6.2%)

I should probably note that 'all of the above!' is not an option, since I only have the shelf above my desk for display space.

Incidentally, whoever posed Storm Shadow and Snake-Eyes while I was out of the room yesterday may be interested to know that Scarlett has stopped face-palming and joined in the ninjacest ;).

So, Sandeigo Comic Con is over for a year. If there was any exciting news about the shows I love, my flist has not informed me so far. (Of course, I tend to be pretty spoiler-avoidant anyway.)

However, it seems that Hasbro and Mattel are trying to get me to give them all the money I make at my new job. Nothing exciting revealed in the Marvel Legends line, but there were lots of shiny Transformers. We're getting a Universe Cyclonus to go with Universe Galvatron, and a repaint of Animated Activators Bumblebee as Cliffjumper, with a new headsculpt! Here's hoping they make Wasp in the same scale.

Also on show were many more Robot Heroes to swell the ranks of my tiny robot army, including Ironhide, Blaster and Thrust. The appearance of a Conehead is especially cool, as it means we're bound to see the other two soon.

Even cooler than the transforming robots, though, was Mattel's DC comics panel. Because, dude. I cannot even tell you how awesome their news was, so I'm going to show you instead.

( Warning, large images below cut. )

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Look Who Arrived!

I Think I Have A Storage Problem

Thank You, Character Options

The Trouble With Tiger and Bunny Action Figures ...

The Joy of Action Figures

Thirty Days of Doctor Who: Day Twelve

Serious Problem!

Things That Make Me Happy

Deeply Serious Question ...

SDCC Toy Joy

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