Air Fighter

Sometimes I wonder if my love of crappy bootlegs goes too far.

I was in London for work last week, and my hotel was in this really Middle Eastern area of London. We’re talking full burkas and Hookah parlors. Needless to say, my hopes of scoring robot toys in this neighborhood were pretty low.

As luck would have it though, I stumbled upon a discount store and found these cheap-ass bootlegs in the back with all the other crappy toys. Hell yeah I bought them.

These bad boys are interesting for a few reasons. They consist of toys originally made by an obscure Japanese company called “Wing”. Read VF5SS’s review of some of their other products, and you can see where they made it to America. In Japan, each component was sold separately, and also in gift packs.

These are interesting for a few reasons:

Reason 1

These aren’t straight knockoffs. These are OVERSIZED, by at least 50%. I’ve never figured out why bootleggers do this, or how it makes financial sense to completely retool a bootleg to a larger size. Do they have some kind of crazy machine that does it? It remains a mystery…

Reason 2

I don’t think these two components were ever sold together in a pack. This is a combination of two toys – Sukaiza and Z Jeccar. If they were Japanese, the combination would be called “Super Source Kaiser.”

Reason 3

This is one of the worst assembled “modern” bootlegs i’ve ever come across. The flash (the material left on the parts after taking it out of the mold) was all over the toy, on some parts by as much as a 1/4″ out. I literally took these toys apart and cleaned off all of the flash with a razor blade. I should have taken a before and after picture.

The material is cheap and soft. The stickers are mis-aligned and ugly. The transformation is all loosey-goosey.

This exists, and it shows that cheapo toys can be found wherever your travels take you.