Transforming Robots are like GODS

        Better believe I'm a G1 Transformers snob.  ...Well, alright, not entirely.  I'm actually quite a Beast Wars fan too.  ...Yeah, I know, I get funny looks.  Loved G1 as a show and as a toy line, loved Beast Wars as a show and... a good deal of the toy line.  Hey, they caught on pretty soon.  ...Mostly.
       What is it about transforming robots?  I have no idea, but I love them.  Well, maybe I have some idea; hot cars and often times very "interesting" looking animals transform into robots with weapons that do battle with one another!  It is sweet.  So sweet.
       The horror is, I still can't afford G1 toys.  Ah well.  I am satisfied with the occasional Beast Wars figure or the really occasional tasty Alternator.  Ah, my beautiful Corvette Ravage.  Some day I will have you in Jaguar form as well.  I did pay dearly for my straight-from-Japan Destron Black Convoy and Beast Wars Ravage, as well.  ...So I have a thing for Ravage.

Look at All the Moving Parts!

       Even today, I think my pride is most certainly my Thirty/Thirty.  I know, barely anyone else has ever heard of him, either.  But here he is at Bravestarr.org.  Oh yes, mine was purchased mint in a factory sealed box.  Then I opened him.  And threw the box away.  Kept the booklet, though.  Nothing like a "transforming" anthropomorphic horse with a big-ass gun.
       I do, of course, have a crapload of other toys.  Lots of Palisades FFVIII critters (all of which had their right limbs fall off), some Legend of Zelda toys (the really tiny gorgeous ones that had no movement, and the later ones with horses where Link looked fucking creepy), and so many random scattered things.

So... Why Action Figures?

        The answer could always be "why not", but let me explore just a bit more here.  Action figures... they're where the stories come from.
       When I was a kid, my parents wouldn't buy me action figures.  It's really, pathetically sad.  But that did force me to get violently creative with My Little Ponies.  And you sure as hell do not want to know what I did with Barbies.  What I really wanted?  Transformers, He-Man, Thundercats, G.I. Joes--all the stuff I liked.  I could nto stand those frilly little girls, hanging out with the guys and getting to play with their toys.  And that sounds so wrong that I'm not going to bother to edit it.
       Play is what starts your desire and ability to tell stories.  I admit mine were more elaborate than most.  My villains needed reasons and characters died.  My heroes never had it easy.  Sometimes they literally lost limbs (glue can only do so much).  Rarely was there a truly happy ending.
       I find that the figures I go after now are ones that inspire.  They could be video game characters that I've come to love, or a particular Transforming robot that just looks so damn bad-ass that I can't help but imagine a while city cowering in their presence.  They're icons, they're symbols, and the more articulation they have so I can pose them every so often while no one's looking (or, admittedly, while everyone's looking... I still play with my toys), the better.  It is nostalgia and it is the joy of having a small piece of that thing that keeps you going.  They are little plastic muses that sit over your desk and occasionally remind you that life isn't as serious as you're making it, so play with a toy and have a little fun.