ARTO'S SPECIAL AGENT BRIEF CASE

With the latest OO7 epic, SKYFALL, opening this Friday at the flicks our spy toys thread continues. Arto has sent these pics of a beautiful toy attache case in a sumptuous box. I also picked up one of these, albeit unboxed, at the NEC in Birmingham years ago and sadly, like many items, I sold it during my dealer days.

 

 

Arto explains: "To celebrate the 007 occasion and special agents in trench coats, I snapped these pictures of this interesting (and fairly rare, as I've understood) Hong Kong 007 knock-off, the Special Agent Bullet-Firing Brief Case. A Sean Connery period piece, by the looks of the box art. Apart from firing bullets, its features include Concealed Spring Dagger, Invisible Ink, Cap Gun With Detachable Silencer, Earphone For Secret Messages, Bullet Firing Camera Water Shooting, Special Agent Badge, Bullet Firing Wrist Watch, along with secret documents. Up and ready for any covert operation!"

There's something uniquely pleasing about vintage toy attache cases and their packaging. I think its all the effort that goes into putting them together, all the countless bits and pieces of spy gear and documents like even this knockoff set has. As to its origins, the pistol recalls Remco's Okinawa Pistol from their vast Monkey Division range, which they later re-hashed into the Rocket Pistol from their Star Trek line of toys [which also included a SpaceX Cricket-type vehicle!].

The packaging has been clearly influenced by the Daddy Cool of all toy attache cases and one I still dream of owning some day, MPC's James Bond OO7 Attache Case, pictured below. Any more spy toys out there in readers' secret stashes?