Nathan's M.U.S.C.L.E. Blog!

MUSCLEs were all the rage for the scant few years that they were popular, and a bunch of bootleggers wanted to cash-in on the craze by cranking out their own MUSCLEs. The results were usually awful, but those bootlegs certainly had a character all their own that added to the tapestry of MUSCLE collecting. So how can you tell if your beloved MUSCLE is a bootleg? For one, since bootlegs were molded from production figures (i.e., copies of copies), they're always smaller and less detailed than legit MUSCLEs. Bootlegs usually don't feature the familiar Y/S*N*T trademark that adorns the back of official MUSCLE figures, either. They're often cast in weird and wacky colors and their plastic is almost always more rubbery. The sculpts are usually ripped off from poster MUSCLEs , but they might also be taken from Japanese Kinnikuman Kinkeshi sculpts (the source toy line for MUSCLE) that were never released in the US. In my ol' MUSCLE-collecting days, I amassed a nice little army ...

A few figures have stirred up some controversy amongst MUSCLEheads. These figures are not shown on the poster nor on any other official MUSCLE item, yet they have the same MUSCLE-like plastic and feature the Y/S*N*T trademark. They are periodically found in MUSCLE lots from both the US and Japan. Are they truly MUSCLEs?

M.U.S.C.L.E.s conquer Europe! Exoginis are the Italian version of American MUSCLEs. They seemed to have been released at about the same time as MUSCLEs and Kinnikumans. Only 40 individual figures were available, a huge difference from the 236 MUSCLEs available in the US. However, a definite improvement of Exoginis over the American and Japanese lines was the introduction of six new innovative colors, shown above: Ivory, Black, Metallic Silver, Metallic Blue, Transparent Green, and Transparent Pink! Our American colors barely compare to the clear plastic Exoginis! Below are direct scans of 16 Exoginis...

No action figure production process is perfect, and MUSCLE is no exception. They're rare, but every once in a while a MUSCLE figure that has some sort of production error pops up. More common are mold distortions where figures are bent out of shape, but here we explore the more rare variety of MUSCLE birth defects.

The FoxBox Preview is the first official American Ultimate Muscle collectible! This was a freebie given away at Toys R Us stores to promote the Fox Saturday morning line-up, called "FoxBox".

This action figure and vehicle set was constructed to look like the Kinnikuman manga books. When you open it up, there are some "comic" pages with directions for the car, instructions for games, and information about the characters. Also, there's a compartment with the figures and vehicle. Shown above is a scan of the front of the package, and below the back.

The Romando Ultimate Muscles line is a new Japanese line of large scale Kinnikuman characters. The figures are based on a 7 to 8 inch scale. Many different Kinnikuman characters are available in the line.

A Satan Cross Custom by TheGodBeast