A Whole New Bin of Awesome Pt. 2

So here we are, rummaging once more in a bin of awesome stuff that I picked up this past summer. It is of course a sequel of sorts to the bin of awesome I picked up the summer before that. What does the future summer hold in store for me? Only time will tell. 

But for now, let us be content to simply explore THIS bin. Right NOW. 

Buckle up buttercup because this layer of the bin is going to be very Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles-heavy. Now, the LAST bin that I bought from the same guy the year previous also included some TMNT figures, and specifically a Muckman figure... so I assume the guy who sold me this bin is some sort of wheeler-and-dealer when it comes to toys.

This gives me an extra Muckman to pass on to a friend, which is completely Hunky-dorey. The pair of Genghis Frogs is fine too for the same reason. I kept the one with the belt (none of these guys were exactly rich in accessories... or retained all of their body-parts as you will soon see) for my shelf, and set the other one aside for a rainy-day.

Dirtbag here just happened to be one of my favorite figures as a kid. I have no idea why. He's not really anything to get excited about (and this one is missing his tail, which you can't see) but he was always one of the heavies when I played action figures as a kid. Maybe because he's not quite as silly looking as some of the other figures? Dunno. Next we have Scumbug, a fan favorite that I never had as a kid. You can see though why everyone likes him... he's GNARLY. Mine is unfortunately missing all of his gear, which renders him a bit useless in a fight. And I also ended up with an extra Usagi Yojimbo, which again is fine by me.

Here we have Wyrm, Tattoo, Wingnut, and Leatherhead. Possibly some of the most tragic figures in the bunch, seeing as almost all of them (not including Tattoo) are missing body parts. Wyrm's left hand, Wingnut's wings (But hopefully not his nuts), and Leatherhead's leathery head are all M.I.A. (Luckily I have a completed Leatherhead in my collection already). Wyrm is another one of those bizarre fan favorites that I never owned as a kid. As far as I know he never made an appearance in the cartoon, but he did show up in the comic book. Tattoo showed up in the cartoon, but bizarrely as a mutated hamster, which is the worst shoe-horning of an action figure into a cartoon that I have ever heard of. Tattoo in the Archie comics was just a sumo wrestler who seeks the turtles' help in rescuing his dog. And Wingnut? He's awesome but I hate the fact that he's missing his wings. 

My three favorite TMNT action figure finds in the bunch had to be these three dudes here though. King Lionheart is from the later sets near the end of the line, and Ground Chuck was another of my absolute favorite TMNT action figures as a kid. I got him and Dirtbag around the same time. This kangaroo is Walkabout, and is the first one of his kind I had in my collection. I was later gifted one in better condition, including his sidekick mini-figure... but that is a story for another day. 

So a total of 13 TMNT action figures were included in the bin, in various states of dismemberment and disarray. This added 9 new figures to my collection, and gave me a pile of figures that I could pass on to others. But that isn't the end of the Turtle-y goodness by any means!

The TMNT Pizza Thrower was included in the bin as well! This was another one that I had never owned as a kid, but I was more than happy to add it to my shelves now! It even had three of its pizzas included in the mix.

Included were some random loose parts as well. The eyeballs there belong to the Foot Cruiser, which I almost started hyperventilating at the prospect of finding in that bin... only to be disappointed when I didn't find it. That thing is AMAZING. The plunger gun I actually (in a bizarre coincidence) already had a random handful of pieces to already. It was this orange gun piece that was included in the awesome bin though.

I already own the sewer playset, so this one is extra for me. I never owned this playset as a kid, but now as an adult I have two (this one already has a designated home, I just need to get it there...)!!!

By far though THIS guy was one of the most exciting finds in the ENTIRE BIN. While Killer Bee is yes, technically an action figure, I think of him more as a vehicle. He's missing his grapnel gun and his chainsaw, but other than that he's mostly complete, which was VERY exciting to me. 

This was one of those toys that I desperately wanted as a kid, but just never got. The colors, the expression on his face... the whole package to this guy is awesome. Seeing him in that bin in the back of that truck was just one of the factors that convinced me to pick up that bin.

So between the robots in the last post, and the TMNT figures in this one, we've now covered the first two thirds of the contents of the bin. There are a handful of items that I'm still trying to decide if I'm going to waste any time on, since they're not very exciting. But there's one more entry to go where I'll be sharing the last of the stuff I was really excited about at the very least. So stay tuned for that!

I'll be back soon with more Geeky Goodwill Goodies soon enough... so until then, Happy Hunting!

A Whole New Bin of Awesome Pt. 1: Most of the Robots

I know that there are probably people out there who call bulls**t on some of the stuff they read on this blog. Like: "No one would just find a Castle Grayskull at Goodwill STUFFED FULL of action figures, for a few bucks..." But I am telling you guys, I do not fabricate any of the stuff I write on here. I don't secretly go out and buy stuff from eBay or Nerd Rage Toys or Instagram sellers and present it on here as stuff I have found in the wild. I am always 100% honest about where I find the stuff I showcase here. If I do buy something cool from eBay, I will let you know! 

I preface the following post with this statement because I realize how completely unbelievable it is going to sound. I know this, and I realize that some folks may say I have "jumped the shark" here in believability. But I need you all to know that what I am about to tell you is true. 

I swear this is NOT ME.

Last summer, I finished writing a series of 5 posts about a bin of neat toys I picked up for 40 bucks at a yard sale the previous September (That went down in 2013. The five parts can be found here: 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5) I had kind of slacked off writing about the bin after the second installment back in September of that year, and I didn't pick it up again until the following Summer... THIS PAST summer. July 13th is when installment number 3 went up, meaning there was about a 10 month gap between the second and third installments. 

And then on July 15th, something very awesome happened to me. 

If you have read any of the posts I linked to about my Yard Sale Bin of Awesome above, you will know I picked it up at a yard sale just down the road from my house. There is an older woman, a nice lady from Germany who has a house just three or four houses down from my own. She was the one having the yard sale but it was her son who was selling the bin full of toys. The rest, as they say, is history. 

I bought the bin, I wrote a couple of posts about it... and then I let it go for almost a year. July 13th 2014 I started wrapping that all up. And then two days after that, on July 15th 2014, I pulled into my driveway after a day at work, and was headed into my house. It was sprinkling rain very lightly, building up to a drizzle. A toy-filled truck drove past my house just as I was about to walk inside.

Not this truck. But almost as cool. 

The truck stopped. "Hey!" I turned around. "You want to buy some more toys?" 

It was the bin-selling son from last year! Two days after posting about the bin I had bought from him, the guy (Arthur, I found out) was driving past my house on his way to his mom's place, with toys in the back of his truck. Said he was on his way back from a show (toy show? I don't know.) when he saw me. Remembered I bought the He-Man stuff, etc. last year. Wanted to know if I wanted to buy another bin for 50 dollars. I saw something in the back of the truck that made me want to say yes almost immediately (I will not be revealing this item in this particular post... more on it later...) except I knew that my wife would divorce me if I bought another bin of toys... for that price. 

I told him this. He began dropping his price like an anvil in a Roadrunner cartoon. I didn't even dicker with him. He just kept going down, until he landed at 25 dollars. 

I couldn't resist. Just the stuff I could SEE was enough to convince me. The bin was also probably twice the size of the bin I got last year. (I know this all sounds like a fish story. I promise its not. I really do). I ran inside the house to get the money and pay the man. While I was gone he tossed a few more items INTO the bin. 

As I mentioned earlier, it was raining, so I grabbed the bin and brought it inside as fast as I could, to prevent stickers from dissolving right off the toys that had them... and I began to catalog the contents. Unfortunately, I didn't think to photograph the bin with the toys in it, but as I said, there was a serious water issue to deal with IMMEDIATELY. Not everything in that bin was in pristine condition, but almost all of it is a part of my collection now, with a few exceptions. For this introductory post I'm just going to show you 6 of the items from this new bin, and this first batch all share the theme of robotics.  

First up there was a pair of Robo Force figures in the mix. These guys are from around 1984 and have an interesting design, basically having a suction cup for a base and drier hoses for arms. They have a sort of Dalek-y vibe to them in my opinion. The guy above is named Vulgar the Destroyer. He used to have a drill bit where that hole in his face is now. He's really not in great shape at all to be honest. His sticker's messed up (in some part due to the rain damage mentioned earlier) and as mentioned, part of his face is gone... so he's seen better days.

Next up we have Maxx Steele from the same toyline. This was the Leader of the "good guy" robots. He's missing a chest piece and his right hand. So again, not in the greatest shape... but good enough for me to be honest. This line was not one I collected and played with as a kid, but I was vaguely aware of it. I definitely like having a couple of representatives in my collection. 

This handsome fella comes from the Captain Power line from 1987. He is the Soaron Sky Sentry. He is actually supposed to have a pair of wings clipped onto his back and a blaster rifle. We discussed the Captain Power television show back in August on the Geek Fallout podcast episode #91: "Top 5 Shows We Watched as Kids" That was a fun conversation. 

This Robeast "Scorpious" from 1984 put out as a part of the Panosh Place Voltron line is fun but also of severely questionable play-value. Since they made the decision to make this giant, Voltron-sized robot the same size as the human figures in the line, it made it hard for this Robeast to be any kind of credible threat to Voltron. He was anywhere from slightly too short to ridiculously too short depending on which version of Voltron you were playing with. But I have a soft spot in my heart for this guy mainly because of this Robot Chicken segment:

(I especially love the moment at around 1:52 when Robeast full-on twerks in Voltron's face.) 

This guy appears pretty unassuming at first, being a simple rubber robot with bendy limbs and not much else going on... but wait! That's before you get to know him! This happens to be a Mighty Bend-A-Bot, produced by Marty Toy back n 1985. This guy's name might Might MIGHT be "Umda" unless different colors of robot denoted different characters (His buddies had names like "Bongg" and "Zango") . These guys were obviously cheapy-charlie knock-off toys but have enough of a history that they can still be identified. They were packaged in two packs or single packs, and came with awesomely anachronistic knights' weapons like swords and shields.

One f my absolute favorite finds in this whole bin is this guy right here. He is a Starroid Raider from Tomland toys, produced in 1977, or possibly a Space Fighter produced in 1979. Either way, this guy's name is "Koga". These things were produced as cheap knock-offs to the Star Wars action figure line, and they were probably the bane of every child who received them, back in the day. Personally, I took one look at this guy and fell in love. He's blocky and goofy looking, has no knee or elbow articulation, and has a soft rubber head that vaguely reminds me of the soft-headed first wave of TMNT action figures that would come out a decade later. His limbs have a loose, floppy almost marionette-like quality to them that makes him a challenge to get him standing upright and I'm not sure if that came with age or if it was just how they produced them.

So here is: just the first batch of toys to come out of this second bin of awesome. I wish I'd gotten to write about this thing last year before Halloween hit, because now my first impressions and immediate passions have faded and cooled a little bit... but there was still so much neat stuff in there that I can squeeze out a bunch more posts! It'll be nice revisiting all the stuff I got on that fateful day.

That's it for tonight boys and girls! I'll be back soon with Geeky Goodwill Goodies (or more likely, goodies I got in the mail or in the bin mentioned above) very soon. Until then, Happy Hunting!

Goodwill Geek Mailbag: A Package from Brian Napoleon Lapsley

Woof! Where does the time go! Suddenly you realize you haven't updated your blog in something like 10 days... and just woof. 

So I've had absolutely no good reason to put off posting this particular post for so long except... I don't know why! Just been damn lazy I guess. 

I know a LOT of genuinely kind and generous people out there in internet land, and one of them happens to be Brian Lapsley, artist, fellow thrifter-extraordinaire, and blogger over at Awake Oh Sleeper. He is another fine example of a supportive and generous fellow who has sent kind words... and now a fun mystery package my way! 

So first off... THIS is what arrived at my home. As I briefly mentioned above, Brian is a talented artist. I know he draws quite a bit, and he also makes amazing digital pieces such as this piece of his that he photocopied and adorned my package with! 

Inside, a note: Telling me to enjoy. And... I did. 

First up was this Classic Science Fiction Films book, which reads as a sort of movie catalogue with titles, dates, and brief synopses of each film. I love how some attitude creeps into a few of the entries:

"Just plain garbage" and "Makes Missile to the Moon look brilliant". Genius. 

Anyone who knows me knows that comic books are the way STRAIGHT to my heart. Couple of Amazing Spider-Man issues (part of the "Round Robin" event) and an issue of Ultraman.

I have always wanted to read the book Jumper by Steven Gould. I only vaguely recall the movie back in 2008, but I know I wasn't blown away by what I saw of it. I had heard that the book was head-and-shoulders above the film however, and I have been itching to read it. So I did! I read this almost immediately after finding this in the package! And I can tell you, I LOVED it! What a great concept, and executed very well. It's hard to describe the book in any meaningful way, but I can tell you I kept comparing it to Ready Player One in my head the whole time I was reading it. The subject matter of the two books couldn't be more different... but there's a very palpable sense of wish-fulfilment for geeks in both books. The protagonist of Jumper is likable and is using his newfound talents to get himself out of a horrible life. 

Back in the day, I had a complete set of these "Freaky Fighters" which were a bunch of bat-wielding monsters from Hammer films. You could find these at Dollar stores and the like. They were bizarre, and I think I ended up giving my set away to a friend online. I'm glad to get this one back however, because Werewolves are some of my all-time favorite monsters!

Here's a shot of the back. I think this fella will be staying firmly in his package, because I just love the look of the whole thing together. 

This Rad Badge is from Burger King from back in the day! LOVE this thing! The turtles pop up from behind the shell to say hello! Lookit those guys!

Speaking of Burger King and famous cartoon stars that I happen to love, there's this Scooby-Doo plush from Burger King circa 2000! Mr. Lapsley is hitting ALL the right notes here with this mystery package you guys!

Probably my absolute favorite item in the whole box was this little Big Guy! It's a Stay Puft Marshmallow Man pencil sharpener from a 1987 Real Ghostbusters themed McDonald's Happy Meal! Gaze upon the tiny plastic form of the Destructor!

So here it all is! Toys and books and comics from an incredibly generous individual! So generous in fact, that I have already received a second mystery package from him that I will share with you all at a later date! Thank you Mr. Lapsley! I truly appreciate this collection of the weird, the wild, and the nostalgic! Be sure to check out Brian's blog (linked above) and be sure to also check him out on Instagram! 

That's all I've got for tonight kids! I'll be back soon with some Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Hunting! 

The Cool & Collected Magazine Kick-Starter! Support it!!!

Just wanted to take a moment and promote Brian Adams's cool-as-heck kick-starter and passion-project: The Cool & Collected print magazine! 

Brian's been blogging forever, and he is responsible for organizing the League of Extraordinary Bloggers, so I have so much respect and admiration for him and his dream project here! It looks like a collector's dream come true quite frankly, and I can't wait to see it become a reality! Please make a quick stop over to his Kick-Starter page today:

Brian talks a bunch more about the project over on his blog, here and here. Go check it out! 

Who can take a Saturday and change it into fun? The Trash Man Can...

So I'm sitting in my Cave one Saturday morning, just minding my own business when my wife hands me a package that came for me in the mail! Turns out it was from my good friend the Trash Man over at Pop Pop! It's Trash Culture, and I was about to have the best Saturday morning since I was a kid in pajamas munching Cap'n Crunch and watching Muppet Babies!

Upon opening the pack I discovered this pile of loot! Now, I have just recently WON a GIGANTIC pile of loot from the Trash Man in his monthly Trash giveaway. So I was scratching my head at WHY I would be receiving another one so soon... and then it dawned on me... this was a consolation prize! See, Trash Man sends out BIG prize packs, and then he sends out smaller ones to the losers each month. I may have won the very first one, but I LOST the second one (Yeah, I had the audacity to enter into the next month's drawing... Don't judge me. These prize packs are SOFA KING amazing). So I went about my business, and forgot about the whole thing. UNTIL this showed up! 

See, the cool thing about the Trash Man is he PAYS ATTENTION. He knows all my weaknesses. He remembered how much I WIGGED OUT about the Lantern rings he sent me last time, so he tossed a few more my way this time. And believe me, I verbally, audibly, and EMPHATICALLY shrieked like a teenage Beatles fan of the female persuasion (you know, the kind-of-homely-but-kind-of-hot-too ones with the horn-rimmed glasses that probably ended up being your Aunt or something?) when I saw these. GODS I LOVE THESE!!! I have all of them but 3 now, and I will be tracking those down post-haste! 

MUSCLE guys!!! When I was a kid I thought the guy on the left was supposed to be a mummy, so he attacked people with bandages. The guy in the middle was pretty much just Ice Man. And the guy on the right looked like a pepper grinder to me, so he would puff clouds of irritating pepper at people, blinding and burning them while he fought. I was such a MUSCLE nut!!! This brings my current collection up to 26! I miss having these so much. 

Here are a pair of Garbage Pail Kids wax packs that I refuse to open. I love them just the way they are! They bring back such great childhood memories. Some of the happiest times of my young life were the walks I used to take down to the store to pick up these wax-packs. I am so incredibly thankful for these. 

Finally, there was another of my collecting staples: A Choose Your Own Adventure book! "The Forbidden Castle" which is another perfect addition to my shelf. Long-time readers will remember that next to only maybe Little Golden Books, CYOAs are my favorite kind of books to collect. And Trash Man remembers that. Trash Man is the king of KNOWING what you like. This package I received was incredibly generous and tailor-suited for me. 

Thank you Trash Man, this package was really special to me, and it made my day. 

So that's it folks! I'll be back very soon with some more Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until then, Happy Hunting!

The Goodwill Geek's Mailbag Returns!!!

So it's time to return to the Goodwill Geek's Mailbag! (Gotta come up with a better name for this...) 

This came to me in the mail last week, and I am just now getting the chance to blog about it. I recently ordered one of the Cult Film Club's "No Tipping" Sticker Packs. I guess the money goes to help them with hosting and production costs... but I'm not so sure. They're a sketchy crew over there at the Cult Film Club. Jaime Hood over at Shezcrafti gives me reason enough to be suspicious. Pax over at the Cavalcade of Awesome plays it a bit more straight and narrow... but man that guy just seems too squeaky clean. You know what I mean? 

Anyway, this envelope arrived, decorated with a kick-ass Karate Kid trilogy sticker. It felt like the red-carpet treatment from the very beginning, you know what I mean? 

It IS something people call me.
Just sayin',

Included were these neon-colored protective index cards... one of which had a more-awesome-than-I-could-ever-hope-to-be piece of original artwork from Shawn Robare. I'm still decidining how I want to display this in the cave. Just tacking it up somewhere seems dismissive. I'm going frame shopping.

Also included were these two random vintage collector's cards. What Shawn may or may not realize is that he could not have picked better cards to select for me specifically because I love GPK and I love Gremlins 2, and specifically the Grandpa Fred character because he is a horror host with aspirations. And because: "Fire. The Untamed Element, Oldest of Man's Mysteries, Giver of warmth, Destroyer of forests, right now this building is on fire. Yes! The building is on fire! Leave the building! Enact the Age Old drama of Self-Preservation!" Because I want that as a ring-tone when I finally get a big-boy smart phone. 

Anyway... here are the sticker-packs themselves. I ordered two because I F**KING LOVE CULT FILM CLUB!!! And I want it to go on forevers. If you look closely on the left, Shawn signed the header of the pack for me. That one doesn't get opened. It's so f**king money, baby. 

Here are the stickers from the pack I opened. There was actually a Branded in the 80's sticker included as well, but I didn't realize it was in there until after all the pictures were taken. It was stuck to the back of one of the other stickers I think. Not sure. But it was awesome too... just not awesome enough for me to over-come my laziness and get an additional picture of it. Sorry Shawn. I think my absolute favorite one is the ticket-taker... but the CFC projector-skull is just such a sweet design I can't decide... and Steve Buscemi has never looked better than he does as a sticker. 

Here's what it looks like though:

(BUT if you buy some stickers and then post a comment on Shawn's Branded in the 80's blog, he'll toss one if for you too!!!)

Here's (almost) all the loot together in one shot! 

I have not decided what I want to stick these all over yet. I'm thinking I'll slap them on a binder and put AWESOME stuff inside. For now, I just have them in a card collector sheet until I decide. If they're durable enough to go on my car that's definitely where at least one of them will go. 

Soon I'll write a post on the stuff I got from Boxsome! I thought about just including it here, but I really wanted to let Shawn's stickers and the Cult Film Club shine here. The blog is great, but be sure to check out their podcast! But wait! There's more! Join the club and watch the movies in time to listen along! You can also follow them on facebook and twitter so look for them there!

I want to send out a genuine thanks to Jaime, Pax, and Shawn for coming up with such a great, addictive podcast, and for such an incredibly cool way to support and promote it!

I'll be back soon with some Geeky Goodwill Goodies! Until then... Happy Hunting! 

Update on the Toxicity!!!

So, just the other day, I posted about the Toxic Crusaders Poster Book I found (where else) at Goodwill.

I was waffling back and forth about whether to pop open the plastic and take out the poster book. The back cover clinched it for two reasons:  1. There was apparently a story to go along with the posters... and 2. There was an advertisement for the poster book on it's own back. a "Look for this other title we sell" sort of add, but it showed the exact book that was on the front cover...

This seemed too odd to simply be a print error on what was surely a pretty cheap piece of obscure early 90's merchandising. Then looking closer at the spine of the book I let out a gasp of the kind of astonishment that the Wright Brothers must have felt when their first airplane actually swept up into the air instead of crashing to earth.

So I shucked that puppy like an ear of corn and found:

(find out more after the jump!)