Action figures have long been a perfect compliment to comic books, since every kid (or kid at heart) has that natural desire to act out adventures with their favorite heroes off the drawn page. Every so often, a unique style of figure comes along that breaks the mold, so to speak. Each Saturday, Donny B will be showcasing various offerings from Art Asylum’s take on the ‘block figure’, with a weekly spotlight on Minimates.
Aside from a relatively short stint at Wal Mart and Target, the only “big name” store to ever carry Minimates was Toys R Us. For the most part, the only readily available outlet for Minimates is either a local comic book shop, or one of about a dozen online retailers. This makes sense, considering the “collector toy line” nature of Minimates. They may look like they have little kid appeal (and apparently Art Asylum banks on that age group as their major demographic), but really the only people who go hard core for these toys are the more grown up collectors.
That being said, Toys R Us has gained a lot of love from the Minimate fan base, since they are the only national chain to carry Minimates (apparently they haven’t brought ‘mates to their worldwide stores just yet). But it’s not simply a bigger outlet for the same thing you could find at your local comic dealer or an e-tailer. Toys R Us has brokered a deal with Diamond Select Toys (the company who owns Art Asylum, creator of Minimates) to deliver customers “TRU exclusive” releases, such as the release of Cosmic Silver Surfer:
Behind the Image:
I wanted to give Silver Surfer the appearance of surfing through some sort of cosmic something (maybe a nebula cloud? Who knows – it’s space after all. Anything could work. Go watch an episode of Star Trek and you’ll see what I mean), but without relying too much on photoshop.
So I simply placed him inside of my car’s tailpipe, and then changed the color scheme in post production to give it a more “cold” feel.
On Ebay: Silver Surfer
Sweet use of setting! I never would have guessed that was a tailpipe.
Now I’m curious what the regular Silver Surfer looks like. Their name choice for this exclusive figure seems a bit silly. I mean, isn’t the Surfer ALWAYS cosmic?
Comment by Doorman — July 5, 2010 @ 7:44 pm
Indeed. But this was a re-release of the character, so a slightly different name was needed to differentiate the two.
There are several differences that make Cosmic Silver Surfer stand out a bit. This most obvious being his design – the original Silver Surfer came out very early in Minimate history, and sported a much simpler design. Over the years, the artwork (tampos) and sculpting have become more refined and detailed. Many years had passed between the two releases, and it’s evident in the overall look.
The second variation is the inclusion of accessories (not pictured). The original came with nothing but the board. Cosmic Silver Surfer comes with hand and arm attachments to simulate his “cosmic powers”.
Finally, the big difference as far as functionality is the inclusion of a peg on the board, to keep his foot attached. The original was released before the C3 endeavor, and as a result, his feet didn’t have holes in the bottom to attach him to Lego pieces. Cosmic Silver Surfer is post-C3, and so his board was designed accordingly. Also, the board comes with a stand this time, so that you can display him with the appearance that he is flying.
Here’s a pic I pulled off the ‘net: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v232/DonnyB_Face/misc/Surfers.jpg
Comment by Donny B — July 5, 2010 @ 9:18 pm
Nice find. I see the light, now!
the ‘cosmic’, purple-colored light.
Comment by Doorman — July 6, 2010 @ 6:57 am