SilverHawks: Mon*Star

I've been wanting to get around to this review for a long time. While I never had any of the SilverHawks toys as a kid, I loved watching the old cartoon. For those of you that don't know, the SilverHawks were basically the intergalactic space version of the Thundercats. The same pair that created Thundercats expanded their talents and created the Galaxy of Limbo, set in the 29th century, and created the crime fighting SilverHawks. Even many of the same voice actors lent their voices to the new animated series.

On the toy front, LJN - the company responsible for the Thundercats toys, was set to produce the auction figures and vehicles. At the last minute however LJN pulled out for unknown reasons. Kenner stepped in and took over...with mixed results. The SilverHawks toy line is rather small and most of the action figures aren't that hard to come across, but the vehicles are a whole different story. For that reason alone good luck to any collector that has their sights on collecting the entire line.

The SilverHawk's enemies in the series were a group of space mobsters if you will, led by Mon*Star. The similarities with him and the Thundercats' Mumm-Ra have to be intentional. First of all Mon*Star has two humanoid forms. In his "normal or powered down" form he often is shown sitting upon a throne. He can at whim transform himself into a more powerful, armored, version of himself. The animation sequence of this transformation also shares many designs as Mumm-Ra going from his mummy self to his powered up state.

Kenner tried their best to capture this transformation in action figure form, but it falls a little short. Let's take a closer look at the figure.

Like the SilverHawk characters, Mon*Star comes packaged with his own bird (or bat) creature that doubles as a weapon, Sky Shadow. More on that later. Mon*Star seems to have some feline characteristics while in his normal form. Normally the rest of his body isn't all armored up and features darker shades of red. His hair is also much larger, but due to the transformation gimmick I'm sure Kenner had to trim this back on the head sculpt.

Like with LJN's Thundercats toys, Kenner's SilverHawk toys usually featured some sort of auction feature built into the toy. For Mon*Star when you squeeze his legs together his chest and back panels opens up and reveals the powered up, armored head. Using a spring, the new head flips up into place. Mon*Star pulls off this transformation by using beams from the Limbo's Moonstar. During the transformation he utters these words a la He-Man:

"Moonstar of Limbo, give me the might, the muscle, the menace, of MON*STAR!"

Pretty cool, huh? By the way, the same voice actor (Earl Hammond) that voice Mon*Star also voiced Mumm-Ra if you couldn't figure that out from the above video clip.

Now we're talking! Now he looks much more menacing, don't you think? While I love the character design, the gimmick really hampers this toy. If you look carefully the figure is built using two different types of plastic. The arms, lower legs and head(s) are cast of a softer plastic while the center portion of the figure is a more traditional hard plastic. For this reason I'm guessing that explains the difference in the shades of red. Being a 1980's action figure you can probably guess that articulation is almost nonexistent. His arms can rotate a full 360 degrees and you can just barely get his legs to bend out straight to make him sit.

Mon*Star was given his own personal ride, the Sky Runner, a squid hybrid spacecraft. However the toy seems to be extremely hard to find these days.

So we go from Mon*Star looking like this on the left, to this on the right. Big difference. It also doesn't help that the paint apps applied to the face on the left are horribly sloppy.

Mon*Star's companion is the bat Sky Shadow. The toy is roughly the same size as the birds that come with the various SilverHawk characters. Not really a whole lot more to say about this.

Sky Shadow's head ever so slightly pulls out and "locks" into place. When the head is depressed the wings pop forward in a pinching form.

I don't recall Mon*Star using Sky Shadow as much in the cartoon as say the SilverHawks Tally Hawk was used, but at least you can clip him onto Mon*Star's wrist for display purposes.

When it comes to a recommendation I'm a little on the fence. It's not a bad action figure, but isn't that great either. If you are a fan of the series then you'll probably like it, otherwise I can think of better 80's action figures to spend your hard earned money on. I've got a few more SilverHawks figures that I eventually plan on sharing, so if you liked this post let me know and perhaps I'll bump up the next review higher up in my que.

VOR-Tech: Battle Tracker ATV w/ Brad Logan

Be part of the VOR-Tech Undercover Conversion Squad, where things are not always as they seem! Enter a world where a team of ordinary people in ordinary vehicles use amazing computer technology to convert themselves and their vehicles into an incredible fighting force, dedicated to saving Earth from an evil power spreading a deadly plague. Join in this titanic struggle of human against cyborg, brother against brother, and machine against machine!

I first discovered this interesting line of Kenner toys in the late 90's as they were being clearanced out at both Toys 'R Us and KB Toys. I was able to acquire two pieces, but the inventory quickly dried up. Trying to find new VOR-Tech toys on the secondary market has proven quite difficult, but a few months back I found a toy that I didn't own, sealed too! I quickly snatched it up so I could offer it up in review form here.

Right off the bat most of you reading this should be able to recognize the uncanny similarities to the toy line M.A.S.K.. Kenner obviously decided to re-use some of the M.A.S.K. molds and tweek them for their new line. Sadly the line (and accompanying television show) didn't last past one wave / season in 1996.

Why the cartoon and toy line didn't make it past one year is beyond me. While some of the toys we just recycled older toys there were some new molds and ideas integrated into the series. What I've seen of the cartoon seemed to be just as good as anything else on the TV at the time. Let me get this back on topic though. We're here to look at the Battle Tracker ATV toy.

VOR-Tech toys came packaged in one of two ways. Boxed or on a blister card as shown above. I like the large colorful logo. I'm sure that stood out in the crowd of 90's toys.

The back of the card gives you several bits of information. There aren't any instructions packed in so this simple diagram shows you the conversion process of converting the ATV into hovercraft mode. Kenner also did little bios for the driver/vehicle which was an added bonus in my book. What good toy company wouldn't include a ad somewhere on the packaging for other toys in the series?

Sorry for the glare. I tried taking the picture from several different angles and I couldn't get rid of the stupid camera flash. I thought it was interesting that they list the cover occupation for the driver...in this case Brad Logan poised as a TV news cameraman.

" Called to action, Brad Logan drops his news camera and hops on the Battle Tracker all-terrain vehicle, ready to make headlines himself. Armed with his VOR-Tech helmet he converts the wheels of his ATV into jet pads, plus instantly activates dual front gun turrets and a rear laser cannon as his 4-wheel ATV becomes an awesome crime-fighting hovercraft. "

My first ever VOR-Tech purchase was the equally awesome Sonic Stinger sports car. I'll eventually do a proper review for the blog as the vehicle was one of the new molds Kenner created.

The Battle Tracker ATV itself is a pretty nice mold. It's much beefier than the M.A.S.K. toy it was based upon (Bullet). The plastic is of a good quality and the large wheels are free rolling. For a small toy there is a good bit of detail molded into the ATV, especially around the engine area. There are only 4 stickers pre-applied - the headlights and a gray sticker on the rear fenders.

I don't know if the figures are re-used M.A.S.K. figures or not, but they are in the same scale - small. The only articulation are in the hips, shoulders and to some degree the neck/head. I have two complaints about this figure however. 1) the hands are molded to grip the handle bars of the ATV and thus look odd when the figure isn't riding. 2) the head - it just looks off. It's too small and it the sculpt is plain goofy. Of all the VOR-Tech toys I own this is the worst looking figure of the bunch.

From a head on point of view the figure looks OK on the ATV, but when you look at it from the side you'll see that the figure seems to be undersized. You can cram it down a little bit more, but his butt still seems to hover over the seat (no pun intended). Once you do cram him down he's practically looking down at an angle. How can he see where he is driving or flying?!

His bio mentions his helmet. To me this thing looks more like a mask than a helmet. The small black helmet just snaps onto his upper chest and around the head. As you can see his red hat is still exposed. Unlike in M.A.S.K. I have no idea if his helmet has any special power or ability of it's own. From what I saw in the cartoon the helmet basically unlocks the conversion sequence of the vehicle. From a toy perspective this piece could have really benefited by some sort of paint application(s). It's just blah the way it is.

This is where this toy starts to shine in my opinion. The hovercraft mode is nice looking and offers up some fun play patterns. To convert the ATV you simply flip down the wheel assembly on each side to create the hovercraft jet pads. Slide the handle bars back to reveal the front mounted machine guns. On the rear of the vehicle is a laser gun that flips up. You can then position the gun facing either direction you so choose as it's mounted on a ball joint.

This isn't my favorite VOR-Tech toy by a long shot, however there are a few redeeming qualities. The ATV looks good and the alternate form is fantastic. It's simplistic, but that is one of the things that I like about it. I remember playing w/ M.A.S.K. toys as a kid and I loved that you could switch from form to form so quick and easy. It made playing with the toys that much more fun. Where this toy fails is the Brad Logan figure. That shouldn't be a deal breaker for you though if you like the rest of the toy.

Trying to find this toy or any other VOR-Tech toys for that matter will prove to be difficult. Even though they were on clearance at some point there just doesn't seem to be that many floating around the secondary market these days. If you are a fan of M.A.S.K. and you've never heard of VOR-Tech or seen these toys then you owe it to yourself to at least track down one toy.

For a great look at all the VOR-Tech toys and what would've been in the 2nd wave check out the awesome Albert Penello M.A.S.K. and VOR-Tech site here!

Bone Age: T-Rex

I vaguely remember these toys from my childhood, but when I had a chance to pick up a large bag of parts I couldn't resist. I took a gamble on the purchase and it paid off to some extent. Since I don't have much information on these toys nor do I have the instructions this won't be a very in depth review...sorry.

From what I remember these toys were basically large building sets...kind of. Each dinosaur came with a caveman type figure about the size of the figures that came with M.A.S.K. toys. The figure's accessories were very simple - ranging from clubs, small bones to spears. Additional figures were also sold separately. Each dinosaur could be broken down into bones and the rebuilt as some sort of vehicle...and I use that term loosely. There were also smaller sets that were weapons or small vehicles.

I had enough parts in the bag to construct what I think is a complete T-Rex. I gotta say that for a toy from the mid to late 80's I was impressed with the overall quality. The bones were cast in sturdy plastic and for the most part were still white. Old white toys don't usually stay very white. The connector points are cast in clear plastic. The set holds together fairly well. The T-Rex is a little top heavy making it hard to stand up on it's own without some sort of support, but not impossible for it to stand. I think the caveman figure was supposed to "ride" in the skull as the mouth is articulated enough to let it open and close. There isn't really any other articulation to speak of.

The back spine pieces are a different shade of white and I'm not sure if that was meant to be or if the plastic has started to yellow. I wish I had remembered to pull out my measuring tape as this toy stands fairly tall. I don't own the toy anymore, but my best guess from memory would say the toy stood about 2 feet tall.

You would have thought that these toys would have sold well. 1) they are dinosaurs and what little boy doesn't like dinosaurs? and 2) they are a building set of sorts. A lot of the toys I grew up with had some sort of accompanying cartoon show on TV or at least a comic book. Bone Age from what I understand didn't have either so there wasn't an outside force that helped draw kids (and their parent's wallets) in. It's a shame too because when I tried to research these toys after I bought the bag I found some rather nice sets. They don't seem to be all that common on the secondary market either, but that doesn't surprise me if they didn't sell well to begin with. I wish I had more information about these toys to share with you, but for now that is all.