23 February 2012

BRAVE AND BOLD needs women!!

It wasn't lost to any of the caballeros at the Flying Batmobile Ranch that the BATMAN BRAVE AND BOLD action figure line was a little .... lonely.  Sure, there were plenty of bad guys to punch and cool gadgets to stick where ever, but that's not the end-all be-all of two-fisted crime fighting.


Crime fighting is also about them women.

That's why the eggheads in the labs miles below our ranch came to their conclusion:  If MATTEL wasn't going to make Female Action Figures (and they weren't), we were.

And we did.

We began with our mission statement:  To make a woman that would fit the scale and spirit of our modified BRAVE AND BOLD show male figures.   That meant:

1) Scale wise, the female figure had to look proportionate to the male figures in height and size.
2) The figure would need to be a standard "buck" that could be slightly modified for different female characters, similar to the method MATTEL used for the male figures.
3) No damn hex plugs!

Next, we began searching the pegs and the internet to see if there was anything out there that could give us a leg up.  After months of poking around, we finally found her:

Our Patron Figure

She wasn't cheap, but The Batman Selina Kyle figure had minimal detailing in the sculpt, allowing for a generic body type that could be modified to fit most of the B&B characters we wanted.

Our next step was to carefully remove the sculpted collar from the figure and create a series of molds:

Boxing Selina (someone call Fred Hembeck!)

With about 30 fl oz of rubber, we made everything we needed to populate Gotham.

Get Ready,

Get Set,

Batusi.

21 February 2012

The Batmen of All Nations: El Gaucho of Argentina

Don Santiago Vargas! 

Extravagante!

Irresponsable!

Enigmatico!

One Bad-ass Action Figure!


El Gaucho de Argentina


Man, that Grant Morrison can spin a good yarn.  All the cowpokes here at the Flying Batmobile Ranch finish their daily chores and settle 'round the campfire for a reading of BATMAN INC.  One of the reasons his books are so popular with the boys is the fact that it includes one of our all-time favorite Batman stories, "The Batmen of All Nations".  Basically, the conceit of the Fifties Batman story was that Batman inspired crimefighters world wide to adopt similar methods.  Great Britain was protected by The Knight, Italy had The Legionary, etc.  On two occasions, these crime busters gathered with Batman to tear it up internationally.  Grant Morrison recently revisited this idea, expanding upon the team by adding the Native American Batman and Robin, and having them all represent Batman in his BATMAN, INC. concept.


Chief Man-of-Bats, El Gaucho, and The Knight

DC Direct definitely stepped up to the plate and delivered an impressive first wave of BATMAN INC figures.  Sadly, DC Direct is also known for dropping concepts after a first run and no future releases are expected for BATMAN INC figures.  We've come to the table with Hong Kong's very own Batgirl, Black Bat, and we now turn to this Cowboy Crimefighter to step it up.


Two great MATTEL action figures were used to make one great El Gaucho!
 Just as Black Bat was an easy modification of a MATTEL DC UNIVERSE CLASSICS figure, we went back to MATTEL for outstanding sculpts of street clothes.  Our design goal was Yanick Paquette's depiction of El Gaucho from BATMAN INC #3.  Other artists had given El Gaucho a deisgn similar to El Mariachi, which is from Mexico.  We really liked the rugged look of Paquette's figure: Wealthy Don Santiago would shrug off his finery for a leather jacket, work boots, and a simple mask to kick some Sombrero ass.  Our figure is the MATTEL Jack Knight Starman with the sleeves and modified jacket of the Mister Terrific figure.


Who should be the next member to join the team?

  Our dear friend from across the pond also decided to declare a love for all things super Argentina by creating Los Super Malon, the Justice League of Argentina, if you will.  We think she did a bang-up job with such a wild bunch!  Read about it here!

We salute the Batmen of All Nations!  Who should be the next member to join?  Sidekicks?

15 February 2012

GIVEAWAY: And The Winner Is...

CATWOMAN!

as requested by "TotalToyz" 


The buckaroos here at the Flying Batmobile Ranch received 20 valid ballots for the Custom Brave and Bold Female Figure Giveaway.

Hands down, the most requested character was Catwoman (5 total unique votes).

Second place was Batwoman with four unique votes.  Huntress and Black Canary tied for Third with two unique votes each.

Votes were also placed for a great variety of DC's Super Ladies, Mera, Platinum, Phantom Lady, and Black Orchid.

The twenty ballots were placed into a cowl so that one lucky winner could be selected.

Each week, we will post progress notes with the creation of this super-awesome action figure!

Batteries to power,

Turbines to speed!


14 February 2012

Happy Valentine's Day, Batmobile!

Finally, the world has come to it's senses and released Batmobile Valentines!

That's sixty years worth of Bat-car love!

Two of my favorites.

The biggest card goes to the current movie Batmobile

On the back of each card has this extra from Shawn Martinbrough
It probably isn't hard to guess my favorite, but can you identify them all?

Tomorrow we announce the winner of the Brave and Bold Female Figure Giveaway!

Same Bat Time,

Same Bat Channel