Collecting

When I was around 11 years old, I was all about collecting action figures. That's nothing unusual, most 11 year old boys are. And that time period was pretty good for it too, thanks to the Star Wars action figure boom. We also got action figures for Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, The Black Hole, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, not to mention the Micronauts, and all in 3 3/4" scale. To this day that remains my favorite scale for action figures, and I have no doubt that it's due to that childhood influence.

One day my local Toyco got in a box of Battlestar Galactica Series 2 action figures. This was around 1979 (possibly 1980) and back then of course there was no internet to let us know new toys were coming; it was just the thrill of discovering them at the toy store. So I had no idea that these action figures even existed. I only had enough money for one, so I agonized over whether to get Baltar or Lucifer, and decided on Baltar. Which turned out to be the wrong choice; when I went back the next week to buy Lucifer after getting my allowance he was gone, but there was still another Baltar left. I never did get that Lucifer figure. Oh well.

But I loved the packaging as much as the figure itself, because the back of the toy card had drawings of all the new action figures pictured on it. I could look at all those other new figures and still feel that rush of excitement I had when I discovered them, and plan out which ones I was going to get next.

The card with the new Battlestar Galactica figures that I gazed at lovingly for days.
Image swiped from John Kenneth Muir's Reflections on Cult Movies and Classic TV.

This exasperated my mother. "Why can't you just enjoy the ones you have instead of focusing on all the ones you don't?" It was a very valid question that I didn't have a good answer for. I did enjoy the ones I had; I still played with them at that age. I loved looking at all the details on them. And I loved simply lining them up and admiring them all.

But oh, the excitement of the ones I didn't have yet! The thrill of the hunt, trying to save up the money just to get the next figure, planning out which one my next conquest would be, only to change my plans when I got to the toy store and discover the one I wanted had sold out or new figures had been released. These were all things I just couldn't articulate at the time.

Over the years the things I've collected have changed, and so has the game of collecting them. Hasbro puts out the same number of Star Wars action figures in a month that Kenner used to put out in a year, but most of them have become new versions of old figures so it's rare that I'm interested in any of them these days. I was really into the Doctor Who figures for a while, but ironically now that I have 11 Doctors and a bunch of companions and monsters in the 5" scale, I'm not interested in starting all over from scratch with them since manufacturer Character Options has rebooted the line in the 3 3/4" scale. And while the ReAction Figure line has totally pushed my nostalgia button, I have yet to see any outside of the internet and be tempted by holding one in my hands.


But this doesn't mean the collecting bug has gone away by any means.  My new love of collecting has been Big Finish Doctor Who audio drama CDs.

These are great, and if you are a Doctor Who fan, I urge you to check them out. And right now is the perfect time to do it, because they're celebrating their 15th Anniversary of making Doctor Who audios, so if you try them out before August 20, 2014 you'll have the opportunity to download some of their stories for just $1 each. They change the audios they're putting on sale every 48 hours, so go early and go often!


These all feature the original actors performing new stories. Yes, even Tom Baker. Think Paul McGann is a one-off Doctor? Not here-- the Eighth Doctor has no less than 67 stories with five different companions (you may have heard them name-checked in The Night of the Doctor minisode) spread out over 190 episodes. Oh yeah, did I mention they recreate the episode format of the original series? McGann's changes from the 4-episode/ 2-hour serial style to the new series 1-episode/1-hour-with-a-story-arc style about halfway through his run, so it makes the perfect transition into the new series.

But I digress.

A good friend of mine got into the Big Finish audios when they first started making them 15 years ago. He played a few for me, and I started borrowing some from him that I wanted to listen to. Then the real world got in the way and he fell behind on getting them. I wanted to pick up the torch but was unable to do so until the Doctor Who DVD line ended, at which point I started channeling all my money that had been earmarked for DVDs into these CDs. In addition to keeping up with all the new releases Big Finish puts out each month we also had a sizable backlog to get caught up on. While I used my DVD money to keep up on the new releases, I now started selling my old stuff on eBay to make money to catch up.

That's when the lists started. Lists of which ones we needed, wishlists at places that sold them, chronology guides so I could determine the listening order I wanted to use for both listening them and storing them, budget plans figuring out which ones to get next...

Oh, yes. The hunt is alive and well.

And that's when it hit me today-- this isn't just wanting to be able to listen to them all, this has become a collection. It finally clicked when I was looking over those lists, watching my wishlist shrink and my iTunes grow, and I had a flashback to that day with my mother when I was looking at those Battlestar Galactica figures. Can't I just be happy with what I already have? Hmmm... yeah, I think so. I'm loving listening to these. I've been listening to an episode per day since January, in the "order" that they would take place if they were lost episodes of the TV series. But the excitement of closing in on those last couple dozen titles we need, that rush of collecting them, is almost as big a high as -- or is possibly even equal to -- the fun of enjoying them.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to listen to episode two of Helicon Prime, starring the Second Doctor as told by Jamie McCrimmon.

Dressing Up for the Movies

I have no idea how the idea of doing this came to me, but once it did it somehow took over.

The important part to know going in to the video is it starts in the middle of me saying "I'd like to purchase a ticket," and the woman in the ticket booth responding "2D or 3D?"



I almost backed out at the last moment, not out of any sense of real fear of embarrassment (after all, a Green Lantern must learn to overcome fear, right?) but more out of a sense of "I'm getting too old for this." I mean come on, I'm 42, I got a kid... isn't this a little juvenile?

And then I thought, Hell yeah. As the Doctor once said, what's the point in being grown up if you can't be childish once in a while? And really, the fact that I am 42 is what makes it work.  It wouldn't be nearly as funny if I didn't have that middle-aged gut hanging over the underwear.

Kudos to my daughter for having a sense of humor about it and being willing to film it even though she was embarrassed by her old man (and rightly so), and to the ticket woman for being a good sport. 

And yeah, sometimes I do scare myself.

Green Lantern 2-XSteL

2-XSteL, the smartest toy robot of Sector 2814!  In brightest day, In blackest night, no answers shall escape his sight! 

Couldn't make the midnight screening of Green Lantern tonight, but I'm excited enough about a real GL movie finally being here that I couldn't resist putting this picture together of my favorite toy joining the Corps.  I got the idea a month or so ago when I got the 3D mask with an action figure and stuck it on my 2-XL, and 2-XSteL was born!  Note that he's carrying The 8-Track of Oa.

To everyone who was interested in having me continue with the blogging, I just haven't been able to get myself motivated.  I think I need (needed?) a break.  Hopefully this is the start of me coming back to it.  Thanks for your patience!

My Star Wars Vintage Collection R2-D2 Dilemma-- RESOLVED!

Well, I finally come to a decision.  And in my usual style of making mountains out of molehills, I decided to make a production out of it.  And believe it or not, I got it all on the first take!  Wow!

My Star Wars Vintage Collection R2-D2 Dilemma

Like most guys my age, I spent most of my childhood collecting Kenner's original Star Wars action figures.  And when I say "collect," I mean pouring over the racks in every toy store even when my allowance was all gone, longingly examining every detail of the entire collection on the back of the cards, saving up my proof-of-purchase seals for whatever free action figure they were offering next, hanging the cards on my bedroom wall... and of course playing with them.

The line fizzled out when I was in high school, and for years after that I would constantly have dreams of finding Star Wars figures again, so when they brought the line back in 1995 it was literally a dream come true.

Nowadays Kenner has been bought by Hasbro, and Hasbro knows how to try and appeal to the collectors of my generation: vintage packaging.  Oh, they've done the occasional Vintage tribute, with three waves of figures in the classic 70's and 80's packaging, but those were all in special plastic protectors, so it wasn't the same.  But this-- this is uninhibited, all-out nostalgia.  The Vintage Collection figures are a combination of old and new designs, and it's not just a one-off thing:  new waves of figures are coming out in this design all year long!  So the shelves look exactly like they did when I was a kid.  It takes me back and makes me feel like I'm 12 years old again every time I see it.

An amazed Fer discovers the Vintage line for the first time,

 with a figure he always wanted as a kid: Dack!

The crazy thing is... even though I've been oohing and aahing at the toys ever since August, I haven't been buying any.

Take Dack here, for example.  This is what I always wanted them to do when I was a kid. I've had dreams of finding this. So again, literally a dream come true.  But... they put out a Dack figure in 2002.  Oh sure, I had to buy a Snowspeeder and yet another Luke Skywalker to get it, but I did, so what's the point in buying another Dack?  Well, just because of the nostalgic packaging, I guess.

See, the problem is that I'm really not a believer in not opening my toys.  Oh sure, I have a few unopened toys, but it's pretty unusual for me. It's become a real Catch-22.  I want the toys for the packaging, but if I take the toy out of the packaging, it becomes just another Star Wars figure.  And I don't want to just keep the packaging by itself; my New Years Resolution for 2011 is to cut back on clutter.  If you've seen my house, you understand why.

And then there's the Mail Away Boba Fett issue:  to complete the nostalgia, they're re-offering the first ever Star Wars Action Figure Mail Away offer-- a reissue of the original Boba Fett figure, but this time with the actual missile-launching backpack that they had to pull in the 70's.  But to get it, I have to open the figures.  But I don't want to open the figures.  But I want to get that Boba Fett.

So I just haven't been buying any.

Then about two months ago, I found the Return of the Jedi R2-D2.  This R2-D2 has the serving tray and the pop-up lightsaber and the sensorscope and an opening compartment on his chest.  I knew I had an Artoo with Serving Tray, so I held off and waited until I checked my other one to see if it already did all those things.  Nope.  I have four different Artoos that do all those things individually, but this Artoo does it all.

And, of course, the next time I went to the store it was sold out.

No big deal, I told myself, I don't really need it.  Which is true enough.  But it's become one of those figures I regretted not buying when I had the chance.

And then when I went shopping at Wal-Mart last night... they had one again.

So I bought it.

Now what the hell do I do with it?

Do I open it?  If I open it, then I'd be tempted to buy four more figures to get the free Boba Fett.  (Time's running out on that deal; it expires at the end of this month.)  I do want to open it, because this Artoo does all those cool things!

But... it looks sooooo nice.  The classic action figure design.  The Kenner logo.  The "Free Boba Fett" sticker.

What do you think I should do?

You Know You're Truly a Fanboy When...

So my local Barnes & Noble is where I usually buy my Star Wars books.  They always had a wonderful display, with all the nice, shiny Star Wars novels in chronological order according to the guide in the front of the books.  It was quite a sight.  And since I've started reading so many of them at my local library and have long since given up on owning them all, seeing that beautiful display every week always gave me a little thrill.  It's one of the few times I could say "Wow, what a great rack!" in public and not get slapped.

Then sometime before Christmas, Barnes & Noble rearranged their shelves.  No big deal, most stores do to prepare for the holiday sales.  But when they moved the Star Wars books, they just tossed them on to the new shelf.  No order at all, not by author or title or series, and certainly not in the nice chronological order it had been in.  Eh, whoever organized it before will probably get to it eventually, I thought.  It's not like it really matters.

But then December came and went and no one had organized them.  And then January.  Then February hit, and last week I found myself just, kind of... organizing the first shelf.  Just the first row of books.  Just a little.

I came back this week and found my first shelf more or less intact... more or less.  So I decided to tidy it up again and work on the second shelf.  Then I thought, you know, this would really go quicker if I just move all the Prequel books to the top shelf and all the Classic books to the middle shelf and the New Jedi Order books to the third shelf... it was like a puzzle, and I was starting to have a lot of fun solving it.  I was going full steam now, and before I knew it a half hour had passed.

Then, while checking the listings in one of the books, I happened to notice my shirt out of the corner of my eye.

I only own two Star Wars shirts.  One is a design I picked up while vacationing in Disney World, from their Star Wars Weekends.  The other was a gift from a friend of mine, a Clone Wars T-shirt that he gave me for my birthday.  And --honest to God-- it was on the top of my pile of clean shirts that morning, so I had just grabbed it and put it on.

I was organizing all the Star Wars books, that weren't even mine, into chronological order, while wearing a Star Wars t-shirt.


I might as well have been wandering around the bookstore wearing a Jedi robe and a lightsaber.

It's one of those Hall of Fame/Shame moments.  One of those moments of startling clarity when you realize just how much this silly little enthusiasm you have for something truly rules your life, how deeply it truly runs through your blood, and how absolutely absurd it must look to anyone who doesn't get it.  I literally started laughing out loud, and -- once I'd finished organizing the books, of course-- went to get to my wife and have her immortalize this moment with her camera phone.

Sometimes, your inner geek just bursts out of your chest like an Alien, refusing to be denied!

 

My Geeky Terminator Nightmare

I had an ongoing nightmare last night-- "ongoing" as in one of those nightmares where it scares you awake, you fall back asleep, and you're right back into the same nightmare.

I was dreaming that Terminators were trying to kill me. It was worse than the movies or shows ever portrayed it though, because of how computerized our society is.

Anytime I showed my face where a security camera could see me, or even said my name or any of my friends' names out loud where it could be recorded, it would become a part of that camera's digital records. Since Skynet was in the future, all it had to do was look in those computer records and it knew every single instance of where I was. So anytime my face was caught on camera or I said a name aloud, bam, there was a Terminator trying to kill me. So I was constantly running and hiding and being attacked, with Terminators roaming around everywhere.

These dreams went on for about four hours, until Joy got up to go to a Doorbuster sale this morning and I was able to talk with her a little bit, and finally fell back asleep thinking of kitties and McGriddles.