Trans Atlantic Army

In the mid to late seventies, when I was fairly tank toy obsessed and space toys were on the back burner, I ran into Atlantic models. Made of soft polythene, they tended to sacrifice realism for playability and to a degree value. A lot of the model packs held two kits of the same toy, making them a great buy. The slightly larger boxes had a single, more complex model in such as these machines shown here. Notice the slapdash painted red Laser Command Vehicle, with a slightly familiar design...

The Army Game

No mention of Timpo can be complete without a brief look at their soldiers. My earliest memories include toy soldiers, Timpo and Britains standing proud amongst their ranks. Here are some of the later twin sets and a veritable flotilla of landing craft! I know the Britains Deetail Recoiless Rifle and German mortar team are among woodsys memories too!

GONE TO THE DOGS

Following tangenitally on from the recent action figure thread, here are two of my favourite action figures, which for me are unusual as they fit in the seven inch scale. Being a reader of sci fi weekly 2000ad, i was delighted to see a brief range of some of my favourite characters made into toys. Judges Dredd, Death and Anderson headlined the range, but i was pleased to see the two Strontium Dog bounty hunters, originally drawn by Carlos Esquerra make an appearance, in quite faithful detail. Johnny Alpha is almost perfect with his helmet  chest holster and futuristic weaponry and his vampiric colleague Durham Red is modelled after her Mark Harrison reboot style.

Red has her twin pistols which attach magnetically to her leather clad hip. Unfortunately, the line was short lived and never made it beyond six figures.

http://www.2000ad.org/markus/durhamred/

Thunderbirds 2004

With a new series of Thunderbirds in the offing and after looking at the Japanese cartoon series, Thunderbirds 2086, it’s time to consider  the film ‘Thunderbirds’, released in 2004.

 We’re all aware that it’s about as popular as a fart in a spacesuit with Anderson fans, indeed Gerry himself refused some easy cash by turning down an invite to the premier and endorsing it. Has it got any better with age?  As a Saturday morning kids matinee is might have held it’s own, but call it a Thunderbirds remake and suddenly you’re in a danger zone!

The simple philosophy behind Thunderbirds is the fact that International Rescue will  use anything at it’s disposal no matter what the cost  to save lives - that might be a hundred or just a single one -  it’s fairly straight forward  - the hard bit is getting that philosophy across in an entertaining way.

Did the film do that? Well it did to some extent, however seeing how the crux of the story  is having four of the Tracy brothers along with Dad Tracy being rescued by younger brother  Alan, Kyrano’s young daughter Tin Tin and Brains' son, Fermat  is taking that Tracy family nepotism a bit far .

I can see why the writers went down this road - get rid of the boring adults and the kids can play . I imagine it was also handy to have Lady P and Parker helping out. Lady Penelope is the decorative ‘older sister’ type and Parker can provide the laughs!

Actually I quite liked  the characters of Lady Penelope and Parker - maybe it’s because they actually had some character.

The Ford Motor Company being a major sponsor provided Lady Penelope with her  FAB 1 -  a Ford Thunderbird of course.

The CGI special effects were a definite no-no for me. With the odd exception  I’m not that keen on computer generated imagery at the best of times and considering the original series was a ground breaker for special effects you’d think the makers would have built on this.

One little effect  that did raise a  nostalgic smile was the point in the film when Alan and Fermat are about to launch Thunderbird 1 in pursuit of the Hood. Both their arms reach for the launch levers. For a split second we see a puppet hand complete with strings operating the controls.

The Hood is suitably insidious, with a back story providing a motive for his nastiness. 

There’s even a chance for pod vehicles to shine  - a redesigned Firefly and Mole!

I’m sure a lot of youngsters found this film a hoot and rushed out to buy up all the merchandise associated with it. It might have even guided them in the direction of the original series providing another generation of fans. I do hope so.

Let's hope we're all still smiling  after we've all seen the remake!

YARD WARS

Ed's recent mention of playing war brought back fond recollections of battles with my mates in our back garden back in the sunny Sixties. 

 

 

We young boys took it very seriously, even using dabs of brown and green shoe polish to camouflage our cheeky faces amongst the hydrangeas and privet hedges! One mate, who's Mum was a nurse, used to bring along stethoscopes and bandages for our very own field hospital under two deck chairs!

 

 

However, my fondest memories are reserved for the toy rifles we played with. They were simple crude home-made affairs using old planks of wood as the body with metal gate bolts nailed on to create realistic cocking sounds like the one pictured. I think my Dad made them up in his shed but they were basic enough for us to copy and repair ourselves on the battlefield! I can hear that metallic drag and clunk even now! A wonderful wonderful sound!

 

 

It was only when Mum shouted 'Paul, time for tea' that we all called a truce and stacked our weapons ready for the next skirmish in those never-ending summers of lawn wars! Mum's beans on toast and pints of Vimto usually healed any friendships that had been bruised in the action!

 

 

After all, boys will be boys, but I wonder if its politically correct any more for kids to tear round a garden playing war? Did it do us any harm? What do you think readers?

Spacex Space Patrol 1 - Upscaled!

Courtesy of the Kevin Davies Shipyards!