Book Review - Gus & Duncan's Guide to Star Wars Micro Collection Toys

There's nothing I like more to foster a new collecting obsession than reading about it. So when I started to get into the Star Wars Micro Collection, I read A LOT about it on the Internet, and even found a podcast where it was discussed. The podcast was a fun listen but not too deep - however one thing the podcasters mentioned was Gus and Duncan's Micro Collection book. WHAAAAAAAT???

So no sooner did I hear about, than I went on the web to try and find it. And here it is. I got it from lulu.com, which I highly recommend, especially since it was $25 less on lulu than on Amazon and $20 less than on ebay. Not sure why anyone would get it from those bandits, maybe free shipping on Amazon? But lulu shipping, even to the hinterlands of Canada, was pretty reasonable.

ANYWAY... you're wondering what the book is like. Well it's a high-quality glossy hardcover 148-page book, full of information from Gus and Duncan, photographs of toys, packaging, and prototypes, and is very attractively laid out by friend of the hobby Mattias Rendahl (and that's his very cute little boy on the cover).

The book takes a comprehensive look at each of the released Micro Collection playsets and ships of course. These are the Death Star Compactor and Escape playsets (collected into the Death Star World set), the Hoth Ion Cannon, Shield Generator, Wampa Cave, and Turret Defense (the first three comprising the big Hoth World set), and the Bespin Freeze Chamber, Gantry Walkway, and Control Room (Bespin World), as well as the X-Wing, TIE Fighter, Snowspeeder, and Millennium Falcon vehicles.

The great thing about Gus and Duncan's books is the unproduced stuff they include - and there was plenty of it for the Micro Collection. The Hoth Bacta Chamber nearly made it into production and the prototypes and packaging are amply illustrated in the book. Likewise the Bespin Torture Chamber and Dagobah sets, although they didn't make it quite as far towards production. But we see the figure sculpts and prototypes all the same and that stuff fascinates me.

Anybody who thinks the Micro Collection figures are crude or lack detail needs to check out the four-up sculpts in the book. These are four times the size of the production figures and the detail on them is just incredible.

So if you're a fan of the Micro Collection, or just of Star Wars toys that are a little off the beaten track of 3 3/4" action figures, you'll love this book. Gus and Duncan know what they're talking about, write about the toys with humour and love, and the book showcases some truly remarkable prototypes and "what-might-have-beens" from the Micro Collection range. Highly recommended!

Gus & Duncan's Guide to Star Wars Micro Collection Toys by Gus Lopez and Duncan Jenkins

Completist Publications, 2015

$50 from lulu

Micro Collection Hoth Turret Defense Action Playset

Continuing on the Micro-theme today I'm posting another Hoth item - the Hoth Turret Defense Action Playset. This was the only Hoth playset left out of the Hoth World "big box" - likely for reasons of space and cost, as the Hoth World already collected THREE playsets. But I think the Turret Defense set is probably the coolest Hoth set, except for maybe the Ion Cannon. But let's take a look at the box first.

Here's the back. The HTD box has the distinctive "top flap" shared by many of the Micro Collection boxes. Cool because they give a bit more real estate to showcase the contents, but unfortunately many previous owners stored these boxes with the flap folded down against the back of the box and they're hard to straighten back out.

Anyway this box has some good photography of the other Hoth sets as well as illustrations of some play features, as well as the ubiquitous "Build Your Armies" offer.

Box end here.

And the top flap and box top, illustrating the diecast figures included in the set, and some "exciting events" from the movie.

Setting up the tableau from the box front here. All six figures are rebels, including Luke astride a tauntaun waving a blaster... something he notably never was seen doing in the movie. Han didn't participate in the defence of Echo Base either but, well, toyetic license is being exercised.

Here's the pic from the box end, not much different except the turrets are rotating and Han has jumped into the trench.

Here's one of the box photos featuring a Rebel commander scanning with his macrobinoculars.

All six figures included in the set are pictured above. As noted, all Rebels... you'd need to buy the Generator or Ion Cannon playset (or redeem the Build Your Armies offer) to get any Snowtroopers for an Opfor.

 

The figures were actually quite well done weren't they! Readers may be aware that another hobby of mine is tabletop miniature wargaming and painting model soldiers for use in the games. I've painted a bunch of Star Wars stuff in that hobby as well and for 1982, these figures are not bad, and came pre-painted to boot. Shame about the chipped paintwork but they were kids' toys after all...

 

I've been trying to collect the instruction sheets with these playsets as well, with reasonable success. The sheets are pretty cool, complete the toy, and in some cases can be quite helpful with assembling the playset. This one was straightforward but the Hoth World/Ion Cannon was a little more tricky.

Even got a used sticker sheet, unfortunately the stickers aren't on the toy... I wonder how that happened?

One unobtrusive repair was required as one of the turrets had lost its "click"... the principle here is the same as the old "baseball card in the bicycle spokes" trick. The inside surface of the turret is "toothed" and engages with the small clear strip of plastic attached to the top of the shaft. On one of the turrets this clear plastic piece was gone - no click. But it was the work of moments to make a replacement from a clear plastic blister pack and attach it as shown above. Very strong click now.

Anyway that's the Hoth Turret Defense Action Playset, and with that we're finished with Hoth for now. Of course we still have the rest of the Death Star, all of the Bespin sets, and the vehicles to go. They'll all be coming up soon!