Playmobil Series 8

Female gladiator! Pretty awesome. I'm not sure if the weird B-exploitation movie armor makes is a knock against the figure or makes it better. But it's a figure of a woman with a badass face tattoo. And that shield is an awesome Playmobil accessory.

19th century soldier! I don't know what army this is supposed to be. Anyone? But I love that it came with a bayonet.

Snake Dancer

Oh look, new Playmobil blind pack minifigures. And one of them is an Indian snake dancer... I'm going to put this in the cultural appropriation category, which is a category of toys I tend to pick up: European companies that make semi-stereotypical figures of Asian cultures. She's got the bindi and the snake and I just realized I don't know enough about South Asian cultures to really be judgmental.

Sigh, whether it's racist or not, it's an interesting figure and at least Playmobil is trying by making figures of different races. Wow, this was nicer than I thought it was gonna be.

Coming soon: Paymobil on this blog

My friend just gave me this, so I know what I'll be writing about this December. But until then, I think we need to bridge the last Playmobil Advent Celendar to this one. And I think I've already explained why I buy Playmobil figures, so from now on, whenever I post about Playmobil on this blog, it'll be part of the ongoing continuity of Ben and his makeshift family.

Balance Beam

I was so happy to find someone that still had this set in stock. I've been looking for this ever since I found out about it. I grew up around family really into gymnastics, so I remember watching a lot of balance beam as a kid.

Of course the use of a ball and hoop means this set can be used for a rhythmic gymnastics set. I also love that the balance beam is designed so that figures can stand on their hands. Suddenly you can make figures tumble. Awesome.

Gymnast with Pommel Horse

I love the Olympic Playmobil figures. Sure they might be called "Sports" figures, but let's face it, they're all Summer Olympic sports. I particularly love the accessories that they come with, since it means I can pick up some sports accessories for all the Playmobil figures I have. So the Gymnast's Pommel horse can suddenly become the Pommel horse for a Civil War General!

Samurai and Union Officer

This is not a set. It's two figures I recently picked up from the playmobil website. The Samurai has the upturned, squinty Asian eyes, but I can't get mad because of how much I love the details on the samurai armor.

Meanwhile the Union Officer has a funny mustache. Historical facial hair is always great.

There's just something about the way Playmobil does figures from history that tickles me in the right place. Now if they'd just do some figures from less violent professions, I'd be super thrilled.

Kung-fu guy

Hai-ya!

Continuing my ongoing quest to get action figures of Asian people, I ended up getting the Series 3 Playmobil figure of this Asian dude. Playmobil figures don't really have names, so I'm calling this dude Asian Kung-Fu Guy.

I know I like to ironically collect unintentionally racist action figures of Asian people, (I'm Asian, I'm sensitive to this kind of thing, especially when the toy manufacturer is from Europe) but this guy is even more racist than I usually expect. He's not just a martial artist. He doesn't just have the slanted eyes that all Playmobil figures of Asian people have. He's got a fu-manchu mustache. Oh, and angry eyebrows so you know his fu-manchu-stache means he's evil.

Which is funny, because if the television show "Kung-Fu" with David Carradine taught me anything, it's that the practitioners of Kung-Fu are supposed to be peaceful people. Oh wait, I didn't see the dragon on his clothes. He's clearly evil.

I don't really think this guy is all that racist. But then I look at the mustache and I don't know. I just don't know.

Collectobot

I love Playmobil. Today I went to an Educational toy store and in their Playmobil section I finally found the Olympic sets. Unfortunatley they didn't have the ones I wanted, so instead I had to "Settle" for a Playmobil mech suit.

Playmobil made a mech suit. Also a flying car, but whatever, a mech suit! Sure they call it Collectobot but it's a fricking mech suit. And also:

ELVIS HAS DEMOLISHED THE BUILDING!

Thankyaverymuch.

Vacation window shopping

I went on vacation last week. Here's some of the stuff I didn't buy.

I was sorely tempted to get Elvis a Pegasus to ride, but I realized I could buy one of these sets any time. No need to waste precious luggage space by buying it on vacation.

Hey, they made a Hobo Superman costume.

They had Transformers at Universal Studios because of the Transformers 3D ride. They cost $10 more than they do in regular retail stores.

Although I was tempted to get the exclusive EVAC figure. Evac is a character created for the ride, he's basically the car you ride in. I love when they do figures for this kind of exclusive character, but $25 was too much to pay for a novelty.

I was tempted to get this POP! vinyl figure of Gonzo, but I just had to pass.

I also went to Downtown Disney (not Disneyland itself) and the Disney store there sold all the theme park exclusive figures. Of the "Disney Characters as Star Wars" figures they had, the one I considered getting was this 3 pack of the Duck Nephews as Jawas. They even come with pars of an R2 unit. But in the end I decided that it wasn't worth the $25 considering their insanely limited articulation. I dunno, maybe if they were in scale with regular Star Wars figures I'd be more interested, but the issue is moot.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 24

Day 24:
So apparently the gestation period of the Bensaurus is about a day. Which is why this morning we were awoken to the sounds of a baby Bensaurus cracking through its shell and being born. It's certainly an adorable little guy. No idea if its a boy or a girl, since apparently I'm really bad at guessing that. Either way it is adorable. And large.

It is a very large baby dinosaur, especially in relation to the parent. And that egg looks bigger than the ones from yesterday.

I really hope this is really a Bensaur baby and Ben Jr didn't steal another dinosaur's egg. It's hard to tell at this stage. Charlene says we'll love it either way, but really? What if it turns out to be a dinosaur that spits acid at people. Well, as long as Ben Jr. can keep it under control, I guess it should be fine.

Hmm, no more holes left to dig up. I guess Ben Jr. dug up the last ones. Is that where this baby came from? This is so confusing. I'm going to have to get Charlene to start doling out answers. Otherwise I'm going to have to just guess my way through my weird existence with my dinosaur family. Actually, that doesn't sound too bad when I put it that way.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 23

Day 23: 
Well, now I know why Ben Jr. was so excited. It turns out Ben Jr. isn't a "he." Also, she's got some eggs now. She was really proud of them too, she kept showing them off to me and Charlene. Fortunately Ben Jr. trusted us enough to let us get close to her nest. It was fascinating. Charlene might be even more excited than Ben Jr. She kept saying that we were going to be grandparents.

You know, this is all pretty weird, but I really hope she means we'll be grandparents in a proud pet owner kind of way. If it turns out that we're actually Ben Jr.'s real biological parents I'm going to just stop trying to understand how any of this works anymore.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 22

Day 22: 
When we got back to the land mass, we found that Ben Jr. had already dug up one of the remaining pits and pulled out a large straw nest of some sort. He's very excited about it. It's understandable, now he has some bedding to sleep on.

Man, I hope one of the other pits has a sleeping bag or a cot or something. Even a pillow would be nice.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 21

Day 21:

Charlene found her magnifying glass, which for some reason she kept separate from her other tools. She says this is the last thing she remembers having on her before she blacked out. There's only a few pits left, so I'm not entirely sure what else we're going to find. So far everything has been so vague. I guess I'm a Paleontologist... either that or a game warden in a Dinosaur Park where they have living Dinosaurs. Would those two things be considered the same field of study? I'm so confused.

Charlene isn't very helpful. She's being coy and guarded with her answers. She says it's adorable to watch me stumble around like this. That makes me think we knew each other before this whole mess started.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 20

Day 20:
Charlene captured a turtle. I like turtles, so that was kind of cool. Charlene even agreed not to cut it open and kill it. I really hope that means she isn't going to cut it open and keep it alive. Charlene says she has some suspicions about wherever it is we are, but she wants to wait to make sure she's absolutely certain before she tells me.

Could it be that Charlene is a better scientist than me? Probably, I'm betting that remembering science is necessary to be good at science. I really hope I can get my memories back.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 19

Day 19:
Yup, Charlene's really good at this. She found her tools right away, including a scalpel which I suppose means she's going to cut the lizards open. She saw that I was looking a little squeamish at the prospect and promised to do it somewhere I couldn't see. That was nice of her. She also thanked me for digging up her things, even though she chose the spot to dig. She might have just been trying to flatter me,  but it was still a pleasant day of hard labor.

If I'm that squeamish then I think we can safely assume I wasn't a biologist.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 18

Day 18:
Charlene dug up another pit and wow, two lizards came out. Two! That makes the one lizard I found a couple weeks ago seem rather lame. Charlene decided to trap the lizards. She thinks that maybe the pits served some sort of purpose that might have affected us in some way. She wants to study the lizards.

She says that she had a set of tools before she was taken, so she wants to dig around and try to find them. She's a lot better at finding relevant things than I am, so I'm going to let her pick where to dig next. She seemed to appreciate that.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 17

Day 17:
Charlene used my shovel to uncover her animal trap. She suspects the pits are filled with all of the things we had with use when we were taken. If that's true she was travelling with an animal trap and I was travelling with a motorcycle, dinosaur, and dinosaur skeleton. I'm not sure if I fully accept Charlene's theory, but it's better than anything I've come up with so I'll hold my tongue for now.

I admit I was afraid that Ben Jr. would get jealous of Charlene, but he seems to like her. I like her too, although for all I know I could be married to someone in the world. Or she could. She doesn't recognize me so we never knew each other before this world of holes, so what possible reason is there for us to be buried in the same area?

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 16

Day 16:
Big news, we dug up another pit and it was a woman! I'm shocked that she was buried for 16 days. If I had known I would have dug her up earlier. Her name is Charlene and she says she's a biologist. I was surprised to find that she wasn't at all put off be Ben Jr. In fact she seemed to take it in stride. What kind of world is this? Are dinosaurs commonplace?

Charlene is experiencing some memory loss too, but not as much as I am. She remembers her name, most of her life. In fact the only missing piece seems to be how she got buried in a hole. The last thing she remembers was trying to catch some small lizards to run some tests on and then- nothing. I asked if she knew me, but she said she didn't. She did say I was kind of cute and that she liked my hat. That pleased me even more than I would have thought.

She did wonder where her equipment had gone. I showed her the items I had already uncovered, but she didn't recognize them. She did seem interested in the lizard and snake I mentioned, but we couldn't find them. Me and Ben Jr. showed her our bit of land and she thought it made a lovely home. I hope she decides to stay with us.

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 15

Day 15:
We found some tree branches so we jammed them into the stump we already had. Now our land is a little more green. Ben Jr. really likes this. Now we can truly consider our patch of land a home. I think I'll hold off on putting up the skeleton I found earlier. I'm afraid it might spook Ben Jr. He's not old enough to confront his own mortality.

And I shudder to think what kind of trauma he would experience if it turns out the skeleton is his mother or something like that. (The dead one is a fair shot better than Ben Jr. Although maybe female Bensaurs are always bigger.)

Playmobil Advent Calendar Day 14

Day 14:
After a day of digging, Ben Jr. and I were overjoyed to find a tree for our area of land. The hardest part was bringing it back and planting it, but we both feel it adds something to our home. I noticed that it seems like the tree has the possibility for growth, so hopefully it will grow or we'll find something to jam in there.