1990s | Vintage Action Figures

Extreme Sports Thrashin’ Mike

When Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reappeared on the small screen in 2003 in a relaunched animated TV show Playmates Toys picked up their old license and resumed production of their legendary TMNT action figures, raising the bar with every new figure set with increasingly clever and inventive toys.

Their range of solidly constructed action figures were also built to survive heavy play. This particular 5 inch figure, for example, was part of an accessory-packed set of figures from that same year – the Extreme Sports line – which kitted out the turtles in helmets, knee and elbow pads, to protect them whilst scooter riding (Leo), BMX riding (Don) in-line skating (Raph), and in the case of Mike here, skateboard surfing.

Snikt! Wolverine gets his claws out with Toy Biz!

Several years ago I posted a great vintage advert for the first wave of 5-inch X-Men action figures produced by Toy Biz, which appeared in issue #1 from the October …

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Pink Ninja by Bandai!

Who can resist a ninja action figure?! Not me, evidently, as I knew I had to have this figure the second I saw it in a charity shop on a recent trip back to the UK to visit friends and family. I wasn’t entirely sure who this character might be, but knew it probably wouldn’t take much sleuthing to discover the identity of this dazzling pink net launching girl ninja!

She may look like something out of Disney’s Aladdin, but I soon discovered that this 5 ½ inch action figure is a Ninja Ranger released as part of Bandai’s Mighty Morphin Power Rangers toyline in 1995, in conjunction with the TV show Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Season 3 and the big screen version Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie.

Marvel Superheroes Thor by Toy Biz!

With no less than three Thor movies starring Chris Hemsworth appearing at the rate of one of year – last year’s Thor, directed by Kenneth Brannagh, and the imaginatively titled sequel Thor 2 still to come in 2013, and of course, Joss Whedon’s The Avengers presently smashing box office records all over the world – Thor, the Norse God of Thunder, has never been so popular. A veteran character from the Silver Age of Comic Books, Thor was created by the comics dream team Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, together with Lee’s younger brother Larry Lieber, first appearing in Journey into Mystery #83 in 1962, looking rather like this 1991 action figure by Toy Biz.

Captain Simian and the Space Monkeys

Sometimes we need a little help from our friends, so big thanks are in order for Twitter follower @happymonkeyshoe who helped me identify this cosmic monkey when I sent out a tweet for help recently! I’d spotted him on a market stall in Rome, but hadn’t the faintest idea who he might be – thanks Dyl, for introducing me to the world of Captain Simian and the Space Monkeys!

The only clue to be found on this 5-inch chunky monkey is a copyright line which reads © 1995 HEI & MPI – which I assume stands for toy distributor Marco Polo Imports – although UK toy designers Bluebird Toys actually created these figures, with Mattel handling US distribution in 1996.

Tarzan…King of the Fast Food Jungle!

I’ve been a vegetarian for almost all of my adult life so it’s been quite some years since I’ve eaten a burger or stepped inside a McDonald’s restaurant, and as a result have never really been a collector of the ever popular McDonald’s Happy Meal toys and action figures. They do seem to turn up in bargain bins and on market stalls pretty regularly, however, and I inevitably find them hard to resist!

A stroke of marketing genius, Happy Meal toys have been getting kids to drag their parents into the fast food chain for decades, with Disney heavily involved with the company as a means to promote its latest films during the 1990s, until they abruptly ended that relationship in 2007.

Samurai Don – The Foot-fightin’ Film Star from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III!

By the time everybody’s favourite reptiles had appeared on the big screen for the third time in 1993 in the unimaginatively entitled movie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III, TMNT fever was maybe waning a little since its frenzied heyday of the late eighties. Certainly, this live-action movie suffered from poorer quality costumes – Jim Henson’s amazing Creature Shop had been involved in the previous two cinema outings and was missing from this production – although, with an adventure which saw the turtles transported back in time to ancient Japan, how could the tie-in action figures be anything other than awesome?! Regardless of the quality of the movie, the accompanying Playmates Toys 5-inch TMNT action figures were extremely cool.

Neo Lord - the Neosapien Super Warrior from Exosquad

Neo Lord – Neosapien Super Warrior from Exosquad!

I confess that when I found this ugly-looking bruiser in a flea market recently I didn’t immediately recognise him and needed to do some sleuthing on the Internet to put a name to his gnarled face – Neo Lord, one of the Neosapien Warriors from the 1995 Playmates Exosquad action figure series.

Originally launched in 1993 as spin-off toys for the Japanese anime-inspired Exosquad cartoon series created by Universal Cartoon Studios, like all self-respecting toy lines the Exosquad action figures and vehicles came packaged with fully fledged back stories which helped to expand the entire Exosquad universe lore.