A portrait: one through ten

As a special celebration of all things ten, I have seen fit to take one last group shot of the premiere ten toys of INAKA. I love that acronym, by the way. Makes this blog sound important and Japanese.

Does the picture need explanation? I assumed it to be pretty obvious, but I want my intentions to be made clear to all. After all, my dad walked in on me positioning and photographing this eclectic set of toys like a freaky man-child, so I don’t want this to be for naught.

At the rear, Oogie Boogie has established himself a throne of the equally creepy Fi-Do from which he does his bidding, but not his glowing. Alternatively, they have eked out a relationship and are going steady. It’s up to interpretation.

Just ahead of them, Wildwing and Lowly Worm are engaging in road rage. Though Lowly continues to beg that they ‘just be friends’, Wildwing has gone mad with hockey fury. Unfortunately for Wildwing however, he has left the goal completely unguarded, causing his Ducks to lose in a record 94-0 slaughter. As a result, Wildwing is transferred to Thailand’s national team, where he becomes an instant star.

You might have noticed Robin Hood fleeing with his coveted sack of gold, having discovered the Turtlecycle to be history’s first getaway vehicle. Tragically, Robin Hood does not know how to operate a motorbike, and furthermore, it lacks handlebars and a reversible trashcan sidecar. He will be missed.

Feeling emotionally distressed by the chaos around him, Scar tucks his tail between his legs and slinks away from the scene. He finds solace only in bubble baths and Enya’s Shepherd Moons album. Needless to say, he’s never the same again.

This is indeed a spectacular day for the hapless Ugly Laser Man, who has finally found a head he can point his gun at, after years of pointless shooting at toes. The luckless fellow in this position is the smug Snoopy, who chose the worst place to take a nap. If only he truly were a magician, he would have been able to get out of this mess. His only hope is that Lowly Worm chooses to park nearby, so that Snoopy may run Ugly Laser Man down in his apple car.

Duck has no fucking idea how he got this far away from the railroad tracks. But he’s a malicious son of a bitch, so he simply watches the bloody mayhem with glee. It only comes to a halt when Snoopy asks the horrifying question:

“Is that train fucking smiling?!”

#0010: Oogie Boogie

We’ve hit something of a hallmark today. An important moment, and one that will go down in history for its significance in the world of toy eulogies.

We have reached ten toys.

That’s ten toys that I won’t play with anymore. Ten prizes that have ended up in someone else’s possession. Ten little pieces of my life that I have passed onto the next generation. It’s like donating sperm, you know. My little babies are out there somewhere, and I’ll never see them again. Just, most of them aren’t as sticky as that.

So a special day calls for a special figure. And although I don’t know if you (or even I) would consider this one to be ‘special’, per se, while I was sifting through the tub for the next selection, he just felt right. You know how sometimes in life, you pick a winner? Today, my winner was in the form of a fat ghostly sack filled with bugs.

Let’s roll the dice with Oogie Boogie.


Haha at first I typed that as ‘Oogie Boobie’. Sounds like a kinky game for the bedroom.

I was a fan of The Nightmare Before Christmas back in the day, so much to the point it’s hard for me to say ‘Night Before Christmas’ without slipping up and chucking a ‘mare’ in there. Its animation style is still beautiful, its denizens are still surreal and creative, and I’ve been known to strut down the street as quickly as my spindly legs will take me while fondling everything I see and asking ‘What’s this?’

Unfortunately, I choose to do this naked, so it’s not considered acceptable in today’s uptight society. Not until that proposition passes, at least.

Oogie Boogie (Boobie) was the antagonist who tried to kill a singing skeleton and Santa Claus. Yes indeed. It’s like Casablanca all over again. He also had one of the most boss songs from the movie, a swingin’ jazzy tune where he declared his love for gambling and killing Santa Claus. If you haven’t heard it yet, check it out on Youtube. It’ll give you newfound appreciation for this toy, and possibly also a distinct fear of sacks.

This Oogie Boogie toy knows where it’s at. He’s not posable, he’s not opposable, it’s just not possible. All the same, he grins a fearsome grin, dice in hand, curiously showing snake eyes, which he hated. I know, it’s referencing the game of chance and everything, but I would have thought he’d be so superstitious that he would never roll from the starting position of two ones.

I don’t think anyone else in the world has ever analyzed this toy. Maybe they should. I feel as though something good is coming from it.

I seem to recall him glowing in the dark, just as he did in the movie. I love glowing toys. Especially when they’re considered canon to the character’s ability set. I don’t know what advantage glowing would have given Oogie Boogie, other than being able to blend in with his neon surroundings, but he sure had it.


That’s the demonstration of his glowing ability, which you will have surmised is not much. In actuality, it seems as though the only part of him that still glowed after twenty minutes of light exposure was the inside of his mouth, but my elitist camera clearly felt slighted by this lacking glow and chose not to capture it.

I swear to god, he fucking glows. And that showed some dedication right there, taking the boogieman into a darkened closet. I mean, Christ, that’s the boogieman’s domain right there: I was just asking for trouble. So when he broke my nose and chewed off my fingers, I wasn’t exactly surprised. It just made this review a little harder to type, because I usually type with my nose.

For some unknown reason, he’s got a sort of discolouring phenomenon occurring across his body. You will have noticed the prominent orange and blue smudges upon his stomach, but his back is even more wild.


I don’t know how to explain this, but it’s almost like a child just assaulted Mr. Boogie with a crayon. And though it certainly wasn’t me, whoever that evil, artistic little toddler was has surely devalued Oogie to all get out. I could have made millions off my Oogie. Instead, he’s a worthless Oogie. Prick won’t even glow when I tell him to.

Trying to track down this figure’s origin is a fruitless endeavour. There’s lots of Oogie toys out there, each with their own bugs and their own (theoretical) glow, and they’re all much more robust and detailed than my little guy. This could potentially make him rare (or HTF in the lingo of cheap toy hawking), but I may never know.

Perhaps there is a truer story behind all this, and that his decline into obscurity is derived from his lacking ability to glow? What if this was indeed the reason he was evicted from Halloweentown to begin with? I always just thought it was because he was an asshole, but if I was kicked out of town simply because I was shitty at glowing, I’d be an asshole too. Such a misunderstood burlap sack is he.

Give him your love. Give him your arms. Give him your fingers. He’ll take it all.

Worthy of note, I think that this gaffer actually came from a similar line of toys as Scar from our last entry. Does that mean that Oogie Boogie is also a devout Chinese enthusiast? Let us investigate!


‘Applause 2 China’?? The plot thickens…

#0009: Scar

What’s your favourite Disney movie?

I’m guessing that the majority of people would name something from the years of 1989-1994. Some call it Disney’s golden age. Others call it a key era for commercialization and consumer monopolization. Me personally, I wouldn’t use that many ‘zations’ in one sentence, though in essence I suppose I just did.

It’s hard for me to decide on my #1 flick these days. They each have their own merits and shortcomings, and I’ve been yelled at more than once for spending hours on deep analysis of Disney films, when I could be trying to make something of myself. I guess I always just figured that somehow I was making something of myself, but realistically, comprehensive knowledge of Rajah’s character development over the course of the Aladdin trilogy isn’t quite as useful as a doctorate in physiology. My mistake.

When I was a kid though, the choice was easy. It had to be The Lion King. It gave you everything you could ever want, from endearing characters to Mr. Bean as a parrot. It was made of so much ‘yes’, you might as well have called it The Yes King.

By now you should understand that that would mean demanding a multitude of Lion King products. Toys, plushes, activity books… And yes, a sticker book, too. Those things were nightmarish money vacuums. But that’s another tale for another day.

For now, we’re going to get dark and sinister. That’s right, we’re going to take a fleeting peek at Disney’s own Claudius. He’s climbin’ in your kingdom and he’s snatchin’ your lions up, he’s Scar!


Accusations of a fetish for plastic be damned, this toy is just plain sexy. He’s wonderfully coloured, his face is full of expression, and his details are so precise… Plus, his chin is pointy as fuck. It could take your eye out, so step back. Scar is dangerous!

This particular figure has Scar sporting a particularly malicious snarl, making him battle ready, or plotting something wicked. It’s less appropriate for scenes where you’re trying to recreate his famous deception of Simba, because one look at that mug and you just know something’s up.

He also has a mane of delightfully shiny black hair. He’s a true greaser. A toy this fantastic surely created a generation of kids skulking in corners muttering about overthrowing their brothers, with horrible Jeremy Irons impersonations. Unfortunately, I never acquired an adult Simba toy to engage in fisticuffs with Scar, so combat was left in the incapable hands of his younger self, or Pumbaa, who was the only other one I had who was similarly sized. Come to think of it, Scar never did plunge off Pride Rock in my playtime. It’s seventeen years later, and Scar is still king of the ring. You’d think he’d have cracked a smile by now?


In his elder years, King Scar likes to strut the catwalk. He’s also closely involved in foreign affairs, carbon emission reduction and park preservation.

But future generations may not know of his infamous evil exploits. In fact, I worry a little bit for Scar’s well-being once he’s left my loving possession. Will the benefactors treat him with the fear and respect that he deserves? I don’t want to relegate Scar to tea parties with Barbie.

So as a test, I introduced Scar to a three-year-old with no prior knowledge of his tyrannical power and authority.


The results were a raging success. King Scar rules on, and all others tremble in his presence. After briefly sniffing him, granted, but there’s still trembling involved regardless.

So what does this toy actually do? Nothing outside of the realm of our imagination. He has no movable parts or rocket launching action, so he’s not really helping you along much with visual cues. Indeed, if you did fling his ass from the throne, he’d still just look pissed off and in a curious prone position of prowling. That alliteration did nothing to enhance that paragraph, incidentally.

Although I’ve just now discovered that you can tuck his tail in between one of his legs.


I don’t know about you, but I’d say he almost looks bashful now. As though he’s done something naughty that he’s trying to hide, or he’s come across a girl he likes. In my mind, the latter is unlikely.

He’s gay, you know.

He’s also a Chinese ambassador. I know this because his belly told me.


Don’t pretend you don’t see what it says on there. ‘Applause 4 China’. That’s right, subliminal advertisements in a child’s plaything. I don’t know if his propaganda ever got through to me, though on a completely unrelated note, this entry will henceforth consist solely of portraits of emperors from the Ming Dynasty.


Above you’ll see Zhu Yuanzhang. He established the Ming Dynasty in 1368, overthrowing the Yuan Dynasty and helping influence the growth of our proud nation tenfold. His influence was godlike.


Here we have Zhu Di, known during his reign as the Yongle Emperor. He strengthened Chinese culture through erection of monuments such as the Porcelain Tower of Nanjing, as well as weeding out foreign dogs from our land.


I’m sure you already realise that this is Zhu Yijun, son of the Longqing Emperor. His reign was plagued with fiscal instability and, later, encroachment by the Manchu. Despite his faults, he is praised in Korea for his contribution towards defending the Chosun Dynasty against the Japanese.


This is Chip. His reign was brief and confusing, and consisted primarily of mass acquisition of acorns.

#0008: Duck

Kids are notorious for becoming obsessive about the latest craze and surrounding themselves with it, at the expense of their parents’ funds. These days, it’s crap like Ben 10 and Bakugan, things that I wouldn’t understand if I was given a complete thesaurus on it, but they make perfect sense to kids.

I was no different. I was on the Pokémon and Dragon Ball Z bandwagons a decade ago, and they came and went just like all the others. The price of admission to an Anthony birthday in 1995 was Street Sharx. One year later, everyone was going nuts about Space Jam toys. Or maybe I was the only one. Point is; I had legions of those damn things.

If you delve earlier though, past Sonic the Hedgehog and the Ninja Turtles, you’ll find my simplest, earliest fascinations. It was basically things that roll when you push them. First off, it was generic cars. And who didn’t love cars as a kid? You’d give your stationary toys a shove, and they’d tumble over and crumple like wusses. But cars? Man, you push them around, and they roll with it. They were like us. They understood us.

Then, it came to branded products. Hot Wheels didn’t quite catch on with me for some reason, even though it would have been the natural progression. Instead, I aspired to collect the things I saw on the television; I wanted myself an assload of Thomas the Tank Engine goods.

Today, we shall premiere this beloved series, with help from my good friend, Duck the Great Western Engine.


Ahh, Thomas. Just hearing the opening tune makes me feel giddy and nostalgic.

For a kids show, it certainly had an odd way of teaching us morals. In every episode, one engine would be our protagonist, and one of two things happened; either he was an arrogant prick who would get taught a lesson, or he was being picked on by other trains and had to show them who’s boss.

And seriously, there was very little in the way of character consistency. It didn’t matter who it was, every train was a dick at one point. Even the titular character was known to tease that little tosser Percy every now and then.

So it certainly didn’t instill any feelings of trust amongst our peers. Through avid watching of Thomas, we learnt to fend for ourselves, to pull our heads in or else face the wrath of God, and that trains are mean fucks.

Who is this Duck, then? I remember the episode when he premiered, one of the other trains (typically) made fun of him for being called Duck. Apparently his real name is actually Montague, and he’s called Duck because he… waddles. I don’t know. I don’t know why being called Duck because you act like a duck is any nicer than actually being named Duck, but if that’s what Duck wants then that’s what Duck gets.

(Eight instances of ‘duck’ in that last paragraph. I tried to slip that many in my Turtlecycle review as well, but it didn’t quite pan out)

Duck featured the unfortunate fate of being a later addition to the series (albeit the second season, but later all the same). Kids had already chosen all of their favourites, and about 95% of us had based our favourites on our most beloved colour. I was a James kid, because he was red and red was awesome.

In Duck’s case, he was a pompous little train of green. Oops! Kids had already hitched their wagons on Henry or Percy, and it’s not like Duck was much more endearing than either of those two.

He was an outsider. A misfit. A dog of the house of Montague!

Had it not been for my obsessive collecting tendencies back in the day, I doubt I would have acquired Duck for any merits of his own. I don’t remember him getting any playtime, and even if he did, he would have been getting rescued by James. James would have also had all of the superpowers, the witty one-liners and sex appeal. I projected everything I wished to be on that train, by god.


Forgive the nonconformist’s dirty face; he was a garage acquisition after all. The very first Thomas toys had stickers as faces instead of being modeled into the toy, and they would inevitably peel away after years of play and bath time fun, revealing the horrific truth that, under the façade of a grinning mug, they were indeed mere trains.

In Duck’s case, he was a fancy-schmancy edition with a real live face (well, not real real, of course. That’d be fucking creepy), and as such, other than some faded paint in places, a host of chipped flesh and filth ingrained within his being, he’s fared better than most.

I never understood what ‘GWR’ meant as a child. A quick squiz at Wikipedia reveals it as being an acronym for ‘Great Western Railway’, and in a few brief moments I have solved a mystery that plagued me for years of my youth. It was almost as infuriating as how Knuckles’ name was abbreviated to ‘K.T.E.’ in early Sonic games. Made him sound like a goddamn robot.


I’m sure that that very first episode I mentioned would have told us the origins of GWR, but I was a dumb kid who was probably waiting for something funny to happen, or for James to do something cool, or for Ringo Starr to say ‘toot toot’. Clearly my attention span wasn’t at the level required for a sophisticated program about trains.

There isn’t really much more to be said here, because we all know Thomas. He’s been done before. It’s not like I can form a lore about him, and my fanfic would be very blasé and uneventful (and likely jam-packed with James action).

So instead, let’s ponder on something I never quite fathomed. Why were the trains always looking… somewhere to the side? Were they manufactured with the intention of sitting next to one another, smirking a creepy, knowing smile at each other? Were you indeed supposed to navigate them in that direction, thereby condemning them to an eternity of moving in circles?


I’m looking at Duck and looking at him hard, but he’s not telling me anything. All I know is I feel unsafe about the concept of getting into a train that refuses to watch where he’s going. …But really, would I board a talking, self-conscious train who’s often up to mischief and occasionally crashing into things? I suppose not.

You know what else I’ve only noticed from taking these photos? Those faces are damned scary. How were we not terrified by these trains as kids? The way they’d smile, and their eyes would dart around suspiciously? It’s quite eerie. It’s shit like that that got Mulligrubs canceled.

Unfortunately for Thomas the Tank Engine toys, because of their necessary length, they were smaller than our other usual toys. I always hated height inconsistency, particularly when people were larger than passenger vehicles. If this were Zoolander, I would slam the display to the floor in fury.



“Come on, you lot!” whistled Duck cheekily, roaring into the station hours ahead of time. If the Fat Controller found out about this, he would be very cross.

“Come aboard, come aboard!” shouted Duck to the passengers at the station, “We’ve got a long way to go yet.”

“How am I supposed to get on this train?” pondered Dracula Don aloud, shrugging in dismay, “I paid ninety quid for this ticket. Fuck that shit.”

#0007: Fi-Do

Back in the 90’s, Beanie Babies were hot property. I don’t seem to recall any sort of favouritsm among most collectors; it didn’t matter if it was a frog, a bear or an elephant, if it was retired, it was considered golden.

Me personally, I was a cat collector. I went to great lengths to collect every single variation of cat (in the early stages, they all looked the same other than fur colour, which made my multitude of purchases even sadder), until it struck me: those bigwigs at Ty Inc. would never stop producing them.

Where I would once feel glorious pride for finally nabbing that elusive white Flip, I would later feel cheated and bewildered how quickly a Bently or Frisco would hit the market. It was like a zombie movie; no matter how many I picked off, four more would surface in their place.

That being said, if I had to choose between fending off hoards of zombies or collecting stuffed animals, I would much prefer the latter. So really, I lucked out, I suppose.

There was an inexplicable excitement whenever you saw that a store stocked Beanie Babies. You’d run over to them (well no, you’d walk, but running sounds more animated) and sift through them for a goodie, inspecting each thoroughly for authenticity.

Could the same be said for 1997’s Teenie Weenie Beanie Meanies? Would you hoist a flatulent Bart elephant to the air with the same elation you would had you found the legendary dragon Magic?

…The short answer is no. The reasons are plentiful, and let’s explore some with my friend, Fi-Do the Dalmutation.


In case it isn’t strikingly obvious yet, Meanies were an attempt to cash in on Ty’s stuffed craze by creating their own line of gross, unusual toys. They would theoretically become collectibles like the Babies, each model going out of production like their prolific cousin, but tragically, it seems as though the whole line drying up in 2000 has done nothing to increase their value.

I can’t remember where it was that I got my first and only Meanie, but I do remember being faced with a decision that day: Which one would I choose? I could only get one, and I had narrowed the contenders down to either Fi-Do, or Boris the Mucousaurus. Two-headed dog or dinosaur with a runny nose? If only all choices in my life were so simple and inconsequential. If only all choices on Earth were as mundane. World problems, solved on a basis of which stupid stuffed toy you would buy.

In the end, I went with Fi-Do for the reason that he was less gross. Perhaps then, I really needn’t have gotten a Meanie at all. When one of the product features is of its being ‘Totally gross!’, you have to realise that its ability to be repugnant might be of mild importance. The significance of Meanies was clearly lost on me that day.


Retrospectively, I made the right choice. Boris looked like shit; at least Fi-Do was aesthetically pleasing. He’s a two-headed dog with his eyes and ears all mixed up. Hehe he’s fun.

But really, Fi-Do offers little else other than some jumbled features. He’s just a sad little sack of beans, and I can’t picture him making anyone’s day. Just imagine the look of chagrin on a little girl’s face when she unwraps her present, and out comes Fi-Do?

Christ, I’m disappointed for her, and she doesn’t even exist.

Look, the Meanies idea is nothing that hasn’t been done before, and done much better. Remember the Garbage Pail Kids? Originally Cabbage Patch-esque collectible cards (before copyright infringement opted them to decrease the similarity) with grotesque qualities. Pimply Acne Amy, multi-eyed Starin’ Darren, Max Axe the executor, or my personal favourite, Adam Bomb, who simply exploded.


These characters were legitimately disgusting, or in some cases even frightening. I mean, shit, Brady Back Ribs was a baby that was eating his own ribs. People bitch about Ricky Gervais praising his atheism, when we once had a self-cannibalising toddler appearing as stickers on children’s textbooks. If it helps raise your concern at all, I’m fairly sure Brady is an atheist, too.

By comparison, Meanies are just mildly quirky. Boris is nothing more than a dinosaur with some glue on its nostrils. Snake Eyes Jake is a snake with a pair of dice for eyes. Otis Octopunk on the other hand, he looked pretty cool. They should have just released a shitload of Otises. I’d be down with that.

Without having really done a lot to describe the toy itself, I feel as though I’ve limited your scope of appreciation for Fi-Do. The only thing I can really offer is that he’s proportionately awkward. Which seems like a really obvious statement to make on a two-headed dog, but like, his body is so tiny, but his legs are remarkably long.

Why for, Fi-Do? Doth thy seek’st a lengthy trek? This is an appropriate thing, because I fear as though he will change hands many more times from here on before he finds a good home. Let’s put it this way; if this doggie went to the pound, I wouldn’t like his chances.

Also worth mentioning is that there is a section of Ty Inc’s website called ‘Ty Girlz’.

…I certainly hope they’re not retired…

#0006: Smug Snoopy

It won’t take a genius to deduce that some reviews are better than others, because, in all fairness, some toys are better than others. It’s true for all things in life, after all. For every Ninja Turtle, there’s an Ugly Laser Man. For every Meryl Streep, there’s a Jon Heder.

So today I look at a toy that provided no childhood glee. Instead, it seems as though its sole purpose is to bemuse me now. Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce the smug Snoopy.


Yup, there he is. In all his glory. Whatever glory he holds, anyway. I don’t know where he’s from, what his deal is, where his ambitions lie, or indeed, even exactly what he’s supposed to be dressed up as.

Upon first retrieving him, I had picked him for a magician, about to perform some sort of trick. He’s got the pose, he’s got the big bowtie, it all added up. But then, I pondered more on his cummerbund, and general lack of magical paraphernalia.

Really, if they’re going to make magician Snoopy, he’d at least have a magician’s hat, or a bouquet of flowers in-hand. After all, what’s a magician without the magic? An illusionist? Ha! We don’t need no Criss Angel Snoopy, thank you very much.

So then, I was convinced that this was in fact conductor Snoopy. Why, he’s the front man for the best orchestra you’ve ever seen. He’s got Schroeder on piano, he’s got Peppermint Patty on the triangle, he’s got Ringo on the drums, he’s got it all!


He looks like a crowd pleaser… and as illustrated by the picture above, his very demeanour practically demands celebration from less smug counterparts.

But…

He’s still missing that something. He has no conductor’s baton… and no crazy, frizzled, Beethoven-like doo. Whether or not the manufacturers would have been wise enough to have included the hair I’m not sure, but it’s enough of an oversight for me to strip Snoopy of his conducting title.

And really, it’s this lack of equipment that proves most damning to Snoopy’s ambiguous career options in this toy. Searching for ‘Snoopy tuxedo toy’ yields several entries for a vastly superior toy with a top hat and a stand, who would bow down when you pushed… something. I’m not sure what you had to push. His resolve, maybe.

Curiously, that toy showed the exact same copyright year as this one; 1966. But who knows, perhaps all Snoopy toys had that copyright. ’66 could be a lucky year for Snoop dog. But anyhow, it answers not the question, what exactly is this Snoopy supposed to be?

Judging by his lack of equipment, which belies his snappy dress style, I have come to the bold conclusion that this Snoopy, is in fact…


A valet.

How the mighty have fallen. Subordinate to a Fraggle!

I’m sorry about this review. There’s only so much that can be done with a pointless toy as this. If it’s any consolation, this review becomes infinitely more readable if you take it in while listening to Patti LaBelle’s Stir It Up. Go on, give it a try.

#0005: Turtlecycle

Somehow, as I cast these toys off into the great unknown, I feel as though I’m saving them, in a way. From an eternity of mediocrity and uselessness, to a future more fruitful. Perhaps they’ll become a child’s cherished plaything? Or maybe they’ll find themselves in the possession of an avid collector, to be proudly displayed upon the mantle? Perchance they’ll even be put to work in the salt mines, earning a hard life’s keep?

It’s hard, nigh impossible for me to say. But today… today stands out as even more of a rescue. This toy wasn’t scooped from the comfortable retirement of an air-tight plastic container in the laundry room like its reviewed brethren. Instead, it caught my eye while I was searching for a lost Vancouver Grizzlies basketball in the garage.

In case you’re wondering, the garage is essentially where my old possessions go to die. Everything is deteriorating out there, and each visit is more and more depressing. There’s my ancient stuffed Garfield, burrowed into by vermin. And there; there’s good old Elmo, caked under a layer of dust. And it’s hard to tell, but I’m fairly sure that sun-bleached tragedy was once Bucky O’Hare.

You could think of me as a saviour, plucking the forsaken from the rubble like the hand of God, or Moe Szyslak in that episode where Homer became a boxer. Like I said, I cannot say with any certainty where these toys will end up, but surely, it cannot be as bleak as the existence out here in the garage?

The victims are many, but I only had time for one.

So it was just like that, that I dusted off and gave a wash to the remains of the Turtlecycle.


You might think it’s disrespectful to the cherished Ninja Turtles franchise for me to make this tattered abomination the inaugural Turtles item. It’s dated, broken and incomplete. But dammitall, it was on its last legs, it was practically begging for redemption. Wolfman Leo and caveman Michaelangelo can wait. The time for the broken Turtlecycle is NOW.


Fantastic. Though my Turtlecycle no longer resembles the imagery on its packaging, the very promise that it once had makes me pity it more still.

Where to start? The marvelous slime-shooting slingshot? The inclusion of the National Turtle Quiz Jokebook? The insane Leonardo shouting ‘Turtles rule’ while wielding a trashcan lid, like the member of a cult? Perhaps I need not say anything at all. These things speak for themselves, really. If we’ve gained nothing else from this review, perhaps we should be happy to know that Leo is apparently batshit crazy. Like Westboro Baptist Church-type kookoo.

Also, don’t think that I didn’t notice that the figures in the inset are actually Raphael and Donatello, offering a whole slew of other questions. Wasn’t there a Leonardo available at the time? Is Raph slutting his ride out to all takers? DID HE DIED?!

…The latter was supposedly a meme. I just wanna be like the cool kids.


The reverse is perhaps even more enticing; if the wacky illustration didn’t hook you in, then this surely did: a bevy of Turtlecycle features. From ‘sewer saddlebags’ to ‘foot-ripping Hub Cap’, it’s all there and it’s all glorious.

The fact that you could also point the trashcan sidecar in either direction was apparently nothing to be sneezed at, garnering not one but two individual examples. Frankly, I didn’t think it was either that hard to understand or that incredibly exciting to make such emphasis necessary, but I’m not a child in the year of 1989 right now. For all I know, maybe that was the only thing worth talking about back then.

Take note that you save two pizza points for purchasing this product. Me, I never used any of those damned pizza points, but I reckon I would have accumulated enough to have been awarded something mighty special. It’s a shame, I don’t think I kept any of them, throwing them out with the rest of the packaging to be recycled. Some bastard at a recycling plant probably got rich off all of my pizza points.

And my favourite bit: the box tells us to collect all the Ninja Turtles merchandise ‘…or else!’


Talk about your pressure advertising!! It’s not like this was Goosebumps or Spawn, this was friendly, safe Ninja Turtles. Why threaten us like that?!
Between you and me, I never did collect all the accessories. I haven’t felt the ramifications yet, but I will have a little bit of trouble getting to sleep tonight.

Other than the unopened boxes of yesteryear, it’s hard to find this toy available in its entirety. Most of them are either missing the sidecar, the handlebars, or in my case, all the above. Plus, it’s a smidgen obscure for being one of the earlier ‘playsets’. Everyone wanted the much more prominent Turtle Party Wagon, or the iconic Technodrome. Ain’t nobody wanted a slimy motorbike.

As such, a Google search will net you less results about the enigmatic Turtlecycle than pages about a turtle’s life cycle. But maybe you’re into that.

Anyway, my Turtlecycle is in such a state of disrepair that there really isn’t much worth mentioning about it, so instead here are four turtley revelations I had while doing all my research on this toy.


1. What is the point in having a license plate on the Turtlecycle? It feels redundant; It’s not like it’ll be hard to identify the Turtlecycle if you got hit by it. It’s the GREEN MOTORCYCLE SHOOTING OOZE OPERATED BY GIGANTIC TURTLES. Even if there’s more than one of those in New York, there’s bound to be only nine, tops. It won’t take long to find.

2. Why is the Turtlecycle adorned with turtle shell gear? Did our beloved boys kill some hapless wannabe TMNT’s and fashion a bike out of it? I only shudder to think.

3. Not only is our sidecar missing, but judging by the two-decade-old sticky tape on the bottom, we must have snapped it off clean. Perhaps in the process of attempting their precious reversibility function? Blatant false advertising! They promised me reversibility and I got none. I want my pizza points back.

4. Did you ever wonder why humans always got scared shitless when they saw the Turtles in public, even though they’re so cute and cuddly? I’m inclined to think that it’s because they actually look like this costume.


Fuck, I’m running already.

Finally, if you’re wondering why I had a picture of Davy Crockett Raphael draped over the Turtlecycle, looking less like he wants to ride it; more like he’s challenging someone to an arm wrestling match, the answer is simple. Without the sidecar, this thing can’t balance for shit.

For your amusement, here is a brief video of me attempting to get him to ride. He’s either drunk, or safety conscious about his lack of a helmet. You decide!