Flagged-up as forthcoming on the 'Home Blog'
the other day, except this isn't the referred-to post on the Toy House blister set, but rather the lose
Giant originals, the post on the Toy House set will be the next of two
following this post.
Giant's space aliens; six poses, manufactured in a nicely tight palette of chocolate
browns, jade-greens (here toward the darker hues) and a pink toward purple or is
it purple toward pink (?) range. Note - the forth figure from the left (second
green) is a left-hander, nice to know other worlds have the same variable DNA!
How they came here; despite what you might
read - here, or elsewhere - they arrived in small, blow-moulded staring wheels
(yeah, there's an attempt at a joke in there somewhere!). Seen in yellow and
red (as here), I'd like to think there may be green or blue ones out there, but
everyone else seems to only have, or found, red or yellow, so far?
They are soft polyethylene ('polythene')
with a clear-plastic dome manufactured in harder polystyrene, which clips into
three slots, found at the upper-roots of the ship's arms. The compartment will
take two or three at a squeeze, but is probably designed for one figure.
Top - A comparison between the two similar 'advancing'
poses, the figure on the left is almost stationary 'at the ready', while the
figure on the right has a more horizontal weapon-hold and a bent right leg,
he's clearly getting a shift-on!
Middle - Camera-flash rendered this a less
than successful shot, but is supposed to be showing the range of the pinky-purple,
with a darker purple on the left and a paler pinky on the right. Brighter and
darker exist; see below.
Bottom - A Giant original on the left against a poorer clone on the right, the
copies come in a wider range of often wackier colours (again; more below) but can
be quite distorted or misshapen, and are all-over more 'blobby'.
There is little-to-no evidence that these
large blow-moulds were ever branded to Giant,
despite them being often so-described by some online (there's an hideously overpriced
2-pack on evilBay as I publish this, describing them as Giant), nor any evidence they were ever carried by Giant, PMC or the later Arcotoys?
Every example I've seen/encountered (we looked at them here, a while
ago) is an unmarked 'generic' rack toy.
Equally, there's nothing definitive to say
whether they came first or second. My own feelings are that they are later
copies, for a number of reasons, not least is that they only copied three of
the six poses, a forth, less common pose (waving space-rifle) being not taken from
Giant.
Additionally Giant's early bi-colour graphic blister-carded sets date from the
early sixties while the larger bagged blow-moulds with full-colour header-cards
are more late 1960's/1970's, so these days I suspect the blow-mould'er copied Giant's diminutive figures.
Comparison between Giant and non-Giant
bases, the clones having a simple and often half-readable 'HONG KONG',
the Giant's having the full 'GIANT ⓟ HONG KONG' mark.
Now, I have been quite derogatory toward
the Giant ⓟ-mark
. . . in the original series of articles in One Inch Warrior magazine (back issues may still be available of the later numbers), earlier on the home blog and most recently - I think - on
the Roman page of the same Blog.
However someone then thought to add a
rather long winded addition to his site - which hadn't worried about the ⓟ-mark until I did that Roman page - muttering about patents. There
are several internationally recognised abbreviations pertaining to patents, all
of which have been on the home Blog for a decade;
- Pat. - Patented
- Pat. App. - Patent Applied-for
- Pat. No. - Patent Number; followed by a numeral
In 1961 it was agreed internationally that
the P in a circle mark; ⓟ, would represent
phonograms (phonographic recordings), referred to as "...the sound recording, phonorecords, phonogram or
phonographic copyright symbol" by the Rome Convention on such matters.
So, while some date Giant from 1959 (without empirical evidence), Tawser gives "common belief", which is pretty safe, Garratt gives 1962-, which is a bit later
but would have come from one [or more] of his US correspondents (Pestano?) back
in the day, nearer to when it all happened, I myself prefer a wider 1961/2,
which gives a couple of years for production contracts to be settled and for New York to organise licences with the Hong Kong
office and/or shippers, UK importers et
al., to enable James Opie to be buying the early bicolour blister-card sets,
in the UK, in 1964.
Even if Giant
dates earlier (and the correct date for their move into the colony may be in
the HK book), the ⓟ-mark is lacking from some of the earlier
stuff, and fully-associated with the later-issued black/silver knights, as
blister-cards gave-way to header-carded bags.
Ergo, Giant
were pulling a fast-one with their ⓟ-mark, hoping
people might THINK it meant patented or protected or some other equal nonsense,
and as such I will continue to take the piss out of their ⓟ - yes; another attempt at a joke of some
sort!
The aforementioned archive shots, I believe
the trio in the bottom-left hand shot are now in my sample! The upper shot
seems to have been worked-on in a picture-editor; the brown and green darkened
as the pink has been enhanced to a probably false shade? While a more turquoise
green is to be seen bottom right, in a more colour-true image.
The only remaining question is, are they
aliens, aliens in space-suits or riveted android/robot types?
Elite interdiction-squad the 'Puce Panteras' of the 4th Astrovasion Wing (LRRP) receive the day's orders from their spore-parent, prior to launching their invasion of Earth, little did they know that their reconnaissance drones, lacking scale on the camera's, had sent back terribly inaccurate data, the Terran's were over a thousand height-units, and the gravity so heavy, the moon-men couldn't move, few survived, and decades later it was a rare thing to see them alive or dead, usually on the evilBay . . . for many credits; fate is a cruel mistress.
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But is it Giant?
Yes! except the obvious copies and the blow-mould comparison, this is all Giant product, unless it's Toy House, but I'm getting ahead of myself . . . see next post/'Newer Post'!
