Collectible of the Day for January 31, 2011
(First in a series)

Optimus Primal versus Megatron
10th Anniversary Edition

Toy Line: Transformers (Beast Wars)
Region, Year: North America (United States), 2006
Essential Weblink: http://tfu.info/2006/Maximal/TRUOptimusPrimal/optimusprimal.htm
http://tfu.info/2006/Predacon/TRUMegatron/megatron.htm

The Rundown: This is all Julie’s fault. She called me up two weeks ago from the Comic Book Shoppe (yes, one of our more dependable comic book stores is actually called the Comic Book Shoppe, which makes it somewhat difficult to throw out a generic description as a rendezvous point, but I digress). Seems the Shoppe had acquired another collection and she was concerned that I know about the Japanese Beast Wars Optimus Primal and Megatron in the store. I did and later regaled her on the number of variations of the two Beast leaders that appeared to celebrate 10 years.

But a picture is worth a thousand words, particularly when the pictures can be taken from one’s own collection. And here we are.

Rather than start with the two Transformers in question (the subjects of the next two days posts, actually), I wanted to kick this new Collectible of the Day exercise with a bang. And what better bang than the reissues of both Optimus Primal and Megatron.

I honestly cannot remember where I picked up this set of figures. Probably Botcon a few years ago. It was a release limited to Toys ‘r Us, and one I never found in Canada. Based on a Japanese release of the same time, it features the original Voyager scale (i.e. CDN$29.99 price point) Megatron and Optimus Primal, in more show-accurate colours and with new head sculpts that better resemble the visages of the Beast Wars cartoon. So a tighter head for Megatron, and no mouth guard for Optimus. Like the other 10th Anniversary releases by Hasbro, the set also comes with a single episode DVD for “Equal Measures”.

It’s one of those items that always leaves me waffling on the virtues of opening the set versus admiring it in its packaging. For now, I continue to waffle. And while it may lack some of the bells and whistles of the Japanese packaged edition, including the Japanese-region only Golden Disk DVD, the price point and the ability to see the figures without constantly raising the cover flap makes it a great choice.

Additional Pictures:

Back of package.

Tap, tap. Anyone there?

I know, I know. Fairplaythings.com has been very, very quiet for the past few months. Odd considering the recent trip to Japan that screams good blogging. And yet, silence.

No really good excuse. I’ve clearly been preoccupied. With the aforementioned trip, with work, with holidays, and, more recently, with the prospects of a move. To a bigger locale to better display my plastic friends (as well as provide for additional living space, a second bathroom, and all the normal reasons one moves.) It has meant a lot of minor fixes in the current space, and even more packing in advance of a possible home showing TBD.

Which means the plastic is being painstakingly packaged away to make proper space for staging.

The packing of the toys is both a joy and a sorrow. A joy because it provides me a chance to really see what I have, and finally properly catalog the collection. A sorrow because moving means giving up what has been a home for seven years.

But did I mention cataloging? Yes, I did. And it dawns on me that maybe, just maybe, I can use the cataloging as a means of filling the void left in fairplayings. More specifically, maybe it is a way to return to Collectible of the Week, version 2.0. Except this time, how about a Collectible of the Day? Yes. We’re going back to a daily ritual again. A quick and dirty daily ritual admittedly, because as I am fond of saying but find difficult following, “perfect is the enemy of good”. Basically I will click one or two pictures of a particular item and come up with some content (why it’s in the collection, why it is being spotlighted, that sort of thing). But regular content (again!) and an ongoing format.

Something to fill the void.