ACTION FIGURES & MERCH | 13th Dimension, Comics, Creators, Culture

Mar30

Dig These 13 Groovy Offbeat BATMAN Collectibles

Posted by Dan Greenfield on Mar 30, 2021

Dig These 13 Groovy Offbeat BATMAN Collectibles

It’s Batman’s anniversary and we take you on a tour of a life collecting the Caped Crusader… Hey, guess what: Batman debuted 82 years ago on March 30, 1939! To celebrate this offbeat anniversary — 82 is hardly a round number — we bring you recurring contributor and fellow Batexpert Mark S. Reinhart with 13 OFFBEAT BATMAN COLLECTIBLES. Groovy. By MARK S. REINHART I wasn’t quite 2 years old when the Batman TV series premiered in January 1966, and I started hanging onto whatever Batman merchandise I was given right at that point in my life. Thanks to my ongoing Batman obsession and my parents’ kind indulgence, many of these items have stayed with me throughout my 56 years. A life of collecting Batman has brought me some unusual things, and I thought it would be fun to share 13 items that I consider to be kind of off the beaten path. There is a common theme to some of the pre-1970s items. Even as a little kid, I was fascinated by Batman stuff that captured him as a darker, more serious hero. Strangely, I guess I was drawn to a vision of the character that reflected Bob Kane and Bill Finger’s original creation before I even knew their first Batman comic stories existed! Here, then are 13 OFFBEAT BATMAN COLLECTIBLES, in no particular order: — Batman infant’s bib, 1966. There’s nothing dark or serious about this first item. Yes, this bib was mine, and I used it when I was a baby. My parents never got rid of it because I simply liked looking at its colorful Batman image even when I didn’t need to use it anymore. But even as a toddler, I remember being annoyed that the colors on Batman and Robin’s costumes weren’t true to the costumes of the TV show! — Batman kid’s dinner plate, 1966. The same goes for this plastic dinner plate in terms of not being dark or serious. And it was also something I used when I was a very little kid. This image of the characters was pulled from the cover of the classic comic book Batman Annual #1, Summer 1961. The only change that needed to be made from comic to plate was putting a yellow oval around the bat symbol on Batman’s costume in order to update...

Mar22

FIRST LOOK: The Groovy TROUBLE WITH TRIBBLES Playset You’ve Waited Decades For

Posted by Dan Greenfield on Mar 22, 2021

FIRST LOOK: The Groovy TROUBLE WITH TRIBBLES Playset You’ve Waited Decades For

STAR TREK: Just in time for William Shatner’s 90th birthday! To its eternal credit, the original Mego gave us two playsets for its line of 1970s 8-inch Star Trek figures: the U.S.S. Enterprise and Mission to Gamma VI, based on the episode The Apple. Well, customizer Anthony Durso of The Toyroom has begun tackling other classic settings to bring you more strange new worlds for your Megos to seek out. In 2020, he created an Enterprise playset based on the Filmation animated series — and now he’s released the K-7 Space Station, better known as the facility featured in the ever-popular episode The Trouble With Tribbles. Dig this EXCLUSIVE FIRST LOOK — on William Shatner’s 90th birthday, no less — along with Anthony’s brief commentary: “I’ve been doing some daily binge-watching of Star Trek (the Original Series) and thought it’d be a cool idea to try an alien world displayset to go along with my Filmation Enterprise or Mego’s original Enterprise playset,” Anthony, who is also a 13th Dimension contributor, explained. “After some preliminary work I eventually started to gravitate more toward an episode-specific displayset and settled on The Trouble with Tribbles as the first one. I have ideas for at least two more in the pipeline.” “Basically, I watched the episode numerous times during the last week and made notes and freeze-framed accordingly,” he added. “The displayset features the station manager’s “office”, the transporter pad, and the bar. Originally I worked on a panel for the quadrotriticale grain storage area with many, many Tribbles but ended up rejecting it because it didn’t fit the flow of the rest of the set. And it wasn’t as colorful, even with the Tribbles. Instead, that infamous scene is represented on the front of the playset with Captain Kirk among his furry friends. And although some Tribbles do make some cameos in the displayset, there’s always room to add your own.” — A few thoughts: — Anthony’s created about 30 playsets over the last year or so, primarily for comics characters and shows. You should definitely click here to check out our index, which shows off each set and provides links to more detailed views. — As I always feel compelled to point out, I don’t make anything from this. I just love showing it all off. Each set — including case,...

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