TIE Fighter (Kenner Canada)

One of the original wave of vehicles produced in the Star Wars range was the humble TIE Fighter. This example, however, is in a box that's a bit unusual. Even on the front side, a knowledgeable collector will have a clue that this one is a bit different. Here's a hint - it has to do with the area around the Kenner logo at bottom right...

If you spotted the "Long-Playing Toy" logo on the box front and thought "WTF?" then kudos to you - Kenner USA had discontinued the use of the LP logo in 1979, before the ESB wave came out. But this isn't a Kenner USA box - it's Canadian! With French! Obviously - look at the stylish child flying the TIE Fighter in his cool black turtleneck.

Here's the French box front. Note absence of LP logo - presumably there was no French-language equivalent available for use.

Even though this is an ESB box and the TIE Fighter Pilot figure was an ESB figure, this TIE Fighter still gets piloted by a Stormtrooper - presumably the same one who stole Chewbacca's bowcaster and appeared on the Landspeeder box. This dude really gets around - now he's in the Death Star hangar for the duel between Darth and Obi-Wan!

"It's a man's life in the Stormtrooper Corps! One minute boiling your a$$ off on a desert planet - the next minute flying a TIE Fighter and witnessing a lightsaber duel between the two last surviving Jedi! Wow!!"

Copyright info appears on the underside of the battery compartment.

Action feature alert! Pulling up on the tab raises the pilot's seat. I have to say that as action features go, this one is pretty lame. But it obviously stood the toy in good stead because this same tooling was used over again for the blue "battle-damaged" TIE Fighter as well as for the POTF2 re-issue version in the 1990s!

An icon.