Of all the toys I expected to see remade in 2017, Sabre Sword Tiger was not one of them. Hasbro put one out in Transformers as "Fengul," a Titan Master companion to Grotusque. It's the second Battle Beasts
head companion figure we've seen so far, and this was as good of a time
as any to look at its inspiration from thousands of years ago, back in
the 1980s.
Have a cow, man! The Bodacious Bovine came out as part of an eight-pack. It's a cow, but udder-ly devoid of feminine characteristics. You're going to love this.
Most of the figures I tracked down as a kid were aquatic in nature - so Eager Beaver
was another no-brainer. The figure shows that whole quasi futuristic
vibe you've come to love from Takara and Hasbro, with big armor and not
much in the way of pants. This unique style was largely cribbed in Beast Saga, and it's not too dissimilar from Masters of the Universe.
The outfit is unique in that it doesn't feel slavish to the
creature's habitat, and also shows off some of the more distinctive
features of the anatomy.[ READ THE FULL REVIEW ]
Since American toymakers tended to have (and still have) an allergy to really cheap toys, Tanglin Pangolin
came out as part of an eight-pack. In the USA, series 3 was sold only
in boxes of eight while the other series were two-packs or packaged
with vehicles. This is one I didn't have as a kid and tracked down a
few years ago. I didn't even really know what a pangolin was, but I dug
armadillos and penguins and other creatures so why the heck not? These
are tree-dwelling insect-eating armored mammals, and they're endangered
which means kids of the 1980s probably were super into them. (I was a
manatee fanatic myself.)
Most of what interests me in toys are really old things - like Battle Beasts - or brand-new figures. I went nuts and got as many of these guys as I could a few years ago, including Pixilated Pointer.
I'm not a big dog person as such, but this is a fine figure - the
2-inch pooch has jointed arms and a weapon, plus a rubsign sticker.
It's awesome. You should get one, or whatever figure best represents
your spirit animal.
Courtesy
of most toy lines dying out in the late 1980s, the toys made their
statement and left a more or less perfect plaything that most kids
missed out on. Rainbow Sam was released in the USA in limited
numbers, so he can be had for a somewhat hefty but not insane price.
$30 is the usual going rate for a loose and complete specimen.
In early 2012 it seemed as if Battle Beasts
were really, actually going to make a comeback so I decided it was time
to finish up my set. I hadn't picked up any new ones since 1988 or
1989, so I was off to eBay to buy a few comically oversized collections,
which quickly and surprisingly cheaply finished up the collection minus
a couple of weapons and Pillager Pig here, who just plain didn't
show up on eBay for quite some time. Most of the figures cost me $3 or
$4, this one was closer to $8. I figured, what the heck, I wanted to
finish up my rubsign beast set and this was it! It was also my main
motivation for buying the figure - I already had all the ones I wanted,
and a few I didn't mind having, which is a weird thing that happens to
me (and others) when buying some older toy lines. You got what you
wanted - and then you decide to go ahead and buy the rest.
Another one of my very first Battle Beasts was Hare Razing Rabbit,
a simple figure with two arm joints, a spear, and a second figure in
every pack. For about four bucks you could get two cheap (but fun)
figures in the 1980s. Heck, for $1 you could get a pack of four random M.U.S.C.L.E. guys. Today, astonishingly, you can still get a Hot Wheels
car for a dollar but not a heck of a lot else. The reasons for this
are many: increasing labor costs, higher materials prices, and a
constant ascent in fan demands for figures that have more parts and more
deco. I was pretty amazed that Diamond got its new Minimates Battle Beasts to Toys R Us for $7.49 per pair in early 2013.
The Battle Beasts Triple Threat Snake
came from a collection I bought in either late 2011 or early 2012. He
didn't have his weapon, so I had to trade around for that. It was
surprisingly cheap and didn't take long to assemble, and it was fun to
actually get a figure I've had on my mind for a couple of decades.
Along with King Cobra, he's one of two snakes in the original line of
roughly 2-inch tall figures. I swore off collecting "vintage" (read:
defunct) action figure lines in the early 1990s, with a couple of lapses
here and there. I made an exception for this line, and one other,
solely because (at press time) nobody has yet decided to bootleg them.
Knock-offs ruin toy collecting for me, I want originals, 100%-new
remakes, or nothing.
Another Battle Beasts I've had since it was first in stores, Slasher Seahorse is my buddy. It looks like we'll get at least one semi-updated version of this sea creature in Beast Saga eventually, but he ain't out yet. Let's look at an original! 
The Battle Beasts came out in that great period of my life after Star Wars was a dead thing and before it came back, plus when I got Horny Toad
an action figure was still a legit toy. Things like "points of
articulation" weren't even a consideration until older fans when I was
roughly 12 or 13 pointed out that I was wrong in liking old Kenner
figures for what they were, but eh, this isn't about them. It's about
the fact that Hasbro released a figure with no name, and then shipped
out posters telling people its proper name was "Horny Toad."
When Diamond Select announced their plan to revive the Battle Beasts brand, that was my indicator to jump on the vintage guys-- people were ignoring them, and they may still be ignoring them, but I wanted to get as many as I could before that changes. (For the record, I completed a US set as of March.) Anarchy was one of the few Laser Beasts I picked up as he wasn't too pricey, and was pretty cool as another mole in this series. With a drill arm and a drill weapon, thematically, he's pretty awesome as a construction/destruction/explorer type.
One of the most fascinating things about toy lines in the 1980s and 1990s is as they wind down, nobody really knew what was going on at the time. The final series of Star Wars, Battle Beasts, and other lines were tough to tell because with no real marketing support, no internet, and no resources, rumors and "my cousin got this somehow" were our main sources of intel. As such, I have vague memories of the final US series called "Shadow Warriors" (Laser Beasts in Japan) and I didn't really have much of awareness of the line (beyond it existing) until recently. Heck, I didn't even intend on getting Spark Shark until he showed up in a collection with a bunch of rubsign figures I was after. By himself, he sells for $15-$20 (no weapon) and $30-$35 (with weapon), and he's probably the cheapest and seemingly most commonly sold Laser Beasts figure.
Series 3 of Battle Beasts was thought by many (myself included) to be the end of the line-- additional "Shadow Beasts" and "Laser Beasts" were issued in very limited numbers in the USA, Europe, and Japan, but it seemed to my not-old-enough-to-go-on-a-toy-run-self that Diving Duckbill and friends were the end of the line at the time. The sets were increased from randomly-packed pairs to a specific group of 8 figures, which was more exciting from a gift standpoint but slightly less so if you had to basically whine like a little bitch to convince your parents that yes, you should be able to take the ten bucks your aunt sent you to get yet another batch of these little guys. (This set was particularly awesome, containing a Zebra, Penguin, Flamingo, and Orangutan among others.)
Series 2 of Battle Beasts refined the figures a little bit with better paint jobs, stranger figure choices, and big changes to their feet. The copyright information was moved to the soles of the figures, and a foot peg hole was added-- previously released Series 1 figures had flat feet (like Gormiti toys) and the copyright information was usually on their backs. Wolfgang Walrus is a fine example of a good concept refined in its second series, and he also just happens to look more than a little like the Transformers toy Longtooth. As I'm a sucker for ocean life toys, this was one of the many figures I requested as a kid and by gum I've still got him.
Sawtooth Shark is the first classic guy we're going to look at this week, and he's pretty awesome. Heck, the entire line is fantastic and perfectly sized for the modern toy collector. Worried about them taking up too much room? They're 2-inches tall. Need a toy that won't fall over on your desk? Their footprint is small and they're sturdy, so they can sit on top of a thin LCD monitor. They have but two joints, but if you want a toy to display on your desk it's not like you'll be having them fight much. Their giant feet make it harder to tip them over, too, which I appreciate.