Pocco and Rin-SISTERS!

My next toy comes from the Fraulein series of super-poseable action figures. Fraulein is German for "Mrs., Ma'am, Madam," etc. Fraulein is similar to Figma, which I'm sure more than a few of us own, with a few notable exceptions. I'll get to those in a bit.

Firstly, let me describe how these things work. These dolls are part of a line of special super-poseable toys called Revoltech. And they aren't lying. These things have something like 20 to 30-something points of articulation and are fragile! I would never give these to a little girl as a gift, they simply have way too many parts and they are designed to come apart at certain points to facilitate poseabilty. You can pose them in almost any way you can think of. However, like the Todd Mcfarlane toys, they really are more for posing than playing with. Each one is different and there are a large number of the revoltech figures from different animes/mangas. just watch it with them, work with them on a clear, clean surface where you can easily find any parts you may lose. And please, if you work with them, have a clean room. I've lost the little wrist bands (yes, even the WRISTBANDS are seperate) a couple times, only to be lucky enough to find them again.

Pocco was the first of this series I bought. I went to ToysLogic.com and was browsing their site when I found this cute, punky, eclecticaly-dressed figure that one could pose themselves. She was so CUTE! I put in my order and two weeks later she arrived. She's got little goggles that have actual transparent material for the lenses. she comes with a little sash that comes off and shows off her...um...underwear. Nothing else comes off, so there isn't a lot of fanboy service to her. She has a nice...um...pair that aren't revealed too much. I crazy-cool outfit with red leggings/lower chaps, a cool two-handed sword, six seperate hands that you can replace for different effects and to hold the sword. She has this look on her face of "where am I?" but some come with more expressions. She is a character from Bishoujo master artist Shunya Yamashita from his book "Sweet Dreams." She's the cover character and even has more inside the book, I highly suggest if you can find a copy of it, pick it up! She also appears in "Wildflower" another Shunya Yamashita book. These are art books featuring a load of great art pieces, all original stuff, and worth your hard-earned cash if you're a serious otaku, or not. You could have it as a coffee table book, but be careful wiutht he coffee! Pocco is number 004 in the series.

So, A-kon 20 just got done this last weekend in Dallas and it was a BLAST! So many people there it took me two hours to get through the line to register. One of my main objectives was to pick up Fraulein 002 Rin from Fate Stay Night. She is dressed in a dark red long-sleeve sweater with a big cross on the chest, black schoolgirl skirt (very short), eight hands all together, and a cool dagger. She wears stockings and a pair of loafer-style brown shoes. It was my plan to put them in poses suggesting they are sisters in my collection. My brother ribbed me again for it, but he likes Pocco for her outfit. I have them both hugging now and it so SWEET! I got a picture of them looking at the camera hugging and it cool!

MY next purchase will be a brother for them. More than likely a Macross veritech fighter Battloid from the same series.

Fraulein! Fraulein!

I would start a "Anime/Manga Conventions" world, but I don't go to that many since there aren't a lot going on here in Texas. So, I have decided to start this world where we can discuss our favorite new and old toys that we got from Japan. I welcome any input from TheOtaku community on this subject as I'm sure many of you own at least a handful of these.

I grew up with the likes of Thundercats, G.I. Joe, and Transformers in my toy collection. I swore I'd never get rid of them when I was younger. However, as one grows up, they forget about the toys and start going for more "grown up" playthings such as computers, Ipods, cars, stereo systems for said cars, etc. Those toys of yesteryear are forgotten, given away, or sold in yard sales. I know that's what happend to my collection.

Fast-forward 18 years

Never in my life had I owned a manga/anime-related toy before I bought Boten from Yu-Yu Hakusho. It was an impulse buy and she was the last Yu-Yu doll the toy store here had. So I picked her up for $5. She had the craziest blue hair an ever-present smile and big bright eyes. She wore that metallic-pink kimono and carried her spade in one hand. My brother ribbed me endlessly for it for a while. But I liked her. I still do. She's not very poseable, but she has the honor of being the first anime toy I've bought in a long time and unlike my Akuma playarts toy, she's always got that happy expression and a cute outfit...even though she is actually Death. The toy line came out around the time the anime was on Cartoon Network and I really liked it since Yu-Yu was NOT another Goku (thank GOD) and he came to rely on his friends quite a bit. Boten was just a really off the wall take on the personlity of Death. As most people think of Death as a male figure, especially here in the West, it was refreshing and surprising to see her as a cute girl in a kimono with a pleasant demeanor. Those nutty Japanese!