Throwback Thursday - Spawn!
 

Decided to do a throwback set for Spawn, focused on the hero shots for just the ones I dug the most.

Spawn Action Figure Retrospective - McFarlane Toys Throwback Thursday! - The Toyark - News

Little taste of what's in there:

http://news.toyark.com/wp-content/up...9-Cover-01.jpg

McFarlane hated joints that broke the sculpt yet somehow was totally fine with static seams doing the same in a more egregious way. Those seams on Al's arms are ridiculous.

Your photography is top notch, as always.

The group shot is amazing. I have most of my McFarlane figures stuffed on one 12 foot shelf and it doesn't look nearly as cool as this. I may have to rethink my grouping.

never did understand why mcfarlane didnt like joints when doing action figures, thats the main point. thats like having pizza with no cheese. he sure did miss out on alot of money

Yeah it came out pretty good. Some are on risers, some using the stands. I don't have the room to put them out like that so I need to redo some shelves myself.

I do get that, but, the way I look at it is this. These came out in 2000-2005 or so. Way ahead of it's time in terms of sculpt and paint. NECA, DC Collectibles, and others that are on par are just now getting to the point where they can do full detailed sculpts with awesome paint AND articulation. For a reasonable price.

Not making excuses, but that's how I look at it. Hopefully that new Fortnite level of articulation spreads into his rebirth of the old lines they were talking about.

good point, have you seen the gaming figures he has done recently like the Borderlands figs. i bought the Zero figure. those have superb articulation, hope he continues this and takes out new spawn figs.

These stactions are definitely of its time but, I kind of forgotten how good a lot of the McFarlane stuff looked.

I don't feel like McFarlane missed out on any money, since his stuff is what paved the way. People were buying it in droves, which is why a lot of it can be found on the secondary for pretty cheap. Even NECA and then Mezco were delivering the same staction figures when they first came out with their horror stuff, once McFarlane scaled back and then quit. Mcfarlane basically created the "adult collectibles" market in the toy aisles. Before that, toy collectors were buying toys. People that wanted more than generic kid stuff were buying statues and models, not figures. So, I disagree that he left money on the table at the time. Flash forward 15 years and yeah, some people were leaving McFarlane stuff on the pegs, because of articulation. So, maybe some lost money there, but he has said that the color tops line was highly profitable. Stores were buying it up, even if the consumers weren't.

I'd actually credit McFarlane with making the garage kit scene in the US irrelevant.

I was young at the time, so was unaware; was there a garage kit scene in the US? I never even really heard of the term until last year talking about Godzilla stuff.

Yeah, garage kits are still around but their glory years were from the late 80s through the first half of the 90s. Most of them were unlicensed with low print runs but there were also a couple of companies that were putting out licensed stuff like Horizon (mostly 1/6 vinyl-Marvel, DC and later on pretty much every license from that time period) and Screamin (1/4 vinyl-horror and Star Wars). There was a long running magazine devoted to it, Amazing Figure Modeller ( which actually may still be around) and some books as well. But yeah, as the 90s went on the popularity kind of faded and I correlate that with the rise of McFarlane and Bowen statues.

I got a Venom vinyl model from Horizon as a birthday gift in '92 or '93. Never built it. Never even opened it, in fact. No idea what happened to it. But, yeah, they were everywhere.

Epic shots... I like Spawn figures. Yes this are not 100% action figures and they are mini statues but this is not problem for me. Some neca figures are damaged in my collection because I have broken joints (Palifico from pirates of caribbean serie) but McFarlanes figures are more durable. In my opinion best looking Spawn figure is Pirate Spawn from Alternate realities serie. This is small masterpiece with many nice details. Would by nice see some new photos from toyark with this figure. Thanks for nice reading.

Great Pics!!!


Pretty much all of this.
Lets give credit where credit is due.
This man CHANGED THE GAME.

I actually have two Spawn figures that have been on display SINCE purchase because they have always been my favorites.
I had one figure that came in like this plastic casing, he came with a wolf.. it was actually my FAVORITE all time figure for years. Until fucking Hurricane Sandy..and it was mostly destroyed.

I think Malbolgia (splchk) was one of the first chase/hard to get figures I remember looking for. I think it was like 40.00 at one point which was INSANE for a figure back then. I also remember my son's mother threw him out of the window one day when she was mad at me...awwwwww they know how to hurt ya..ha!!

My Creech figure is still dope!!



Although now-adays his figures are kinda hit and miss with me.
I did love the Walking dead 5" line and collected most of them. But these color top things...ehhhhh... i purchased the Gears of Wars sets because i love that IP. Those Figures sucked though and TO THIS DAY they still can't even hold their STACTION figure pose properly. The only one that was fine was marcus.
I saw the COD figs two days ago and couldn't bring myself to get em even though they were only 15.00 on sale. Close but..ehhhhhhh.


https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1966/...2b9c7d8f_b.jpg

Find that Horizon Venom and build it! It's awesome and I still have it on display.

That he did. For those of you "younger", you owe a lot of what you are complaining about today to Todd McFarlane raising the expectations.

Back in our days**, you either get the toy (which is a sucky piece of plastic) or if you want something that looks decent, you have to build/paint it yourself (garage kits already mentioned).

His attention to detail and intricate sculpts also means he created a whole sports lineup that actually looks like the actual athlete. And this is before the days of digital scan and printing!Now, when any figure is based on a real person, we expect that head sculpt to look like that person.

I'd say he put garage kits AND Starting Lineup out of business, and pushed all other toy companies to up their games.

He pretty much (maybe accidentally initially?) popularize the "hunt for exclusives and variations" market. I still remember racing fellow collectors when TRU open to get to that fresh box of Spawn figure to find that one per case rare variant or paint error. "Commando Angela!!!" Not saying factory errors and rare figures didn't happen before, but McFarlane toys made it a "thing". Now that's part of the regular toy collecting landscape. He wasn't always the best, but he was the first!

**We also had to walk up hill to school both ways in 10 feet of snow even during summer! And get off my lawn!!!

wow, interesting story. i never knew the backstory of mcfarlane and what he did to figure collecting.
im not young in age but i am young to the collecting world.

OH, and I should also mention McFarlane's contribution to the horror/taboo toys category. Before McFarlane, toy companies made toys for kids, so they shy away from controversial subjects and questionable accessories. Even R rated movies like Robocop, Aliens and Rambo, they made toys from the kiddy cartoons only. McFarlane came in as a small company, he wasn't afraid to include a severed head or a bloody axe as an accessory. As a matter of fact, their 1 per case Malebolgia figure was quite literally a figure of "Satan" that you can buy for your kids! They proudly make the list of "worst toys for Christmas" every year for quite a few years. Their Movie Maniacs gave collectors their first decent action figures of a lot of famous movie monsters and villains, and their in-house design lines like Tortured Souls gave rise to what we know as "crowd funding" toys today, as people create and sell their own creations regardless of subject matter.


Thank you Tony Bacala for this post. What a great trip down memory lane. I still have a lot of my Spawn figures on display.

HAHAHAHA.....right..
and you had to say the last part while shaking your fist in the air..


and i forgot to say..
i was at a toy show in jersey like a year or two ago..
a guy opened up a box and had SOOO MANY new unopened McFarlane Spawn figures...
he said.... $ 1.00 a piece..
i was like...WOW..
but i had them all so didn't need. I'm sure it was great for ..someone..

The bottom line is, McFarlane Toys have been a joke for the past decade or so. Not living up to their legacy of being collectible visionaries, not by a long shot. I hope to be pleasantly surprised with the relaunch, but I highly doubt it will blow the competition out of the water.

For those who love the old Spawn figures and their dynamic poses but want more articulation, if you add more articulation, then we don't get figures similar to those pictured above. McFarlane should stick to their guns as far as the Spawn franchise is concerned and continue creating staction masterpieces. Spawn figures in the 2000's were never meant to be played with, just stared at in complete awe. Personally, I would really like to see another collaboration with Ashley Wood. Those things are works of art.

Oh man , The Sam and Twitch figures of Ashley Wood!!!, IF you could get Twitch to stand at all, but they way most of those later Spawn figures were just pure beauty as a small affordable art piece. I still have a ton of them.

Agreed.

Doubly agreed.

That's another lesson that McFarlane taught us well: not all toys hold their value! Small companies like McFarlane simply don't have the ability to keep promoting their products, and when the next generation lost interest (or simply don't know it exists), the value plummet. So don't worry so much about a toy's value, just collect what you enjoy!

Agreed. If you add enough articulations to make the figure poseable enough to strike some of Spawn's poses, you end up with ugly seams, especially with a cape (Revoltech Amazing Yamaguchi Batman comes to mind). Personally, I don't "play" with them like kids do, they just need to look good on the shelves.