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Sunday, May 30, 2010

30 Years of THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK - part 30


As we head towards the conclusion of The Empire Strikes Back 30th Anniversary celebration I decided to post a bunch of ephemera I've saved over the years beginning with these two note pads. The Yoda one is a pretty common image of the popular character. I was excited when I found the other one though. A big fan of the cantina aliens from the prior movie, I was surprised to see that there were some in The Empire Strikes Back, though of course you couldn't actually see them in the movie, as Cloud City wound up being a pretty much humans only kind of place with the exception of the pig faced ugnaughts.
The short one is a snivvian (at the time we would recognized it as "Snaggletooth" because of the action figure) with new hands and a new costume. The taller one is a hare mouse also with new hands and costume. Full shots of this posed image reveal the snivvian to be wearing dainty women's ballet slipper type shoes, leading me to believe that this pair was never meant to be seen in full. 

Below are two complete Kenner booklets (click on the images for a larger view) which were inserted into the packaging of the action figure vehicles and playsets and designed to make you drool over the Star Wars toys you didn't own yet. I spent a lot of time looking through these little booklets. I was very fond of the micro collection which did not last long. Aside from the later addition of a Millennium Falcon, this subset of Star Wars toys never went any further. I'd guess that high pricing on these expensive toys which were not to scale with the popular 3 3/4" action figure line led to its demise. It may also explain why I have all of the Bespin playsets (and some others) but never received the awesome AT-AT for my action figures. 



































Below are a couple pages plus the cover from a third booklet. 





Like Boba Fett before him, fellow bounty hunter Bossk initially appeared as a free action figure you could mail away for by sending proof of purchase seals from other Star Wars action figures. He was available before The Empire Strikes Back reached theaters and when he arrived in the mail, he came with this tidbit of biographical information. 






  

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