Galloping Geargrinder - Pixar Cars - Background characters always get the coolest accessories.

(Top) Galloping Geargrinder is sort of the Boba Fett of Cars 2. You see him on screen for a mere moment out of the movie, his look and design is really unique and understated, and he gets a killer diecast release, making fans scramble to find him. (Left Bottom) An actual Galloping Goose that this character is based on. (Right Bottom) The sealed blistercard.

Mattel is a very odd company. Box assortments, case distribution, and a sometimes off beat knowledge of the fan base they cater to, makes for rocky relationships with the people that buy into their toy lines.

Go to any retail outlet that carries Cars, and you'll probably find fifty McQueens just warming pegs. That was the case when I found this often unknown gem of a diecast. (We all know we hide finds we can't afford behind a pile of other less looked at toylines, or behind high dollar ticket items.) He was stuck behind an obviously clustered 3 pegs of LMQs no doubt hidden until someone's paycheck would deposit and they could claim him. But no, I am onto the tricks and wiley ways of many of my cohorts and plucked him like the forbidden fruit of... okay, I'm getting off base here.

He's really just as oddball as his real world inspiration.

But I mean first of all, the fact that Cars collectors even got this guy who is a wholly original sculpt (and no he's not a retool of Lizzie, although they do look alike) and came with what I think is the most amount of accessories for a single card Cars release, that HAD to get others scratching their heads.

The details, the details, the details. Although I don't know how he'd use any of what he carries on him, the included tools and the lantern, are all welcome and unexpected inclusions for this car.

Personally I love offbeat releases like this, because these are the ones that become the true chases and revered additions to personal collections.

It's when you look at the sculpt up close like below. This. This is what gets me excited about die cast collecting. The details on the radiator, the headlights, the lantern hook and horns... this is one that when I finally assemble/create my 1:55 scale version of Radiator Springs, I want to spotlight in some way.

It looks like he'd fit on an HO or HOn2 model scale track, I have yet to find out.

Thanks for reading and keep collecting! - Mario, the Rogue Hobbyist.
 

Stats	Rating/Information
Item	Galloping Geargrinder
Made by	Mattel (Disney/Pixar license)
Rarity	Very Uncommon - because Mattel evidently uses feral cats to get case assortments to retail.
Classification	Modern
Condition	Very Good
Procured	ToysRUs, Kansas
Worth	around $20 as of Dec 2014 if still carded
Investment	$7
Further Research	http://coloradorailroadmuseum.org/train-rides-home/galloping-goose-rides/
Trivia & Fun Facts	It is unclear exactly where the name "Galloping Goose" comes from. It is mostly commonly suggested that it referred to the way the car body and the freight compartment tended to rock back and forth on the railway's sometimes precarious track. A more colorful story is that the name arose because the "geese" were equipped with air horns rather than the whistles of the steam locomotives.

Pixar Cars - Disney Store "Crabby" Tugboat - An issue of scale.

When it comes to the way that both Mattel and Disney are handling the seemingly endless run of Cars related diecast toys, there are moments when Mattel seems to be the obvious leader because of release count, diversity of line, and exposure in stores.

The Disney Store has kept a premium sort of presentation since the first movie with it's larger scale releases. Very much made to showcase in the box for the adult collector.

But there are really nice standouts that the Disney store takes care of, that don't even make it into the normal diecast line by Mattel. This is one of the characters in Cars 2 that was only seen in the early part of the movie, in fact being the first character onscreen that helps identify one of the new main characters, Finn McMissle, and sets the stage for letting people familiar with the Cars world that the action will be taking place in a very different place than the desert area of Radiator Springs.

Back of the box.

I recall as a kid seeing a film about tug boats and how powerful they were. Pushing boats around and seeming to be these just awesome little hard survivors of the sea.

I'm not going to kid, I was disappointed that there was not more to this character because his design and personality immediately seemed more interesting than Finn's (whom, if you've not seen the movie, was onboard being transported out to sea).

Closeup of the front of Crabby.

I'm not a completion crazy collector when it comes to the Cars line in regards to buying every release. I prefer to get the characters and playsets that compliment each other scale wise and especially the ones that I liked the designs of.

After opening up the display box, I was already enjoying the overall detail and the nice touches of worn paint and rust stains that were all over the hull. A few more protective plastic pieces cover other parts of the softer plastic parts on the deck.

The hull is actually the only part that is diecast metal, the rest of it is varying degrees of plastics, some soft, some more rigid. Sort of an odd construction as some of the earlier releases were almost all metal.

Though the outer box had some scuffs on it, Crabby is well protected inside.

Crabby, as you can see below comes with this great add on that adds to the play value for the younger set. It's this blue plastic combination display stand and rolling play platform that when I first looked at the packaging, hadn't even noticed it.

Crabby in the included play platform/display stand.

The hull is one solid casting of metal, which I guess if one is feeling adventurous, you could use this as a more pricey tub float toy. (I'm joking on that, yes it did float for a bit before capsizing because the balance is all kinds of off on this thing, and what parent in their right mind hands a diecast toy with a keel like that to a toddler in a tub?)

The deck and other details don't have as nice of a paint application to them.

The rolling play platform is sturdy, well made, has four low profile wheels under it, and a nice application of white and blue paint to the wave break part on top.

Scale wise, Crabby doesn't come close to the size relation that his movie role depiction shows, but he is decently sized for what he is, and with some small exceptions the graphics on him are fairly accurate.

My final thoughts on this diecast? I'd say he's a good buy if you can find him around the $20 or under range. For completionists, it's the better release to get for your Cars collection compared to the one that came out in the Mattel "Action Agents" line, which looks to be suffering from some sort of late era Elvis bloating or something. Seriously. It's a goofy looking toy.

Thanks for reading, I have many more reviews coming now that I've started opening and photographing a larger portion of my collections. - Mario, the Rogue Hobbyist.
 

Stats	Rating/Information
Item	Crabby the Tugboat
Made by	Disney
Rarity	Uncommon
Classification	Modern - Released in 2014
Condition	Very Good
Procured	Cargo Largo (Retail Reclaimation Store), KCMO
Worth	between $25 to $85 on ebay as of Dec 2014
Investment	$13
Further Research	http://carsthetoys.yuku.com/
Trivia & Fun Facts	Though the toy above has a diecast metal hull, most tugs in the real world are built of wood or metal-sheathed wood; the resiliency of a wooden hull prevents damage to both tugboat and vessel in sea/dock operations.

Cars - An 80's formula revisited.

In the 1980's a whole range of what were essentially 22 minute long television commercials raged onto the airwaves to support an explosion of toylines. G.I. Joe, He-Man, Thundercats, Care Bears, Rainbow Brite... the themes and styles ranged far and wide, but all followed a fairly standard formula of toned down violence and a lesson to be learned in the end. Anyone in their late 30s can recall this time, and toy companies and copycat lines of product were everywhere.

"Cars", the Pixar Studios release, was very much a personal project for director John Lasseter, as it was a product of a series of months he spent out with his family taking the scenic backroads of America.

A little over twenty years later, in April of 2006, Mattel began releasing 1:55-scale die-cast models of characters based on, and in marketing support of the Disney-Pixar film, Cars.When I first got wind that Pixar would have a Mattel based line up of diecast cars coming out, I imagined it would be maybe a few of the major characters that would see the light of day, and that if I was smart, I would beat a path to the nearest toy retailer to procure them before it was too late. In fact the night that I went to go see the movie, I went quickly to Walmart right after the show, only to find ten pegs all but standing empty save for a Lightning McQueen, and two Sarges.

The initial wave consisted of Chick Hicks, DJ, Doc Hudson, Fillmore, the King, Lightning McQueen, Mater, Sally, Sarge, Sheriff, Wingo, and Lizzie (who seems to have been the early unintentional chase/rare because of how Mattel short packs certain characters). This was just the beginning as Mattel would have a run away success on their hands that would polarize collectors ranging from niche theme collectors, to facing down the dreaded bane (in this blogger's opinion) of getting to a retail peg section after the Hot Wheels fans have picked it over, to the incredibly bizarre way that Mattel handles box contents, to the short run non-sensical exclusives.

"Cars" the movie was essentially Doc Hollywood (the movie that had Micheal J Fox out as a fish out of familiar waters to the backset of a romantic comedy), but had some great voice acting talent, and a decent storyline that talked about moving on, Route 66, family, and being true to yourself, or more importantly, FINDING yourself. The movie was, as most Pixar movies are, visually stunning and stuffed to the brim with various characters of all makes and models of cars that literally begged to be made into toys.

Fast forward again, and you can find the Cars toy line everywhere from Wal-Mart to Aldi Grocery Stores to ToysRUs, but because of the popularity of the line, distribution of some sub-sets, chase cars, and even some of the more commonly made ones, differ wildly from store to store, state to state, with some stock on hand barely moving in one city, to another city maybe only 30 miles away not seeing any new stock for weeks or months at a time.

I have over the years collecting this line, amassing a large investment of time, money, effort... and going about it the old fashioned way of staying as far from Ebay as possible, and doing store hunts for the personal satisfaction and fun of it, the one thing that has not changed and should have in my opinion is the distribution of the toy line.

Pictured above are examples of Mattel's "Super Chase" and "Chase" selections.

The joy of being able to find a random toy perhaps in a blind box assortment, or maybe track down that one short packed female action figure from a recent big budget blockbuster like Captain America is one of the things that the kid in me revels in.

So as this packaging says on the back, no more than 4,000 of Trike Feldman will be made and found out in the "wild". For a Super Chase as it is though, I found 4 total at my local Aldi grocery, and none in any of the other places where I normally go toy hunting, which includes a list of at least 25 different venues in a 40 mile radius.

But not when it gets harder and harder to collect toy lines because of bad distribution. And Mattel, for all it's presence in marketing and brand recognition, does not know how to get enough variation out to the markets.

I really think that the Carla and Nigel ones should have just been variations that were generally released with the normal versions prior as opposed to counting them as Chase vehicles in this way.

The fact is that at this point in collecting Cars, it can be both incredibly fun even if you don't like the movies, just because of the huge spectrum of car types and characters that were created. That said, it's probably also one of the most frustrating collections I try to keep up with.

(top and bottom left) Megan Carrar (top and bottom right) Trike Feldman

I'll end this with a brief overview of the two characters that I found at the same Aldi. The first, "Magen Carrar" looks a lot like a repaint/retooling of the main character Sally (who is also a Porche, so I guess that is to be expected, and the Cars toy line is rife with repaints and retools of existing cars). Nothing really stands out about this character, and I think she was seen for just a few seconds in Cars 2.

Now "Trike Feldman" is one of those in the Cars line that I really like to find. He is a fairly unique model, and has a great bit of color and variety that adds to his appeal and is what I would expect from something labeled as being a Super Chase.

As I move forward in these reviews, I will try to hit sets, unique editions or variants, and cover some of the weird places I managed to find some of the ones that were harder to get.

Until next time!

Mario, the Artisan Rogue

about.me

@theartisanrogue

Stormtrooper Helmets Reimagined by Celebrities & Artists will be on Display in Celebration of the Global Fan Holiday, May the 4th

Lucasfilm, Disney Consumer Products and Neff announced today the upcoming Star Wars Legion exhibition. Artists from across The Walt Disney Company including Lucasfilm, Industrial Light and Magic, Marvel and Pixar—as well as select street artists chosen by Neff and celebrity Star Wars fans –all come together to create individualized interpretations of the iconic stormtrooper helmet in celebration of the global fan holiday, Star Wars Day or “May the 4th be with you.”

“Creativity has been a hallmark of the Star Wars franchise for over 35 years,” said Troy Alders, Lucasfilm Creative Director for Disney Consumer Products. “May the 4th is a perfect time to celebrate this fantastic group of artist’s unique creations and share them with Star Wars fans.”

“As a lifelong Star Wars fan, it’s been a dream of mine to collaborate with Lucasfilm,” says NEFF Founder and CEO, Shaun Neff.   “Teaming up with some of the most prominent street artists from around the world, we are thrilled to work alongside The Walt Disney Company—to re-imagine such an iconic piece of cinematic history as the stormtrooper.”

Exhibition details to view the decorated, customized helmets, for free:
WHERE:            
Robert Vargas Gallery
620 Main Street
Los Angeles, CA 90013

WHEN:              
Friday, May 2nd 4:00pm – 8:00pm
Saturday, May 3rd 2:00pm – 6:00pm
Sunday, May 4: Noon – 4:00pm

For more about Star Wars Legion, visit http://starwars.com/news/star-wars-legion-reimagining-the-stormtrooper-helmet-for-star-wars-day.html

Featured Product - April 8, 2013

 Disney Pixar 2.5-inch Blind Box Mini Figures by Funko

New from Funko, come these blindboxed Disney Pixar figures. Eight characters are featured in this release with 3 variants to total 24 different figures to be had. Featuring Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh, Maleficent, Tinker Bell, Sulley, Mike, Stitch and Jack Skellington each figure stands 2.5" tall and is available for $5.95 in the Tenacious Toys online store.

~Mr. N. Visible

Disney / Pixar 2.5-inch mystery figures by Funko up for preorder

 Preorder your Funko Disney / Pixar blind box minis here! 8 characters with 3 variations of each. Coming in March.