When I was a kid, I remember several classmates of mine did not like the fact that Droids kept changing main characters. I however, due to Doctor Who, loved the idea of changing characters and changing stories. I guess I was an odd kid, but I enjoyed being able to explore the Galaxy far far away
Droids was a very lackluster cartoon and toy line, but it's always interesting to see what might have been... I wonder what would have happened if Kenner had used Brian Daley's Han Solo at Star's End or Alan Dean Foster's Splinter of the Mind's Eye as the basis of a toy line...
I remember Droids and I was very unimpressed. Never picked up any of the toys because I had moved on to GIJoe and transformers by then. But love the dedication and research you guys put in to these videos. Entertaining as always and informative. Keep up the good work!
This makes me excited as I'm pretty sure someone out there is already hard at work creating figures for other characters in our favorite cartoons that either never got represented or were unreleased. I would love to see animation accurate Bravestarr figures with the same modern articulation as Classics He-Man figures.
Funny enough I just broke down and ordered these last night, been wanting them for a while and hope that maybe we’ll have a fan do some other figures from droids, including some of the more expensive first wave figures. Keep up the great work sir! Always love your videos!
This is a great video as always, Michael. I have these pro custom figures and the Ewoks line they produced. For a long time, I wanted someone to make these lost Kenner waves. At last, my collection feels complete.
Another fantastic video Michael, Happy Birthday! Procustoms produces fantastic figures these look awesome! I have two of their rocket firing Boba Fett's!
Another excellent video Mr French, Droids was one of those vague ‘I thought it was ok as a kid’ parts of the Star Wars universe for me and hasn’t really peaked my interest since I started collecting again, but! After this video, I may have to revisit this avenue. I know Stan Solo also has some excellent figures from this line. Thank you and I sincerely hope you have had an excellent birthday Sir!
So, judging from the digital cutouts in this video, you now own the Second Series Droids figures, yet you never owned the actual produced first series? When I got my own set from ProCustoms, I sent him a group pic of all of them together. He said my Tig and Sise lurking in the background were worth a small fortune. I asked if he had plans to make reproductions of them, but he said he too lacked those figures. I said, "And let me guess, no one is willing to loan theirs out to have molds made from them?" He said something like, "You got that right!"
Ive ordered from procustoms . amazing figures in hand when you get them. you wont be disappointed. i still need to get a few more. great review michael.
It’s amazing that the fans are giving their fandom true high quality products, weather they’re rare variets of pre-existing figures, 100% custom figures or incredibly rare/highly hunted for figures, they always do the best work. Since there’ll be a Bespin playset soon, imagine either a scaled up micro Death Star world playset or a completely redesigned and circular Death Star Playset that can serve double duty as both Death Stars. I personally never had a desire to collect the droids figures, but part of me is tempted to buy the female figures and do head swaps with Super7 ReAction female figures to either make some background figures or OCs.
i suspect the reason the demand and value of these figures is so big today probably literally just boils down to most of the serious old time collectors mostly have everything they want after almost 50 years, but they dont want to stop collecting so they just start looking for other things that still have the same overall branding. also even though most wont admit it i always believe most collectors absolutely will covet toys based solely on the fact that they are rare, even more so if they are well known to be rare.
Man i've had that Screed and Gaff in my cart for months but just can't pull the trigger. As a kid these Droids characters didn't feel Star Warsy enough, but compared to modern Star Wars, they've become tempting...
I remember being a child and soooooo let down about the Droids cartoon, but always wanted 3PO and R2, but never got them. Droids could of had so much potential if accurately executed properly. Such a shame.
Does everyone these days lament that Star Wars (other than these stories) was not continued after ROTJ? I had to move one to Transformers and GIJOE, rarely (as I remember) giving much thought to the what if whenever I ran across my Star Wars toys in the attic while pretending that area was CyberTron! It’s good to see that Lucas had learned from this mistake and that’s probably why we have REBELS and the CLONE WARS animated series, plus the fact that decades of fan love and devotion meant there’s a greater diversity of thoughts and ideas about Star Wars after the prequel’s- it kept the money rolling in! And Transformers allowed for me to finally find an excuse to play in the attic!
Yeah, with Jessica, I'm suprised Kenner didn't use the same type of plastic they use for Lando for a correct skintone, I know it's a prototype but still it baffles me
Love these figs! I don't collect vintage Droids but if I did I would be all over them like Lando was coming onto that Gonk droid. "Why, what have we here..."
You know I grew up remembering Lando also making beer commercials! The power of Colt-45 working every time was smooth! But Disney was like no no no... Lando will bang your microwave............. in a #PImpBlueCape
Cool review. I bought these about a year or two ago. I also own the complete first wave. I was a very big fan of the cartoon. It was re-ran in my area well into the early 90's. And I hate to nitpick, but his name is pronounced Size, not sissy. It's just spelled Sise. And the last name rhymes with mom, Fromm - mom. Kez-Iban is pronounced like Kez - E - Ben. Seriously not trying to nitpick. Your video was terrific as always. I just had to say it because Droids is one of my favorites.
As a kid I couldn’t wrap my autistic brain around having toys not look stylistically similar & the droids and Ewok toys drove me mental. Even now I’d like to see these translated into black series toys just to bandage that wound.
That Star Wars Han Solo head looks a little like Liza Minnelli from Cabaret. Speaking of show tunes, if there evere were a more accurate, imposing Bea Arthur figure from the Christmas Special, I'd put her the nativity scene I set up during the holidays.
I think I watched the first episode and remembered absolutely nothing beyond C-3PO acting more clownish than usual. The franchise was really taking a beating in my age group then. I still enjoyed it, but was rediscovering some elements of the original, like the 'novelization' from Lucas's screenplay and some Marvel back issues. Still an excellent video, though, and it's always great to see Broken Vader even briefly. I don't know why I'm curious, but would you back a Great Heep kickstart from Procustom or Stan Solo?
shame really, we could have the white witch speeder, maybe mungo ship if the toyline succeeded, maybe a playset of the lightstation with a couple of mupples acceries, another we could have for army building are stormtroopers with those staff blasters, another thing we could done is have tie fighter with pirates markings stolen from the empire ewok wise they could replace a dulok with teebo and maybe kneesa
You still can make a great ending. Do you suppose the Droids line got big because the regular vintage line got more competitive, so some collectors migrated over? Or is it the niche market becoming chic, like the time Pabst got big for hipsters?
It was so niche that when they zeroed in on it, the range became exponentially expensive almost overnight, outpacing the vintage Star Wars movie toys unit per unit.
It's a crowdfunding thing, so I'm out. Also, it's Eternia - the most acid tripping, ridiculous playset ever conceived. I suspect recreational drugs were heavily involved. It's dumb.
3:49 - 'Cept at no point in the story was it referred to as IMPERIAL Space Academy, regardless what bozos at Wookiepedia say. Also, Luke too desired to join the academy so is he not a hero either? On top of it all, why would there be only one space academy in the entire GALAXY anyway?!
I think it’s more that this character succeeded in joining and was seen as a “good guy” despite all the films being out, and the kids clearly knowing who the empire was in it’s entirety at that point. As far as the academy thing……Star Wars’ “galaxies” are pretty small, and not all that well written. It wouldn’t surprise me if there was just one.
The Academy is shorthand in the Star Wars universe for Imperial Academy, and yes, Luke INTENDED to join because his Uncle kept him sheltered from the actions of the world, including the Empire, even as Luke exclaims, "It's not that I like the Empire, I hate it!" But when the Empire murdered his family, Luke didn't just keep on the path to the Academy. Jann Tosh was on several adventures in which the Empire played a negative role, but did that stop him? Nope. Imperial Academy or bust apparently.
Great video Michael.. the cantina bit was very funny.. 'The Great Heep' was always my favourite Droids episode.. I'm a proud owner of Mungo and Screed figures
With all due respect! Jann Tosh joining the Empire would actually be something within the Star Wars story because they were numerous Rebel infiltrators within the Empire. It will be interesting to see what Jann’s role in the Empire would’ve been and if he would’ve helped the outcome for the Rebellion, even in some small way! Even if it meant giving his life for the Rebellion.🪦 I going to take an oil bath now, sir.
When I was a kid, I remember several classmates of mine did not like the fact that Droids kept changing main characters. I however, due to Doctor Who, loved the idea of changing characters and changing stories. I guess I was an odd kid, but I enjoyed being able to explore the Galaxy far far away
Droids was a very lackluster cartoon and toy line, but it's always interesting to see what might have been... I wonder what would have happened if Kenner had used Brian Daley's Han Solo at Star's End or Alan Dean Foster's Splinter of the Mind's Eye as the basis of a toy line...
After 10 years you can still hit them out of the ballpark Michael!
Thanks. Means a lot to read such a nice comment. - Michael
"The Adventures of Lando Calrissian: Gonk Lover" is my new favourite Disney+ series.
I know it wasn't everyone's favorite, but I loved droids and ewoks as a kid, great episode and happy birthday Michael
I remember Droids and I was very unimpressed. Never picked up any of the toys because I had moved on to GIJoe and transformers by then. But love the dedication and research you guys put in to these videos. Entertaining as always and informative. Keep up the good work!
Great new video
This makes me excited as I'm pretty sure someone out there is already hard at work creating figures for other characters in our favorite cartoons that either never got represented or were unreleased. I would love to see animation accurate Bravestarr figures with the same modern articulation as Classics He-Man figures.
Lando checking out that badonk-a-Gonk 🤣
Procustoms are absolutely the best customizers out there. Their quality and customer service is the best.
Okay the Lando bit in the Cantina is one of the greatest in-universe-feeling star wars jokes I’ve heard in a while.
I love how the unreleased second wave is infinitely easier to collect than the first wave which was commercially available for a while
Funny enough I just broke down and ordered these last night, been wanting them for a while and hope that maybe we’ll have a fan do some other figures from droids, including some of the more expensive first wave figures. Keep up the great work sir! Always love your videos!
That ending. Hahahaha!
Excellent review. I love what Procustomfigures has been doing by filling in all these gaps in the Kenner Star Wars lines.
This is a great video as always, Michael. I have these pro custom figures and the Ewoks line they produced. For a long time, I wanted someone to make these lost Kenner waves. At last, my collection feels complete.
Another fantastic video Michael, Happy Birthday! Procustoms produces fantastic figures these look awesome! I have two of their rocket firing Boba Fett's!
Another excellent video Mr French, Droids was one of those vague ‘I thought it was ok as a kid’ parts of the Star Wars universe for me and hasn’t really peaked my interest since I started collecting again, but! After this video, I may have to revisit this avenue.
I know Stan Solo also has some excellent figures from this line.
Thank you and I sincerely hope you have had an excellent birthday Sir!
Another excellent addition to this treasured Retroblasting series! Thank you!
So, judging from the digital cutouts in this video, you now own the Second Series Droids figures, yet you never owned the actual produced first series? When I got my own set from ProCustoms, I sent him a group pic of all of them together. He said my Tig and Sise lurking in the background were worth a small fortune. I asked if he had plans to make reproductions of them, but he said he too lacked those figures. I said, "And let me guess, no one is willing to loan theirs out to have molds made from them?" He said something like, "You got that right!"
Ive ordered from procustoms . amazing figures in hand when you get them. you wont be disappointed. i still need to get a few more. great review michael.
You know what’s lacking in the droids toyline? Droids.
A Great Heep toy would be something.
Ok, as soon as I heard tines Horky I literally shouted it in the same western accent as you did and I synched with the audio it was beautiful!
That little joke about Han's friend getting into trouble, hahaha I was expecting something with Chewie but got something way funnier!
"OH that's just wrong!"
Jessica Meade? Oh, you mean Gozer the Gozerian.
Gozer reminded one of my brother's of Denise Huxtable(Lisa Bonet) from the Cosby Show and A Different World tv shows.
always enjoy your show , thank you :)
Finally someone mentioned Kybo Ren. I thought it was an odd coincidence concerning him and Kylo Ren.
It’s amazing that the fans are giving their fandom true high quality products, weather they’re rare variets of pre-existing figures, 100% custom figures or incredibly rare/highly hunted for figures, they always do the best work.
Since there’ll be a Bespin playset soon, imagine either a scaled up micro Death Star world playset or a completely redesigned and circular Death Star Playset that can serve double duty as both Death Stars.
I personally never had a desire to collect the droids figures, but part of me is tempted to buy the female figures and do head swaps with Super7 ReAction female figures to either make some background figures or OCs.
Great content
Side note all of my valaverse pre orders from January just shipped out today
(Pre orders from BBTS)
i suspect the reason the demand and value of these figures is so big today probably literally just boils down to most of the serious old time collectors mostly have everything they want after almost 50 years, but they dont want to stop collecting so they just start looking for other things that still have the same overall branding. also even though most wont admit it i always believe most collectors absolutely will covet toys based solely on the fact that they are rare, even more so if they are well known to be rare.
I often have this crazy .thought that, the lighter blue, Tri-Logo Boba Fett figure variant was originally intended for the Droids cartoon toy line.
Man i've had that Screed and Gaff in my cart for months but just can't pull the trigger. As a kid these Droids characters didn't feel Star Warsy enough, but compared to modern Star Wars, they've become tempting...
Great video!! Now you’re making me want Droids figures.
lmao'd at the han and lando skit
Great work, dude. This video made me feel like a kid in the toy aisle all over again.
Ahhh wouldn't be a Follies/Victory without Broken Vader!
Great Video Michael. Can’t wait till you do a video on the White Witch.
I ordered the Stan Solo Batha in January. I hope it arrives soon.
Ya know, Michael. I bet you'd be the greatest Film Studies/History professor ever. Seriously.
Thanks man. Much appreciated.
@@retroblasting P.S. Happy Birthday!
I remember being a child and soooooo let down about the Droids cartoon, but always wanted 3PO and R2, but never got them. Droids could of had so much potential if accurately executed properly. Such a shame.
Does everyone these days lament that Star Wars (other than these stories) was not continued after ROTJ? I had to move one to Transformers and GIJOE, rarely (as I remember) giving much thought to the what if whenever I ran across my Star Wars toys in the attic while pretending that area was CyberTron! It’s good to see that Lucas had learned from this mistake and that’s probably why we have REBELS and the CLONE WARS animated series, plus the fact that decades of fan love and devotion meant there’s a greater diversity of thoughts and ideas about Star Wars after the prequel’s- it kept the money rolling in! And Transformers allowed for me to finally find an excuse to play in the attic!
These are really well done!
"A fine box" 😏✨
Yeah, with Jessica, I'm suprised Kenner didn't use the same type of plastic they use for Lando for a correct skintone, I know it's a prototype but still it baffles me
Love these figs! I don't collect vintage Droids but if I did I would be all over them like Lando was coming onto that Gonk droid. "Why, what have we here..."
😆😆😆😆💯🔥🔥🔥 Tynes Horky!!!!
Excellent video!!!
You know I grew up remembering Lando also making beer commercials! The power of Colt-45 working every time was smooth!
But Disney was like no no no... Lando will bang your microwave............. in a #PImpBlueCape
Cool review. I bought these about a year or two ago. I also own the complete first wave. I was a very big fan of the cartoon. It was re-ran in my area well into the early 90's. And I hate to nitpick, but his name is pronounced Size, not sissy. It's just spelled Sise. And the last name rhymes with mom, Fromm - mom. Kez-Iban is pronounced like Kez - E - Ben.
Seriously not trying to nitpick. Your video was terrific as always. I just had to say it because Droids is one of my favorites.
Okay, that was a bombshell you just dropped. Jann Tosh joined the empire?!?
lol nothing better than a good old edgy box joke. was definetly not expecting that from your channel always keeping me on my toes; love the content.
My only memories of this cartoon was it showing on bbc 1 in 85 on a Tuesday before the 6pm news
I remember the cartoons but I wasn’t allowed to buy toys as a kid so I never knew about any cancelled toys.
Fantastic!!
I love droids and I always wanted a mongo bayobab and skreed
I wish some of these peeps would make some 78 original Galactica figures. I'm not getting any younger.
At least in the old canon, Ben Burtt’s character in The Phantom Menace is also a Baobab.
Star Wars Victories. Droid. Lost. Wave. Pro custom figures
Great video Michael French! You're looking very sharp! It looks like you had loads of fun making this video! This was truly a Star Wars Victory!
As both a Kylie and original trilogy fan... Your shirt is fucking amazing.
Great review of a uniquely niche section of Star Wars collecting.
(Question: Is Hanbone McGillycutty from Tines Horkey?) :P
Awesome 👍
Most carded DROIDS figures i've seen still have their '99 cents reduced' stickers on them
These Droids figures remind me of LJN Dune line.
I don't know if I'll ever get any 85 droids figures. I want thim though!
Been meaning to ask, what's that Rule63 Luke art (from the shirt)? I can't seem to find it anywhere!
Who else but Lando? Giggity giggity giggity gooo
I see the footage of the series and keep expecting Taarna to start slashing up aliens or Hanover Fist to chase Captain Sternn through the scene.
Where does Michael get all these great shirts from? And what character is he wearing?
As a kid I couldn’t wrap my autistic brain around having toys not look stylistically similar & the droids and Ewok toys drove me mental. Even now I’d like to see these translated into black series toys just to bandage that wound.
That Star Wars Han Solo head looks a little like Liza Minnelli from Cabaret.
Speaking of show tunes, if there evere were a more accurate, imposing Bea Arthur figure from the Christmas Special, I'd put her the nativity scene I set up during the holidays.
I suppose C-3P0’s blinking eyes were added to give him more personality in animated form. But to me, they are creepy and disturbing.
I forgot Tom Bombadil was in Droids.
I think I watched the first episode and remembered absolutely nothing beyond C-3PO acting more clownish than usual. The franchise was really taking a beating in my age group then. I still enjoyed it, but was rediscovering some elements of the original, like the 'novelization' from Lucas's screenplay and some Marvel back issues. Still an excellent video, though, and it's always great to see Broken Vader even briefly. I don't know why I'm curious, but would you back a Great Heep kickstart from Procustom or Stan Solo?
Cool figure. Are they going to make the super rare ewok wrangler ?
❤
shame really, we could have the white witch speeder, maybe mungo ship if the toyline succeeded, maybe a playset of the lightstation with a couple of mupples acceries, another we could have for army building are stormtroopers with those staff blasters, another thing we could done is have tie fighter with pirates markings stolen from the empire
ewok wise they could replace a dulok with teebo and maybe kneesa
🤣 "that's what I call a fiiine box!"
Great video as always Mike. Lovely figures. Who was the female figure in the cantina playset? Cheers.
A custom Akmeena sent by a channel supporter.
You still can make a great ending. Do you suppose the Droids line got big because the regular vintage line got more competitive, so some collectors migrated over? Or is it the niche market becoming chic, like the time Pabst got big for hipsters?
It was so niche that when they zeroed in on it, the range became exponentially expensive almost overnight, outpacing the vintage Star Wars movie toys unit per unit.
@@retroblasting I see. Much like you, I'm baffled why it became chic.
@@retroblasting So we should expect that one day the price will drop when the popularity ends?
Can someone tell me what that droid said to C-3PO?
Michael, what do you think or origins eternia?
It's a crowdfunding thing, so I'm out. Also, it's Eternia - the most acid tripping, ridiculous playset ever conceived. I suspect recreational drugs were heavily involved. It's dumb.
@@retroblasting yeah, I think they should have done snake Mountain. But I don't own the original eternia, so it intrigues me
7:04 oh no!
Didnt droids see release in Europe?
Really nice figures, but $80 each!!! Not sure why these are so much more expensive than Stan Solo figures, or some of Procustom's other figures.
Everything Droids seems to be more expensive than anything else. Why? I have no idea. Reasons beyond reason, as I said.
It’s crazy how bad I want to get a vintage 12 inch Vader and rip the arms off
Lol i thought you were saying that one dudes name was Bon Jovi lol
forgive my ignorance but tell me about that t-shirt!
3:49 - 'Cept at no point in the story was it referred to as IMPERIAL Space Academy, regardless what bozos at Wookiepedia say. Also, Luke too desired to join the academy so is he not a hero either? On top of it all, why would there be only one space academy in the entire GALAXY anyway?!
I think it’s more that this character succeeded in joining and was seen as a “good guy” despite all the films being out, and the kids clearly knowing who the empire was in it’s entirety at that point.
As far as the academy thing……Star Wars’ “galaxies” are pretty small, and not all that well written. It wouldn’t surprise me if there was just one.
The Academy is shorthand in the Star Wars universe for Imperial Academy, and yes, Luke INTENDED to join because his Uncle kept him sheltered from the actions of the world, including the Empire, even as Luke exclaims, "It's not that I like the Empire, I hate it!" But when the Empire murdered his family, Luke didn't just keep on the path to the Academy. Jann Tosh was on several adventures in which the Empire played a negative role, but did that stop him? Nope. Imperial Academy or bust apparently.
@@retroblasting Wasn't Jann Tosh drafted into the Imperial army? I know Luke's friend, Biggs was, but he dodged it to join the rebellion.
Lando joke. Lol. Is this why he hired the cyborg in cloud city as his assistant?
Tynes Horky! Not sure how to spell it, but I sure want to yell it!
I’m from Mississippi. Can’t help it!
Kybo > Kylo
Lando 🤣🤣🤣🤣👍🍺
Great video Michael.. the cantina bit was very funny.. 'The Great Heep' was always my favourite Droids episode.. I'm a proud owner of Mungo and Screed figures
For The Algorithm.
1:07 least effort possible in creating a new figure. squid face body with hammerhead arms and squidface headflipped up.. face palm
Droids could have been a cool cartoon but never was a success. Some of the character designs were interesting.
With all due respect! Jann Tosh joining the Empire would actually be something within the Star Wars story because they were numerous Rebel infiltrators within the Empire. It will be interesting to see what Jann’s role in the Empire would’ve been and if he would’ve helped the outcome for the Rebellion, even in some small way! Even if it meant giving his life for the Rebellion.🪦
I going to take an oil bath now, sir.