Another unlikely contender for a toy line must be Paul Verhoevens sci-fi shoot-em-up, Starship Troopers. Based loosely on Robert Heinleins novel about earth forces in an ongoing battle with sentient insectile aliens, the film was a quantum leap forward in computer graphics imaging for the big screen. Phil Tippett, who had previously been on the Star Wars production crew, brought millions of scrambling, screaming arachnids to life on screen. As the film was essentially a running battle punctuated with the obligatory schmaltzy love scenes, Verhoeven managed to cram in plenty of blood and guts making it a little unsettling for younger viewers.
However, the licence was picked up once more by Galoob and they placed the toys in the Action Fleet line along with Aliens and Star Wars. A line of six inch action figures was also made complete with vehicles. The Action Fleet line are easily some of the most impressive and unusual space toys ever made outside of the Star Wars cadre. Similar in premise to Remcos early Hamilton Invaders toys, they featured two small soldier figures to each boxed set and either a bug or a vehicle. The Plasma Bug (pic 1) is possibly the most outlandish. In the film, the giant creatures blast streams of glowing plasma from their abdomen and the toy features a spring launched ball of blue energy attached to a ribbon. This can be shot out and reeled back in. The Tanker Bug (pic2) was the central bug in one of the most impressive sequences, as hero Johnny Rico jumps onto the back of the flame spitting bug and blasts a hole in its carapace to plant grenades. Each tiny soldier has a magnet in the base, allowing them to be attached to points on the bugs such as the back, jaws or tongues. The Tanker Bugs have a launchable 'tongue' of flame on a ribbon with a magnet attached.
Easily the most scary bug is the fearsome Warrior, tiger striped in black and yellow (pic3). This was the central protagonist and to see the hordes of these creatures streaming over the hill to attack the marine outpost, is one of the best parts of the film. This came in the standard six inch size bug, a smaller battle damaged version from the carded Battle Pack sets and a large electronic one, complete with realistic scream!
The Hopper Bug (pics 4/5) is probably the prettiest with its irridescent green shell. This was also produced as a remote control toy (pic5) with rather limited walking action.
The squishy Brain Bug featured in one of the grossest moments of the film as it sucked out the brains of the human pilots. On screen it appeared as a fleshy, gooey being, which still managed to convey a feeling of eerie, cold intelligence (Pic6).
The standard Warrior Bug prepares to relieve the Marines of their limbs (pic7)
Dropping the hapless forces onto the bug ridden planets were the Retrieval Ships (pic 8) above. One of my favourite designs from the toy line. The boxy base unit has a door at the back to allow the troops to jump out, but also contains 8 large bombs which can be released to carpet bomb the bugs by pulling back on the tailfins.
In case the bugs are dug in to the hills or a fast air strike is needed, we have the TAC Fighter (pic9) - a two man interceptor with large missiles to blast the warriors out of their den.
Finally we have the second remote contol vehicle, the Dropship. Slightly larger than most of the other toys it has a crew of three, four remote launch torpedos on the top turret and an odd shuffling movement as the designers obviously decided to use the same mechanism from the Hopper Bug in the toy.
Beautiful collection WOTE! Just how big is your trove! Paul Verhoeven, like Cronenberg of Canada, likes to mix 'normal' life with ultra-violence (and TV adverts) as he did in Troopers and Robocop. Not good for kids and a dilemma for parents when toys appear in the shops. Kick Ass is a similar film running currently - first impression is that it's a kids film (kids are the main stars) but it definately isn't. I saw it the other week, it's a 15 but should be an 18 in my view. I just hope that no-one under 15 sees it. Lovely toys though Wote!
ReplyDeleteThe toys are interesting, but I didn't like the film at all.
ReplyDeleteI reckon WOTAN will soon have to build an extension to house his collection ^_^
I always wondered what the magnets were for, I'm afraid mine have to make do with fighting the giant insects from the King Kong merchandise!
ReplyDeleteThe film spawned 2 sequels, which seemed to go down the horror route and then descend into utter farce. It did however redeem itself with the brilliant animated version 'Roughnecks', a series which elaborated on the theme in the film, kept the great visuals but dropped the guts and gore.
ReplyDeleteI always get mixed up between the names of the male lead hero's in Starship Troopers and Grease! Johnny....?
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