When Did The Variant Thing Start ?

bosk70

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I'm not too into variants / variations , but was happy when I noticed I had both versions of the lando bespin belt buckle molds :) which I didn't even know existed till I saw the variant thread on it, and I also noticed I had two boba fetts with different shades of dark red / darker scarlet brown grey etc... is it, belt area so suppose I'm a bit into it with out meaning to be :D
 

pizzathehutt

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the mould on the head of the stormtroopers I had being different rang alarm bells for me

I quite like some of the factory errors although don't own any, I like the unpainted hand ree yees
 

Dannywhiteley

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I think variants really started to become more than the few obvious examples (VCJ, Han large/small, Blue Snag etc) when Kenner deliberately produced variants in the early POTF2 - EP1 lines. Long/short sabres, circles on Boba hands, Darth maul black vest etc really got collectors looking for the smallest, silliest details.

Best vintage variant I heard of recently was the light and dark faced Bespin guards. Only its not what you are thinking, both are actually the black Bespin guard, just one is a very slightly lighter shade of brown.
 

Snaketibe

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bosk70 said:
I'm not too into variants / variations , but was happy when I noticed I had both versions of the lando bespin belt buckle molds :) which I didn't even know existed till I saw the variant thread on it, and I also noticed I had two boba fetts with different shades of dark red / darker scarlet brown grey etc... is it, belt area so suppose I'm a bit into it with out meaning to be :D
I hate to do this to you (not least because this sort of thing is presumably exactly what non-variant collectors don't care for :)), but there are at least three different variants of Lando's belt buckle, not two (please excuse the poor photo quality; they weren't actually taken with a view to focus on the buckle, so they're a little bit blurred :)):

Narrow with no vertical line:

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Narrow with a vertical line:

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Wide with a vertical line:

Wide with vertical line.jpg
 

subzero

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Dannywhiteley said:
Best vintage variant I heard of recently was the light and dark faced Bespin guards. Only its not what you are thinking, both are actually the black Bespin guard, just one is a very slightly lighter shade of brown.

Slightly off topic, but the black Bespin guard always sticks out in my memory of playing with it as a kid ( the dark faced one ), I always remember just how damn black he was haha but at the time never thought anything of it whatsoever it was just normal to look at. But today now I look at him and think omg why is he so unnaturally black like a golliwog :lol: if that figure was released today no doubt you'd have people screaming 'racist' saying how the face should have been brown, even down to the packaging that has to mention that he's black in case you didn't notice lol I find that strange. If that figure was released like that today it would last a day or two until it gets pulled from the shelves for offending people, how perspectives change!
 

Dannywhiteley

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subzero said:
Dannywhiteley said:
Best vintage variant I heard of recently was the light and dark faced Bespin guards. Only its not what you are thinking, both are actually the black Bespin guard, just one is a very slightly lighter shade of brown.

Slightly off topic, but the black Bespin guard always sticks out in my memory of playing with it as a kid ( the dark faced one ), I always remember just how damn black he was haha but at the time never thought anything of it whatsoever it was just normal to look at. But today now I look at him and think omg why is he so unnaturally black like a golliwog :lol: if that figure was released today no doubt you'd have people screaming 'racist' saying how the face should have been brown, even down to the packaging that has to mention that he's black in case you didn't notice lol I find that strange. If that figure was released like that today it would last a day or two until it gets pulled from the shelves for offending people, how perspectives change!

Quite right too. I prefer to call him "Bespin Guard of African origin" but then my anthropology professor friend would remind me that we are all African.
 

Snaketibe

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Dannywhiteley said:
subzero said:
Dannywhiteley said:
Best vintage variant I heard of recently was the light and dark faced Bespin guards. Only its not what you are thinking, both are actually the black Bespin guard, just one is a very slightly lighter shade of brown.

Slightly off topic, but the black Bespin guard always sticks out in my memory of playing with it as a kid ( the dark faced one ), I always remember just how damn black he was haha but at the time never thought anything of it whatsoever it was just normal to look at. But today now I look at him and think omg why is he so unnaturally black like a golliwog :lol: if that figure was released today no doubt you'd have people screaming 'racist' saying how the face should have been brown, even down to the packaging that has to mention that he's black in case you didn't notice lol I find that strange. If that figure was released like that today it would last a day or two until it gets pulled from the shelves for offending people, how perspectives change!

Quite right too. I prefer to call him "Bespin Guard of African origin" but then my anthropology professor friend would remind me that we are all African.
Indeed!

Regarding the black guard's possible running change, unless it was simply another case of one factory using a different shade of brown paint in error / through not really caring, in this instance, due to the possible racial sensitivity issue, whilst there certainly are people in the world with extremely dark skin tones, I suppose it's possible Kenner made a deliberate running change to make the figure more closely resemble the skin tone of the guard pictured on the card. However, that's assuming the dark brown one came out first, and I don't actually know if that's the case. However, here are the two different guards (that I know of! There may be even more shades of brown out there that I don't know about!) and the picture from the card:

Black Bespin Guards.jpg

Black Bespin Guard Card Image.jpg
 

bosk70

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Snaketibe said:
bosk70 said:
I'm not too into variants / variations , but was happy when I noticed I had both versions of the lando bespin belt buckle molds :) which I didn't even know existed till I saw the variant thread on it, and I also noticed I had two boba fetts with different shades of dark red / darker scarlet brown grey etc... is it, belt area so suppose I'm a bit into it with out meaning to be :D
I hate to do this to you (not least because this sort of thing is presumably exactly what non-variant collectors don't care for :)), but there are at least three different variants of Lando's belt buckle, not two (please excuse the poor photo quality; they weren't actually taken with a view to focus on the buckle, so they're a little bit blurred :)):

Narrow with no vertical line:

Narrow with no vertical line.jpg
Narrow with a vertical line:

Narrow with vertical line.jpg
Wide with a vertical line:

Wide with vertical line.jpg

Thanks for the info Snaketibe..... now I have the middle one to look out for now... :eek: no.. no.. i'm not into variant's :D dam but they would look good all lined up... no.. no :lol:
 

subzero

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Maybe some words were actually said about the dark skin tone to make them change it to the brown, even back then.

But I suppose like you say it's the same thing with different tones such as for Han Hoth, pale face, pink face etc!, and like you say it's probably just down to what paint they had to produce them at the time, or just complete accidents etc.
 

Snaketibe

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bosk70 said:
Snaketibe said:
bosk70 said:
I'm not too into variants / variations , but was happy when I noticed I had both versions of the lando bespin belt buckle molds :) which I didn't even know existed till I saw the variant thread on it, and I also noticed I had two boba fetts with different shades of dark red / darker scarlet brown grey etc... is it, belt area so suppose I'm a bit into it with out meaning to be :D
I hate to do this to you (not least because this sort of thing is presumably exactly what non-variant collectors don't care for :)), but there are at least three different variants of Lando's belt buckle, not two (please excuse the poor photo quality; they weren't actually taken with a view to focus on the buckle, so they're a little bit blurred :)):

Narrow with no vertical line:

Narrow with no vertical line.jpg
Narrow with a vertical line:

Narrow with vertical line.jpg
Wide with a vertical line:

Wide with vertical line.jpg

Thanks for the info Snaketibe..... now I have the middle one to look out for now... :eek: no.. no.. i'm not into variant's :D dam but they would look good all lined up... no.. no :lol:
All lined up, you say? ;-)

Lando Line-up 1.jpg

Lando Line-up 2.jpg
 

subzero

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Snaketibe said:
subzero said:
What's this Attck of The Clones? :lol:
It sometimes seems that way! Personally, I prefer to think of it as Attack of the Teeth, Head Widths and Belt Buckles :wink:

Attack of The Old Smoothies :lol:
 

bosk70

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Snaketibe said:
bosk70 said:
Snaketibe said:
I hate to do this to you (not least because this sort of thing is presumably exactly what non-variant collectors don't care for :)), but there are at least three different variants of Lando's belt buckle, not two (please excuse the poor photo quality; they weren't actually taken with a view to focus on the buckle, so they're a little bit blurred :)):

Narrow with no vertical line:

Narrow with no vertical line.jpg
Narrow with a vertical line:

Narrow with vertical line.jpg
Wide with a vertical line:

Wide with vertical line.jpg

Thanks for the info Snaketibe..... now I have the middle one to look out for now... :eek: no.. no.. i'm not into variant's :D dam but they would look good all lined up... no.. no :lol:
All lined up, you say? ;-)

Lando Line-up 1.jpg
Lando Line-up 2.jpg

Really nice line up, a thing of beauty, puts my two to shame and I forgot about the face variants of teeth etc. it goes on and on and on :D
 

jared007

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I think it has emerged as a way to keep on collecting once you have a set completed. I actually don't think many of us completed full sets back in the 90's which is why the variant thing never came up. And now that many of us have, and we have a bit more disposable cash these days it's the next thing to do.
 

Snaketibe

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bosk70 said:
Snaketibe said:
bosk70 said:
Thanks for the info Snaketibe..... now I have the middle one to look out for now... :eek: no.. no.. i'm not into variant's :D dam but they would look good all lined up... no.. no :lol:
All lined up, you say? ;-)

Lando Line-up 1.jpg
Lando Line-up 2.jpg

Really nice line up, a thing of beauty, puts my two to shame and I forgot about the face variants of teeth etc. it goes on and on and on :D
Thanks :)

I know you were probably joking, but never feel bad about only having two. For many, many years that's all I had (and knew about); teeth and no teeth Lando (and for many people, that's all they care about, which is fair enough). It's only when I deliberately set about looking for vintage figure variants and starting doing some research that I realised just how many other variants of most figures there are out there. I find it really interesting, but I completely understand why variant collecting is not for everybody!
 

Bonsai_Tree_Ent

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jared007 said:
I think it has emerged as a way to keep on collecting once you have a set completed. I actually don't think many of us completed full sets back in the 90's which is why the variant thing never came up. And now that many of us have, and we have a bit more disposable cash these days it's the next thing to do.

Agreed - from a budget POV it also serves as that middle ladder rung between a loose run and a MOC run.
 

Snaketibe

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jared007 said:
I think it has emerged as a way to keep on collecting once you have a set completed. I actually don't think many of us completed full sets back in the 90's which is why the variant thing never came up. And now that many of us have, and we have a bit more disposable cash these days it's the next thing to do.
I agree with you. Although I personally was lucky enough to complete a 'full' ( :lol: :lol: :lol: ) run of about 115 figures by the mid-nineties, I didn't really get into variant collecting properly until about 2 years ago! And you're right; it has really breathed new life into my Vintage collecting. The funny thing is that even back in the nineties I knew about a lot of variants (many of which I even owned!) yet didn't really like or want to display them. I was happy to display the more obvious ones (large and small head Han, blue and red Snaggletooth, etc.), but didn't care enough about the minor ones to bother. I had four different Ackbars (1 Hong Kong painted hands, plus 3 Taiwan painted sleeves), but I made the decision that although their vests were all clearly different shades (I didn't even focus on the painted / molded hands / sleeves obvious difference!), I didn't want to display 4 of the same (dull!) figure.

I also passed on some things I wish I hadn't because of it. I didn't like the tri-logo / PBP Fetts (not that I had a clue what PBP was back then) at all as they were the 'wrong' colour, being even lighter blue and hence even further away from Boba Fett's on-screen costume colour than the 'regular' Fett was. And for that reason, I actually refused to buy a mint carded one in my local collectibles shop when it was for sale for £20 :shock: ... You live and learn! :lol:
 

Snaketibe

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Bonsai_Tree_Ent said:
jared007 said:
I think it has emerged as a way to keep on collecting once you have a set completed. I actually don't think many of us completed full sets back in the 90's which is why the variant thing never came up. And now that many of us have, and we have a bit more disposable cash these days it's the next thing to do.

Agreed - from a budget POV it also serves as that middle ladder rung between a loose run and a MOC run.
Agreed as well. And it was your variant collection, Sir, which I enjoyed viewing very much when it toured near me, that rekindled my interest and started me back on the variant road, so thank you, from both me and Barclaycard :)
 
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