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I take it from the OVERWHELMING lack of e-mail I received from my last article that the people who read my articles month after month don't care that I'm leaving. That's fine though, because over the past six or so years I've been writing for the Collector Times I have gotten maybe five e-mails about various things.
Over my thirty years of life, I have seen a lot of toy lines come and go. By far, the one that I felt sad seeing it go was GI Joe. GI Joe was a security blanket in my younger years. You see, back in the 80's there was the looming threat of Russia/Soviet Union/CCCP was going to nuke the United States at any time. GI Joe was used as a Special Forces military group made up of personnel from around the US Armed Forces. It made me feel a little bit better that there was a military group willing to give their lives in defense of this country. My biological father seemed to encourage my interest in GI Joe by getting me one action figure for every three 100's I made in spelling each week. That was only for about two years before my parent's divorce was final and he left town. Then there was only my mom and my three brothers and the only time I got any GI Joe figures or vehicles was at Christmas.
I think with the exception of a few toy lines, modern toy lines have forgotten their roots. Most of them are based on movies that kids are not interested in; unless they are big kids (IE: Pirates of the Caribbean) or based on Japanese imports like Naruto. It seems to me that American toy lines are based on trying to get the nostalgia of people in their late twenties and early thirties to buy what was popular back then now that we have disposable income.
Here's a list of the Top Five Toy Lines from 1978-1994 according to me.
- Super Powers (1984-1986) - I was not a big fan of the comic book or cartoon, but these put the "action" in action figures. Based on DC Comics characters that were popular at the time and being based on a comic book line; they came with mini-comic books that gave us something to read and collect along with the action figures.
- MASK (1985-1987) - I liked watching the cartoon of the same name, and the toys were put out by Kenner, but they really need to release the show on DVD in the U.S. so we can have more interest in the toys again.
- Transformers (1984-1990) - I'm still kind of confused if Transformers was from Japan and brought over to the U.S. or the other way around. My older brother was really into them. I liked the cartoon, but I guess I was too young to appreciate them.
- Star Wars (1978-1985) - I was really young when Star Wars came out and I think my older brother was really into Star Wars while I was into GI Joe. I only got into it when the POTF 2 line came out in 1995.
- GI Joe (1982-1994) - I think any male that grew up in the 1980's and their parent's were not tree hugging hippies played with Joes and Cobras. I always thought that Baroness was the hottest of any of the females on either side.
Thanks for reading my articles over the past six years or so. I hope that I have given you some insight to my little corner of the toy collecting world.
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