What used to be a $0.97 toy has evolved into one of the more expensive lines of 8″ action figures today. These are not some awesome Type S2 body by the infamous Cast-A-Away Toys, but instead are very cheap blow mold bodies. Arms, legs and torsos are connected by pushing the soft plastic peg into the connecting parts. Hands are attached by pushing a plastic “spike” type of wrist into the end of the arm. Surprisingly, elbows, knees and wrists have metal rivets instead of the cheap plastic of some of their competitive toys. The heads are squishy soft plastic, painted (usually minimally) and have a neck plug to attach at the shoulders. The outfits on these characters are odd at best, but nevertheless sought out by collectors worldwide. Typically using a spandex style knee length pant, some kind of shirt and sometimes even a scarf around their neck, these monsters come from legend and outer space in both English and Italian. Their hands are exaggerated deformed hands, claws, pincers, suction cups and more. Their feet also range in everything from a “normal” foot to an oversized clown style foot, bare or with shoes, and sometimes even a suction cup style. These creatures were released in the USA and in Europe (mainly Italy). They came in several different lines repackaged on different cards. One series even had a mail in offer to join a club! One of the things I like most about these, and what also makes them difficult to collect the whole set, is that they came in both non-glow and glow in the dark versions in most cases.
My first encounter with these strange creatures was from the man who got me started on the path to knockoffs, Raymond Shariff Castille. His Gallery of Monster Toys website back in 1997 at http://thegalleryofmonstertoys.com was my first encounter with these formerly obscure (to me) toys. During that time, you could pick up lots of variety in this series, including the glow in the dark versions for a pittance of what they go for today. In any case, take a look and let these toys get your mind percolating with excitement! They were marketed during the popularity of both Mego and Star Wars and these 8″ figures were sold as Barroom Scene “Kooks” from the cantina scene in Star Wars. Being 8″ tall vs. Kenner’s 3.75″ Star Wars figure would have not made these actually to scale, and actually not a good match by any means. Just a note that the figures were the same in each line sold. They only changed the name on one character for one of the lines, but the figures themselves and outfits were the same.
Famous Monsters of Legend
Probably the most sought after series are these guys. Sporting card art on the front and text on the back that they stole from a little known coloring book at the time, Monster Gallery by the Troubador Press in San Francisco:
The figures consisted of The Abominable Snowman, Cyclops, Morlock, the Fly, and the incredibly rare Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy and the Wolfman.
Star Raiders
Next to each figure I put the Star Wars character they ripped off..many of them are obvious but some are not! MORE TO COME…
Star Raiders Glow in the Dark
MORE TO COME…
Creatures from Other Worlds
There were only four in this set. Notice that “Zhor” is the only one that has not name listed on the card. Also, “Coth” was renamed to “Zoth”. MORE TO COME…
Star Command Interplanetary Starroid
There were just six of these guys on these really unique cards. The neat thing about these is the “Hey kids! Special offer! (see inside)” to become a member of the “Star Command Club”. These guys came on a different style card and the figures were not named. MORE TO COME…
Guerrieri Galattici (Italy) – labeled as “NEWGIOCI – ROMA”
Translated, “Guerrieri Galattici” actually says “Warriors of Stars”, not “Star Raiders”, but close enough. These figures hit Italy later in the production cycle but were sold not “Tomland” on the card, but instead ‘Newgioci – Roma” which means, “Newgame – Rome”. The back of the card displays all 16 Star Raiders whereas the earliest Tomland cardback releases in the US only had 12….Added later were Dral, Rot, Yick and Ah later.
