MYSTERY SPACE TOY

This tiny cracker toy caught my eye on the cool Making Good Use site. I've seen it before at a larger scale along with a few LP spacemen on a backing card but just can'y think where. What on earth is this thing - a space boat?

 

UPDATE!

That's what I was thinking of! Hawk-eyed Arto has spotted the very same toy, albeit bigger, in a Hong Kong Space Exploring set on Ebay, pictured below. But where does the strange design come from? And that isn't an LP spaceman with it or?

Is Sci Fi Set To Mushroom?

The Atomic Age and Space Race during the 1950's and 60's fired a whole explosion of Sci-Fi on the small and big screens.

 

 

Kids were treated to B-movies like War of the Colossal Beast and This Island Earth, TV gems like Quatermass, the space antics of Moon Zero Two, Thunderbirds' epic grandeur and the sheer style of UFO. We were immersed in Science Fiction.

 

 

The Eighties were pretty good too if I remember rightly but perhaps not the Nineties or the Naughties?

 

 

Do you think that NASA's new Mars adventure might inspire a whole new generation of Sci Fi films, series and novels?

A SAUCER FULL OF SECRETS: SOMA, THUNDERBIRD 5 AND CRUSHED ICE

Many Century 21 toy collectors believe that the JR21 Thunderbird 5 toy, pictured here, was based on an earlier or existing flying saucer or UFO type toy.

The base of the toy adds to the mystery showing an unusual logo, a H inside a globe and a model number, 507, unlike other JR21 Thunderbirds toys.

Armed with this information I have searched for the flying saucer many times. The SWORD Moon Prospector, below, always comes to mind but the lights aren't similar really

More convincing is the T in a Circle UFO, seen below, which has a similar shape, dome and edge. The lights could be altered for the JR21 toy I suppose.

What is far clearer though is that a company called SOMA copied JR21 when they created their Space Ship X711, pictured here left.

SOMA's saucer is the same but white and I think I have found the same saucer being used in another guise, the TIGER Ice Crusher from Japan no less! Difficult to date but the SOMA and TIGER items could be contemporaries, maybe the 1970's or 80's. See what you think from the following comparisons and make your own mind up!

TV21 SWORD STORY: THE REBEL: ISSUE 170

BLUE CRUISER

 

ox

art

FILM4 FREAKY FUTURES NIGHT

UK film fans will be treated to a fistful of Sci Fi flicks this Saturday evening. Starting at 6.45pm with the original Planet of The Apes, FILM4 is running a FREAKY FUTURES night.

 

Click here foe more info.

Speaking of simians, I love vintage Planet of the Apes [POTA] toys, particularly carded rack toys. For a short while a few years back I was the happy owner of this ubercool Target Set by our Golden Astronaut friends Multiple Toy Makers in 1967. I bought it on one of my scouting trips to Memorabilia at the NEC back when I was a vintage toy dealer. Alas, like so many of my purchases they were re-sold on my old Ebay shop. Anyone else collect rack toys or POTA stuff?

CANDY AND ANDY ANNUAL: ANOTHER LOOK

As the blog's fourth birthday on the 15th September approaches [watch this space!] I'm starting to feel nostalgic about how it all started. I wondered what I posted today in 2008? Well, nothing, as it didn't exist then, so here's today's post from the same date back in August 2009. District 9 was on at the cinema and I was still in my forties!

 

 

The Moonbase library has grown a bit this summer with some great Century 21 finds: Topo Gigio, TV21 Summer Special, SiG, Action 21, Anderpup, Monkees and a particular favourite, the CANDY and ANDY Annual 1967. Concerning the lives of two dolls who live with panda teddies who run a toy shop, the Annual is choc-full of surprises!

The first surprise is the number of pictures of 1960's Century 21 and other toys on the shelves of the toy shop. See how many you can spot in the next two pictures! The first full answer emailed here will get a small plastic and modern LP-like astronaut sent in the post!

There is also an advertisement for CANDY comic - below. I've never seen this. Has anyone got any and are there any toy adverts in them?

Probably the biggest surprise are the three wonderful short THUNDERBIRDS strips. Rendered in very attractive pastels and aimed at smaller children, they are quite hypnotic! I love the reversed-L panel at the end of each strip - where else would you see TB2 blasting off over a boy and a deer! Classic!