This is the first of a planned series of articles giving an overview of a specific Tolkien Collecting area. It is not a completest list of everything to do with the area (see the Visual Collecting Guides for that), but an introduction to the area to give people an idea of what the area is about.
I have laid this out in a series of sections in order to cover the same details when looking at different areas.
As indicated within the Beyond Books article, I will primarily be covering non-book collecting areas. That is not to say that books won’t crop up within other areas, and I might cover book areas themselves at some stage.
The first area I have chosen to look at is Action Figures.
Size of the Area
Action Figures is quite a medium sized Tolkien area to collect, there are only 9 series within it, and it is only the Toybiz Normal range which is big.
Overview, History and Scope
One of the first things to establish within any area is the scope of that area. This is not meant to specifically set boundaries to any individual collection, but purely to define the scope of what is covered within this article and, to a lesser extent, what I consider that area includes.
Action figures are toy/collectable figures with articulation so that they can be posed and played with. Some action figures have removable fabric/plastic clothing, although some do not. They often come with other accessories such as weapons.
The first Tolkien Action Figures came with the Bakshi Lord of the Rings Animated Film in 1978 and were produced by Knickerboker. This was a limited of just 6 figures and 2 horses, all carded. These have now become very collectable, particularly in mint packaging. https://vintageactionfigures.com/the-lord-of-the-rings-knickerbocker.html, https://youtu.be/uGQn-F5xnng.
Toy Vault Action Figures were produced between 1997 – 2001, just before the Peter Jackson movies, and is based on the books. The are 2 types of packaging these figures come in, both of which have a small number of figures. There are however quite a few ‘variations’ and ‘special editions’ for a lot of the characters. http://www.toymania.com/archives/metoys/metoyshistory.shtml
Toybiz Normal Action Figure range are 6in scale figures based on the 3 Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movies. This is a very big range with a lot of sub series, split between the 3 movies and with a final set being labelled as ‘Trilogy’. The packaging is split between ‘half moon’, for earlier released figures, followed by carded figures. The packaging is also primarily colour coded for the 3 movies (green – Fellowship, Red – Two Towers, Blue – Return of the King), however the titles on the packaging can sometimes contradict this, the Trilogy packed figures are also not colour coded. There is also quite a lot of re-issue of figures in different packaging. The series also included quite a few multi-figure sets, both ‘half-moon’ and boxed.
This video is of a complete collection.
Toybiz Large range is a very small series of 9 figures based on the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings Return of the King movie.
Bootleg Action Figures are a series of unlicensed movie figures roughly based on the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movies. They appear to be very poor copies of some of the Toybiz figures. http://bootlegactionfigures.com/blog/?p=2245
NECA Epics is again Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movie based and has only 3 large figures.
Applause also is Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movie based and is also a small series or larger figures. It consists of 4 Fellowship movie, green packaged, figures and 6 Two Towers movie, red packaged, figures.
Bridge Direct Normal Action Figures range are 6in scale figures based on the first 2 Peter Jackson Hobbit movies. They are in the same scale as the normal Toybiz figures. The series is again not very big, 11 figures and a single boxed set.
Bridge Direct Small Action Figures are 4in figures again based on the first 2 Peter Jackson Hobbit movies. There is slightly more available in this smaller range including single figures, multi-packs and boxed sets.
There are also a few more odd figures. These include a Toybiz Large Talking Gollum and a NECA 52in Balrog (which is to the same scale as the Toybiz Normal range).
Overlaps with other Areas
Magazines – there are a few magazines which have covered Tolkien Action Figures. The main ones of these which are collectable are the ones with covers specifically featuring Tolkien Action Figures. To a lesser extent, magazines with Tolkien Action Figure articles, or adverts, could also be collected.
Out of Scope
‘Action Figures’ is an area within the general ‘Figures’ category, therefore some other types of figures are close to Action Figures. These include ‘Dolls’ or any other larger scale figures, ‘Toy Figures’ which are smaller less detailed/articulated and can be more cartoony, ‘Ornamental Figures’ or statues which are more solid with no articulation.
Promotional
This is not an area with many promotional items to collect. For instance, I have not come across any Posters, Flyers or Standees.
There are 2 Toybiz Burger King Mail Away figures, Uruk-Hai and Lurtz characters (see below).
I have also seen some Marketing material for the Toy Vault range.
Away from the Normal
Within the Toybiz Normal range, a lot of the figures were also produced for non-English speaking countries and these had different packaging.
Also, within the Toybiz Normal range, there were some different variations within the same production of a figure. These occurred due to different production runs, normal in different countries. Some of these can be very minor, so it is debatable as to how collectable some of these are.
Similarly, again within the Toybiz Normal range, anomalies in packaging have occurred i.e. printing errors, wrong figures for packaging etc. These can also be collectable, however be sure that their packaging is actually factory sealed.
See Tolkien Visual Collecting Guide - Action Figure Variants for more details.
Production Prototypes of the Action Figures can be found, these are one off’s and as such are very rare. The provenance of these items should always be established.
It is also possible to find figures which have been autographed, usually by the corresponding actor the Action Figure is based on. Although these are nice to have in a collection, they are often personal. Again, provenance of these items should always be established.
Specialisations
If, however, this area is still too big for you, you could also specialise in one of the specific series. The series have a good range of sizes: Bakshi (very small) expensive, Applause (very small), NECA (very small), Toybiz Large (very small), Toy Vault (small), Bridge Direct (medium), Toybiz Normal (very large).
Another idea is to collect all action figures of a specific character, either from any series or within a specific series. See this article about Toybiz Ringwraiths as an example.
High End
There is not really any ‘high end’ or expensive series within this area, although the Knickerboker series has become expensive.
Rare, Unusual and Interesting Items
The following are some of the rarer, unusual and interesting items to be found within the Action Figure area.
Knickerboker Set – these figures in mint packaged condition are quite rare and highly sort after.
Toybiz Arwen Horse and Rider Red Box – this is the rarest of all the Toybiz range, it is very hard to obtain hardly ever being sold on ebay. The Green and Blue Box versions of this are more commonly available.
Toybiz Helms Deep Gimli Red Half Moon Packaging – only released in Australia, this is the second rarest Tobiz figure and very hard to find.
Toybiz Uruk-Hai Burger King Mail Away – this was an exclusive promotional figure by Burger King US, only available via mail away. There were limited numbers and when the company ran out, they supplied a previously released Lutz figure. There is no branded packaging, it came in a white cardboard box. These can be found occasionally on ebay.
Toybiz Mega Deal Value Packs – these were not widely available, only a few were seen in the US. They are not new figures or packaging but are 3 of the last released figures fixed together on a plain labelled backing. The 3 characters included can vary between each pack.
Toybiz Epic Trilogy Series 3 – these are the last 5 figures released in the series. You can find these, but they are quite expensive. Be careful as some of these are re-packagings.
Toybiz Return of the King Canadian Exclusive Series - 6 figures in multi-language packaging only released in Canada. These are very, very hard to find, particularly outside of Canada.
Toybiz Carry Case – this was only available in Canada. This is quite hard to find.
Toybiz El Senor de los Anillos Boxed Set – this is the an exclusive Foreign Language Boxed Set and was only available in Spain. It is not especially rare, but harder to obtain from outside of Europe.
Toybiz El Senor de los Anillos Cave Troll – this is the an exclusive Foreign Language Boxed Set and was only available in Spain. It is Very hard to find, particularly from outside of Europe.
Toybiz Korean Deluxe Gift Set – this was only available in Korea and is very very hard to find.
NECA Balrog – this was a one off very large limited-edition figure produced by NECA but to the scale of the Toybiz Normal range. It did not have any official packaging but came in a labelled cardboard box.
Bridge Direct Hobbit SDCC Exclusives – 2 figures, Invisible Frodo and Azog, with special packaging, were exclusively available at SDCC. These come up occasionally on ebay.
What to watch out for
As with a lot of collecting there is always the ‘Packaged’ vs ‘Loose’ consideration.
When considering ‘Packaged’ items, the quality of the packaging is important. Any damaged packaging will impact on the collectability of the item. Although, in my opinion, it is better to have an imperfect item than not have the item at all, so long as you don’t overpay for it.
When considering ‘Loose’ items, it is important that all the parts are there. For Action Figures this is particularly important as they normally come with accessories which are easily lost.
Some Action figures have working parts, either manually controlled or battery controlled. Be sure that the these are working, although battery-controlled elements only have a certain life span.
Storage and Display
Loose Action Figures are very easy to store, they take up little space. It is important to keep hold of all the accessories, which are easy to lose, so it is recommended that these be stored together in a box/container, but with the figures so that they are kept together.
Loose figures are also good to display, they can be posed and arranged in dioramas.
Boxed Action Figures are bulkier and require a fair bit of room to store. Some of the boxed sets are very large and if you have a lot of these, they can take up a lot of room.
You can get display cases to display Action Figures, loose and boxed.
If you have a particularly rare Action Figure, you can get it officially graded (according to condition, including packaging) and sealed into a display case. Although this process is not cheap.
What makes this area Interesting?
Action Figures in general have always been very popular to collect. They are a great visualisation of the characters from the books and the films.
This is quite a good Tolkien Area to collect as there are a reasonable number of items, not too many, with a lot being available and affordable. However, there are also rarer items to also make it a challenge for completists.
Resources
As well as the reference given above, the following resources have a lot more details about Tolkien Action Figures.
FigureRealm - Lord Of The Rings
Collector-ActionFigures - Lord of the Rings
Collector-ActionFigures - Hobbit
The Lord of the Rings Universe YouTube
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