AcroRay, one of the more obsessive and informed Micronaut fans, found a really unsettling and well written story about Bill Mantlo, a comics writer from the 70′s and 80′s who was responsible for the Micronauts comic and ROM The Space Knight comic, among many, many others.

I was a huge fan of Bill’s as a kid and probably read more comics with his name on them than any other writer. It never occurred to me what might have happened to him. Comic writers come and go. So it was illuminating to find out about Bill and his odyssey through a health care system that really isn’t designed to help people who need long term rehabilitation.

I’ve always felt that you can take the measure of a people by the way it treats its neediest. I frequently think America fails to live up to its potential in this regard. This story only reinforces that belief for me – and makes me want to do more to try to address it. Enough sermonizing. Links below. If you ever read a Micronauts or Rom comic, you owe it to yourself to read about Bill.

Link to AcroRay’s story, where I first found out about Bill

Link to the actual story about Bill

Rocket Tubes Blueprints

Been meaning to repost this for quite a while. Over on Micronauts Home World, there is a great article about Mego’s original plans for their Rocket Tubes toy. I won’t spoil it for you, but suffice it to say, if you’re a Micro junkie, it is a great read. I had a set of Rocket Tubes and LOVED them. The idea of a vacuum powered racing set…Just too cool for words.

So skip on over and take a look.

Saturday was San Jose Toy Show day. Time Tunnel Toys puts it on three times a year and a pretty good number of toy vendors, comic book people and other pop culture merchants show up. There’s always something interesting and this one was no exception.

The event was held in a different part of the San Jose fairgrounds this year. I’m not sure if it was just change of venue, but it seemed like there were a lot more vendors there this time.

So many toys...

A view down the length of the hall

As nice as hall full of toy vendors is, the real draw is the toys…

Moon City circa 1970

There is always one toy that just blows my mind at the toy show. This Moon City was it. I love the tin litho graphics on the two towers. And the color palette just screams “space age!” I damn near bought it. It was in perfect condition. Everything worked. But it was $80 bucks and really big.

Vincent Price plays Hangman

I loved Hangman as a kid. But if I’d known Vincent Price was waiting in the wings, ready to open the trap door on the gallows…Well, I might have played a bit more cautiously.

James Bond 007 Set

This is one toy set I had never seen before. I love vintage Bond. As a kid, I would have killed for this. It is a full briefcase with pistol, silencer, scope, collapsing shoulder stock, code book and code breaker. I am assuming the case explodes if you don’t open it juuuust right. Show price? $750.

Rat Patrol toys?

The Rat Patrol, if you are unfamiliar with it, is this really great late 60′s tv show about an American jeep squad that patrols the African desert during WWII, fighting Nazis, taking risks, but always pulling the fat out of the fire at the last second. I’d never seen a toy from the show before, but here we have a cabled remote control plane. I seriously considered picking this up as well, but I have a 1 in, 1 out rule. Not sure what this would replace in the current collection.

Hot Wheels!

More Hot Wheels!

There are always lots of Hot Wheels cars at the show, but for some reason this show had booth after booth with track sets, launchers and other die cast car accessories.

Then there was Doctor Who. So much Doctor Who. There were at least five booths that all had toys from the late 80s version of the classic BBC show. I’d never actually seen these before. I love the Doctor…

The Fourth Doctor

Exterminate!

Never saw this episode...

Card Back

Not sure if these are the same toy line...

The other card back

Signing at the DC booth

Totally off topic for BEM, but if you’re curious about my trip to SDCC, head on over to Conform And Obey.

I do a quick recap of my trip with some good pictures for the nerds and geeks out there (that includes me btw.)

There is a picture of a TOTALLY hot Tinker Bell if you need a reason to look…

ComicCon 2011 was another great show. As always, there were TONS of toys for fans of pretty much, well, anything. There were a few though that really caught my eye. My hands down favorite was the re-release/re-creation of The Outer Space Men. You’ll note the red one, Orbitron, who is the unofficial mascot of the site. I don’t generally by repros of old toys, but with these I may just make an exception.

The Outer Space Men

There's my boy! Sniffle.

But wait! There is a runner up. Hasbro, which maintains a store on the show floor if you can believe it, did have one toy set I liked. Not a remake, or vintage-ish, but based on one of my all time favorite movies. For the low low price of $80, you could pick up a six figure set of Indiana Jones figures. I love Indiana Jones…Be sure to check out the close up on Toht. I’m meeeeeelting! I’m meeeeelting!

Indiana Jones Collector's Set

Toht, he melts, he heils!

Slowly but surely, more toys coming online. For this latest update, catch the following:

Ray Guns: Lots and lots of awesome space guns. A Mazinga ray gun, Flash Gordon (the movie) gun, and some other cool ones. Totally worth looking at.

TH3 Project: Added a Thur gun and a page on the ZX series of guns. Related to above, sure, but TH3 baby.

Micronauts: A Grandstand Toys knock off Deltarian Fighter. Have to see it to believe it.

Enjoy! More to come.

Ideal Cap Gun

Been watching vintage Electric Company with my 6 year old. I still love Easy Reader. Also just finished watching the American version of Life on Mars. What a spectacular show!

Watching that awesome 70′s-ness turned my thoughts to toys and BEM. So a few updates.

Check out the new Ray Guns category. Lots more coming there.

Also check out the crazy cool Deltarian Fighter in the Micronauts section. If you are a micro fan, so worth checking out.

I do sometimes diverge from the realm of toys on BEM. But usually only with a good reason.

The return of one of the seminal computers of my youth seems like a good enough one. Commodore USA just announced they were bringing back the C64. Not the original one, but a brand new computer in C64 housing. I don’t normally get PCs. I’m a Mac guy. But this one I just might have to have.

Read more about it over at my other site: Conform and Obey.

Went to the San Jose Super ToyShow today. I went partly to entertain my daughter and partly to browse for toys. The last few shows have been short on interesting finds so I didn’t have a lot of hope for this one.

Just as we were leaving, though, I looked in a $1 bin and saw this Tente mini-set. I couldn’t believe I found such a cool toy AND that it was a buck.

I have come across a number of Tente sets over the years, but have never seen a mini-set like this. Can’t decide whether to open and build it or keep it sealed.

Wow. I suck. But to be fair, I got a full time job in August, and there was all those holidays and I got a year older (reaching a depressing milestone, I might add.)

In the intervening months I have developed a renewed fascination with all things ray gun. Especially 70′s ray guns with lights and sounds. Unfortunately, I have neither the cash nor the space for an extensive ray gun collection, so this fascination has expressed itself mainly in ebay browsing. I have seen some REALLY cool items go through the stream. I’ve asked the listing ebayers permission to use their images here, and will be putting together a Ray Gun Gallery with those images soon. For now, check out the Shoot Out In Space page.

Shoot Out In Space