tupperware toys?

I've always loved plastic and as a medium it seems to have attracted good designers in the Sixties and Seventies.

Companies like Casdon spring to mind. They made a very classy cash register that came with a kite mark of classiness on the box. They also made a rather neat football game made of plastic, which was endorsed by Sixties legend Bobby Charlton.

But I have never associated Tupperware with well designed toys. The wheeled manned vehicles above are Tupperware.

Did you have any Tupperware toys?

bed pepper

Couldn't resist sharing our yawning red pepper!

Ha ha!

Have you any funny food?

they live through Roddy piper

I recently saw a film called They Live. I'd never seen it before but knew of it so I was excited to see it.

Essentially They Live is about an alien occupation of America. The aliens are disguised as humans and living among us. No-one can see the aliens except for a few resistance fighters who wear special glasses, through which their faces appear like thinly muscled skulls. The blurb to the movie calls them ghouls but I can't verify this as I have no idea what a ghoul is meant to look like although I did appreciate the use of this underused horror trope. It was released in 1988.

One of the resistance is played by Roddy Piper the WWF wrestler and his character John Nada is the film's leading role.

When John wears his specs he sees a cityscape of subliminal commands to OBEY and a world full of skull beings. Unfortunately for him they know he can see them!

Very much of the ilk of Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Futureworld, John Carpenter gave us a neat new slant on the sub-genre, creating a kind of socio-economic critique of Eighties America. In this sense it reminded me of Romero's Dawn of the Dead without the grue.

The version of They Live I saw was on You Tube and a Monster Vision showing. Monster Vision must have been an Eighties US cable TV station ( anyone remember it? ) as it had its own host who popped up every now and then to crack jokes. He even interviewed Roddy Piper, which was fun. Roddy had the most perfect set of top teeth I've ever seen! Sadly Roddy died in 2015 aged just 61.

Consulting my well-thumbed guide to loose action figures I noted that Roddy came as a plastic figure back in the day and sported a red tartan kilt. He was part of that initial muscled flush of famous WWF wrestlers who were made into toys during the Eighties wrestling craze headed up by Hulk Hogan. Sadly this passed me by completely but I often saw whole heaps of these figures wrestling in boxes at car boot sales in the Nineties. Should I have invested in wrestlers like Roddy, IRS and Mr. Perfect I wonder?

Does anyone collect old wrestling action figures? Have you seen They Live?

Stretch Armstrong Remembered

Too old to have had one as a kid, I did however find Stretch Armstrongs all the time at car boot sales. In the 1990's. Sometimes he was full dressed in his boxers ans vest, sometimes not. He was always stiff however and in need of a massage.

To unstiffen him I would place him along the top of a radiator wrapped in a towel. Being full of corn syrup, which hardens when it cools, the heat would loosen everything up again and give the figure the stretchiness he was famous for.

As a toy dealer years ago these loose figures always sold well but the postage was quite high. Old Stretch was weighty.

I never found a boxed version of the figure or his pet dog, Fetch Armstrong. Much harder to find again was the Stretch Monster.  I wonder if there was a stretch limo too? 

Did you have a Stretch Armstrong?

jr21 thunderbird 2 jeep

A reader kindly supplied these pics of his little plastic jeep from his JR21 TB2. 

I was keen to see whether the JR21 diamond mark appeared on the base but as you can see there's no mark at all. 

How about the Mole? Are there colour variations on this jeep and the mole? Any other J21 pod vehicles?

jr21 and the corgi corporal missile carrier

Hi Woodsy,

I managed to unearth my Corgi Corporal Missile Carrier after some minor excavations in my office.

I thought it might be nice to get a couple of shots of the two toys together. I suspect the unusual addition of chrome wheels on the JR21 toy was influenced by this variant of the Corgi model.

Ferryman

Originally posted on my JR21 blog 2009.

birthday competition prize winner! the photo!

Hi Woodsy 

Please find attached a photo of me with the 2016 anniversary compo prize - sorry it took so long to organize but here it is ! 

Massive thanks to Alan Shubrook for sending on his 2nd book (as I already had his first which was the original prize) - I can say it's every bit as wonderful as the first - packed with photos I'd never seen and a trove of new info - my highest recommendations (and thanks again !). 

Thanks to you and the Blog team for running such a great Birthday Compo - hope the photo's okay (and there might be a sign of the prize from last year in the background !) - 

Thanks again and very best wishes - 

John

P.S. - I should probably also give credit to all those British Annuals and comics that used to do the Puzzle page where you have to identify an everyday object from an unusual or close-up angle - they were great training for the Blog Compos !

*

John's Winning Answers

to the comp

1. - Johnny Seven OMA Rifle - Deluxe Reading/ Topper Toys

2. - Billy Blastoff - Eldon (possibly a knock-off ?)

3. - Atomic Disintegrator Gun - Hubley

4. - Fireball XL5 Playset - MPC (Multiple Toymakers)

5. - Moon Patrol Cricket - Golden Astronaut Moon Exploration Series - Multiple Toymakers

6. - Blushing Frankenstein (Mod Monster) - T.N Nomura

7.- Strange Change Toy (featuring "The Lost World") - Mattel

8. - LUNAR EXPLORER - ALPS 

9. - James Bond 007 Road Race - AC Gilbert

10. - The Wolfman - Aurora

jr21 missile launcher with automatic launching device

Pictures: Ferryman