I wish I could share more on this thread, here is my beloved Neronga of Tsuburaya EP version. This may be considered as the first "serious" vintage sofubi I collected, I am hooked by its sculpt and of course its sweet colors, and my poor photography just couldn't justify its beauty. This is really a toy which I would love to appreciate every day!
Was able to add a couple more Gojis to the collection so I decided to take headshots of the lot to show differences. Still need lots of variants but very happy with what i've found so far. Bullmark Marusan
It's cool to see the very subtle differences. Excuse my ignorance but do Bullmark and Marusan use the same molds or repro from the same vintage goji?
Marusan and Bullmark used a few different factories, and some of them created molds based on production figures instead of the original prototypes, so there were slight variations in the sizes of figures, plus paint variations, plus things like the Godzilla J-Tail vs. L-Tail and Gyango's stubby tail, etc. In the case of Godzilla, that silver paint was not very resilient, and once kids started playing with them, a lot of that paint usually rubbed off. I saw a bagged one a while back that was nearly head to toe coated in pristine silver paint.
If you're asking about the modern Marusan and Bullmark, as far as I've been told they use modern molds that are different from one another. I don't have it handy but I took a photo of a new Marusan reissue next to a new Bullmark one, they were slightly different in terms of size and minor imperfections.
What's better than collecting Bullmark Hawaiian spray toys? Bullmark Hawaiian spray variants... Hawaiian spray Anguirus on orange vinyl and caramel vinyl. Some of you might have noted that M1GO reissued Anguirus on caramel vinyl: Hawaiian spray Gojira on similar blue/green vinyl but the left example has body suit style sprays with metallic teal color and matte lime green on the spine. The right example is the more well-known metallic green all-over striped sprays with metallic gold spine and metallic red spray on the mouth. I have also seen another variant of both of these in the wild with a heavy matte yellow spine. The metallic green spray with gold spine seems to be the most common for what is still a very rare toy: Hawaiian spray King Ghidorah with silver eyes. I do not have a red eye example to compare here, but note the metallic teal spray on the toes, legs, chest, and tops of the wings. There is also a teal stripe down the back of the spine. Another interesting note about this beautiful beast is the extreme amount of silver sprays completely coating the necks and head which is quite rare. Many examples have minimal silver sprays on the face with heavier matte green sprays on the necks/heads with either silver or red eyes. I have also seen one that had matte blue spray on the backs of the wings and down the spine. There seems to be a many different spray variants for KG but open for debate if there were intended for export or not. Flesh vinyl Gojira variant - I have learned this is technically not a Hawaiian/export toy, but including in this list. Example of the well-known variant on the left with bright red painted mouth and silver sprayed directly on flesh vinyl spine. Flesh vinyl has a pinkish hue. Smaller mold variant on right has a tiny amount of dark red paint in mouth with metallic blue sprays completely covering spine before small amount of silver spray applied. Flesh vinyl is more of a beige/tan. I have only seen the one shown here, but likely more out there to be found. This little blue guy is also one of the smallest Bullmark gojis in my collection. It may have been a late production run from a well-used or revised mold:
@NewChrissy - Good to see you posting vintage toy photos. Those Mirrorman kaiju are a rare sight. Adding more here to the Bullmark Hawaiian variant spray discussion with some Garamon examples: I have reviewed photos of a few other examples along with these two under close inspection to now track what looks like two subtle spray variants. Gary on the left with heavier matte colors and bright red sprays with dark green sprays. One on the right with much lighter sprays overall, but with more of the silver underspray showing. It also has a darker maroon spray rather than the bright red and what looks like teal spray rather than the dark green. It is possible it's the same color green and just applied so lightly on the silver underspray that it looks teal, but I'm leaning toward teal right now. The examples similar to the one on the right also have those classic stripes of silver spray showing that run up the backs of the legs to the top of the head. The silver stripes look to be buried under all the heavy matte sprays on the variant on the left. Yes, tail is broken off the Gary on the left -- difficult to find one of these let alone one with an intact tail and limbs.
Bringing back the 90s distro list description for the above: bestial. god-like. Being partially color-blind, especially to finer nuances of greens and reds, doesn't detract from the comparisons due to your great studies and write-ups @deafmetal
Beautiful Mark, one day like many of us I'd love to own a Gary but it seems to be getting further and further away with the prices these days. These two are stunners!
Bullmark Giant Gojira Ochre/orange torso on left and light gray/cocoa torso on the right. The goji on the left has some saggy feet which make it look shorter. Both of these are factory mixed-parts vinyl frankengojis which seems to be somewhat common for the giant gojira other than on the brown vinyl variant which is reported to be very uniform. There are some rare colors out there but are very difficult to find if not impossible now. Both of these examples have khaki/tan arms and a mix either khaki or ochre legs and tail. The separately-pulled middle spine piece appears to be a slightly different vinyl color than the torso and the limbs which is interesting. There are subtle variations within the the observed colors that could be due to different factory vinyl batches, etc. The ochre and tan vinyl gives the giant goji the classic uniform "yellow vinyl" look when the dark green sprays are applied and wear off on the torso and limbs.
