Back in the mid-’90s, Ultraforce seemed to have it all. There was a comic on the rack, a cartoon hitting the airwaves, and a brand new action figure line. Fifteen minutes of fame later, they’re nothing but a brief footnote, with a license in limbo, a 13-episode cartoon run and a toy line that didn’t make it to a second wave. Them’s the breaks.
To be honest, I wasn’t technically an Ultraforce fan. I never got the Malibu Comics Ultraforce comic, and I didn’t watch the cartoon — hell, I barely knew a cartoon existed. I have no idea what channel it was being shown on, but it wasn’t at a time I would have seen it. So why do I have the complete line of figures?
Two magic words: dollar clearance.
That’s pretty much all it took. Eight figures for eight dollars at my friendly neighborhood Hill’s department store was too great a deal to pass up, and I could always use some Marvel-connected figures to go with my 5-inch collection. At the time, Characters like Juggernaut and Black Knight were living in the Malibu universe, and there was a whole crossover that involved the Phoenix entity at one point, so that was enough of a connection for me.
Even though these were done by Galoob and not ToyBiz, they were close enough in articulation to fit in, and for less than ten dollars I had a decent amount of heroes and villains at one shot. The characters were:
- Prime
- Hardcase
- Topaz
- Nightman
- Prototype
- Ghoul
- Atalon
- NM-E
Personally, I think it’s a shame that Marvel bought Malibu and stuck their characters in limbo because I think a lot could be done with them.
While these are all fairly rigid figures and their dead-eyed, soulless stares are terrifying, I do really like the ’90s charm of these designs and wouldn’t mind seeing updated, super-articulated versions of them. I know customizers have been pumping out versions of them over the years, and a lot of them show the potential these toys had. There was a planned second wave that would have included characters like Lord Pumpkin and Primevil, who is basically… evil Prime. I figured that out using science. I remember Toyfare doing an article on the second wave and being bummed that Lord Pumpkin would never make it out.
As the wave goes though, NM-E is probably my favorite. He’s actually got a great sculpt job full of plenty of detail, and his paint job gives him a real metallic feel above and beyond the standard paint for toys back then. It’s like they went all out on him because they knew how awesome he was. Gotta respect that.
In addition to the regular lines, there were a number of variants, including a handful that were limited to 5,000 and a few that were limited to 504. While I never got any of the Ultra-rare (no pun intended), I managed to get two of the black-carded 5,000 variants for that same clearance price of a dollar, which I still have mint-on-card despite the fact that they’re not worth that much. The Red Slayer version of NM-E is a gorgeous figure on its own, with deep shadows, and it shows how everything is awesome if you put it in red.
While I don’t have it in me to complete this line, tracking down all the odd color variants and such, I am glad that I managed to get the core lineup for such a great price back in a time twenty years ago when a huge amount of properties were still getting toys and cartoons. It’s a little bit odd to think of the mid-’90s as twenty years ago. I think someone just walked over my grave.
Update!
Fwoosher mr Articulate has shared a few pictures of his prototype of Sludge, destined for the second wave. Enjoy, and thanks to mr articulate for sharing!
