No, I'm not talking about the classic '80s film starring Matt Dillon. Nope. Though that is a good one. I'm talking about another '80s classic icon, well to me anyways. See, I was big into superheroes as a kid. Not just reading comic books, but collecting them and any and all action figures and toys I could find. (Which was sooo much less than what's available today!). But one of the coolest things ever that I have was my pal Raydeen.
Raydeen was just pure awesomeness in a 23 1/2" package. Made by Mattel, he was part of the Japanese "Shogun Warriors" line. Basically they were giant robots that helped fight the good fight and save people. There's a big long Japanese history with comics, anime, toy, etc. But I didn't care about any of that. I just loved this insanely cool toy!
Not only was he huge, but you could literally fire his left fist off and knock down an army of bad guys. I used to have all my superhero figures climbing all over him, hanging off the horn-like projections on his head. Man, I had such a blast with this guy. His arms moved up and down and he had small wheels on his feet. My friend Chris actually had Mazinga, a different model from the same line that shot all sorts of tiny missiles from his hand. So whenever we hung out to play, there were plenty of battles between the two.
But the coolest and most MacGyver-ish thing I ever did was literally make Raydeen my personal protector. Y'see, in the middle of his chest, there's a missile launcher. You press down on a button on his back and this big yellow bird-like missile would go shooting out of his chest. So after a lot of trial and errors (mostly errors), I found a way to tie some thread to that button in the back and stretch it out across my door. So whenever anybody opened my door and walked in the room, they'd activate the missile which would fire at a whopping 0.05 mph and possibly hit them in the leg. Yeah, I was real proud of myself with that. Heh.
Sadly, like all great toy stories, the Mighty Raydeen met his match. I don't remember the exact moment, but I imagine years of abuse and being smashed, dropped and tossed around, finally took their toll. His arm trigger mechanism totally broke, so not only couldn't he fire his fist, but I couldn't even put his fist on. Then I lost all his missiles. More cracks throughout. And eventually his head came off.
I'm sure I can hunt another one down on ebay or pick it up at some comic book convention somewhere. And who knows, I may just do that one day. And while it'd probably cost me an arm and a leg for such a retro toy... that's still gotta be loads cheaper than paying the monthly fee on a security system, right?
COUPON TIME:
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2 Responses to “My Bodyguard”
I can so relate to your bodyguard. My memory's vague, but I probably did something like that with my Six Million Dollar Man doll. His ever-watching eye would alert me to intruders. And thanks to my constructive genius, I'd set up some small object to a string that would collide with the victim when the opened the door. LOL
Btw, I remember The Bodyguard movie. It was when I first started hating Matt Dillon. It took me years to get that image of him out of my head and see him as something more than a bully. And wasn't the bodyguard one of the Baldwin brothers, the who is now on Chuck? Guess I'll make a stop over to IMDB to see if my memory is working right.
@Mark - Howdy, good sir! Wow. Thanks for the memory charge too. I totally had that Six Million Dollar Man one too! With the cheesy cloth red jumpsuit outfit! And his arm would mechanically raise when you press a button. I must've used him as a bodyguard too. Heh.
And yeah, one of the Baldwins was in that too. Oh, man. And I am sooo suffering from Chuck withdrawal right now!