Disney / Pixar - Toy Soldiers

I don't have a lot to say about this manufacturer. They are branded as Disney/Pixar, but as we all know, they are not in the business of making toy soldiers, so I suspect they were outsourced to someone who does. These guys are Disney's representation of the TimMee green army men that many kids grew up playing with during the 70's and 80's, as well as the many clones that have followed them up to the present day. As far as I am aware of, these guys existed initially only in digital form and it was only later that they were cast into actual plastic figures. You can find them in buckets with about 80 of them -well, 82 if you count the two paratroopers. These guys represent Vietnam era soldiers -look at the M16s-, so they are technically off topic for this blog, but since I gave the Vietnam TimMee guys a break, I figure I should also do the same with their offspring. Note that only 7 of the original 13 TimMee poses are represented. Most of the new figures are poses/actions that were displayed during the movie.  

Toy Story US Infantry - Part I

Except for the second guy from the right, the other four poses are roughly the same as their TimMee predecesors. The new guy however is not one that I remember from the film, so I am not sure why they did not go with one more of the orginal TimMee poses.

Toy Story US Infantry - Part II

Here we have figures 1, 2 and 4 from the right from the original TimMee set. The other two are poses from the film. One is the officer who controls the whole mission to scout the new presents, and the other is the one that is used during the marching sequence if I recall correctly.

Toy Story US Infantry - Part III

This is one of the guys that drops from the second floor during the daring scouting mission.

Toy Story US Infantry - Part IV

Here is his wing man. The only thing I don't quite like is that the ring where the parachute strings are attached is on top of the helmet. I don't recall if that's how the figures in the movie had theirs attached. Anyhow, all in all a nice set and a nice tip of the hat towards the original TimMee GIs.

Burger King GIs

Here's a bit of an unusual set. It is modeled after the Toy Story GIs, released in 1995. They are about 65mm tall. If there were a few more poses, it would make a good unit. Given their limited number of poses, they will have to be combined with some 70 mm GIs to give them some support. 

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Bergen Toys - Toy Soldiers

Bergen Toy and Novelty Co. was an American manufacturer of plastic figures. They were also known as Beton, a name that combines the first letters of the words in the company's name. The firm began in the mid 30s, manufacturing lead figures, and they later switched to plastic. Their range is not just military, but they also made circus, farm, and other types of figures. The company was quite popular in the 40's and early 50's but by 1958 it folded under the pressure of foreign made plastic manufacturers. In terms of military figures, they made both WWI and WWII soldiers, although they seem to have focused on the domestic market making only GIs. The WWII figures seem to have borrowed heavily from the WWI set. Let's take a look at what the WWII set looks like. 

Bergen Toys US Infantry - Part I

If it were not for the paratrooper you would definitely wonder if this set is from WWII or WWI. The machine gun does not seem to represent any of the actual weapons issued during WWII and the man with the gas mask on is also a bit out of place. 

Bergen Toys US Infantry - Part II

Note how the poses are very straight, favoring ease of manufacturing. The man throwing the grenade could have certainly used a bit more action in its sculpting. 

Bergen Toys US Infantry - Part III

Always a good thing to have a standard bearer, just in case you want to have your troops parade down the Champs Élysées. I find the guy holding the phone so close to his chest a bit amusing though.

Bergen Toys US Infantry - Part IV

You can recognize these figures by the logo in the bottom of the base.

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Marx 54mm versions of 6" Toy Soldiers

Usually, in this type of posts I like to give a bit of background and history about the manufacturer, but in this case, the manufacturer of these figures is a bit of a mystery to me. Back in the 70's Marx produced these figures in 6" scale. They were big and solid. A few years back though I ran into them in 54mm scale -albeit on the smaller side of 54mm. They were being resold by Minute Men Toy Soldiers as 'SWTS' sets. SWTS -Steve Weston Toy Soldiers is a dealer that also manufactures some figures. However its figures are originals, so I don't really know if SWTS was simply reselling them or if they were the ones that issued them in this smaller scale. BTW, since that time, I have also seen them advertised as DSG figures. DSG is the firm from Argentina that has recently reissued some of the Britains Deetail sets. So as you can see it is a real puzzle who makes them. If you happen to know, please leave a comment!

UPDATE: I recently had the good fortune of getting referred to Steve Weston who clarified that he bought them from DSG, and simply re-packaged them wih a SWTS label and sold them. 

Reproductions of Marx 6" figures - Japanse Infantry

As you can see that they have a very close resemblance to the Glencoe/Marx figures, which makes sense given their common origin. They are nice, action poses which fit well with other Japanese troops. 

Reproductions of Marx 6" figures - German Infantry

Several of these guys have a strong resemblance with the CTS German Infantry. One thing that I don't like is that the guy who is running carrying the ammo box used to have one foot off the ground in the 6" version, but in this scale they forced it to have the back foot on the base, and to lower the rest of the figure they shaved the bottom of the front foot.

Reproductions of Marx 6" figures - German Infantry - Painted

In this picture you might be able to see what I was talking about the front foot of the guy on the left. I did not paint the rest of the set because I had already painted the equivalent poses from CTS and they are almost identical. 

Reproductions of Marx 6" Figures - Soviet Infantry - Part I

Another decent set, but again, they are on the smaller side of 54mm. I like them however as much or more as the other 54mm Marx guys. 

Reproductions of Marx 6" Figures - Soviet Infantry - Part II

Here is the last one of the Soviet guys. I did not paint this one as it is, except for the base, almost exactly like one of the 54mm Marx guys.

Reproductions of Marx 6" Figures - US Infantry - Part I

These guys are OK, but there were a couple things I did not quite like. The first one is the size. They are definitely small and skinny. Another one is the weapon of the man on the right. It is short and stubby. One thing that I did like is a nice detail on the middle man. Notice how the straps of his helmet flap in the air as he runs forward!

Reproductions of Marx 6" Figure - US Infantry - Part II

This guy is the sixth in the set. I actually find him acceptable when I look at him. Not quite sure why I left him out when I painted the other guys.

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Steve Weston Toy Soldiers - Toy Soldiers

Steve Weston Toy Soldiers is a British Business. It is both a dealer of toy soldiers from all periods and other manufacturers, as well as being a manufacturer of its own line of 54mm figures. At present, its product line is rather small, as they have only been producing their own figures for a few years and the range is mostly focused on the Wild West, however, they do have one interesting WWII set as you will see below. The other really unique and interesting offering that they have is a 1/32 British WWI Mark IV 'Tadpole' tank and its German counterpart the A7V tank. Those of course, are beyond the scope of this blog, however they do deserve a mention due to the uniqueness factor if you are into WWI, you might want to get some of those. 

Steve Weston Toy Soldiers British Infantry

This is their sinlge WWII set. As you can see, overall it is nicely sculpted. I like how the figures are standing with their weight shifted off-center as the poses look more realistic that way. They also come with a good amount of equipment on them, which shows that they pay attention to detail. Perhaps the only thing to criticize is how wide the helmets are. The helmets on a couple of them, like the guy on the very left, remind me of the helmets used by the Star Wars troops protecting the Emperor. Overall, a decent set to add to the collection. As you can see, at the time I took this picture I was in the process of painting them. Once they are fully painted they look better!

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Supreme Playsets - Toy Soldiers

Supreme Playsets is a relatively unknown company that manufactures soldiers for kids. They come in bags and are relatively inexpensive. This would be great for me as a collector if only they offered more WWII sets. They do cover a large range of figures, like knights, pirates, ancients, but only one WWII set. One interesting feature of their figures is that they come factory painted. Once I heard that they were based out of Russia, but I don't have any evidence of it. One thing that points in that direction is that they do tend to favor sets depicting Russian figures, like Russian Knights, Russian Napoleonic Infantry, or WWII Soviet Infantry as you will see below.

The Soviet Infantry set was released only 2 or 3 years back. They are recasts of the 1/72 Italeri Soviet Infantry. There is an imporant difference though between this set and the Italeri 1/32 set. While Italeri also released a Soviet Infantry set in 1/32, that set only contains 8 figures, whereas the Supreme Playsets Set contains 12. If you want to try to identify which 4 are the new ones, do so before reading the rest of the post.

Supreme Playsets Soviet Infantry - Part I

As you can see it is a solid set, althpugh the credit for that should really go to Italeri. The man on the very left is carrying an anti-tank rifle (not sure if it is a PTRS or a PTRD), which is actually a nice and unique figure/weapon across all the Soviet Infantry sets that I have seen. He's great at taking on lightly-to-medium-armored German vechicles. The two figures that Italeri did not release in 1/32 are the first and the third guys from the left.

Supreme Playsets Soviet Infantry - Part II

As you can see, Supreme Playsets relased these figures in two color schemes. The green base color that you see is actually the color of the plastic, and only the face is really painted. The rest of the figure just has some brown patches throughout the body. So, other than the eyes, which actually look fairly decent, the rest of the paint job is rather poor. The same is true for the brown figures in the first picture above. The two new poses that Italeri did not release in 1/32 are the first and the fourth guys from the right.

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