A vintage star wars collectors' confession.. I need help! I can't take the blaster away.

Okay, becoming self aware that I might need help...

About a year ago I bought a Palitoy 12 back Leia- at a good price because the bubble had been opened. A beautiful item that I'd been after for a while, and a step further towards my attempt to complete the Palitoy first 12 MOCs.

This 12 back Palitoy Leia looks great and fair to say I was pretty happy to put on the shelf and start the admiration process. It's missing blaster and footer, and I thought casually that it would be good to, at some point, get a blaster, and if possible, although less likely a footer, (although not sure how I could ever do that without destroying another moc which I have no interest in doing).

Anyway, I've looked out for a Leia blaster for the last year and, as you know, they're not as easy to find as you'd initially think. Lots of them are overpriced and there's **** loads of repro rubbish, the extent to which you only realise when you start looking out for niche weapons.

After a year of hunting, last week I had a breakthrough. Having had a tip off to a reasonablish priced R2 D2 pop up I went along to Camden to Monkey's Emporium- great store, highly recommend, and picked up a complete Leia Organa with blaster for a further reasonablish price.

I got home expecting to instantly execute the easy transition, to take the blaster from loose Leia and move to the 12 back's opened bubble to her Palitoy cousin.

However very strangely- I can't do it.

My conscience is telling me that It seems unfair to take the blaster away from the loose Leia- it's her blaster and they've been together through thick and thin for nearly 30 years. I also don't know if she's a Kenner or Palitoy, but that's a secondary consideration.

A sad state of affairs, but am reluctantly now back hunting a loose blaster.

Anyway, thought I'd share this. Has anybody else ever faced a similar unexpected issue?

Feel free to abuse me as you see fit / let me know if anybody has a 12 back Palitoy footer for Leia or blaster at reasonablish price!

Cheers.

I think that collectors can be picky about some things... but other things you have to let slide.

Truth is if they are loose then most weapons and figures that exist have likely been intermingled at one point or another. If a kid in 1978 owns a Stormie and a Death Squad Commander then who's to say that the kid hasn't inadvertently swapped their guns over whilst playing.

Maybe that particular gun did share the bubble with that particular figure, but chances are that they didn't. As long as its the right type and colour of accessory then who really cares, I'd say let it slide!

Agreed. If the Palitoy factory had a bin of figures and another bin of weapons, the fact that one specific figure got paired with one specific blaster is luck of the draw. It could just as easily have been any other pairing from those bins, so as long as you find the 'correct' blaster, I'd certainly say that's good enough.

Regarding the footer, original ones do occasionally come up for sale (usually at silly prices), but if the piece is just for you, and since it's so very easy to do, I'd recommend making yourself a replacement footer. Personally, I regard that as being a world away from buying a repro blaster or box, and since it's for your own personal use, and providing of course that you fully declare the fact that it is a custom footer if you ever come to sell it, I think that's perfectly acceptable. It's not like there's a roaring trade in repro footers out there! ;-)

I understand where you're coming from.
I have all my childhood vintage stuff, mostly complete apart from the odd blaster, leias white gown, and Yoda's robe.

I don't display my own figures, rather I have them tucked away all boxed up.
The pieces I've lost/misplaced I don't want to replace as they aren't from my childhood.
I'm focusing on a loose run of the main rebels in any condition, complete or incomplete.
I'm displaying these. The ones I buy complete, their accessories won't go to add to my old originals.

I agree with most on here with regards to the blaster, you don't even know for sure if it is the original blaster that she came with and as long as it's on display with the same style Leia I don't think you should worry too much about it. The bigger question I want to know though is if you're planning on having the blaster in her hand or re-taping it back inside the bubble? I've been lucky enough to have the old vintage tape still inside some of my opened bubbles and have simply tucked the weapon back in but as I like to display my reseals as they came out of the factory I have used new tape from time to time. One thing I did do though was measure up the thickness and length of it to get it as close as possible to the original (probably only on two or three of my reseals though).

As for the footer there are two ways you could approach this. One way is to find a real beater card back with enough of the same colour blue on it and cut out the footer size. You can peal off a thin layer of the paper from the back of the card so that the bottom of the footer looks correct (the correct cardboard colour). I've done this a few times and it looks great as well as still being vintage. I know some people would never cut up a card back no matter what but there are plenty of really destroyed card backs out there that are useless so I don't really have a problem with it. I would never do this to anything even half decent so blow the burning torches out :lol:

The other way that I've had success with (and this is the preferred way), is to contact anyone who sells U graded figures with ANH Leia in their 'for sale' section and ask if they have the footer. I did this once and scored about 50 of them which I'll dish out at some point when I get them out of storage. The way I figured it is that the damage has already been done with U grading so I may as well help out in any way I can to put to good use what's left from the terrible process. True enough you won't know if the footer is from a ANH, ESB or Jedi Leia footer but at least it's fully original and keeps it with the right figure as it was intended.

Just my thoughts on all of this and if I ever do get back to my footers before you've resolved your problem I'll see if I have one.

Ian

Cheers guys, some useful advice. Looks like the blaster is going in the bubble. Great idea on contacting U graders to get a real footer, although not sure how I'd feel about effectively supporting them U grading stuff. Thanks again.

I actually know what you mean and had the same dilemma myself recently. I purchased a loose pin-head Han, which came with blaster. I had every intention of using the blaster for my childhood Luke X Wing, as his was lost years ago. But I just couldn't do it, it seemed somehow unfair on Han, so it stays with him! Luke will have to wait...

Ha ha, this is funny. I did a similar thing.., my childhood Ben didn't have a cape or light sabre so I bought another complete Ben off Ebay to use for parts. When he arrived I hadn't the heart to take the bits off him so he remains intact. My original Ben will have to freeze until a loose cape comes along. Well done for confessing, I thought it was just me.

Sell the complete Leia and blaster, then buy an over priced blaster. Might not seem as bad then, or just buy an over priced blaster! :lol:

whats monkeys emporium?

is there another place in Camden selling vintage star wars?

just found it, £19.50 for a complete chief chirpa :roll:

I have had the same dilemma during my loose run collecting. Everytime I ended up retaining the weapon with the second figure and ended up buying the loose weapon anyway - thus having two complete loose figures and spending too much !

It's counter productive. Just buy the loose weapon and move on. Yes you will pay probably 25% above what your sensible head deems it's worth, but when you consider the time spent searching, well that 25% falls away quickly......

Best of luck.

Yeah did the same recently, I bought a Droids Kez Iban (loose of course!) so I could give my Luke Stormtrooper the proper black blaster. When it arrived I decided I would rather keep Kez with his proper blaster and Luke with his "acceptable" blue/black one.