Classic Movie Monster (Imperial)

Classic Movie Monster
Imperial
1986

Since their inception, Universal has willingly been the gigolo for their trademarked monsters. These classic characters have been on everything from posters to coloring books to toy to <insert genre of collectible here, and keep going>. Rest assured, if you're a fan, there's something out there for you to collect.

While Imperial's venture into the realm of Classic Movie Monsters isn't the best iteration of toys to be found, they are certainly some of the more budget friendly ones to this day. Unlike the Remco line which will set you back not only a ton of money, but a lot of time and patience to obtain, Imperial's are relatively in abundance, and sell for as little as $10.00 a piece. Granted that's more than double of their original price of $3.99, but fairly on par with the cost of figures these days.

Imperial produced only four characters; Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy and Wolfman. The first thing you might notice with these is their unnaturally large hands. Yikes! Is that where the majority of the plastic went into these products? HUGE!

Still, there's something about these that we really love; The cardbacks work so well with the figures inside to give them a real appeal to the eye. They pop, if you know what we mean. It would be difficult to walk past these hanging on a store peg, and at least not glance at them. Their vibrant colors draw you in for at good look (at the very least).

The downer to these is that the back of the cards don't share in the amazing design of the fronts. Rather than make the backs leap out at you like the fronts, Imperial went with a bland black and white "drawn" look. They get points for the classic Meco type artwork for the available figures in the line, but at the end of the day it's rather bland, and leaves you wanting to quickly flip it back over to the figure side.

Beyond that there's not much more to say about this line. It has its appeal for being a Universal Monsters property, and of course you can't go wrong with a a well put together bendable figure - Which Imperial certainly does. This certainly wasn't their first outing in the realm of bendable toys, and it shows that they know what they're doing when it comes to producing a line of toys. In other words, there's quality (and care) there.

This is not one of the more well known toy lines to be produced based on Universal's monsters. This factor may contribute to its (relatively speaking) low prices on secondary markets. They're certainly a conversation piece, and fans of these iconic characters should definitely consider adding them to their collection.

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Apollo Moon Exploring Series (Imperial)

Apollo Moon Exploring Series
Imperial
1970

The Apollo Program was launched (no pun intended) in 1963 where America saw the tragic loss of three astronauts intended for the Apollo 1 flight. The program was designed with the intentions of landing humans on the moon, and bringing them safely home. Six of these missions achieved that goal.

The first of these was Apollo 11, which landed on the moon on July 20, 1969. The second was Apollo 12 on November 19, 1969. This lead to the most popular space mission to date in the program, thanks in part to the 1995 Ron Howard / Tom Hanks movie, Apollo 13 which launched on April 11, 1970. Their mission was to land on the moon, but unfortunately due to equipment malfunctions and failures the mission was aborted, and the pilots almost lost.

The Apollo missions continued until December 7, 1972 with the launch of Apollo 17. The program was discontinued with their return to Earth on December 19, 1972.

There's no denying that the Apollo program's greats achievement was indeed landing and bringing humans home. However, in addition to this it turned an entire generation of children to the stars. Now kids were focusing their eyes on the skies, but not in a science fiction adventure sort of way. In a reality of prospect for the future.

In 1970, Imperial launched a great line of space themed toys to help fuel the imagination of children. Each pack featured numerous vehicles and accessories, all centered around a reality of space travel and exploration.

There were twelve sets in total released, and oddly enough none of them have a signifying name. They can only be depicted by their colored packages, and contents inside.

Unfortunately the sets are very difficult to track down. They can be found here and there on secondary markets, but putting together a complete set can prove challenging. When found, the sets sell for about $25.00 a piece.  
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