Eggformers (They're More Than Meets the Egg)

[Zobovor]

So, a while ago (like, a year ago) we started carrying this ridiculous toyline at Walmart called Hatch'n Heroes by Bandai. It consists of licensed Disney/Pixar characters who all fold up into egg-shaped things. So, transforming toys only by a generous stretch of the imagination. Bandai sells another, similar toy line called Egg Force (which includes Star Wars characters who fold up into eggs) which is popular in Japan, so I guess this is the domestic version.

They flopped and eventually went on deep clearance, and as a novelty I picked up the Hatch'n Heroes versions of Lightning McQueen and Mater, from Disney/Pixar's movie Cars. I stopped collecting Cars toys a while ago, but I've always been a sucker for transforming toys, and these were like a dollar a pop. In some ways, they're kind of laughable. Lightning McQueen, for example, manages to fold up into a round-shaped egg thing rather nicely, but his car configuration isn't the right shape. It's interesting how his eyes rotate around on a tumbler, though, and how his little mouth pops open. Mater is better in truck mode but his egg mode isn't quite as smooth and round. Both toys are ridiculous. I think I also bought Strip "The King" Weathers, too, now that I think about it, but I can't remember where I put him.

There were a bunch of other characters from different Disney licenses (Olaf from Frozen, Baymax from Big Hero 6) that I wasn't interested in. Plus, you know, by the time they were a dollar, there wasn't a lot left.

Flash forward to this week. Walmart is spending crazy money marking down all the deleted toys. Just for example, the huge Batcave went from like $88 down to $25. The Barbie Dreamhouse which was originally $169 went to $30. Anyway. In the computer there were some price changes for more Hatch'n Heroes even though I haven't seen them in like a year. Turns out we must have gotten some, maybe inside the Chrismas toy "train" that we get every year, that I literally never saw during the holidays. I've been gobbling up clearance toys when they appeal to me (three-dollar Ghostbusters action figures? Hells yes), and I've also been getting stuff for the kids. You never know when somebody might skin their knee riding their scooter and needs a Barbie doll or a Hero Masher or something as a pick-me-up. Also, it's awesome when somebody gets invited to a surprise birthday party and I just happen to have toys that can be quickly wrapped and given as gifts. But I digress.

So, I picked up Woody from Toy Story for my son and Dory and Nemo from Finding Nemo for my daughter. Woody is supposed to be really lanky with long arms and legs, and they captured that much pretty well, although due to the design of his legs, he stands with his knees locked slightly backwards, like the way Thundercracker looked when he was shooting at the dinosaurs in "Dinobot Island" part 2, and he's got Big Hugs Elmo arms. Still, I've seen worse Woody toys. (Okay... no, I haven't.)

Nemo is actually amazingly successful. His entire face rotates on a tumbler to hide his eyes and mouth, and the sides of his tail pop apart and wrap around to cover the sides of his body and hide his fins. He's like an orange and white stripey Easter egg. He also has a preposterous undocumented "robot" mode in which the halves of his tail serve as legs. No, I did not take pictures.

Dory is kind of terrible. She has a tiny little tail fin and a great, big rotating face which doesn't really correspond to the contours of her body. I get that, to some degree, this toy line was inspired by what's currently on the market (Finding Dory was last year, and the Walmart computer said that there were some Zootopia characters solicited, though I never saw them in the store). Still, it seems like there are so many other Pixar characters that would have been better suited for this.


Zob (this is what I do when I'm not buying real Transformers, apparently)

[banzait...@gmail.com]

Curious what drove you to collect Cars toys?

[Zobovor]

On Wednesday, February 8, 2017 at 7:53:42 PM UTC-7, banzait...@gmail.com wrote:

> Curious what drove you to collect Cars toys?

What "drove" me? Ha ha! A vehicular pun.

I think you've asked me about this before. I know a few people here consider them to be geared towards younger kids. It's funny how we as adult collectors distinguish between toys meant for four-year-old boys and toys meant for eight-year-old boys...

When they first came out in 2006, I didn't really know what they were (I hadn't seen the movie yet), but there were only about 12 of them so they were a fun novelty. They reminded me a lot of the characters from the Tex Avery cartoon "One Cab's Family" from 1952, which I've always loved. Cars with faces means that they're self-motivating vehicles, which makes them robots, after a fashion. Living machines. For me, that was the draw.

Then I saw the movie and got to know the characters and I really liked the world that they inhabited. It's a Pixar masterpiece with tons of heart and humor and easter eggs, and I find it eminently rewatchable. As the years passed and my collection grew, the character selection became more and more diverse, to the point where unnamed background cars with no dialogue were getting toys. It was like Star Wars, where I could buy the action figure and then go and check the film to play Spot the Obscure Background Character.

Even variations of Lightning McQueen were interesting to me, because there was seemingly no limit to the different versions of him they could sell... mud on his bumpers, Dinoco dream sequence with missile launchers, bugs in his teeth, etc. It was also not unlike Star Wars where seemingly minor variations in costume warranted an all-new action figure.

As an aside, there are lots of adults who collect Hot Wheels, but I'm largely uninterested in them unless it's a car based on a media vehicle like the Mystery Machine or George Jetson's bubble car or somesuch. I will buy a car if I can repaint it into a Transformer, but I don't "collect" them in the traditional sense. I just can't get too excited about machines that aren't alive (not a Gundam fan, not a Voltron fan).

So, my interest began to wane considerably with Cars 2, which was (let's face it) a terrible movie that almost seemed to be introducing characters just for the sake of feeding Mattel's merchandising machine (witness the eleven different iterations of Mater in the space of a few seconds). My collection was running on its own momentum for a while until I realized I just wasn't enjoying it the way I had been for the previous six years or so. And don't get me started on Planes.


Zob (I look back now and it does seem kind of silly in retrospect, but I am certainly no stranger to buying toys that I later questioned why in the world I own them)

[banzait...@gmail.com]

I somehow missed this... My apologies. Cars came out when my first daughter was around 3, and she would watch it over and over and over. So I guess I have always viewed it as a little kids movie. But as you pointed out, it is quite enjoyable. I haven't watched it in at least 6 years, so curious how well it's held up. I had a friend who's kid was REALLY into cars. He too would chase down the rarer versions and characters. He would claim he was doing it for his kids, but after reading your story, I think it's clear he was collecting them through his kid.

> > I think you've asked me about this before.

My apologies if you had to repeat yourself. Maybe my wife is right when she says I don't listen. If I ask you again in five years (moderate probability), please feel free to tell me I am a complete idiot and reference this thread.

-Banzaitron

[Zobovor]

On Wednesday, March 1, 2017 at 8:45:14 PM UTC-7, banzait...@gmail.com wrote:

> I had a friend who's kid was REALLY into cars. He too would chase down the
> rarer versions and characters. He would claim he was doing it for his kids,
> but after reading your story, I think it's clear he was collecting them
> through his kid.

My son was a huge fan of Cars for a few years, probably when he was about three or so. He didn't call the character Lightning McQueen; he called him Kachow. (This isn't at all relevant, but I'm going on a tangent and you're all coming with me. He wouldn't refer to Mario of Super Mario Bros. fame by his name; he called him Wee-Haw, because of one of the sounds he makes in Mario 64. Meanwhile, his name for Santa Clause was Ho-Ho. Just for fun, one day I showed him a toy of Mario wearing a Santa hat, and I asked him who it was. His answer, of course, was Ho-Haw.)

(Well, I thought it was funny.)

> My apologies if you had to repeat yourself.

It's all good!


Zob (if I hated to type, I wouldn't be doing this every night...)