Comments on: Before the Interwebs…

By: B and H Comics

B and H Comics — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 21:53:11 +0000

LOL Mer man and Rock N Roll were my first guys from the respective lines as well !

By: CantinaDan

CantinaDan — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 19:01:07 +0000

Good stuff, Jeff. Spent many many hours pouring over the JC Penney X-Mas catalogs. But I’ve got two very clear childhood collecting recollection: the first time I saw MOTU on the pegs and the first time I saw G.I. Joe on the pegs.
Like yourself, I spent a long time just staring at the He-Man endcap in a KB at some mall. I was mesmerized. Another kid came over and his mom asked me which figure I would choose. I remember thinking: “is she gonna buy me one?” Ha. For some reason I did eventually get Merman as my first MOTU.
I saw G.I. Joe RAH on the pegs for the first time in a Bradlees in Wayne, NJ. Same thing, I was immediately sunk. Rock n Roll was my first Joe.

By: TRDouble

TRDouble — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 03:33:19 +0000

As much as I loved the Sears Wishbook (it’s how I used to look at the Joes and got the tank with the bridge), nothing beats Heroes World! How they could get away with advertising items with drawings instead of actual photos of the product is a testament to how good the art was and how well put together those catalogs were. I used to drool over the Mego pages and those stuffed Super-Hero toddlers (Super-Babies?).

By: TRDouble

TRDouble — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 03:30:49 +0000

I thought those Joe commercials hawked the comic book (image a commercial for a comic book!). I loved G.I. Joe:RAH toys, but I wouldn’t touch the comic book. Not until I saw the commercial for Issue #14 with Destro on the cover: “Hmm? What’s this?” I was mesmerized so much that I bought the comic, every back issue I could find (all but #2 or #3; I forget) and was hooked. The comics helped inspire my toy scenarios from that point on.

By: Hourman

Hourman — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 00:23:03 +0000

I spent many happy nerdy hours with new issues of Toy Shop and a highlighter

By: Jason "Plastic Soul" Lenzi

Jason "Plastic Soul" Lenzi — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 19:54:05 +0000

Great article, Jeff! I have a stack of those Heroes World catalogs, and can spend hours with ‘em. I’m in complete agreement with you, and have been thinking of writing something similar, but about how different ‘collecting’ was, say 15-20 years ago. Having to find stores in your town, or using the collector’s yellow pages, Toy Shop, to get second hand items. But there’s nothing that beats that ‘holy cow’ moment of seeing something you had no idea was coming. Thanks for the cool read!

By: George

George — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 16:28:29 +0000

I think it’s the same for comics. I used to go into the shop every week, see what’s on the shelf. Maybe I got a Comic Shop News insider pamphlet with my comics that time around. I loved those things. For a while, that’s the only news I got. Now, forget about it. I think if I was a casual reader, I’d probably go back to that (getting closer to that each year). The Internet, in a way, destroys your innocence.

It’s good for information and all, but it does take away why you probably got into whatever hobby–just for the enjoyment & fun of it. I think sometimes we all forget that when we’re scouring the shelves, the Web, wherever for that one action figure & get pissed off when we don’t acquire it.

As for toys, back when you were a kid, you were a kid. Not a collector. I didn’t even know what that was. And I never equated getting toys of a certain line as collecting. They were just toys. They were cool. Had to get Skeletor to fight He-Man. And always gravitating to the bad guys (they always looked cooler, didn’t they?), had to get Tri-Klops, Trap Jaw, to fight Stratos and whoever else. Collecting, to me at the time, was baseball cards, stickers (sad to admit–they were like the Silly Bandz of yesteryear), etc.

Those catalogs were cool, Sears & JC Penney for me. Or a toy store called Kiddie City. That was the Toys R Us in my day.

By: TripleM

TripleM — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 04:46:22 +0000

Jeff, what about those little product booklets that you used to get with Kenner vehicles and playsets? I learned about new Star Wars, Super Powers and Batman stuff from those booklets. Mego had one that I know of as well. It unfolded into a long strip of paper with many of the figures depicted. I think one was included in the box of the Mego Supervator Playset. Remember that piece of junk?

By: Hourman

Hourman — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 03:45:36 +0000

I have hugely, HUGELY fond memories of Heroes World catalogues and ads in comics, and I have been picking up old HW catalogues here and there for a couple of years. I’ve got about 8 or so of them and they really take me back to when I was 6 and 7 years old. And what’s really fun is they’re still totally useful as catalogues – only now, instead of filling out the order form and sending in a check or money order, you glean information from the catalogue description and go browsing eBay. Delayed gratification is still gratification!

By: Shellhead

Shellhead — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 01:42:25 +0000

What I really miss are those cool GIJOE and Transformers ads where they had 30 seconds or so actual animation that tied into whatever toys they were hawking. Kind of like original mini-films. The animation seemed superior to what was on the cartoons, but I could be wrong. I seem to recall actual ads for the GIJOE comic as well. When’s the last time a comicbook had a TV ad?

By: demoncat

demoncat — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 01:30:44 +0000

i recall those days also . either going to the store and finding a new character or just thumbing through the wish books and seeing the ads showing now avaible. which now a days toy collecting has kind of lost a core element with all the ways to know what is coming the joy of surprise

By: Jeff Cope

Jeff Cope — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:15:23 +0000

You’re absolutely right. SDCC/Toy Fair are analogous to the old Christmas catalogs!

By: texgnome1

texgnome1 — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:05:42 +0000

I still remember those days too, and yes there was something amazing about getting the Christmas catalogues each year. But there is still some magic. Twice a year, we all sit around our computers instead of the mailbox. We wait with baited breath for the news to trickle in from Toy Fair and SDCC. And we pray each time that our personal favorites are made, in whatever line we collect.

Yep, there are leaks, but for the most part, we’ll all be clicking that refresh button. Waiting to capture a piece of the magic.