[Super7] Toxic Catalyst

Last night, Super7 (still located at Post St., btw) held a 'resin invitational' show, Toxic Catalyst. The resin hater ventured back to San Francisco's Japantown to check out the show.

Unlike the high pressure coordination of the Gargamel show earlier this year, Toxic Catalyst was almost casual in its presentation. Visitors arriving early could walk in, grab a beer and peruse the pieces- comfortably placed on a low-slung side table- at their leisure. Although they had to deal with those two jerks who insisted on shooting every piece in the show. The nerve!

On the farthest left were the submissions from Godbeast. The lighting in that spot really did not do them any favors. My favorite was the Gloop robot... who doesn't love slime blobs with googly eyes?

Paul Kaiju sent in a few of his hand-cast Mockbats and a set of the Bad Trees. The Bad Trees seem like they would make a nice backdrop to a Halloween toy diorama.

I think these are made by Velocitron? They don't seem to have been for sale.

This set of 3 small mini-figures was a surprise find at the show. Detailing and sculpt are excellent, particularly given their small size. Made by Monstrehero? I feel like I have seen them somewhere before.

Rich aka LASH aka Mutant Vinyl Hardcore brought in a custom Doji-san for Toxic Catalyst. The paint really sparkles on this one.

A custom Baby Huey from Lamour Supreme made an appearance at the show. Again, great paint work and a very polished sculpt.

Japan toymaker, Nerd One, mailed some very special items to Super7 for Toxic Catalyst. The first was a custom version of their brand-new resin kit of the Soutou no Miira Youkai [双頭のミイラ妖怪] (Two-headed Mummy Creature), which I understand to be a Shigeru Mizuki creation. This item was previously sold as an unbuilt (?) kit at Wonderfestival earlier this summer. The custom Two-head Mummy at the show has a clever reference to Nerd One's Stereogon character built into its dual heads. Someone said it is also a Star Wars reference. Is it? The second Nerd One submission was a custom version of the original resin of Stereogon　[ステレオゴン]. Some might not remember, but Stereogon was first conceptualized as this resin toy after Nerd One had produced several resin accessory kits for Cronic. Development of Stereogon took place over several years, and I was frankly shocked to see it emerge as a giant vinyl toy. I am not sure if this was one of the original casts for the Stereogon prototype (or a special cast for this show), but it is the first time that I have seen this item for sale. Whoever bought this has a fantastic piece of history in their collection.

Ilanena was another big surprise at Toxic Catalyst, as he sent over a bevy of his older resin figures (circa early 2000s). Most were for display only, but Vahine was for sale. Each was blister carded with appropriately eerie backing card art. It is hard to believe that the toymaker behind the popular and colorful Daikaiju 3-packs used to produce these delicate, grotesque resin works.

And finally, the primary objective of my trek into the city: paying tribute to an original urethane hand-cast, hand-painted version of Onell Design's Rig. Take a moment to drink in its painstakingly weathered splendor. Yes. As described on their blog, this is not so much a resin art toy, but one of two hardcopy prototypes and the only paint master for the Glyos Rig (which will be sold very soon in vinyl form).

It was interesting to see the split of items sold before me (I was 8th in line). Some of the resins by GUF (?) went first from the far right of the table. Those of the Skullbrain crowd bought more from the traditional Paul Kaiju, Uamou, etc. pool. And then there was me. What did I buy? You'll have to wait until next time...

And then we ate Korean food next door. Pretty good. Needs more red stuff.

In the bag

As is yearly tradition, Gargamel released a New Year's Lucky Bag this year on January 3rd. Unlike the customary 'fukubukuro' used to get rid of excess store inventory in Japan, these lucky bags are filled with new sculpts and new versions of old toys... and sometimes rare prototypes and one-offs!

Unlike past years, I actually had the chance to drive into SF to see this event unfold first-hand at the Super7 store. But as it turned out- for the first time in history- the bags were only sold online! Usually there is a big turnout for this (everyone loves Gargamel) and I was really looking forward to seeing the excitement and hoopla as people ripped into their bags. So pretty much a bummer.

But a few of us did show up, and I was able to watch a lucky someone pull this beautiful Kiyoka Ikeda 1/1 Zagoran from his bag. The colors are intended to evoke the likeness of a vintage toy, which is an added level of significance that I appreciate.

On the way home, I bought a Sanrio fukubukuro for the woman. Cost me $20 and was probably the better choice. I think so, anyway.

12/12/2009: A Kaiju Kronicle, Chapter I

The following is based upon a true story. Names and places have been changed to protect the identity of those involved. ...but not really.

CHAPTER 1 - White Elephant

Scene: Morning, apx. 9:30 a.m., somewhere in San Francisco.

I pull up to a street corner and carefully wrench my wheels sideways. With a torrential downpour just a few minutes behind me, I question my afternoon plan of parking myself on the sidewalk outside a certain North Beach store. I will at least require my trusty duck-handled umbrella from the trunk. Wait. Why would anyone do that? That would be the question asked by a reasonable person such as yourself, fair reader.

Let me explain.

Today is the opening day of a show produced by Mark Nagata of Max Toy Co., Beikokuten: Kaiju Invades San Francisco, and held at the gallery of Double Punch in North Beach, San Francisco. Attending this show will be the mastermind behind the company known as "Dream Rocket," Yajima Junichi- and his toys. Toys are good. Toys plus guys who make the toys, even better. There will be some other guys there as well.

Right now, I'm meeting Joe to drive down to Super 7 for a morning trade-fest with local and not-so-local toy freaks- the hors d'oeuvre before the main course. You, of course, know Joe.

Joe looks like he woke up about 10 minutes ago. A small dog in a sweater attempts to maul my lower half as he runs about throwing toys in a shopping bag for the trade-fest. I ogle his collection of shelves with random kitsch dumped on them- mostly rubber dinosaurs or some other such hipster trash. Nice shelves though.

Scene: Morning, apx. 10:00 a.m., Super 7 store.



Arriving at Super 7, there is already a crowd inside the store despite that it does not officially open for another hour. You can always be certain that no matter how early you show up on event days, there will always be someone that woke up earlier. The donuts and coffee are quickly being consumed in direct proportion to the growth of a sizeable mound of 'white elephant' gifts for the festivities later that day. Toybot and t0fu have preceded us, as has plastichunter (visiting from down south), and the customary morning-of greetings are exchanged.

The glass dome at the register is a rather celebrated fixture in the store. New or upcoming releases are always previewed through its protective shield. Everything looks classier on the mahogany surface of its base. I wish I were mahogany. For show this morning is the "Mele Kalikimaka" 3-piece set of RxH, commissioned by Scott "stealthtank" of S7 Florida, and painted to resemble the Hawaii exclusive Bullmark Angilas vintage toy. Also: the Astro-mu tribute Space Barbarian from Secret Base (with the gun which you may or may not get). They are quickly swarmed by camera toting nerds who fondle and pose them with donut-greased fingers (that will teach those Super 7 staffers to turn their backs). We all need to see 4 sets of pictures of the same toys on the same table at the same time. Ok, here is mine:







More people arrive- uberboy aka "Slim," il_muffino and female accomplice, Sokko and smaller Sokko, midnight26man, gatchabert and others who are omitted due to memory loss and not lack of significance. Bags are opened, more toys are fondled with donut-fingers. Tentative offers are made and quickly withdrawn. And at last, some people finally do make actual trades. I'm just here to watch this time.

uberboy had a bunch of his original resin toys for our fondling pleasure. You can probably go here if you want to know more about them.







Someone brought this unpainted Super 7 Mutant Chaos.



Custom by Toybot (?). I like the split motif and the glittery black bits poking through. I don't know if this is new or if it is old and I just forgot that I saw it. Either way, it was nice enough to get its own photograph.





But the real event that morning was a 'white elephant' gift exchange among the attendees. The basic idea of a white elephant is that each person brings a secret gift, which are piled together and redistributed randomly. The catch is that successive giftees may 'steal' the present chosen by a prior giftee, who will be left to choose another gift. You do not want to be the first person (unless the gift is shite).



And the first gifts out of the pile were a couple of Bandai Ultra kaiju figures, worth about $10 each. Not shite, but not really "a gift of around $30 value" either. Expectations were low. But the gifts increased substantially in value as the game progressed, with the best pull (in my humble opinion) being a set of Skull Toys test shots of the 3 Dokkun Rolls.



Another interesting pull was this vintage Tiger 7 mini, which was basically rolled up in a postal envelope (so no one chose it until the very end). My gift was one of the Super 7 Zombie things... wrapped in a Peet's Coffee bag. Part of me hoped for the lingering remnants of a scone or brownie inside. So who was the cheapo that brought $20 of toys and left with presumably over $100 worth? I guess we'll never know.

Right before we left for lunch, gatchabert whipped out these stunning customs. The photographs (isn't this always the case) do not show off the glistening clearcoat, which is glossy and slightly sparkly, and it looks perfect over the tight paint technique (look at the head spots). He says they are "just for practice." Modesty is thy name.





- Interlude -

Gatchabert, plastichunter and I pile into the back of Joe's import ride and we pull out of the Japantown parking garage to sound of the Goo Goo Dolls. Lunch is pho and other Vietnamese cuisine at a bustling restaurant, followed by dessert at Creation and a brief stop at the famed Heroes Club. I've never been there before, and the wall-to-wall display of 1/6th figures is very impressive. Unfortunately, no photos allowed! I really wanted to snap a shot of the Bruce Lee style SF3D suit in the back corner of the store.

TO BE CONTINUED.

[Super7] It Came From Skullbrain!

It Came From Skullbrain!, or ICFSB for short, was held in the fuzzy walls (flocked Stormtroopers, baby!) of Super7's San Francisco Post St. location on Saturday, April 18, 2009. The first of its kind, ICFSB invited the professional, semi-professional and admitted amateur artists of the Skullbrain.org forums to showcase their best photographic and three-dimensional works on the store shelves. These are the same shelves that have hosted many a show of the notables of the soft vinyl world. That is to say, it is something of an honor to participate.

I arrived a bit late to the show due to heavy traffic in The City and other scheduling conflicts. To make a long story short, I took a nap. The party was in full swing at Super7 with KISS (??) mugging for the cameras, out-of-towners in town, the tub of free beer almost empty and the temperature 20 degrees above the outdoors. Truth be told, I have never seen the store more crowded than it was that night, so it can probably be safely said that the event was a success.

On the left as you enter, all of the photographic works were on display. I didn't take shots of these, but Joe (ever the diligent photographer) has them up on his NEW blog. My personal favorites were the two from Hawaii's Zakka, which were done on unframed, raised canvases. Did I mention he is from Hawaii. Da kine?

Toys were displayed at the back of the store on two levels of shelving.



One of my two favorite customs of the night, Hiro Hayashi (aka, Lil' Japan, aka BEYOND) had these smooth Beetlars on display. The colors on these were earthy and subtle, with the feel of traditional Japanese pottery or ironware. The brown 'spattered' Beetlar on the left (photo is not great) would have been my pick of the lot had I some additional cash that night.

The two Madball-esque fellows were from motorbot.



Customs by Skullbrain's hellopike (far left) and scottygee (right). Custom Dream Rocket Doguma... neat!



Customs by Bob Conge (skull in box, and Hedorah?) and Mr. Grzlli Atom (Dragamel, Killer and Smogun).



Can't remember who most of these are from. The "Satan King" Ojo Rojo is by hellopike. How 'bout one on a clear body... hmm?



LASH customs on right (Bawer and Hood Zombie)- there are lots of (better) photos on his blog, so I feel a little less bad about giving them the edge cut of two photos. Don't know who did the Secret Base in the middle.

Fulfilling the neon quotient of the show, VELOCITRON gave us a Kemuru Ningen (what do you call these?) and a custom vintage Garuban. He assured us that no viably collectible vintage pieces were harmed in the process. I feel like I wasted my time sharpening my pitchfork.



Assorted customs...



Paul Kaiju gave us another helping of classic kaiju with his custom M1Go Vira Seijin and Marmit VP Baran customs. Also: Zollmen Monster Parade set up front and a Rumble Monster to the left (it is shown in another photo). I've got to say that a nice, thick clearcoat really does wonders for a custom. Not that Paul K's airbrushing techniques are lacking in any way, but the glossy surface definitely gives customs a professional, finished look.



Killer "Battle-Damaged" Combat-R Zeros from Robert DeCastro (who is also the creator of the toy!). These were just "off the hook" as the youth say, and reminded me of my formative years spent flipping through Hobby Japan. And hey, you can buy the production models on his website: Atomic Mushroom.

The Squirms are custom works from an artist called "Reactor-88," if memory serves. They're clean and well-executed, but I am not a fan of customs that use a toy as a blank canvas. There's lots of platform toys for that kind of thing.



I really have to apologize to whomever entered that Majin Bander into the show- I took two photos and both cut off its head.

My attention was just stolen by the Amapro Mecha-Gonira custom from Grumble Toy Chris. I broke into a bit of a nervous sweat when I saw this one because there was no price tag on it. Had it already been sold? Fortunately, when I inquired about it at the from counter, Josh said that it had just arrived and that there had not been time to prep it for the show. And, yes- it was still for sale! We'll see more of evil Mecha-Gonira in a few weeks.



A handful of customs from Leecifer on the left and some fantastic metallic pieces from Skullbrain's redhanded. I don't know how he does it!



The Mummy Boy and Gorosaurus on the far right are customs by Josh (joshuajh) and Josh/Alex (bannedindc), respectively, both of whom were pulling double-duty that night as Super7 employees and artists.

Joe (or as you may know him, JOE) was responsible for the Rangeas and Gaiking Gachados. I've been told that the reason Gargamel will not produce many paint masked Gachas is the complexity of the sculpt. So yeah, I'm guessing this took a while.

Comic artist / toy guy, Ben Seto (mangakaben), created the custom Secret Base Devil Dog on the far left. The toy that no one wanted is back with adorable, robotic vengeance. Be sure to check out his website- I would love to own a poster or a print from him someday.



Kirkland Jue (aka, Toybotstudios), the man who does not need a link to his website (because it is on the right side of this page) gave us the 4 customs in front. Each of the Space Troopers has a little skeleton inside, exposed through the cracks in their armor. Where do you buy little skeletons like that?

Tan-ki (from France, I think) painted the Kanegon on the far right.



Custom Himalayan (cut off), Globby and Jet Jaguar from Bert Gatchalians (aka, gatchabert). The green Bop Dragon is from a new face, Dustin Cantrell; the patterned Bop in back is from OsirisOrion. Although Rumble Monsters appears to have picked up the style on the left for a future production run, I think I like the less intricate blue-green version by Mr. Cantrell. Good use of the texture and smooth areas on the sculpt. I look forward to seeing more from Dustin.



The two pieces on the left and in the middle are customs from devilboy, who is also the creator of the sculpt! They have a totally different feel when painted with the speckles and stains of stone textures versus a normal, "full color" paint job.



Assorted customs from people whose names I can't remember. Sorry guys. I like the Goga- simple and oceanic.

And two of the other stars of show (in my humble opinion, anyhow):




Up top is custom Jumbo Machinder from artist Jeff Lamm (aka, greasebat), best known for his distinctive kaiju-centric prints and posters. It takes a little bit of nuts (the good kind, that you're gonna love) to customize a freakin' Jumbo, and this thing towered over the other customs at the show. I love the design, which reminds me of what could be an obscure Argentinian bootleg of a Jumbo. I'd totally buy a smaller toy of it.

Bottom is a custom Dempagon from RedYoda. Not only is his kitbashing job admirable, but it is also a functional piece (emitting squealing electronic static is technically a function). Something in the eye is sensitive to light; by shining the light pen into its eye, it translates the intensity of the beam into sound. I don't know how it works- so, hey, it's magic. So he gets "mad propz" for building something in addition to destroying a toy. Wink.

I went into the show with somewhat mixed feelings on the subject matter. In some sense, elevating fan customs to the level of show pieces rubs me in a bad way because it brings out the sharks in the designer toy world. And, true to form, there were a lot of artists there that I had never heard of personally, although they seemed to be well-known (?) in the western world. Did they really "come from Skullbrain (forums)"? I guess I can't blame them for pimping (oops- displaying) their stuff at the store- an eyeball is an eyeball in the end.

But the show did have the effect of bringing folks together who might not normally fly out to SF for a Super7 show. This is really the strength of the hobby- community. The shows at the store are great for getting to know new collectors/faces and reconnecting with old acquaintances. And you know what? Most of the customs were really good, and to see them all displayed together was fascinating in its own way. So damn the opportunists, I'm looking forward to seeing another show like this in the future. Make it happen you creative bastards.