Wow those are nice! Usually contemporary clear vinyl toys make me go 'meh'.... but god damn it looks good vintage.
Finally found a Takatoku clear Kikaida. I've wanted one for awhile but they would always go a little too high on YJA and then none showed up for the longest time. Mandarake actually listed this as an auction on ebay and the end time was something like 6am EST (I'm a very early riser). Luckily won with no other bids besides the initial and pretty cheap. I debated keeping it in the bag but I'm 'not' that kind of collector. No tinsel inside though
Just seeing your shadow study for the first time. Nice ones, man! And congrats on the new pick-up, Chris. Looks like he survived the ages very well.
That is a lovely Kikaida, great pickup! Really nice clear vinyl and some nice paint on him. I can understand the conundrum, but I am happy you decided to open him up and enjoy him after all. That is a bit odd with the tinsel, but at least now we know that some of them came like that straight from the shop - it always seemed to me unlikely that kids had removed it. It was probably a manufacturing change done during production at one point, as it became too costly/time consumption to do the inserts, or possibly, they just were clearing out a larger production of the vinyl toys at the end days of the line and just had them put together and sold.
Condorman - probably hard plastic. Licensed. I need to put together a lightbox to desuckify some of these photos.
Thanks dude. There are a total of four arm attachments. They really had a thing for giving figures drill arms back in the 70s!
Standard size Mazinger with guts + pipe cleaner inserts. I believe I've seen one with blue guts. Normally you just see the clear figure - sometimes with guts, but guts + cleaners is super tough.
Nice piece Andy You are right, there are some with blue pipe cleaner or blue chest and red pipe cleaner.
Lovely figure Andy. You are right, I haven't often seen a combination of two together. And I haven't actually been fortunate to check one out in person; what are the guts made of (is it plastic pasrt, or paper similar to other cyborg figures)? I always really loved how the pipe cleaners on these guys were quite narrow, in comparison to the width of the limbs - especially in red it makes it look like they could be arteries/tubes feeding Mazinger his vital fluids. The bubbles on yours give him a really nice effect to the vinyl too. Great figure, congrats man!
^Nice shot! Great colors. Cheers. The guts are plastic. I think they're sofubi, but not 100% sure. I agree - the fellow has lots of character - good toy soul.
Clearly I can see....... Decided to take some pics since I never have taken one of my entire cyborg clear group together. Would have been cool if there was sunlight behind them but at least I know which storage tub these guys are in for another pic if I can deal with the domino effect when setting these guys up (8 tries before they all stood up on their own!) Still would like to own bootleg Thundermask clear, mid-size Kikaida clear, Rainbowman clears, and a KR V3 clear....
Thanks boon! Yeah my sad sack ass misses the detolf set up but I got through some phone interviews this week and although I'm not counting on anything- the laws of the universe must align in my favor sometime right?! One step at a time, but getting my own place and getting the toy display back up eventually is on my list trust me.
Oh wow Chris, that is an incredible cyborg family. I mean, I am incredibly impressed each time you land just one of these fellows, but seeing how many you've managed to bring home is awe-inspiring. Like you, these are probably among my favourite styles of vintage toys (the others being bootlegs and removable mask fellas). The different shades of yellowing, with all of the nice colours, not to mention the great inserts - it all just comes together to make such a myriad of fun and delightful toys. You sure did incredibly well in your chasing of these, and I think you still got in at a fairly decent time, as the cyborg guys have really been going up lately. I am really jealous, especially of those full-size fellas. And you did well to capture their beauty in natural sunlight. Excellent work, and thanks for sharing this family with us. They really don't make enough clear toys. [And obviously I need to step up my game when I can get back to vintage hunting]
@ultrakaiju Yeah my last purchase of a cyborg clear was 2014 (see above for bagged Kikaida) but I look occasionally and yeah many of these have gone up in price. Deals still can be found though, but I think the days of vintage bagged 6000 yen clear toys are in short supply. I was incredibly lucky and had a lot of help when I went full throttle on these years ago. I know I shouldn't but I sort of like that golden hue that comes with aging of these toys. Sunlight reacts with the vinyl so I do limit their exposure time lol. Can't let them get too much of a sunburn.
