NINJA MUTANTS

 Teenage Mutant Ninja Mallrats… they seriously missed the opportunity to make Jubilee part of the Toy Biz Ninja Mutants line!

Yeah yeah I know, it’s not Ninja Mutants, that’s too similar to a more popular toyline, it’s Ninja Force, that name has definitely never been used by a rival toy company…

Around this time last year, I saw someone selling a carded Ninja Psylocke on marketplace. I hemmed and hawed and decided to pass on it even though it was cheap and cool. My Toy Biz collection is pretty tiny and I wasn't planning to expand it. 

I also hadn't really come up with a good way to display MOC figures, and they usually get lost in the back of a cabinet or sit in a box. I recently used some leftover peg board to make a peg wall for the carded stuff I do have, it feels like a mini toy store from the 90s. I knew Psylocke would look cool on there so I went to marketplace, as the figure had been on there all year.

She was gone! Someone else must have bought her. No big deal, it wasn't meant to be...

Since then I had come across a decent lot of the early Marvel Legends, and I have sold ML to a local dude a few times so I hit him up. We chatted a bit and trade got brought up, and you know me, I would WAY rather trade. Turns out he bought the Ninja Psylocke and had two Ghost Rider figures! I have been trying to get into these Ghost Rider figures for way too long but they never pop up in my area. 

A deal was struck, we're both super happy and now I have the missing Psylocke for my wall! This figure is great, she's one of my favourite X-Men characters, my X-men list is basic, Wolverine, Storm, Bishop and Psylocke. I don't have any specific reasons, I made the list when I was 10, through the old Marvel cards and what I saw on TV. These are also some of the most toyetic characters so the math adds up. 

I am like many other 80s babies, in my love for all things ninja. Originally I was just going to write about ninjas on this blog but I came across Vintage Ninja and spent about a month diving into the archives, and now I hope you’ll do the same 

Psylocke as a Ninja just makes sense, especially with the soft goods cloak. The rest of the figures in this sub-series ehh not so much. I know Wolverine has history in Japan but he’s so wide and stout here maybe a sumo would have worked better. 

I’ve included the cross-sell from another Toy Biz series to show how they were advertised, and a tease for an upcoming post! 

It's interesting to note, Toy Biz was pretty consistent on adding female figures into "boy" toylines, I can't think of another toyline specifically geared towards boys in the 1990's that had so many female characters. I know it might be hard to reconcile with this, but in the 80's and 90's boys just weren't playing with girl figures, because our parents just didn't want us to. I had to fight to get April O'Neal, never got a She-Ra because rooted hair equalled doll, and if I knew there was a Jem and the Holograms line I would have wanted that too! A world without female characters just doesn't really work and I am glad parents now can see that and not be so 'blue and pink' minded. 

There is one dream 80s toyline that could have only men, and that is John Carpenter's The Thing, which obviously would never have happened, even if the movie wasn't a huge box office stinker. That hasn't stopped customizers though, I highly suggest tracking down The Thing Toy Commercial on Youtube, they did an amazing job and it makes you wish it was real. Oh heck, I will just link it here, life is just getting so easy for us isn't it?

What do you think about the Toy Biz Marvel toys? I feel like talking about them a lot lately, so I hope you like them. 

I will also have a special Ghost Rider retrospective coming soon! Check back often, you never know when something new is happening in the Nostalgic Basement.