Yeah, the figure of Darth was OK as far as detail went. So points to them for some improvement there. I still can’t figure out why they didn’t give his cockpit seat some armrests though, unless they assumed that Lord Vader is so powerful in the Force that he don’t need no stinkin’ armrests (or seatbelts either apparently) while he’s flying.
I don’t know what food I’d like if I time-traveled to 1973 or so. The best thing to do would be to track down my parents and scare them into a much better overall family diet by showing them what resulted from them letting their baby boy becoming a sugar addict. [:'(][;)]
I built this kit while in college, maybe 1983 or 84. Yeah, I left it all unpainted silver plastic. I still have the instructions and the bridge(?) glass piece. Also the USS Palimino ship that sets in a small docking port.
The last time I saw that kit for sale was at a seedy liquor store in Kapahulu. Like some other similar stores they had a small but good selection of kits. I think I got my old AMT KlingonD-7 there.
Cool Rob, I thought you’d mentioned the kit before. Funny I was around back then and picked up a few of ‘The Black Hole’ action figures but never any of the kits. The only SF kit I had was the starfighter from the NBC ‘Buck Rogers’ TV show. Most of the kits I had as a kid were all aircraft.
G, thanks! So I need to hunt though all the seedy ABC stores in Hawaii!!!
MPC did three Black Hole model kits. I got the Maximillian kit, still have it, as a kid. Then I got the Cygnus while in college and probably 20 some odd years ago, I got the Vincent robot kit.
I never got the Buck Rodgers fighter, but had the Draconian raider. I remember putting an F-16 seat and pilot inside the fighter. You can see it in this old photo of jjunk that came from my childhood bedroom.
No, the seedy liquor stores I mentioned were not the nice, tourist-friendly ABC stores! They were the ones with faded merchandise in the window (ie model kits), beer neon signs, sports betting sheets sold at the counter (for entertainment purposes only!), and porno mags on spinner racks right on the sales floor.
There would be two. Hopefully stacked side by side on the shelf. The Aurora “Wheeler Cruiser” and also their release of “Sealab”. Nothing else really tips my bucket
I’d head back to the Christmas of '78 and grab the Monogram B-24 Liberator kit my aunt and uncle had got me. I was 4 at the time so it was way over my head, but my older cousins were given models as gifts and they didn’t want me to feel left out. I remember trying to open it on the living room floor and start building it on Christmas Eve. I was ultimately talked into trading it in for an Adventure People set, but that kit has always held a special place in my memory.
Rob: Yeah, I think you’d posted the photo before. Really cool collection of vintage kits. I had a simular walker like yours on the left from Robotech. I think I still have a few parts of it but the main kit is gone.
G: Ah ok. I just call everything an ABC store since I can’t spell liquor. Maybe I should just say ‘booze’ store…
As a kid, that MPC TIE was one of my favorite kits, and one of the first of my Star Wars models. I think R2-D2 was my first followed by Luke’s X-Wing, the TIE and C3PO out of the clearance aisle. It sat there for forever before I finally grabbed it.
The Empire Strikes Back gave us the Star Destroyer, Slave 1, Snowspeeder (my favorite), and the AT-AT. I think there was the Hoth base diorama, but I didn’t get that one until many years later.
They dumbed down the line for the Return of the Jedi with the majority of the new kits being snap together kits like the Y-Wing, TIE Interceptor, B-Wing, A-Wing and AT-ST. But that Speeder Bike was the bomb! They also reissued the Falcon without lights.
The way MPC went about the entire Star Wars line was fascinating. There’s not a hint of any sort of attempt to have a consistent scale among the vehicles. Examples (as per Scalemates):
Vader’s TIE was in 1/36, but Luke’s X-Wing was in 1/43 and 1/63 for the ROTJ version; the standard Imperial TIE was in 1/51; TIE Interceptor in 1/51 then in 1/48
Rebel Y-Wing was in 1/95; A-Wing in 1/48; B-Wing in 1/98; Snowspeeder in 1/22
Imperial Shuttle Tydirium in 1/89; AT-AT in 1/100; AT-ST in 1/54; Speeder Bike in 1/11
Boba Fett’s Slave-1 in 1/85
Threepio & Artoo in 1/8; Darth Vader in unknown scale
I’ll put this down as a classic case of old-school model manufacturers basically making up scales out of thin air just so the parts trees will fit inside a pre-determined box size, in a way that was sort of typical in the store retail market of the first thirty or forty years of the kit industry (see also Revell’s warships, ranging in scales from 1/429, 1/500, 1/700, 1/720, etc etc etc as another example of this sort of boxing) . Either that or AMT were under some sort of pressure from 20th Century Fox/Lucasfilm to have the finished kit be able to easily fit into a kids hand so they can chase each other around playing starfighter duel. They were probably correct in assuming things like “they’re just kids playing with toys, they won’t care in the slightest about accuracy in either scale or detail”.
OMG I seriously until the moment I saw this completely forgot that I had one of those kits! I didn’t finish it and have no idea where it went, but…dang, thanks for that memory!
BOX SCALE! Yeah, I always thought it was odd that I couldn’t put the SW stuff next to each other for size comparison. I (fairly) recently acquired the MPC original issue X-Wing, Darth Vader’s TIE fighter, and AT-AT. Now I’ve got to see if I can find a speeder bike.
Keeping with the theme of the OP, I have to say that I’d probably try to get the model that my father had on top of the wardrobe in the garage. It was some sort of old model car, something like a Packard or Rolls - I remember it as metallic maroon with a rumble seat, and that’s about it. I’d love to get my hands on one and do it, possibly even as a gift for him, since I know he never finished it…
Back when I was a kid in the 60’s, I remember seeing this big beautiful red hot rod setting on the top shelf of the five and dime. The box was huge, well at least to a boy of 10, and I would make an excuse for Mom to have to send me to the store just so I could take another look at it. It didn’t come to be though but if I could find one today I definitely give it a shot.
A Revell 4662 F-4 in 1/32. I tried to build two back in the day, but where the body meets the wing always got a gaping hole in it from to much sanding (this was back in the day before water based putty).
I’d settle for finding a few decal sheets for the Monogram original Colonial Viper kit. Since I’m not about to find the kit of the Chrysler Turbine car, I might as well settle for a second choice.
That four legged walker originally came from the Dougram TV series. Many of the Robotech kits came from several Japanese cartoon shows. Most of them were re-branded without the permission of the creaters and eventually had to be withdrawn. However they did manage to make it to the board game version called Battletech, for a short time. I have several of the lead figures.
I remember doing some research on the old Revell Robotech model kits. What they did was akin to taking all Star Wars, Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica kits and combining them into their own science fiction line called Galatic Trek Wars.
I loved those kits. They were awesome and I built most of them and still have quite a few.
Thanks for the info on the Viper markings, I’ll see about them as soon as my disability card recharges.
I had the Cygnus when it came out. I even considered lighting it up, but since the hull was solid grey plastic, I figured it wouldn’t be worth the effort. If I had it now things might be different.
All monogram original issue 1/48 kits, especially the 4 engine bombers, but if I could only choose one bomber it would be the B-24J, and the Testors 1/48 electro plated P-51D ‘moonbeam mcswine’ … and the revell huey gunship (1/32?)
