In November of 2021, a lot of over 100 figures appeared on Ebay with a $4,000 BIN price. At around $40 per figure, this probably wasn't a great deal. Except, when you looked at the lot, there were over 60 unproduced 1995 Ninja Commando figures included! On top of this, there were vintage test shots as well as some other oddball items. A collector bought the lot. But, unscrupulous people reached out the seller, offering much more than the selling price. The lot purchase was cancelled. And, it's likely that we'll see the figures parsed out and sold individually for much higher prices in super secret sales at some point in the future.
The one thing this lot proves is that there were more Ninja Commandos that reached full production than we ever thought. Around 2002 or so, a collector friend of mine was able to visit Hasbro. There, they had a bin of figures that they used to kitbash figures for the early 2000's figure releases. In this bin of abandoned figures were several production level Ninja Commandos. So, it's likely that Hasbro HQ got a ton of them and they just floated around: no one really knowing that something as desirable as an unproduced set of figures were collecting dust with the rest.
Here are the photos from the auction. It's amazing that finds like this still exist out there. You will note the following:
- 14 Ninja Commando Budo figures
- 12 Ninja Commando Road Pig figures
- 14 Ninja Commando Knock Out figures
- 14 Ninja Commando Stormshadow figures
- 13 Ninja Commado Flint figures
- 1 M Bison figure with blue hands
- 2 Clear Ken Masters pre-production figures
- Lots of bagged figures from late in the line. Tough to see the details on them, though, for oddities.
- Multiple Ninja Commando brown weapon trees. (Some unproduced sculpts on there.)
And, thus, another Rarities Month comes to an end. I liked this year's group as I had more time to work on them through the year. The archives are running low. But, I've got one more good year in them. Oddly some of the posts did really poorly. Like, historically poorly in terms of overall views. But, that could just be a function of too many posts in the last week or just the stuff got buried in all the other Joe news of the month. Regardless, I hope you all enjoyed it and we'll see you next June!
People that contact Ebay sellers and ruin a deal are literal scum of the Earth
ReplyDeleteCollectors can be scum. Not just toy collectors, but people like art and antiquities collectors, who buy stolen artifacts and works. Collecting can be an obsession, and the lengths people go for obsessions can be sick.
DeletePart of the issue I think is that instagram doesn't allow links from posts. I often see articles that I just can't easily cut and paste to link into later. And since we consume much more through Facebook or Instagram, it's harder to get the traffic through websites.
ReplyDeleteWow...not sure I've ever seen Knock Out before. He's the second row right? They could have easily called him Snake Eyes. Not that he looks much like Snake Eyes, but none of them look much like who they are supposed to be.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing!
The HEAT-VIPER V2 with extra paint details is intriguing. Could be a custom, but given this lot...maybe not.
ReplyDeleteI didn't notice it before, but there's a movie Guile T crotch body with regular SF2 line Guile head.
ReplyDeleteThere's two of them in the lot, definitely not a custom. An ultra rare item few know about?
DeleteInteresting seeing the Ninja Commando weapon sprues in the bottom left. The one with the bow is interesting. Looks like Kenner Robin Hood bow/arrows.
ReplyDeleteAlso there’s several blue Long Arm helmets 🤔
There are even more than the ones pictured. About 2-3 before the eBay post, the same seller posted a similar lot on Facebook - which were sold and then the additional eBay lot subsequently found.
ReplyDelete