As promised, we are back with the second part of our Amazing Heroes feature! If pulp characters are your bag, I am positive you liked what you saw in the first half of the assortment we featured on Monday. Well, now we have more heroes and villains from the past to bring you, courtesy of Fresh Monkey Fiction.
Now, we had a chance to talk about the actual construction and quality of these figures in the first feature, and all of those characteristics extend to the figures in this group. The engineering is great, the paint is crisp and clean, and the figure style will certainly invoke nostalgia for those of you who are fellow children of the 1980s. I know it is easy to tag figures like this as “simple” in terms makeup, but the clean lines and throwback style makes it positively essential that the sculpt and paint are as perfect as possible, and Fresh Monkey has done a wonderful job shepherding this along.
Now, the character selection in this group really runs the gamut of well-known to pretty darned obscure. I actually had no awareness of the Green Turtle prior to this Kickstarter, but I have to tell you, the Green Turtle might just be my new favorite superhero. Seriously. Of course, I have a great appreciation for Captain Action (first a toy, as a myriad of superheroes), and the Champion of Mars has had a lot more visibility in the past several years.
Seeing this group together, I am challenged to think of a more eclectic and diverse first wave of action figures from a line in recent memory, and getting more historical awareness out there is always a great thing. Again, I wanted to include some biographical information on these guys, both from the card backs as well as online sources.
CAPTAIN ACTION
Fictional Bio:
Miles Drake is more than a just Captain, he’s a master of disguise, a master spy, and an exceptional soldier. As Captain Action, his prowess and cunning are unparalleled.
Captain Action was an action figure created in 1966, equipped with a wardrobe of costumes allowing him to become Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Captain America, Aquaman, the Phantom, The Lone Ranger (and Tonto), Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, Sgt. Fury, Steve Canyon, and the Green Hornet. Captain Action was the Ideal Toy Company’s answer to Hasbro’s G.I. Joe — although the protagonist dolls of both toy lines were created and designed by the same toy-and-idea man, Stan Weston.
STARDUST (The Super Wizard)
Fictional Bio:
This all-powerful being fights evil from outer space — no matter where it happens. With cosmic godlike powers, Stardust is more than a hero; he’s a force to be reckoned with.
Stardust is an alien from an unnamed planet (in some stories, a star), whose “vast knowledge of interplanetary science has made him the most remarkable man that ever lived.” He arrives on Earth vowing to clean up crime, and uses the powers that his knowledge has given him to fight all evil-doers. In addition to such powers as super strength, flight, and invulnerability, Stardust’s powers included “retarding rays” that slowed down moving objects, thought recording, the “delicate detecting unit” (a combination of ESP and super-vision), the ability to transform into a human-sized star, and many others.
GREEN TURTLE
Fictional Bio:
Aided by his ability to avoid bullets, The Green Turtle fights the Axis in China during World War II. His training and determination to fight evil gives all evildoers a run for their money.
The Green Turtle aided the Chinese in guerrilla warfare against the Japanese invaders in World War II. He wore a green cowl and a cloak with a turtle-shell design. Most origin stories around the comic say that Hing initially wanted to make him an overtly Chinese hero, but his publisher would not allow this, believing there would not be a sufficient market for an Asian superhero, so Hing never drew the character without his mask. He had a sidekick, Burma Boy, a young beggar whom the Green Turtle rescued from execution by the Japanese army.
CHAMPION OF MARS
Fictional Bio:
He is an enigma, this warrior born on Earth and forged onto sands of Mars. Armed with his saber, this Champion of Mars brings cunning and guile to the strange red planet.
On Mars, which its natives call Barsoom, Carter encounters both formidable alien creatures resembling the beasts of ancient myth and various humanoids. He finds his true calling in life as a warlord who strives to save the planet’s inhabitants. He wins the hand of a Martian princess, Dejah Thoris of Helium, but after several years of marriage he sacrifices himself to save Barsoom from the loss of its atmosphere. Awakening again after this second death he finds he has been miraculously transported back to Earth, into his original body. Carter then collects the wealth that resulted from his discovery of a rich vein of gold ore right before his original passage to Barsoom. Unable to return to Mars, he spends several more years in a small cottage on the Hudson River in New York, where he once more appears to die on March 4, 1886.
Again, Carter’s apparent demise is not a true death; rather, he is restored to Barsoom, where after more adventures he rises to the position of Warlord of Mars, having played an instrumental role in creating alliances among many of the sentient races of Barsoom. He returns to Earth on a number of occasions afterward to relate his adventures to his nephew (“Burroughs”), revealing that he has mastered the process of astral travel between the two worlds. During his adventures on Mars his earthly body reposes in a special tomb that can only be opened from the inside.
I want to give kudos once again to Fresh Monkey for a great first go-round with their successful Kickstarter, as well as their full-fledged entry as an action figure company. I have a great appreciation for the effort it takes to bring this kind of project to reality, and I hope there continues to be a market for these as there are more characters from the pulp (and other) age that would do quite well as figures. Again, you can still order some of these from their online store, located HERE.
