What better way to celebrate ALIEN Day than to post about the original 1979 Kenner ALIEN toy.  Today, we have this very special set of a dozen photos of a test pilot engineering sample.  I’ve posted about these early production pieces before but having a 2nd item surface right now is timing at its best!

Pilot box samples like this were used for multiple test purposes early in the figure’s production.  This rare and fascinating item has been added to the HIDEOUS PLASTIC page dedicated to Kenner ALIEN prototypes. 

I’d like to thank Steve Dwyer for going well beyond just sharing this item with us all.  He’s removed the box – and the figure – from the acrylic display case it normally resides in for the sake of taking these photos.  Thank you, Sir.

-Windebieste.

Do you want an instant collection of Kenner’s ALIEN product line from 1979 but don’t want to hunt around for eternity to find them at a low price?  Luckily for you, duffinopolis has one of each available for sale on eBay in a single lot.  That’s right, in one fell swoop, you could land yourself a Kenner ALIEN Movie Viewer, a US edition of the ALIEN board game and an 18″ tall ALIEN action figure – including the box!  All this for just US$799.99!  CHEAP!

Now, you may think I jest, but this is actually a decent price.  These 40 year old relics are high value collectibles now and finding a set of 3 like this is very rare.  You’ll find them for sale individually quite frequently but as a set?  That doesn’t happen too often.  As for the price of US$800?  Yup. That’s not too bad, either.

The action figure in the box alone can pull that amount of money – or more – and while the poster is missing and the red insert card is a facsimile the box itself is in good healthy condition and the figure is complete.  Consider US$600 to be an average price for this item on a good day.  That’s True.  Then there’s the board game.  You’ll find this is the common US edition included in this lot.  Nonetheless, it’s worth around US$100 – easily more.  …and that movie viewer?  Once again, it’s worth around US$100.  Of course, these are average ballpark figures.  You can find them cheaper – if you wait and hunt around but the US$800 price tag is pretty much what I would expect for this trio.

As an instant set of 3 highly collectible vintage pieces, it’s a good deal.  If I didn’t have them already, sure.  I’d grab ’em at this price.

-Windebieste.

During the course of the last 40 years, there’s been dozens of ALIEN action figures manufactured by many, many licencees.  The 1979 Kenner ALIEN toy was one of the first (pre-dated only by the MPC model kit). It’s also been reproduced at least 12 times.  As so many iterations of the figure have appeared over the past 4 decades, it’s not surprising some confusion may exist between different versions.  Take this ALIEN figure for sale on ebay for example.

He’s missing a few parts here and there; notably the dome on his head, the spike on his back and his tongue pieces are all absent.  These items are commonly missing from these old toys and their absence will significantly devalue the figure.  Nonetheless, he’s an original Kenner toy but the vendor has erroneously listed him as a Gentle Giant figure.  Continue reading →

Incredible as it may seem, 40 year old Kenner ALIEN action figures are actually worth a lot of money. With this information in mind, let’s take a look at one of the pitfalls of purchasing one of these old toys, buying it at auction on eBay. This recently sold sample is in less than stellar condition and it fetched a respectable sum. Significantly, the arms are broken off and half of the tongue is missing. At least the head dome is present- and that’s a feature many purchasers will pay good money for. This auction is over now so let’s take a look at how it went.

firstly, we should acquaint ourselves with the actual item for sale. Here’s the description the vendor provided for this listing, “Missing top part of inner jaw. Clear part that goes over head is a little cloudy.” It’s not a lot to go on but at the very least the vendor does have the integrity to acknowledge the figure isn’t complete and part of the tongue is missing.

Continue reading →

It’s well known 1979 Kenner ALIEN action figures can fetch extremely high prices.  Find one in an unopened box, and the price escalates dramatically and you can expect them to be well over four figures.

Take this item for example, currently for sale on Ebay. It’s a little rough around the edges, as these boxes frequently are; but all the contents appear to be inside:  action figure, the red insert card it’s supposed to be attached to; and the B&W poster.  All of these items are present but is there anything missing?  Yes, actually.  There is.  Continue reading →

Something I’ve been wanting to do for a while now was to add a set of photos of the little known bilingual variant of the Kenner ALIEN action figure box to the gallery dedicated to the old nefarious action figure.

While much of the box is essentially the same as the US edition, notable differences are scattered about regarding the text badging the packaging.  French and English share the common spaces on these items where only English is used on the US version.

You can inspect more photos of this international variant on the page dedicated to the Kenner ALIEN action figure.

-Windebieste.

In 1979, Kenner Products released three retail items designed to capitalise on the then recently released ALIEN movie. While the famous 18 inch tall children’s toy was the main item in this range of merchandise a (2 to 4 player) board game and a manually operated crank handle one minute movie viewer were also made available to the public.

Here we will be focusing on the board game, specifically some of its curious features along with exploring other international variants of the well known item. One particular feature of note is the cover of the board game which depicts a cropped image of one of Kenner’s 18 inch toy appearing against a still shot of the three Nostromo crew members about to enter the newly discovered derelict space craft of unknown origin.

In this regard, it is notable all images appearing on the package art of these items featuring the famous ALIEN toy and logo have all been censored, permanently disfiguring and concealing prominent evidence this figure was actually a prototype. It is possibly either a hard copy or test shot of the toy which differs from final retail samples and reflects Kenner’s frequent use of such prototype use during promotional exercises of their products. Here, conspicuously absent from the image, is the translucent nature of the dome on the head through which the glow in the dark paint application of the creature’s “evil brain” is normally visible. Continue reading →