I am a huge fan of the unlicensed stuff. Here are a pair of Japanese unmasked guys that may be 'junk' but I picked up on the cheap and am quite happy with. On the left we have Iron King, with a more traditional "Bandai"-looking head, and the right is Thundermask, wearing a slightly happier expression, despite the state of his uniform These will do for now, until I can find more complete versions, or loose masks.
Re: Vintage bootlegs Pretty sure that Thundermask is a licensed Bandai version actually. At least that's what I always thought.
Re: Vintage de-masked figures Well you are right actually. One foot bears the 'Toyo Agency' (the company that produced the original show, later Sotsu) and the other has the Bandai name in hiragana. I had seen this guy a few times, but since his head was different than the standard Bandai issue, and his body was a bit differently proportioned, I always assumed it was not an official issue. Sometimes it takes having these guys in hand to know for sure.
True! These are amazing. Who cares that they don't have their masks? Well, I know who cares, but I don't.
Ironically I placed a bid on this before you posted: http://page7.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/g117828383 and foolishly bid way too low Pretty nice condition. What draws me to this version is the mask seems so big. Good score on yours though. No shame in finding a cheaper unmasked version. Still a great toy.
Hmm, the mask on that version does seem very large. Hard to say whether it is an exact match or not. The colour is also off. It looks like it was meant for another head sculpt, that has the same neck maybe, but wasn't so bulbous at the base (doesn't seem to fit so well). But this could well be the right mask too. The price was fairly high. To be frank, these aren't of great quality compared to the other Bandai stuff. and for reference, I paid about 3% of that for my beat up condition dude.
No no the mask is correct. I was just saying I like the masks on this version because they are so big. It's like that on all of them.
Cool. I still think it went for a high price given the damage and it not being such a clean example. if you've got the scrilla though, hey, why not?
