“Introduction”

You know what’s so frickin’ cool about the first waves of G1 (Generation 1) Transformers Autobots? They were actually based on REAL vehicles! They contained die-cast metal parts, nice and shiny chrome parts and rubber tires, which gave them a feeling of quality that I really miss from most of the later waves of G1 Transformers. The Autobot this article is dedicated to is no exception to the rule! Submitted for your approval, I present to you: Prowl!

Prowl is the military strategist amongst the Autobot ranks and his alternate mode is based on a Datsun 280ZX Japanese police car. According to the tech specs that we find on the back of Prowl’s packaging, Prowl has a rank value of 9, which puts him squarely as second in command, right after the Autobot leader Optimus Prime who holds a rank 10 rating. Well, not exactly. Jetfire somehow also holds a rank 10 rating and Grimlock also holds a rank 9 rating, but we’ll conveniently ignore that for now, because popular opinion in Transformers G1 fandom holds Prowl as the second in command and because both Jetfire and Grimlock were second wave characters (Prime and Prowl were amongst the first wave of Transformers characters that were released in the U.S. in 1984).

 

“Oil crisis”

As I mentioned above, Prowl is based on a real life vehicle, the Datsun 280ZX. The name Datsun will probably not mean a lot to anyone born in the late 1980’s or later, but it used to be a Japanese car brand that rose to popularity in western countries in the 1970’s. You see, life was not all that grand in the early seventies of the 20th century. In October of the year 1973 something nasty happened. An oil crisis broke out. The catalyst to this crisis was the U.S. decision to supply the Israeli military during the Yom Kippur war and the subsequent reaction of the Arab members of OPEC to increase the price of oil by creating artificial scarcity, in order to meet their political goals. On October 16, 1973 the OPEC member countries decided to increase the price of oil by a whopping 70%. In addition to that they also decided to decrease their production of oil by 5% on a monthly basis. Their strategy worked. Oil prices around the world sky rocketed, especially in the U.S. which was also the target of an oil embargo by OPEC. About a week later the oil embargo was expanded to include the Netherlands, which has long been known for its pro-Israel stance. In the Netherlands, this lead to a string of government imposed car free Sundays. No motorized vehicle was allowed on the road on those days, except for emergency purposes of course.

Although I wasn’t born then yet, I remember by parents’ recount of those oil crisis days. My parents were Yugoslav worker immigrants back then, who moved to the Netherlands in the early 1970’s. With the oil crisis going on it was no surprise there that my dad decided to buy a Datsun 120Y coupé in 1974. The Datsun 120Y was a very fuel economic car and I suspect that my old man really digged Datsun back then. Here’s a picture of him leaning proudly against his brand spanking new Datsun somewhere around that time.

Funky, right? But wasn’t this an article about a Transformer called Prowl, you might ask? Yes…. Yes it is. I like to place things against a background though, so please, humor me and continue reading and we’ll get to the good stuff. I promise!

“Datsun”

So where did Datsun come from? Well, the name can be traced back to 1911 when three friends in Japan decided to invest in the automotive industry. Kenjiro Den, Rokuro Aoyama and Meitaro Takeuchi helped create the Kaishinsha Motor Car Works company. The firm was renamed in 1925 to “DAT Motor Co.” and later, in 1926, it merged with another Japanese car company to become “DAT Automobile Manufacturing Co., Ltd.” The name DAT, of course, was an acronym of the last names of its founders (Den, Aoyama and Takeuchi). In 1931, DAT Automobile Manufacturing created a new small car called the “Datson”, literally the “son of DAT”. In 1933, the name was changed from “Datson” to “Datsun”, because the symbol for “son” apparently means “loss” in Japanese. The Japanese are pretty picky about things like that. Also, using the word “sun” instead, would honour the sun depicted in the Japanese national flag. Double whammy!

If the above Datsun logo looks a tad familiar, that’s quite understandable. You might recognize it from the Nissan logo:

“Nissan Fairlady Z”

The name Nissan is an abbreviation of sorts for “Nippon Sangyo”, which means “Japan Industries”. Nissan was founded in 1928 and took over Datsun in 1930. The name Datsun was maintained as a seperate brand until 1986 and our beloved Prowl happens to be a Datsun Fairlady Z, also known in the U.S. as a Datsun 280 ZX. This model was available between 1979 and 1983 and proved to be a sales success.

As was the case with most of the early Autobot cars, Prowl was originally based on a toy created by Japanese toy maker Takara as part of their Diaclone toy line. The mold was used three times in the Transformers universe for Prowl, Bluestreak and Smokescreen, the only difference being a different paint job and, in Prowl’s case, police lights on the roof. If you’ve ever wondered what Prowl’s police decals are based on, wonder no more, because they are based on Japanese police cars! Not really surprising given what we now know about the toy’s history. Here we have two photos of Japanese police cars, that will surely spark a sense of recognition with anyone who is familiar with Prowl’s car mode:

“Oh my god, it’s all Prowls!!” Yes. Yes, they are. See, what’s so cool about Prowl is that he’s not only based on a real life car, but his police decals are also not just some fantasy police design, but also based on real life! That is one of the many things that are so hellacool about these early G1 Transformers in this collector’s humble opinion. Let’s have another look at some photographs of Prowl in car mode.

If we have a look at Prowl’s sticker sheet closely and look at sticker number 8, we can also see a small black logo with what looks like a yellow sun with sun rays inside, reminiscent of the petal style emblem of Japan’s Emperor (click on the photo below for a larger version).

In fact, it is (a slightly modified version of) the official Japanese police emblem! This emblem can be found on all Japanese police cars and police badges. This what it looks like:

How cool is that? Takara really did their best to create vehicle modes for their car robots that approximated their real life counterparts as much as they could. It is this attention to detail that makes these early G1 releases so fascinating to me. It’s not just some fantasy car, but a real car with a real history! Makes owning one and looking at one all the more enjoyable if you ask me.

“Milton Bradley Prowl”

As most of the regular visitors of this blog will know, I specialize in collecting the MB (Milton Bradley) branded G1 Transformers that were released in Europe in 1985. Prowl was part of MB’s 1985 line up and I was very fortunate to have been able to buy him not too long ago. This particular Prowl has slight yellowing on some parts, but is otherwise in fantastic shape and was childhood owned by a good collector friend of mine. The stickers are unapplied and Prowl comes complete with all his inserts and paperwork.

As with all the Autobot cars that were released by MB, Prowl comes in a styro foam insert instead of the sealed bubbles that we see in other western markets. A very nice packaging variation if you ask me. It allows you to remove the toy from its packaging without damaging the inserts. As most hardcore collectors will know, these styro foam inserts are actually remnants of this toy line’s heritage: Diaclone. The Diaclone toys were released in Japan and Europe inside these styro foam inserts. Now, Diaclone toys in Japan were usually accompanied by little Diaclone driver men with magnetic feet like the one below that belongs to my Diaclone version of Hound:

The Diaclone styro foam inserts usually had a space where the little Diaclone man would fit as you can see from the styro insert of the Milton Bradley Mirage from my collection below:

There at the top left you can see a shape cut out where the Diaclone driver would easily fit. Because Transformers did not come with Diaclone drivers this space is left unused in the MB releases. However, a peculiar thing happened with MB Prowl. If you look closely at the styro foam there is no space carved out for the Diaclone driver. Here, have a look:

What’s the significance of this, you would ask? Well, all the other Autobot cars that were released by MB have a space in their styro for a Diaclone driver. Only the Japanese Transformers did not have any Diaclone driver spaces. This is not just a coincidence, because it appears that the Joustra Diaclone Prowl also has this same styro insert without the space for a Diaclone driver, further adding to the similarities between these two lines.

“Cajofe”

MB released a total of 9 Autobot cars in 1985. Although the toys themselves were all manufactured by Takara in Japan, they were shipped off to France inside their styro foam, where they would be packaged by MB in their signature multi-lingual packaging, sporting German, French, Dutch and Spanish. The packaging was printed in France by a company called Cajofe which was located in the small town of Fegersheim, 12 kilometers south of Strasbourg. An interesting thing about the Transformers packaging that Cajofe created for MB in 1985 and for Hasbro Europe in 1986, is that they printed a date code inside of one of the inner flaps as evidenced in the photo below.

On the top flap you can clearly see the Cajofe logo, but if you look closely at the lower flap you see the number “8 85” upside down. This translates, of course, to August 1985. I’ve noticed this on all the packaging that was printed by Cajofe. What does that mean? Well, although we’ll never know for sure until an ex-Cajofe employee can confirm this, an educated guess would be that August 1985 is the month in which Cajofe printed this Prowl box. Incidentally, all of the Autobot cars boxes that were released by MB in 1985 carry this same date code of August 1985. I have confirmed them all myself, except for Jazz’s box, because I have never seen or owned one, but I’m willing to bet a lot of money that MB Jazz will have the same date code. It is interesting from a nerdy and obsessive compulsive standpoint as my own to know when these boxes were printed, because it gives us the chance to create a fairly accurate estimate of when these toys actually hit the European market. It is not entirely unthinkable that these MB Autobot cars hit European toy stores shortly after they were printed, perhaps around September 1985? Although I’m afraid I don’t know the exact month, I do remember seeing Transformers for the first time in my local toy store around that time in 1985.

“Copyright stamp”

So where does this MB Prowl fit mold wise? Well, the best way to check a bot’s place in history is to check the copyright stamp on the toy itself! Here’s MB Prowl’s copyright stamp:

This specific copyright stamp is in line with most of the pre-rub sign Transformers that were released in the US in 1984. Whereas most of the other MB Autobot cars all have copyright stamps that resemble those from the Diaclone line, this specific Prowl resembles an actual Transformers mold. This actually fits with MB Prowl’s out-of-place styro foam without the Diaclone driver space. It looks like MB Prowl was based on a more recent production run by Takara than the other MB Autobot cars, which were mainly Diaclone molds.

“The Face of the Autobots”

There is one more interesting tidbit of information regarding Prowl that I could not leave out of this article. Have you ever wondered what the original Autobot sign was based on? Well, wonder no more!!! It was based on Prowl’s face! Just look at the comparison photo that I threw together below:

Pretty cool, huh? I’m still amazed at how many Transformers collectors are unaware of this fact and it’s always an eye opener. Now you know as well, so go on and educate the masses! Of course, now you might be wondering who’s face the Decepticon logo was based on? Well, let me give you a hint. His name starts with “S” and ends with “oundwave”.

You might be thinking “Why would Prowl’s face be the basis of the Autobot logo?” Wouldn’t Optimus Prime’s face have been a more logical choice? Well, that’s quite the mystery still. One of the theories doing the rounds is that both Prowl and Soundwave were originally considered as potential leaders of the Autobot and Decepticon factions. You see, the Autobot and Decepticon logos were designed at a very early stage of development, probably even before most of the Transformers were even properly named. My personal view is that the afforementioned theory might be true, but I would not be surprised at all if the original designer of the logos just picked two robots of both factions and created stylized logos of their faces without any real regard as to who would ultimately become the leader of either faction.

“Tail lights”

I started out this article with a long detour into the oil crisis and the history of Datsun and a photo of my dad leaning against his newly acquired Datsun 120Y in 1974. What’s that got to do with Prowl? Well, although the Datsun 120Y is a far cry from the Datsun 280 ZX that Prowl is based on, some design aspects of the 280 ZX resemble my old man’s Datsun 120Y. Ever since I added Prowl to my collection I got a flash of familiarity that I could not place every time that I looked at the back of the toy in car form. Not too long ago I finally put two and two together when I dug up some of my old folks’ photographs. The back of Prowl, especially the tail lights, looks a lot like the Datsun 120Y. Check it out:

My dad bought his Datsun in 1974. I was born in April of 1975 and it remained our family car until around 1978 I think when my parents bought a brand spanking new Ford Taunus. On a subconscious level I always recognized the tail lights from my old man’s Datsun in Prowl. It only hit me when I found this photo below of me and my old man from October 1975. I must’ve been around 6 months old there. My mom’s photographical skills sucked, because her finger is blocking out the majority of the car’s rear on this photograph, but I could recognize enough of our old Datsun’s rear to make the connection. I must have been no more than 3 years old when this Datsun was sold, but its image was engraved in my memory. Prowl always made me remember my old man’s Datsun.

 

“Gallery”

 

 

“Spring is in the air”

Yesterday I visited the Spring 2011 edition of the Collector’s Convention, which is being hosted twice a year in Utrecht, the Netherlands. It has grown to become the biggest convention of vintage collectables in the whole of Europe. Several giant halls are filled to the brim with everything you’d want to collect, ranging from stamps, coins and postcards, to antiques of all sorts and one hall dedicated exclusively to vintage toys and comic books! It’s as close as you can get to all those major conventions you find in the U.S. The Spring edition is traditionally a little less crowded than the Fall edition, but I had a great time nonetheless with some great bargains that I snapped up!

“Yo Joe!”

Right off the bat upon entering the convention I found a nice MOSC (mint-on-sealed-card) motorized G.I. Joe Cobra vehicle on a European card for the measly sum of 3 euros. After pocketing that I encountered another MOSC Batman: Animated Series character that I swiftly added to my growing collection of this wonderful toyline.: Bane! Can you believe this was just 5 euros?

“And now the leg, huh…”

Strolling along further across the countless of rows of vintage toys I soon saw these two posable Scarface action figures. Scarface is one of the coolest gangster flicks of all times (“Now the leg, huh…”) Truely one of Al Pacino’s coolest roles ever. Mezco Toyz created a total of eight 7-inch Scarface action figures in 2005 and these are “The Player” variants in white and blue suits and at 13 euros a piece I just couldn’t pass up on snapping them up both! They look amazing up close with real nice paint jobs. You can even see Tony Montana’s tattoo on his left hand. How cool is that!

“Masterfully crafted classics”

Most of my money went to a set of 4 Masters of the Universe Classics from Mattel. Now, I usually only collect vintage MOTU stuff, but I have been sitting on the fence for quite a while wondering whether I should buy some of these amazing MOTU Classics that have been coming out since 2008. They’re basicly the same as the vintage He-Man action figures, but crafted masterfully by the Four Horsemen and with way more articulation than you ever had with the vintage stuff. Having been on the verge of buying one of these online for so long, I finally decided this was the time to invest in this toy line and I bought a MOSC King Randor, Buzz-Off (which I originally owned when I was a kid), Orko and the Mo-Larr vs Skeletor set! I wasn’t disappointed!! The articulation and detail on these action figures is so frickin’ cool it’s unreal! Just look at King Randor here with his big ass sword!

I busted open the Mo-Larr vs Skeletor set and placed the MOTU Classics Skeletor next to a loose vintage Skeletor I had lying around. Just look at the difference.

Pretty cool, huh? I have a sneaking feeling these won’t be the last MOTU Classics I will be adding to my collection….I will leave you now with some more cool poses that I quickly whipped up of the dark lord Skeletor!!

“Introduction”

Some more Diaclone from Joustra! Released in 1984 in Europe, as part of Ceji Joustra’s first wave of Diaclone toys, I present to you the Diaclone Kronoform! Now, what child of the 80’s does not remember owning or seeing one of these transforming wrist watches? I remember getting one for free as part of some toy store promotion here in the Netherlands somewhere in early 1986 or so. I can’t remember whether it was a true Takara product or whether it was just a knock-off. All I remember is that it was red and had the exact same transformation, so I’m pretty sure it was from the same mold as these Joustra Diaclone Kronoforms.

“Class of 1986”

Regular visitors of this site might remember my article on Beachcomber, which features a school class picture from 1986 with my best buddy wearing Beachcomber inside his chest pocket. For those that don’t remember here’s that picture again in full.

And here’s a close up of Beachcomber on that very same picture!

“Kronoform in da hizzouse”

Well, a couple of weeks after I originally published the afforementioned Beachcomber article, I had another long look at my class picture from 1986 and discovered something amazing! You see, it turns out that Beachcomber was not the only Transformer in this photograph! Another class mate of mine seemed to be holding something up to the camera. Upon closer inspection it turns out this is none other than the Joustra Diaclone Kronoform !! Check it out (click on the photo below for a larger view):

Holy crap! I have to admit I was über-excited when I found this out. Not only was this class picture basking in the glory of Beachcomber who was chilling out inside my best buddy’s chest pocket. But now, on the total opposite end of the photograph, we also have the Joustra Diaclone Kronoform kicking major ass while he’s being held up to the camera by another class mate of mine. Yes, life was THAT awesome back then. The photo is not too detailed, but just look at the closeup and have a look at the gold Kronoform below:

No doubt about it, it’s Kronoform!! How cool is that! After my mind came back to Earth I went to my collection room and dug out the Joustra Diaclone comic that was included with my Robocolt and had a look.

As you can see, Kronoform is pictured in the catalog in black. Joustra apparently did not only release this black Kronoform, because I have two Kronoforms in my collection. One of them is this black Kronoform that is pictured in the catalog above, but the other one is the gold variant that is also visible in the class photo above. There, possibly, also was a silver coloured Kronoform released by Joustra, but I am not sure, because I haven’t seen one yet in real life. Here’s a photo of both Kronoforms from my own collection (I removed them from the outer box):

Looking at the back of the box, a total of 7 different modes are depicted that little old Kronoform could transform into. Ranging from an interstellar launch platform to a lunar moon shuttle and everything you could think of in between. Wow! Well, not really. Most of these alternate modes were rather crappy, half assed transformations when you look at them. Have a look:

“It’s Kronoform Time!”

I have to admit I didn’t even realize Kronoform had these ‘advanced’ alternate modes when I originally had him in the 1980’s. It was a just a cool looking little watch that I could detach from its wrist band and easily transform into a neat little robot! I remember that I actually wore it to school many times (though sadly not in the above class picture, that would have been so cool) and would transform it into robot mode and put the robot on my school desk, feeling rather smug. As I now remember, Kronoform was quite the rage back then, because several class mates of mine had one, no doubt also as part of the same toy store promotion that I mentioned.

I originally wasn’t really looking to add these Joustra Diaclone Kronoforms to my collection. I picked up both the black and gold Kronoform as part of a lot that contained some other Joustra Diaclones that I was after. Now that I have them I’m really glad I did, because I had totally forgotten about owning one when I was 10 years old. Good times!

“Gallery”

 

 

“Introduction”

A bit of a break from the Transformers updates of late. Well, just a little, because today I’d like to focus on Diaclone! As most hardcore Transformers collectors will know, the Diaclone toyline is where most of the early G1 (Generation 1) Transformers vehicles all came from. Diaclone toys originally came out in the early 1980’s in Japan and were manufactured by Japanese toy maker Takara. Not surprisingly, they are usually referred to as pre-Transformers by Transformers collectors. Before Transformers mania swept the world, the Diaclone brand was exported to most Western countries. In France, Germany and the Netherlands (and perhaps also some of their neighbouring countries) a company called Joustra licensed some of the Diaclone toys from Takara in 1984. From my personal collection, here we have the Joustra Diaclone F-15! Yes, it’s the conniving traitor Starscream in his pre-Transformers era guise!

“McDonnel Douglas F-15”

The Diaclone F-15 was first released in Japan in 1983 in two versions: the grey coloured “Fighter Jet” (the toy that became Starscream in the Transformers universe) and the blue coloured “Acrobot Jet” (the toy that became Thundercracker in the Starscream universe), both from Takara’s Diaclone Real & Robo Series. Both toys were based on the McDonnel Douglas F-15 Eagle jet fighter. The F-15 was designed in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s and was first taken into service in 1976 by the United States Air Force. The F-15 was designed as a so called air superiority aircraft and it has lived up to that moniker. To date, the F-15 has a combined record of 104 kills worldwide and 0 losses. Of course, this information is primarily from the US Air Force, so it’s probably a lie, but it’s a pretty safe bet that if ever there were an F-15 shot down in battle anywhere, you can probably count the lot on 1 hand. Yes, Starscream is THAT cool. Check out these butt-kicking pictures of F-15’s in action.

“Brizzi Brothers”

Now that we have established the unequivocal coolness of Starscream and the fighter jet that he’s based on, let’s have another look at the Joustra Diaclone F-15 toy. As with all the Joustra Diaclone releases, the packaging features gorgeous and exclusive art work by the Italian-French Brizzi brothers. Here’s a close up of the art work:

“Mix-up!”

As most hardened collectors, but also any observing casual passer-by will have noticed from the first 2 photographs at the beginning of this article, there’s a “minor” discrepancy between the toy and the actual art work on the box. The actual toy is red and white, while the box art features a predominantly blue toy, who looks an awful lot like Thundercracker! This is not just an isolated case. All Joustra Diaclones F-15’s seem to come with a pre-Starscream toy inside. It’s unclear what exactly happened here, but most likely Joustra originally planned to release the pre-Thundercracker toy when they commissioned the art work. For reasons unknown they ultimately ended up with pre-Starscream toys! Joustra didn’t manufacture any of the toys themselves at that point in time. All the toys were manufactured in Japan by Takara and shipped off (inside their styro foam inserts) to Joustra in France, where they were packaged and from where they were distributed over Northwestern Europe. So, Joustra probably did not have that much control over what product they actually got from Takara. Have another look at the packaging from a different angle:

Notice anything funny?  On the side of the box? The bot pictured here is pre-Starscream! Also, all the promotional material for Joustra Diaclones features the pre-Starscream toy and not the pre-Thundercracker. So when the actual box artwork was being originated (the last changes before it is sent to the printer) Joustra already knew the Brizzi art work would not match the actual toy.

 

“Safety modifications”

But let’s have another look at the toy then! Here we have a nice picture of the F-15 inside its original styro foam insert, just like the original Takara Diaclone release. The Joustra Diaclone comic book is missing, but otherwise this F-15 is complete (though unfortunately the missiles have broken off tips).

If we take a closer look at the mold, we can see that this particular release has the shortened wings. The very first mold of the F-15 Diaclones, which were intended for the Japanese market and were released in 1983, had pointy wings. When the mold was reused for the 1984 US release of Transformers modifications were made to the wing tips to make them less pointy, most likely to meet safety regulations in the US. Meanwhile, in mainland Europe, the same toy was being released in 1984 under the Diaclone brand and featured the same modifications to the wings, which is in line with what you’d expect, because both the Joustra Diaclone F-15 and Hasbro Starscream were being manufactured by Takara. The shortened wings are easily identifiable by looking at the styro foam insert. You can clearly see an empty space which would have been occupied by the original, longer (and pointier) wings! Have a look:

Furthermore, Joustra Diaclone F-15’s canopy is smooth. Later molds featured a ridge across the canopy. The copyright stamping is Takara only. Later molds had an additional Hasbro stamping.

All in all, this toy is still unmistakably Starscream! One of the many cool characters from the original G1 Transformers line up. I was always fascinated with the pre-Transformers releases ever since I first learned about their existence many years ago. I never found the Japanese packaging and artwork attractive enough to warrant investing into yet another toy line. Until I found Joustra Diaclones that is! As I have said often before, the exclusive artwork and the extra mile that Ceji Joustra went for their Diaclone releases is what sets them apart from other Diaclone releases in Europe.

More Joustra Diaclones on these pages soon. In the meantime check out some more photographs of my Joustra Diaclone collection here. And while you’re at it, check out my dedicated page to the ultra rare Joustra Diaclone version of Battle Convoy, a.k.a. pre-Optimus Prime here! More photos of the Joustra Diaclone F-15 are linked below. Enjoy!!

“Gallery”

Been a busy week. I managed to score some nice goodies that have been added to my collection. First off, I managed to add another Transformer to my ever growing MB collection: Snarl! Snarl himself is in pretty awesome shape, with only a loose joint here and there. The packaging also came with its original, multi-language instruction booklet and all of Snarl’s accessories are present. For the connaiseurs; the copyright stamping on the bot itself is Takara-only with year, i.e. no Takara-Hasbro stamping, which seems to be in line with most of the MB releases and leads me to believe this bot is an original MB. The box itself is pretty worn and has seen better days, but I don’t mind, because it’s another addition to my MB collection, so I’m pretty stoked about getting it in the mail this week, regardless!

But that’s not all the Transformers I got! I also got the European versions of Ramjet, Bumblebee and Blurr! Bumblebee’s packaging has been opened, but in such a way that it still looks very nice. The bot itself is missing its rub sign and is in pretty dire shape. I plan on replacing the bot in the near future with a better looking specimen. Still, it’s nice to be able to finally add the most popular mini-vehicle of all to my collection. Ramjet has some loose joints, but is otherwise in pretty good shape and Blurr is even MISB (mint-in-sealed-box). Unfortunately (one of) the previous owner(s) has touched up the box with marker to mask some very minor wear. A real shame, because the wear is very light and these unnecessary restoration attempts automatically disqualify this MISB Blurr from ever getting an AFA rating. Nevertheless, from a collector’s perspective I’m still extremely happy with this European MISB Blurr finding its way into my collection!

And still another Transformer: I also got the European Metroplex! As a kid I really, really wanted Metroplex every since I first saw him in my local toy store in 1986. I thought it was the coolest and most bad ass Transformer ever made (and still do). Unfortunately he was just way too expensive for me to afford back in 1986 as a kid. Thankfully, 25 years later my financial situation is a lot more positive and I finally managed to add him to my collection!

On to the Joe’s! I’ve lamented numerous times about the scarceness of vintage carded Dutch G.I. Joe’s form the toy’s initial European release in 1987 and onward. The only Dutch carded item I had up until now was the 1988 Dutch Battle Gear Accessory Pack #1 and that’s not really an action figure. Well, I finally managed to add my first Dutch actual action figure! It’s the second edition of Gung-Ho in marine dress blue uniform. In the Netherlands, this was the first release of Gung-Ho though, and for some reason he’s not called Gung-Ho, but Chung-Ho! Chung-Ho is part of the third series of G.I. Joe action figures that were released in late 1988. He’s also part of the last series of G.I. Joe toys that were released in Dutch-only packaging. The next series of G.I. Joe action figures featured French/Dutch language backing cards, which were also slightly over sized. I’m so glad to be able to finally add a MOSC (mint-on-sealed-card) Dutch G.I. Joe action figure from the original 1987/1988 series. Many more to go! As part of the same deal, I also managed to score the Dutch Battle Gear Accessory Pack #2! Good times!

Also arriving in the mail this week are three MOSC Action Force action figures. As most European G.I. Joe collectors will know, Action Force is the name of the toy line that was the predecessor to the G.I. Joe line. Before Hasbro introduced G.I. Joe in Europe in 1987, a lot of G.I. Joe action figures were available in Europe under the Action Figure moniker. This particular lot of Action Force figures does not feature any G.I. Joe molds (they have less articulation points), but they were so cheap I could not pass them up. The cards are Dutch and French so I assume they were originally sold in the Benelux countries and maybe also in France.

And lastly, I also bought this very nice Playmobil Esso Station from 1981!! I’ve been buying some vintage Playmobil stuff in the past couple of weeks of which I hope to add some photographs soon. I’m totally nuts about vintage Playmobil trains and most of their late 70’s and early 80’s line up. I just love the early 80’s design of the packaging and the toy itself. As you can see the box is in exquisite state for its age. More Playmobil soon!