#sofubi kaiju

Marusan Godzilla

ReAction

by Super 7

The vinyl that launched a thousand bootlegs.

Arguably one of the most monumental and influential licensing deals of all time. Marusan started producing Godzilla toys in 1964, with the motorized tin toy that we *all* had an iteration of at some point in our lives.

By 1966 they were producing sofubi ("soft vinyl" toys) and pretty much ignited the vinyl collector scene.

What resulted was a flurry of variant colors, iterations, spinoffs - and an entire collecting scene that hasn't stopped since. You could argue thats sofubi toys themselves wouldn't be as prevalent without the first Marusan figures.

The toy itself is excellent. What you'd expect from Super 7, but in all ways at its very best. Robust build quality, great sculpt. The metallic overspray perfectly captures the sofubi *and* the original mechanical toy.

The packaging is also a big part of the presentation. It's the kind of thing you want to hang up on the wall (and I may get a second one to do just that)

How could I pass this up? An excellent action figure in its own right, but also one that celebrates the history of some of my favorite toys. I'm an easy mark.

Kaiju Ice-Bat and Thawed Ice-Bat

- from Uglydolls Vinyl Series 3

[ca. 2011]

- by Kidrobot

Part of Kidrobot's line of mini sofubi Uglydolls from over a decade ago.

Ice-Bat, and his thawed partner in crime-fighting, are references to the kaiju vinyl that inspired the entire designer toy scene. Featuring the scaly texturing and metallic overspray that have become signatures of the style.

I love these toys. I actually picked them up because I had the *entire* wave of Kidrobot's original 9" Uglydolls vinyls and lost them back in 2007. I had no idea there was a kaiju reference in the wave until I opened the box (and hunted down the Thawed version a few months later)

Simple toys with great designs that homage classic toys. An easy win for me.