Favorites from the Road

Well it's been a great deal of months, so if there's anyone out there reading this, congratulations on becoming my biggest fan. Though I've really wanted to get a new post out sooner, I've been extremely busy with all of life's important distractions.

Above: Distractions

It's been a long road since June or July or whenever I last updated, but suffice it to say I'm settled down just a couple short blocks away from the St. Vincent de Paul thrift store of Marquette, my stomping grounds of olde. Anyone who's read this blog before knows I can't help but creep around a thrift store, amassing the gems. Money spent on cool junk you might not really need is always money well spent.

So while there's no way I'm emotionally capable of covering all the great merchandise I've picked up (best to ease back into this blog after abstaining for so long), I grabbed a few favorites to share with you, my biggest fan.

I tried to get a good mix so as not to cause my limited audience to check the site for an update on a whim, only to become immediately bored with what I'm throwing down. Cool, weird, dumb and silly may all be found within.

I'd like to start with some familiar territory.

ROKKON ACTION FIGURE ROCK GUY!

In a $2.50 grab bag with some wrestling guys and wooden blocks that appear to have been painted by mental patients were three figures hailing from the Masters of the Universe (MOTU) action figure line, aka He-Man, the most powerful man in the universe. Out of these three, the only one I didn't already own was Rokkon, the Stone Warrior.

Released in 1985, the line had already been going for a few years when Rokkon came out, and though I love the Masters, I can't help but admit they were grasping at straws when they created Rokkon, who was marketed to children based solely on his ability to turn into a rock.

Missing from my Rokkon is the gun accessory, which would plug into the hole in his chest and make him absolutely impenetrable while in "rock mode." Cool.

As for "rock mode," it gets even worse when you realize it looks less like a rock than it does Rokkon bending over, smelling his own farts.

You know it does.

NOVELIZATION OF HALLOWEEN III!
Halloween III: Season of the Witch, better known as "That stupid one without Michael Myers," is undoubtedly the most shat upon entry in the series. Considering Halloween: Resurrection featured Busta Rhymes beating the hell out of Michael Myers with a slew of WWE wrestling moves, that's an achievement.

If you don't know much about the Halloween series, you're a weenie, and you're probably wondering why a movie three parts into a series is missing its main attraction. *Spoilers* Basically, Halloween wasn't originally intended to be about Michael Myers, which is why he is pretty convincingly killed at the end of Halloween 2. The series was instead supposed to focus on the many terrors that can happen on Halloween. I think that was a cool idea, but people were so pissed at the lack of Michael Myers that to this day, nobody can even tell you what Halloween III is about. Any mention of it just raises complaint about his absence, and people start scratching their heads over why it was even made. The next film in the series was Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers, and he's been back ever since (He actually appears once in Halloween III, on a television screen).

Not that Halloween III is a good movie. It's pretty damn silly when it comes down to it. The movie is about how the Silver Shamrock Mask Company wants to kill all the little kiddies with masks implanted with computer chips containing a piece of Stonehenge. On every television throughout the film, you're basically bashed over the head with the Silver Shamrock commercials counting down the days to Halloween with this jingle: (Warning: Video may cause seizure)

And that's just the final version. When the movie starts, Halloween is still eight days away, which means EIGHT MORE DAYS TIL HALLOWEEN HALLOWEEN HALLOWEEN EIGHT MORE DAYS TIL HALLOWEEN SIL-VER SHAMROCK and so on and so forth. The reason Silver Shamrock is counting down is because on Halloween night, all the little kiddies are supposed to put on their Stonehenge-tainted maskies and watch the magic pumpkin on their television. Whatever the kids expect out of it, they would instead get their heads turned to poisonous bugs, spiders, snakes and other creeps. The nasty creatures would then kill anyone else in the vicinity, i.e. the parents. Since this is something of a witchy movie, being in the title and all, I guess the whole turning kids heads into bugs thing is supposed to be some kind of pagan sacrifice or something. Oh, and the Silver Shamrock company has androids working for it. Androids that look exactly like pee-pul.

But it's not terrible. And I'm really digging that pumpkin mask (they actually sold all the masks as a promo). Like many B-movies, there's at least some part of the movie that makes it watchable. For me, it's the part where a kid's head turns into bugs.

Now you can see why I'd want to own this in novel form. Bonus! Two stickers, ET and a scratch-and-sniff apple, stuck to the inside cover.

Thanks, slob.

SHE-RA GOLDEN BOOK!

Straight out of 1985 comes this very pink hardcover book, She-Ra, the Princess of Power, also known as the kind of thing thrift store dreams are made of.

Male or Female, only fools don't get down with She-Ra, He-Man's twin sister. Separated at birth, He-Man protects Eternia from Skeletor, while She-Ra protects Etheria from the Evil Horde. When He-Man started getting stale in the mid-eighties, She-Ra was created with her own show and toy line (though the Horde was sold with the MOTU line), breathing new life into the franchise.

Bad ass interpretation by *nebezial on deviantART

As far as the contents of this book are concerned, there seems to be a real lack in production value. The drawings are okay, though any half decent illustrator could replicate them quite easily. Here are two of my favorite spreads:

One picture looks like complete shit because the artist obviously didn't know how to draw two female bodies trapped in a net and piled on top of each other. Where did he learn to draw?

What the Hell is going on?

The writing is bad, in that "long story short" kind of way. Here's an example paragraph:

"Adora picked up the Sword of Protection. She could not stop looking at the bright glow. She didn't see the rebels climb the wall. They captured her by surprise, and she dropped the sword."

Not so Golden, but I don't care. In fact, its badness just adds to the overall charm. Apparently this is the first book in a set of four, so you know I'm watching for the other three.

...

And now, for the grand-daddy of all thrift store finds in recent history, I give to you...

TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: THE MAKING OF THE COMING OUT OF THEIR SHELLS TOUR VHS!

*heeeeeeep* That's right, I hold in my hands this ridiculous and moderately rare ($8-$30 eBay asking prices, few listings) VHS tape from 1990, sometimes known as "Behind the Shells." This is a full blown 30 minute documockumentary following four guys dressed like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) during their live concert tour, "Coming Out of Their Shells." What they really do is jump around on stage and pretend to rock while everything plays from the background.

The thing that makes this movie ridonkulous is they treat the turtles like real people. Yeah, they really run with it. I can't give specifics without watching the damn thing again right now, but take my word for it. Now, that might have been okay had the turtles appearance been up to par with how they looked in the first movie.

.. but they look like shit. Their mouths rarely move, even during close-up interviews. And what's with that bondage gear? They look more ready for a leather dungeon than rock and roll. I'm not even going to get into the feet: two-towed, green and glorious in the original film, now just some cheap white sneaks. Obviously this was at the point when the turtle money tit had practically run dry, requiring squeezing to the point of bruises and swelling. Around this period was the only time in history that it would have been uncool to love TMNT.

The VHS features the turtles hit single "You Can Count On Us." Give this a listen and see if it's not in your head all day:

So if seeing a guy in a turtle suit try to pretend-bash on a drum with no discernible sense of rhythm is your cup of tea, you ought to see the turtles come out of their shells, on The Coming Out of Their Shells Tour.

Interesting side note: the whole tour was sponsored by Pizza Hut. Didn't know that? You would if you watched this tape. My favorite part is when some Pizza Hut bigwig is addressing a room full of kids about the success of his bullshit marketing campaign while the kids all wear the expression of "Derp... Where the turtles at?" Then the four clowns come out doing their cheap turtles impersonations to thunderous applause while the pizza exec sits back and no doubt thinks "I don't get it, but there's money here."

And for a real stinger, here's April O'Neil's bit:

I can't begin to imagine how much fun it was for the five- to ten-year-olds watching in the thousands to sit through that monstrosity. I mean, who paid to see April O'Neil?

The actual concert had its own VHS. If you have it, send it my way. In exchange, I'll tattoo your name inside the crack of my buttocks.

Oh, and Splinter looks like shit.

Action Figure Stockpile

Today is an example of why it's necessary to make regular visits to St. Vinnie's. You never know what may have turned up in the past couple of days. If I decided to stay home and take a nap instead, I would have missed greatness. The lesson is therefore get your lazy ass out of bed. I did, and found an action figure stockpile in the process. Though there was an entire box full of them, I narrowed it down to the four which mattered most to me.

The Terminator!

No longer the Governator.

Arnold Schwarzenegger as the T-800, sent back in time by the adult John Connor to protect the young John Connor from the T-1000. Yes, I'm referring to Terminator 2, and if you didn't know that, you should stop reading right now and watch the first two Terminator movies. I'll wait.

Okay, now that we're all on the same page, this is an action figure released along with T2 in 1991 by Kenner. The figure is an apparent tie-in with the final scene from the film, where Arnie is getting his ass kicked by the T-1000. The figure displays what could be called "battle damage," although they embellished a bit in that department. For example, a "metal" rod comes out of Arnie's fist, and I sure don't remember him doing that in the movie. It makes him more like Wolverine. The cool part is that it's in the right position for you to use Arnie to flip off other action figures before beating the plastic shit out of them. Oh, and that whole arm detaches, but it's supposed to, for some reason.

I love the first two Terminator movies, so it was an easy pick out of the box. I believe this is the first action figure I have modeled in the likeness of Arnold Schwarzenegger, and if there's anybody in the real world who has enough manly clout to be an action figure, it's him. My only question is why they chose to put him in a maroon colored undershirt. Why not blue, or any colors other than maroon, pink, or purple? At least the bandolier and gunshot wounds partially make up for his wardrobe malfunction.

Cost of T-800 Figure: $.74

Cell from Dragonball Z!

In case you missed one of the defining cornerstones of my generation, here it is for you now. Dragonball Z was the absolute shit from the time I was in 5th grade until probably 8th grade. All of my friends watched it. One friend would even call me daily after the show was over so we could have a discussion about it. Yeah, it was kind of a big deal.

Dragonball Z, or DBZ for short, turned up in the American culture at large when it appeared on Toonami, the Cartoon Network block of bad ass shows for adolescent boys hungry for action packed cartoons. Getting into all the specific details and background of the show would take forever, so I'll just leave it at the fact that we got everything we wanted and more from DBZ. I mean, the show was 99% battle, and always kept us coming back for more.

Cell was a character who came towards the later part of the DBZ series. Like every major villain that appeared on the show, he was the strongest that the heroes had ever faced up to that point. Cell was some kind of genetically created organism, and to increase his power, he had to absorb a couple of powerful androids, who were actually only created to be absorbed by Cell. Yeah, it was kind of a weird plot line.

Cell himself was a big asshole, of course, and was eventually defeated. His green color always made me think of guacamole. That's about all I have to say about ol' Cell.

Cost of Cell: $.96

Mekaneck!

Finally, something as monumental as Masters of the Universe/He-Man is able to become a part of my blog. It's a close second to the Ninja Turtles for largest cool factor from childhood. Not to mention, Masters of the Universe came first, and had what was probably the most inventive action figure line to date. The names were very inventive, they were well crafted,  a good number the figures had an interesting special skill, and on top of it all they simply looked cool. They still do, which is why I buy them.

Masters of the Universe figures, made by Mattel, came before my time. Mekaneck here, for example, is from 1983, which makes him one of the earlier figures in the line. Luckily for me, I had older cousins who owned a good number of the figures and were nice enough to let me play with them. Thus, some of my earliest memories involve one of these figures in my tiny hand, and for me, that's an ideal place to begin my life's timeline. I've changed less since then than I probably realize.

This is not the first Mekanek action figure I've owned. In fact, I may now have more of him than anybody else. He must've been a popular figure in his time, hence the reason he keeps turning up at every thrift store I shop at. I can see why. He's got those cool silver glasses and a red pointed head, not to mention his neck extends when you turn him at the waste. Put him in a cool display box with a couple fancy weapons and you've got a sale on your hands, bucko. They just don't make action figures like this anymore. No wonder the kids are all such bastards.

Cost of Mekaneck: $.96

Another Battlestar Galactica Figure!

I am also this man's God

I thought that this figure had a familiar shape, and sure enough when I picked him up, I saw the same "1978 Univ. Studios" that I saw on Friday. I quickly grabbed him, and was that much closer to having a collection of Battlestar Galactica action figures from 1978.

For whatever reason, this guy, Commander Adama, was in a completely different place from his partner. While the first Battlestar Galactica figure was near the front of the store in a plastic bag and priced for over a dollar, this guy was in the back with the toys, unmarked and in a bin with other random toys. They had to come in together, so why the separation and vast difference in price? My only guess is because this guy is old, and no one will pay a dollar fifty for an action figure of an old man.

Much like the other Battlestar figure I found, this one originally came with a jacket, which can be viewed here.

Cost of Commander Adama: $.25

That does it for the Monday edition. Check back at the end of the week to see me lose a few more of the precious pillars on which my sanity rests.