Bizarre Toy Box: Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them (eBay)Battle Beasts came out in the late 1980s and, like most toys of the era, had a gimmick to help sales. Each Battle Beast had a heat sensitive sticker on his chest, which, when rubbed, would reveal the warrior's strength. The symbols would represent either fire, wood or water and could be used in a rock, paper, scissors type game—fire beat wood, wood beat water, water beat fire. Later a fourth emblem was added, the Sunburst, and it would beat all other types. There was a total of three series adding up to 76 overall Battle Beasts, beginning with #1, Pirate Lion, and ending with #76, Ossified Orangutan.
Battle Beasts were created by Takara of Japan in 1986. Tomy Co., Ltd., AKA K.K. Takara-Tomy, still owns the worldwide rights to the property. The heyday for the toyline came during the period in which it was licensed to Hasbro for distribution outside Japan, when Hasbro marketed the toys in America and many other parts of the world. Although in the Japanese market Takara branded the toys as a spin-off of Transformers, and even named the toys "BeastFormers", their tie-in to the Transformers universe was not part of the Hasbro American story or marketing.
Lets take a look at 3 of the most memorable Battle Beasts!
Battle Beast #7: HORNY TOAD (No jokes, please) Japanese Name: Drill Frog Animal Basis: Horny Toad is pretty clearly...well, a kind of toad, judging by all of the warts and his more inset eyes (as opposed to the distinctive bulging eyes of frogs). It's impossible to determine the species, though- there are hundreds of kinds of these amphibians out there. He could easily be a Cane Toad- the front profile fits, and they're a famous invasive species, prone to out-breeding the local fauna. Go back far enough, and pretty much all land vertebrates owe their lineage to Amphibians. Debuting in the Devonian Period, they soon came to dominate the Earth, until the Reptiles took over. Amphibians, once extremely diverse and covering many steps in the food chain, now are pretty much just three groups separated into 7,000 small species, 90% of which are Frogs (the other two are Salamanders & Caecilians). A tiny Frog is the world's smallest vertebrate (about half the size of a U.S. dime), and the longest is a hair under six feet in length (the Chinese Giant Salamander) - once, they were up to nine feet long. Amphibians are, well, amphibious, being at home on land or in the water, where they can travel at great speeds. They give birth to eggs full of tiny tadpoles, which grow less and less aquatic with time, eventually growing legs and scarcely resembling their original forms at all (basically, Frogs are the Saiyans of the vertebrate world). Many, MANY species are now incredibly endangered, with the constant frog death being a sign of environmental disaster in many regions of the world - with skin that easily absorbs the water and anything in it, frogs are a good indicator of environmental health. Toy Description: Almost every part of him is weird - his entire body is covered in warts, for one. His legs are actually full-on digitigrade - a VERY odd feature for this line (only some of the birds are like that). His boots are mere shin guards. He's WAY skinnier than the other Beasts. His head is shorter and broader than others, too. In the Japan Headmasters continuity, DrillFrog is one of the many Beastformers who joined the insurgent army under Alligatron raised by Galvatron in order to aid his Decepticons in conquering the formerly-peaceful planet Beast. His role in the Decepticon-allied Beastformer forces is an underwater offensive soldier. He is aided in this role by the fact that he naturally contaminates drinking water with venom discharged from his body. His hands and feet can support his weight sticking to any surface, and he is a powerful jumper. Presumably these are inherent attributes of his species. Drillfrog holds the rank of King of Barāki, in whose agricultural area he was born, over Emperor Snakebomb. One can assume Snakebomb doesn't care for him, since although Drillfrog likes to joke, he has a bad reputation among his friends for saying things that are too cruel. What a jerk. Battle Beast #63: ROWDY ROOSTER Japanese Name: Razorkukku Animal Basis: Domesticated Rooster (unknown breed)- possibly a Leghorn, Sussex or a Wyandotte breed just by looking at the colors, though the creators probably just decided on "Generic Chicken Appearance" and made him white for the sake of coloring. Domesticated chickens are derived from gamebirds - a mostly-ground-dwelling Order (Galliformes) generally treated as big prey items for early settlers of the Americas. Most are quite small (the Quail, Ptarmigan & Partridge weigh much less than a pound, on average), but the Turkey is famously big and fat, and will readily-charge humans. The spectacular Peacock is from India, but is known throughout the world. And they're REALLY friggin' loud. The most famous and important to humans is naturally the Chicken, domesticated from the East Asian "Red Jungle-Fowl" about 5,000 years ago. Toy Description: This is one of the few I glossed over as a kid as unimpressive (I mean, it's an EVIL CHICKEN), but I've come to enjoy a lot more nowadays. It's actually quite detailed- especially in the face, which most Beasts simply leave as a "well-molded face" and that's that. Here, he's actually got a full "mask" of pink- covering a comb, waddle and face-mask. The armor's cool, and his wings look downright flight-capable. For a simple farm animal, they did a heck of a job. As he's pretty late in the game, you get the impression they really knew what they were doing. Battle Beast #12: BLITZKRIEG BAT Japanese Name: Devilbat The chest location of the Battle Beasts rub sticker has one notable exception, Blitzkrieg Bat, who has his sticker on his wing. In the Japan Headmasters continuity, when the Decepticons conquered Beast, the Devilbats were some of the Beastformers who joined them, the only mammals to do so. HONORABLE MENTIONS: This edition of Bizarre Toy Box wouldn't be possible without the images found at sites like Mike's Collection, Little Rubber Guys and Stinny's Toy History, so please go check them out if you're looking for more! |
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