MY COMICS /BOOKS /TOYS & COOL STUFF

Welcome to my blog, I am based in Nottingham UK & I love toys, comics, science fiction, horror ect. This blog is dedicated to my trips around the flea markets, toy shops & charity shops, toy fairs & E bay in pursuit of that elusive bargain and holy grail toy.
All the toys & comics reviewed are mine.
I shall be regulary updating my finds and trips out to various car boots & toy fairs.
Hope you find it of interest!

Monday 31 October 2011

SHIVER & SHAKE ! JUNK SHOP FIND

I also found this great IPC comic from 1973, another i remember from my child hood, i found these 11 issues in a junk shop while out hunting on Friday.


Shiver and Shake began in 1973, the first issue containing a free gift, a rubber chocolate biscuit! i tried it on my dad, carefully concealing it amongst 3 others on a plate whilst he had his regular Saturday afternoon coffee..and yes it worked!
I love  The back page creepy creations! by Leo Baxendale
Frankie stein was the most popular character and he went on to appear in his own comic.


Happy Halloween Everyone!

HAUNTED HOUSE! CHARITY SHOP FIND


Yes i was lucky enough to find this Denys Fisher classic game on Saturday, while out for an afternoons rummage around the local charity shops, its not complete but it still displays great and bought back a few fond memories i had of owning one in the 70's


I always remember Gertie dropping it down the chimney!..that's one of the witches by the way.and nothing to do with my private life!


The game is missing a few bits, including the part to get the broom handle to swing, and one of the clips to hold a wall in place, but for £2.50 i was more than happy to bring this classic home..

Great Game Board
It has all the cards & mice's..and even dirty Gerties original Ball..
Happy Halloween Everyone!

Sunday 30 October 2011

CHRISTOPHER LEE DRACULA & RARE BOOKS

Yes its nearly upon us so as my little Halloween special i thought I'd blog some of my other half's Vampire bits & pieces, first is the rather fantastic Product Enterprise Christopher Lee Dracula, this is a truly great figure, and one all horror fans should have in their collections


The box is no great shakes really, i think a film poster in the style of the Sideshow figure
boxes would be better, the back of the box is a little more interesting showing the figure inside & the accessories


The figure itself is As I've said pretty fantastic, featuring a great likeness of my fave Dracula with a face Straight from the Hammer classic  'Taste the Blood Of Dracula' this looks great on display.
It also comes with Harkers Diary, A Flaming candle and a Crucifix.


The outfit is very well made with great detail, this figure was an absolute E Bay bargain for us costing £20.00, on one of thiose odd rare E Bay moments where, for what ever reason no one else is bidding, they usually fetch
upwards of £40.00 so yes, we were very pleased with him!

Drac on display

Some other Vampire bits, this great old Pan Book 'The Vampire'.presented by Roger Vadim! this is the firs edition from 1963 i love the cover its very creepy and of the time, the inside contents are all short story's by various classic authors..


In search of Dracula has some fantastic illustrations and drawings and is a factual account by 2 researchers to trace the steps of the real Dracula, or Vlad the Impailer, once again a rather fantastic ' Taste the Blood Of' cover and an excellent read,  dates from1973 and is well worth seeking out, its pictured along with 'Dracula's Gold' from the New English Library, this is a bit of a daft story! but worth having as part of the Vamp collection.


All of these books were obtained years ago by my girlfriend, in the long dark days before E Bay, when you could still find such Books pretty cheaply at Flea markets & book fairs.
Ladybird Books, are better known for their Children's titles, more so than any horror based Books, but this one dating from 1985 is Superb, its still of course aimed at children, but it has some really atmospheric illustrations inside.

Ladybirds Children's Version, still Pretty Creepy!

Love the bottom right illustration
Variation On the Cover Picture By Angus McBride
Next is this great Dracula 7" single On power records, a sub label of 'Peter Pan Records' who also did a lot of Superhero & film titles, usually a book & record..if this did come with a book, its long gone but what a great little item, with a really cool cover, front & back. I'm saving this to play tomorrow night at a little Halloween get together were having.



Lastly is this British Publication by comic master Dez Skin 'The Halls Of Horror' i have a few of these but this one features Christopher Lee so it fits in well with this Blog Post with very visually Striking cover art by Ricardo Villagran, i shall be blogging these great mags in the near future


Wednesday 26 October 2011

FORBIDDEN WORLDS

I recently won these great Forbidden Worlds comics on E Bay i usually just stick to my Marvel & DC as there are enough titles there to keep me busy and empty my Pay pal account, but as these were going cheap i couldn't resist,and also because i hadn't Blogged any of my recent comic buys and theres been a lot of those!, if your not too fussed about condition, which I'm not,as long as no pages are missing or cut out i don't mind the occasional crease or mark so the following Forbidden Worlds can best be described as  very good, or Reader copy's if you like.




The devil cover with the story 'The Gift Of Guts' is my fave so far, i like Devil associated items and that is a great cover the others feature more of the  super hero type characters,rather than the one off 'Tales of Terror' style story's the comic started with due to pressure from the senate which saw the rise of the 'Comic Code' and the more horror type story's dropped. All the issues are enjoyable, and feature good artwork including Marvels John Buscema.






The comic ran for 145 issues from October 1961..and yes I'm getting my info from Wiki, otherwise i wouldn't have a clue about this comic! but after enjoying these 4 issues thoroughly I'm after more!..oh no, that's how things start getting out of hand ,and before you know it, your very poor,but comically richer!

First story from issue 113
The Hypno Coin!.classic ad.
Cover story 'The Gift of Guts!'

NEW CUSTOM HEADERS DINOSAURS & HULK


Here's some of Steve's new headers he's done for me, the Dinosaurs one is my fave, it has a great authentic 70's Hong Kong feel to it, which as regular readers of this blog will know, is one of my favourite areas of Toy Collecting, the dinosaurs are just generic ones I've found in various Charity shops during my hunts for cool items for the Toy Room, as is the Skeleton i found in a box of toys at a Car Boot.

This is the Hulk glove puppet i found at Donnington Toy Fair i believe it originally came in a box, not a header, but the recreation of a box was a bit beyond Steve's capabilities..or time, so the next best thing is this great 70's style Marvel Header..looks pretty convincing don't you think?

Hulk trapped in Plastic Bag!..that'll make him angry.

BEN COOPER CREATURE PEOPLE


I was lucky enough to be given this great Ben Cooper Creature Person as an early Christmas pressie by my good friend Steve yes the guy who also does the great custom header cards for me, you can imagine how pleased i was to receive this as a gift, i know how rare they are but he also knows its gone to a very good home where it will be looked after well in the company of other Monsters & Creatures in my Toy room.


How cool is that!

The Header is of course one of his excellent custom jobs, but fits the figure perfectly, I've googled the Creature People but i cant see a header card for them, either no one has one, or they never made one? it may have just had a tag i guess if anyone knows please get in touch.

cool custom header
Ben Cooper also made a female version, which Steve has and i think is planning to E Bay at some point, so keep a look out for that.

I love this, its so Creepy & weird!
Let Me Out!..I Need Blood..Human Blood!

Tuesday 18 October 2011

BATMAN & MARVEL DISPLAY BOXES

I love old display boxes, especially the ones with cool artwork,  for sweets, cards or toys on various trips to the supermarket I"m always on the lookout for a good display box  and the chances of buying whatever's left and taking the box with me to the counter, I've done this many times  and got some great boxes a few of which are pictured here

The Marvel one is from Debenhams department store around Christmas 2009 ,there was a sudden appearance of Vintage style Marvel Memorabilia including T shirts key rings mugs etc, all with Steve Ditko/Jack Kirby art there were 2 Key rings left so i got my girlfriend to take them & the display box to the counter ( i always get her to do that bit!) after smiling nicely to the assistant she said it would be fine for us to take the display box home, in fact we've never had a problem with any store assistants telling us we cant have the box as well that's if there's only a few of the items left in it.


box front with great art work
 Next is this Burger King box for Marvel superheroes i don't have any of the figures just the box, i think a friend gave me this some years ago i also have the Universal Monsters Burger box but I'll put that up a bit nearer to Halloween along with some other Monster Goodies.
Great box, shame about the Meal!
More recently i got these Marvel boxes from Morrison's Supermarket they don't seem to mind at all if you walk up to the checkout with the box, we emptied the contents out and took the box, leaving the contents on the shelf!
the box for these Candy Sticks uses same art all around
Sticker booklets and jelly's And cool little box
Next are some of my Batman display boxes these are my faves they usually feature some great artwork, the following one is from the animated series i got this from E Bay a few years ago for £4.00, it looks great on display even though the spin Pop Batmen had leaked  bat liquid candy over most of the header display it still looks good i had to remove the Candy from the Batman to prevent further damage..


Header with Leak Damage!

Surviving Spin Top Batmen


from the same E bay seller i got this Further Adventures Of Batman & Robin Spin Pop Candy box with surviving Spin Pop Candy Batman & robin, Batman's Spin Pop had already began leaking so i removed it to prevent further damage, I've left Robins on as so far it hasn't leaked, I've had it for around 4 years and its been fine even up in the attic where i store a lot of the items i don't have room for its still OK with no sign of leaking as yet.



Great art for the box front
Batman had to have his spin Pop removed, poor bloke.
Side on view Robin..yes and Batman's on the other.

There was a lot of great stuff for the first Tim Burton Batman movie and a dealer friend of mine had accumulated a lot of it and stored it away, i got quiet a few nice things from him as  at the time I'd gone a bit Bat mad  I've since sold lots of it on the E bay, but i kept a few of the boxes like these 2 Tops ones, the first was for the candy heads, nice little plastic busts full of little pieces of candy in the image of Nicholson's Joker, and Keaton's Batman. neither are rare but i like them especially the one with the Joker art work, it looks very oriental and can still be got off E bay as can the the card box, usually still full of cards.

Very Japan Looking box, with Animated series card box.
Love the Joker & Batman art

From the first Burton movie

The next one is my fave, and another of our Supermarket steals!, it was full of tins but we emptied it kept one and took the box to the counter, this was at Tesco, and once again no bother at all.. i just liked the box so much, from ' The Batman' animated series and its another one that looks great as a little backdrop for figures.

I like this box!
Different pose for the sides

Love the Bat signal in the background

This is the Waddingtons Pog Display box and as you can see also has some great artwork, i especially like the line up of villains just under Batman and the great Bat signal in the distance, i got this from the same guy who had kept and stored Various Bat items since the Burton Movie it came with quiet a few Pog packs too.
As did this brilliant Joker box, the art on this is just fantastic and looks great displayed with various Joker figures

Super cool hypnotic Joker!
Side view..Ha Ha!

Big and small packs
So there we are a few of my Display boxes, i have a few vintage ones too which I'll blog at a later date.