Them! (1954) Official Trailer

Remember this one? It's antsy! 

https://youtu.be/v4URRp39XOo?si=ZldmCea7uoK-tyJt 

Your Help Needed with a Giant Wasp!

 A reader has asked if anyone has the instructions for the Fundimensions Giant Wasp kit? 

If you do could you please could let me know and we can maybe arrange a scan.

Thanks.

W.

*

Some assembly instructions found on Worthpoint, but none close-up.

The Rabbit in Beetle Car

 Being a huge fan of vintage Hong Kong plastic novelty toys I adore this car I've been aware of now for a good twenty years.

I don't own one but I've always admired it from afar online, the Rabbit in Beetle Car by CW toys. What a Christmas prezzie it must have been! 

It has a bobbing head and is part of the small no Circus Toy range.

At first I thought the car was partly cabbage leaves but the green veined top is the beetles wing case!

There's a passing similarity to the Comicars range by JR21, - I've got two of these - which also had moving heads.

Anyone got anything like these?

Do you like them?

Rubber Soul

Blimey, I so recall this rubber frog idling online. I had so many rubber animals and insects as a kid. Frogs, snakes, tons of snakes, crabs, ants, flies, centipedes and even a severed hand! 

I can still feel the waxy surface of them and deep oily smell.

Happy rubbery days!

Did you have any?

Aurora Monster Scenes Giant Insect

Hi Woodsy

Aurora was a US model company, who were most famous for their monster kits, mainly based on Universal horror movie characters from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. In the 1970s Aurora followed up their original kits from the 1960s with a series of smaller scale Monster Scenes.

These proved extremely controversial, as the subjects included various torture devices, and a girl character called The Victim. The line was quickly withdrawn from the US market, and the last few kits were only released in Canada.

The classic horror monsters were Frankenstein, Dracula, and a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde figure that could be built as either character. The whole range had a very short production life – 1971 only - although the kits were all re-issued by other companies in later years.

One of the last, Canada-only kits, was the Giant Insect, which I had always thought was an Aurora fantasy design. It was part Dragonfly, and part Scorpion, with a few bits from other creatures thrown in.

Well, it turns out this might not be the case after all. Because the Giant Insect bears a strong resemblance to the giant Dragonfly in the film Monster On The Campus (1958).

A regular dragonfly lands on a Coelacanth (a prehistoric fish, once thought extinct) in a lab, and reverts to its prehistoric form. So does an unfortunate scientist, who transforms in to a murderous caveman.

Since the Aurora kit was only released in Canada, it is now rare, and very expensive. The Moebius re-issue from 2008 is much easier to find, and it was a sales listing for this kit that mentioned the movie link.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/387791419535

The Aurora/Moebius Giant Insect is certainly not an exact match for the movie Dragonfly, but it is very similar. Aurora clearly changed the design just enough so they did not get sued.

The Giant Insect is a simple, snap-together kit, like the rest of the Monster Scenes range. It comes with clear parts for the wings and the bulging eyes.

The head and mouth are a different shape; the kit has larger mandibles and teeth; the eyes are horizontal rather than vertical; and the tail curves up and over, rather than being straight. But it has six legs, four wings, and is really ugly.

Supposedly, all the Aurora Monster Scenes kits were to a constant 1/13th scale, but the Giant Insect must have been a lot larger, if it is compared to the original giant dragonfly in the film. It seems odd that Aurora based this model on such a relatively obscure movie as Monster On The Campus, when most of their kits were taken from better known sources – movies, comics, and the works of Edgar Allan Poe.

There is a book on the Aurora Monster Scenes kits, by Dennis Prince and Andrew Yanchus, but as I do not have this I do not know what it has to say about the Giant Insect. 

Does it mention the apparent movie link anyone?

Four photographs from Ebay, Worthpoint and a Monster on the Campus movie still from Ebay - not exactly the same as the Aurora kit, but very close.

Have you got the kit? Do you like Aurora?

Paul Adams

New Zealand

A WORM IN MY OR

I was completely amazed by the real and unique Or and Orbitor toy owned by John Eaton and published on his Major Matt Mason blog [thanks Paul V.] 

Regarding John's Or itself, its such a cute and fragile-looking plastic alien creature in two attractive colours. Its a really appealing figure, almost Bruderesque and would 'sit' well among the Colourforms Outrer Space Men too, as well as its stablemates Callisto, Captain Lazer and Scorpio.

Seeing Or made me think of other similar insectoid robots. I couldn't find any contemporaries of Or from the 1960's but there are a few from later decades that have those creepy crawly robot chops.

There's the modern dancing robot.

Kenner's Star Wars droid with Or-like legs.

One of many Japanese candy premiums. I don't know how old these are.

The spinner itself, the Orbitor, recalls in looks my favourite Matt Mason gadget as a kid, the Satellite Launch Pak shown below. 

The concept of domed satellite spinners has been around a while. Below is the PLANET PATROL SAUCER ray gun set with domed rotors that fly from the end of the gun and is from the 1950's. Is that an alien inside?

And finally here is the LUNAR ORBITOR by NP of Germany. Although it has no dome, the centre is topped with a neat silver radar. I don't know the date of this. There are many more examples of satellite toys with domes and thingies stuck on top. 

There are more space spinners.

These uber-cool Stanzel sets even contain a tiny domed figure.

Closer inspection on Ebay shows its an astronaut and not an alien.

But their spinner went plastic too and became a Ziroid!

To cap this post off here's a neat seated robot piloting the M-50 Space Ship.

Have you any spinning discs with aliens or robots in a dome readers?

F O R M I C

 Speaking of ants, I'm getting worried about the number of ,Phase 4' diets I'm seeing.

Makes me think of ants and much chomping in the formulary of phase IV.

I've seen a lot of Ant movies and read a few Novels.

I've never seen Food of the Gods though - maybe that's rats film? It used to be advertised as a cine film for home viewing at the back of Warrens Creepy and Eerie comics.

I bought this softback of Creepy reprints this morning at the Bonner Comic Laden.

 Although Food of the Gods isn't advertised in it, some classic monotone monster cine films are, pictured above. The VHS of it's day! 

Have you seen it? Read any ant books? Did you or do you like Creepy and Eerie comics Readers?

🐜

Ant-dendum

In a sleepy Rhine village we're visiting is, yes, of all things, an ant controller! 

Terranova's THEM! Diorama

I always enjoyed THEM! as it had a fair degree of reality as opposed to giant apes or dinosaurs. 

Insects will inherit the planet no matter what men do to it!

Besides, it has James Arness not as the deadly dull Marshall Matt Dillon of Gunsmoke/Gunlaw or the creature in The Thing from Another World. 

It also had a touch of Quatermass and the Pit when underground.

Here's my diorama pics. Hope you like THEM!

Terranova47

USA

THE ITC BUMBLE BEE KIT RESEARCHED BY PAUL ADAMS

In the 1950s model companies were still trying to discover what types of kit would sell. So far, aircraft, ships, cars, and missiles were doing well.

But what would come next ? Some firms tried anatomy kits, and models of various animals. How about insects - giant insects ? Because insects and arachnids are so small, models of them would have to be made several times life size, so that is what ITC and a few others did.

The kits did not sell, and few have ever been re-issued. Most firms only produced one or two kits before dropping the idea of giant insect models. Further models that had been planned, and listed on kit boxes and even included in catalogues, simply never appeared.

It would be the 1970s before Fundimensions had the obvious idea of re-creating the giant-bug-on-the-rampage movies of the 1950s with their Gigantics kits, setting their monstrous insects in dioramas that showed them leveling an entire city block. Over the years there have only been a handful of giant insect models, and all appear to have been short lived.

Here, we will look at the sole giant insect kit from ITC - the Bumble Bee (two words). This is what the box had to say:

ITC Model Craft - Hobby Division of Ideal Toy Corporation.

Fascinating and Educational - The First of a Series of a Great New Hobby.

Authentic Plastic Assembly Kit - No Painting Necessary.

Made in U.S.A. by Ideal Toy Corporation, Hollis, N.Y.

Kit No.3805-129, meaning it sold for $1.29.

The side of the box lists 'Other insects in this series': Scorpion, Grasshopper, Tarantula, and Praying Mantis - although a couple of these are arachnids, not insects. The illustrations are simple line drawings, and do not show actual box tops. I can not find any listings for these kits, and it seems they were not actually produced.

The Bee kit is mainly moulded in dark brown plastic, with clear plastic wings which have to be cut from a thin vac-formed sheet, and a display stand to show the bee in flight. The most unusual part of the kit is the inclusion of some soft, fuzzy yellow fabric. This could be glued in to recesses in the main body parts, to depict the soft hairs covering the body. There was also a decal sheet, which gave both the common and scientific names (Bumble Bee and Hymenoptera Bombus), for use on the stand. This gives the scale as '8 X Actual Size', or 8:1. Real Bumble Bees can be just over an inch long. A metal rod is also included for mounting the model in flight.

This ITC advertisement has the date 1959 on it, but if it is for a trade show this might have been for the coming year, so it could have been either late 1958 or early 1959. It gives the price as $1.30. The model was 9 1/2 inches long, and had 44 pieces. It is listed as being available for Immediate Delivery. The copyright date on the underside of the model also seems to be 1959, although it is hard to find a good photo of this area.

1959 ADVERT ITC Model Craft Bumblebee 9 1/2" TV Cowboy Characters Maverick ++ | eBay

Scalemates say the model is 20 times life-size, but that does not match what the kit says - given that real Bumblebees can be just over an inch long, this ties in with the quoted scale of 8:1. The model does not appear to have been re-issued by anyone else. It seems to have been a fairly short-lived kit. The only ITC catalogue on the Box Art Den site is dated 1963, and does not show the Bumble Bee.

Bumble Bee, ITC - Ideal Toy Corporation 3805-129 (196*) (scalemates.com)

Copyright date just visible under body.

Vintage ITC USA BUMBLE BEE NO.3805-129 Model Craft Authentic Assembly Model Kit | #3761370238 (worthpoint.com)

Instruction sheet.

Vintage ITC Model Craft BUMBLE BEE NO.3805-129 Kit - Missing Some Parts | #3825742485 (worthpoint.com)

A good view of the vac-form wing sheet.

ITC Bumble Bee Plastic Assembly Model Kit No.3805-129 Original Used | #1953001777 (worthpoint.com)

Good views of the parts, but colour balance appears to be way out.

Complete vintage ITC USA BUMBLE BEE NO.3805-129 Model Kit Unbuilt Ex Cond | #3840475012 (worthpoint.com)

ITC Model Craft Bumble Bee Model Kit Unbuilt | #1829489741 (worthpoint.com)

Rust Belt Revival Online Auctions - VTG ITC Bumblebee model kit (bidrustbelt.com)

1960's ITC Bumble Bee Kit | #152438461 (worthpoint.com)

☆ RARE ITC USA BUMBLE BEE NO.3805-129 Model Craft Authentic Assembly Model Kit | eBay

Assembled store display model, in its original box.

ITC Bumble Bee Hobby Store Display. Rare! Bumble Bee Kit Display | #371806527 (worthpoint.com)

Paul Adams from New Zealand