The following items aren’t new to me, but I wasn’t curious enough to make a post out of them. But I guess by the looks of the post title above, I’m quite curious about them now.
The Nacelle Company, a media company recently known for their Netflix documentaries The Toys That Made Us and The Movies That Made Us, has ventured into the toy production business. And given their love for nostalgia and throwbacks, it’s only fitting that for their first offerings, they chose to revive an old IP which hasn’t received any attention in the last 40 or so years.
Robo Force is a toyline created back in 1984 and also had an animated one-shot specual entitled Robo Force: The Revenge of Nazgar. Following the initial toyline, Toyfinity got the license in 2013 and produced figures compatible to Onell Design’s Glyos. Then in 2021, The Nacelle Company bought the license and are slated to release two initial figures as part of their VERY Important Toy line.
First is Maxx Steele and yes, it sounds similar to Max Steel, an IP owned by Mattel who’s also currently taking some legal action because of that similarity. But to Nacelle’s credit, Robo Force was a much older IP while Mattel’s IP was created in 1999. So, for all intents and purposes, Mattel did the copying. But I digress.
Maxx Steele is the leader of the Robo Force, and this redesign looks amazing. They managed to tie it to the original through these bunch of pipes seen all over its body, stemming from the original toy that also has pipes for arms. The redesign turns them into exposed internal mechanics that adds more grit to the robot. It also has those suction cup-looking feet which are also from the original.
VERY Important Toy “Robo Force” Maxx Steele
Fall 2022 / $49.99
The other figure in wave 1 is Wrecker who, as the name suggests, is the demolition specialist of Robo Force. Ironically, he’s also a construction worker, which is evident with the yellow color scheme and caution striping. Similar to Maxx Steele, Wrecker also has exposed pipes for internal mechanics. But unlike Maxx Steele, Wreckers opts for crane arms connected to its back instead of more pipes for the former.
Ironically, Wrecker includes a flower bouquet accessory, giving hints of his softer nature. Speaking of accessories, he also includes a rocky display base for added support.
VERY Important Toy “Robo Force” Wrecker
Fall 2022 / $49.99
As far as scale goes, both figures, and probably the rest of the line, stand at 7.5-inches. While a little large, it will look good with your 6-inch or 1/12 scale collection since they are robots and are meant to be a little larger. They will also be placed in collector-friendly window packaging for those who want their figures mint and sealed.
While I’m not the greatest fan of these properties, it’s amusing to see how a lot more companies are paying attention to them. We recently got modern, albeit unlicensed, Centurions figures from Ramen Toy and now we have these. These are something you won’t expect from the larger toy companies as they tend to focus on the more popular titles like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or ThunderCats. If you want to show support and let these lines continue, then get your preorders from their online store or your preferred retailer.
