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An Interview With Killer Bootlegs Creator Peter Goral
407 Plays5 years ago
On this episode, Dave and Erik sit down with Peter Goral, better known as creator of Phantom Starkiller, Count Draco Knuckleduster, and Killer Bootlegs, to discuss his latest comic with Scout Comics, his New York Comic Con Super7 releases, a children's book, and taking on the role of CEO for Tracker - Scout Comics' just-announced toy brand!
Learn more about Peter and Killer Bootlegs at killerbootlegs.com
Follow him on Instagram @killerbootlegs and @phantomstarkiller
Buy Phantom Starkiller ReAction Figures from Super7!
https://super7.com/search?q=phantom%20starkiller
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Intro and other voices by Joe Azzari
https://www.instagram.com/voicesbyjoe/
Theme Music is "Game Boy Horror" by the Zombie Dandies
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Overview
00:00:06
Speaker
Toyobobs and dads. Adventures in Collecting is about toys, but it might not be for your children, especially if you don't like words like f***, or s***, or a f***hole. Are you ready, kids? Get your parents' permission, check your mailbox, and grab your shopping cart. It's time for the Adventures in Collecting podcast.
00:00:34
Speaker
I'm Eric. And I'm Dave. Welcome to Adventures in Collecting, where we talk toy news, culture, and hauls. Along with our journeys as collectors. And welcome back to Adventures in Collecting. Here we are, Dave. We're here for another episode. We're back. We're here. Hello.
00:00:55
Speaker
I love, I always love the energy. I look forward to it every other week. I wait for that, that just kind of like never ending source of abundant energy. Everyone, whenever we're back in public is going to be like, you are actually more interesting than you come across. And I'm going to be like, well, yeah, I guess I think.
00:01:19
Speaker
There's a lot. You hide it a lot. You hide it behind the beard. That's that's where it lives. Oh, yeah.
Guest Introduction: Peter Gorrell
00:01:25
Speaker
So like like usual, Dave, when we have a special guest, there is there's absolutely no reason to bury the lead here. Today we have we have Peter Gorrell.
00:01:36
Speaker
better known as the artist behind killer bootlegs. Um, and he has been at the forefront of the bootleg toy movement for quite some time now. So with, with his creation, Phantom star killer, achieving iconic status in the toy world. We are happy to welcome Peter to the show. Peter, thank you for joining us on adventures in collecting. Yeah. Thanks for having me guys. Thanks for coming aboard. Yeah. Thanks, Dave.
Collecting Retro GI Joe: Challenges and Preferences
00:02:01
Speaker
So, Peter, before we get started, the first thing that we like to ask all of our guests, because this is a show about toy collecting, what are you collecting right now? Well, I'm currently trying to collect the Retro GI Joe 3.75 wave, first wave, or second wave I guess they're on already, having some trouble getting them.
00:02:31
Speaker
they haven't shown up around here really here and there they kind of do um i don't i don't like them necessarily because but i i feel like i need them as like a lifelong gi joe fan but so those i guess so so you don't like them or is it is it because they're they're not like the o ring style or what's what's the what's the gripe with the uh the retro line i i wish they were oh uh
00:03:00
Speaker
O-ring or not just modern scopes on retro packaging and called retro, you know, it's just to me, they look like it could have been on a modern package. It could have been another toy. I mean, it is, you know. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's been kind of the, the.
00:03:19
Speaker
the majority of the complaints, aside from not being able to find them. I mean, here in New Jersey, Dave, I know I've seen them a grand total. I've seen Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow once on like an end cap, and I don't think I've seen them since. I don't know if you've seen them at all. I feel like I've seen Baroness once. I never saw
Toy Hunting Strategies
00:03:39
Speaker
any of the first three. The last, like Roadblock, Scarlet, and Destro. I found a case of the other day,
00:03:50
Speaker
was super excited because I watch, I mean, I follow you guys and watch how you go to the stores. I do the same here in Illinois, bouncing to different stores, you know, on my errands every day. And I'm always looking. And the only time I ever luck out is when I can catch somebody early in the morning before they've stocked the shelves. The boxes are still sealed and they have a palette of all the boxes from Hasbro and Mattel. And I sit there and, you know, kind of pick through the boxes.
00:04:19
Speaker
I've been yelled at a few times and told to get away, but generally they let me, will let me, you know, open a box and take something out. And I was so excited thinking I'd finally found Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes, because those are the only two I really honestly give a shit about. But I cracked the box open and it was a bunch of scarlets and dastros and roadblocks. And I just put them back on the shelf for somebody else, honestly.
00:04:45
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it's a cool line in idea. Personally, I'm starting to get into a little bit of the classified line with them, the six inch figures. I just think the kind of weapon system that they have and the way that they can hold everything at once, I find that really clever. But I do like with this retro line, at least, that they're using the original artwork.
00:05:10
Speaker
And it's just nice to see that kind of style of toy back on the shelves again. Yeah, I just wish they were more like the ones that I collected that are now falling apart from, I guess, O-ring rot. Yeah, when Hasbro put out their Star Wars retro line a couple of years ago and then followed it up this year with the Empire Strikes back line, I thought that those
00:05:57
Speaker
hit the nail
00:06:10
Speaker
have a carded version of a figure that you otherwise wouldn't be able to get, I think is very cool.
00:06:16
Speaker
Yeah, and with that Star Wars retro line too, the idea that they were putting out figures that never came out in that retro style was cool. The fact that you could get the Tarkin figure that came with the board game, I feel like that plays to a market very well. Because you can continue the collection that you started 40 years ago.
00:06:41
Speaker
100%. I think that they should do all of the characters from the prequels, sequels, and anything in between that they didn't have a chance to make from 77 to 85. And I just think if there was a Cobra Commander figure from the G.I. Joe movie where he's like, half man, half snake, if they put that out, how well would that do?
00:07:08
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, it's, you know, we're, we're, we're now, now we're speaking into, you know, your wheelhouse, right? So the, the, the, the retro aspect of this stuff, you know, clearly has inspired collectors all over and has inspired this entire community of, of bootleg toys. But tell us a little bit about how these retro toys really kind of inspired
From Collector to Artist: Peter's Journey
00:07:31
Speaker
what you do. Okay. So.
00:07:33
Speaker
I've always collected toys, you know, um, I was born in 85, so I kind of miss the Star Wars boom, but my grandma was like an avid garage sailor. So she would go to garage sales every day and pick up the toys that people who were 10 years older than me were now desperately trying to get rid of because they were, you know,
00:07:57
Speaker
were starting to get hair in their armpits and wanted to talk to girls and shit so they were done with Star Wars but my grandma would took the collect them all kind of literally and would just get them everywhere every garage so she went to and so I kind of amassed this collection of figures that I really had no business playing with her having and I just
00:08:21
Speaker
kept playing with them. And then when I grew out of kind of playing with toys, I just started putting them on shelves and then getting them on in package and keeping them in package. And, you know, so, yeah, it was kind of always action figures. It always played a big role in my life. And as I got older, when I had my daughter, she just turned 13 the other day. I was looking for kind of like a hobby to keep me busy.
00:08:50
Speaker
doing something, you know, when I'm at home and I hadn't done art in a number of years since high school, really. I did a bunch of art classes in high school and was always really talented, but I just lost sight of my passion for art. And in this pursuit to find a hobby, I started going through my action figures and finding ones that were broke or that I had doubles of or triples or quadruples of and would then, you know,
00:09:19
Speaker
boil and pop them and take them apart and just started making kind of weird mash-up toys and different characters and different pop culture reference things mashing two things together and
00:09:37
Speaker
I started putting them in, just doing this for myself. This was before social media and I was just doing them and friends of mine would come over and see them and say, hey, we're having this other buddy of mine is curating this art show at this bar next week. Why don't you put some of these things in there?
00:09:58
Speaker
So I started doing that around town locally and was putting these creations that I was making more one of a kind sculptures at the time that were made of action figures or action figure based or incorporating action figures in some way. And they started selling and I would want to make another one because of, at the end of the day, everything I make I'm making for myself. This is something that I want, you know, a lot of times,
00:10:28
Speaker
I'm making it because it's something I want and I want to see made. So these things I would put them in shows and then they'd sell and I'd be like, gosh, now I got to remake this thing. You know, like I'd have to like go find out some of these. And I was using rarer and more rare figures. I've always kind of done that. My work tried to use things that, you know, there used to be kind of this rule back when, back in the early days of kind of bootlegging 10 plus years ago, where if you used a part, it was kind of,
00:10:56
Speaker
something that, you know, you were using and it was kind of your thing. And now it's kind of a free for all with so many guys doing it, but I digress. So I had to keep remaking these things that I was making and a buddy of mine.
00:11:10
Speaker
told me that I could he was working in some factory that was doing some mold making procedure in some way of making multiples of parts, small parts. And he just kind of explained the mold making process or just molding and casting kind of injection molding or just like that whole process to me of making multiples. And I started doing research online and found articles about mold making and silicone molds and resin casting and
00:11:39
Speaker
It was all in regards to other crafts and stuff. And I just kind of geared that towards what I was doing and just taught myself how to make molds of everything and taught myself how to make casts and then slowly but surely started hand painting them and making the packaging and doing all the different aspects that go into making an action figure and trying to make it as good as I can.
Creation of Phantom Star Killer
00:12:05
Speaker
So when I started doing that, I was
00:12:09
Speaker
Post social media happened, of course, and I started posting these things online and they would get shared here and there and
00:12:16
Speaker
different Star Wars collecting groups and sites on Facebook and such. And I was starting to get compared to this character, the Sucklord, the Sucklord. That looks like the Sucklord made it. And I was like, who's this guy? Or what's the Sucklord? So I Googled that and saw his stuff. And I was like, there's some guy who's doing the same thing as me. This is pretty wild.
00:12:42
Speaker
So when I realized that there was another guy doing it, I wanted to do everything the opposite, complete opposite of what he was doing. So if it was gonna suck and his whole aesthetic was that it was like some back alley bootleg thing that you could find in Chinatown. Like I wanted my stuff to be killer and have it be cool and the best that it can be, like the cream of the crop. And I've always strived for my stuff to be the best. And I've always tried to excel and one up myself
00:13:11
Speaker
or one ups, you know, if some new guy comes on the scene and he's making toys, you know, that I'm going to make something that just blows his socks out of the water and or whatever, you know, it's like it's friendly competition in some ways. And yeah, I've just always kind of progressed and progressed and progressed and Starkiller at the time at 2013. That was kind of my go big or go home moment. I hadn't
00:13:37
Speaker
I've always, I had always sat back at the sidelines and behind a computer screen and watch San Diego Comic Con happen and just, you know, looked at the exclusives and tried to get them or try to find somebody to mule it or buy it on eBay or all the stuff that, that everybody does. You know, it's like this show that you don't go to that you watch from home, you know, on, on G,
00:14:03
Speaker
or on G5 or whatever the fuck that channel is called or whatever, but you don't go to San Diego Comic Con. So I got the opportunity from a close friend of mine now, but at the time he was a stranger and that was Dove Kellamer, the owner of DKU Toys.
00:14:20
Speaker
and he asked me to make a figure for him. He had been watching what I was doing and now he has his DK Econ and it's all bootleg toys and all these guys that me and the sucklord have inspired to make these toys. But at the time it was all vinyl, designer vinyl toys that he was selling. It was some sucklord toy and some Skinner resin toy and then my toy.
00:14:51
Speaker
I wanted to do something that I thought was, you know, so different that it would stand out, I guess. And at the time, you know, nobody was really doing hand painted figures. It was kind of like what Suckler does, casting it in a solid color and splashing it with paint or casting it in two colors and a swirl, kind of like David Healy does or some of these other, you know, bootleg artists at the time with minimal painting and just kind of playing more with the additives like glitter and glow in the dark.
00:15:22
Speaker
the colors you can get just dyeing the resin. And I was like, well, I'm going to hand paint this thing and just do something that's one up from everything that's being done or anything. And so I gave him tried to put his integrate as many bells and whistles as I could to the figure, you know, by giving my telescoping lightsaber that was hand cast and giving the vinyl cape that was all hand cut, you know, with this jagged pattern that made it look like it was tattered. And I
00:15:50
Speaker
collaborated with a friend of mine, Luke Yates, to do original artwork that was based on the toy that I was making. And we made this package that was, you know, not like photocopied pictures like Sucklord might have done at the time. It was, you know, fully printed artwork that was original.
00:16:15
Speaker
It was just kind of like revolutionary, I guess, for the handmade toy scene at the time, what I was doing. And it has inspired a lot of what's come after, I guess, is why it's become so iconic, I suppose, or why that figure did. I try to think about it sometimes and why that stuck out.
00:16:34
Speaker
And, uh, you know, it was just, I never let it go. I always revisited it and made new versions of it. And it was skateboards of it and t-shirts and mini figures and different toys. And now comic books and now comic books, but that at the show, it sold out before I even got there at San Diego. So I didn't even know that preview night was a thing. And I just booked my ticket for that first day. I thought, cause I didn't know that I had like a vendor badge or whatever that I could just get in and, uh,
00:17:04
Speaker
to that day. So I showed up the next day and they were already sold out. And yeah, so it just was kind of like a pretty cool experience to go out there. And I had gone every year up until this year, where I'd have a toy released or something. And I became friends with Brian Flynn in the process, because Super 7 was always a couple of boosts away from DKE.
00:17:34
Speaker
And yeah, Flynn wanted to make a reaction version of it. He was always really stoked on the character and thought it was cool.
Influences Behind Phantom Star Killer
00:17:45
Speaker
And when the time was right, we put out the reaction figure in 2018. Well, I mean, it's one of those things where
00:17:56
Speaker
not only the design of the character with the pop and colors and the bright oranges and greens and the character stands out, but it also kind of plays at the
00:18:10
Speaker
the nostalgic and maybe even aesthetic appeal of so many different things. So you have the iconography of the Kenner Star Wars toys, which there might not be a more famous toy than Kenner Star Wars toys.
00:18:27
Speaker
the kind of the way that it is. If there is one that's more iconic, maybe it's a He-Man toy. So you put a green skeleton face on like basically Moby Wan's body. Like, you know, you are playing up to what could arguably be the most nostalgic slash iconic looking toy ever. Yeah. So I mean, it's one of those things where I can remember
00:18:53
Speaker
So, Dave and I have only been doing this podcast. We just celebrated our one-year anniversary of doing it, but we've been collecting toys for pretty much our entire lives. Dave, going back to being around for those Return of the Jedi counter figures, right, Dave? Yeah.
00:19:13
Speaker
Yeah, it was definitely caught the end of, you know, the Kenner run. I think that that last or that first power of the force like return to the Jedi kind of thing. I don't remember power of the force, but I do definitely remember the Jedi toys and
00:19:37
Speaker
And of course, yeah, and of course, he meant so and especially with that kind of aesthetic that you get from the reaction figures, which is that era. It felt like it was a perfect fit for you. Yeah. And believe me, that was all intentional. It's like I kind of took all the things that I thought were, you know, and well, actually, my idea for the whole thing was and this it it what you said
Peter's Creative Process
00:20:04
Speaker
is all true. But I what I did was I
00:20:07
Speaker
took kind of George Lucas's recipe for all the things that were inspirational to him and whether, you know, it was Kurosawa films and spaghetti westerns and the seven, you know, Vietnam and medieval, you know, Greek mythology, medieval mythology and Buck Rogers and all that stuff that was influential to him as a child. And he kind of spun it all into his own yarn and made this tale Star Wars.
00:20:36
Speaker
I just did that with everything that was influential to me. You know, Star Wars, He-Man, Disney films, you know. The Black Cauldron was a big influence on Phantom Star Killer and the character design. One of my favorite all time. Yeah, I was going to say there's definitely some Horned King in there. Yeah, 100%. That's why when we, I think the fourth colorway of him was the Horned King colorway. And that was me kind of paying tribute to the inspiration that it gave me.
00:21:05
Speaker
Yeah. And it's, you know, I was fortunate to kind of have, you know, Jedi being the my really my first kind of exposure to Star Wars. Like, like I was saying, I wasn't power of the force was Eric's kind of era, but there wasn't a movie at that point. It was the word gearing up for, you know, Phantom Menace. So it's it's cool that there was kind of like he got to play with some of my old canners and it was that kind of generation gap there.
00:21:35
Speaker
Yeah, that's like, like I was saying, like a lot of the garage sale stuff that we were get, I was getting at that time or like my friends, we'd be over to play. I go over to play GI Joes and, um, they would have, you know, a Darth Vader case or a C-3PO case full of their older brothers figures. And we bust them out and, you know, have both. And it's like, I for a while had no idea what Star Wars was. And then, and I had
00:22:03
Speaker
My dad showed me like a bootleg VHS tape one night after a Halloween party and it just kind of changed everything for me because then I had context to what these toys that my grandma had given me were and these toys that I was playing with at my friend's houses and my brother's friends and they're all their older brother's toys and shit. And yeah, it changed everything. And Star Wars kind of became a big thing for me, you know, where I would
00:22:32
Speaker
just like before the internet, where you'd have to read the character guides and all the source books and all the weapons and vehicles. I would spend hours reading that shit and all the books and stuff as I got older.
00:22:50
Speaker
Man, even even well into the 90s with like the, you know, the Kenner, you know, right before Hasbro power or the force, you know, so like the super buff Luke Skywalker and everything, you know, even even in that time, like I, I can remember that.
00:23:07
Speaker
To this day, I only know some of the character's names because of the back of the cards. Looking at the back of the figure and knowing what was coming in the next wave or what was still out there. If it weren't for the toys, I think many people would say the same thing. The knowledge of that world would fade without the toy line. 100%.
00:23:33
Speaker
Yeah, especially like you were saying, we didn't have internet. I mean, our books were the Marvel comics for the Marvel Star Wars comics, or I think even like we were getting Dark Horse at one point. Yeah, like during the Shadows of the Empire. I love that. Shadows of the Empire, I love all that. That was the first game, well, not the first game, but the
00:23:59
Speaker
first game I like remember sitting and like not leaving until I beat it, you know, in one sitting. And that game was fucking hard, too. Yeah, I love that game. I tried to play it on an emulator not too long ago and was like, Jesus Christ. Yep. It's like, oh, games used to control like this. Ew. Or like Dark Forces. Oh, Dark Forces, Rogue Squadron, all those games. I love that. It was like doing Star Wars.
00:24:29
Speaker
Yeah. So there have been many, many iterations now of Phantom Starkiller and Count Draco, Knuckle Duster. And this past weekend at virtual New York Comic Con, which we're still
00:24:47
Speaker
getting used to like this whole virtual thing. It's just it's the worst, but it's totally necessary. You revealed to two more iterations. So, you know, one of the things that you had mentioned briefly before, it was kind of like really thinking and focusing on the design and the color and everything. How how do you go about deciding what these special editions of the figures are going to look like? Like, how do you land on these these
00:25:14
Speaker
Incredible color patterns and and designs well the two that were released this past weekend are both Original versions that I came up with years ago So the well the very first before it was even phantom star killer. I think it was in 2012 when I first made the molds that I
00:25:38
Speaker
birth, the Phantom Starkiller figure, I casted it in a clear resin and airbrushed it, I think, like a smoky gray color with some translucent paint and painted his eyes red and gave him a red sword and a black chess box and a see-through gray cape and called him the Smoked Out Phantom. And that was one of the first figures that I released and
00:26:04
Speaker
Well, in 2012, but it was when I had started doing toys kind of full time and was making this transition from working in a factory for barely over minimum wage to doing toys full time. And that one sold out while I was at work and kind of made up my mind for me. And so it was cool to kind of go back and, you know, do a version of Starkiller that pays trip, like,
00:26:34
Speaker
tribute to that original smoked out Phantom and how far that character has come, man, you know, and Knuckle Duster. That was his other alternate colorway when, so in 2015, I collaborated with a company called Terra Planet X Skateboards and they commissioned Alexis Zuret to do of Night Riders.
00:27:00
Speaker
or not night writers, is it night writers? Space writers fame, the comic book space writers, that's black mass comics. He did a Starkiller and Knuckle Duster skateboard for Tariff Planet X. And they were like, okay, we've got one color way of him, which was the classic purple and yellow for Knuckle Duster. And he was like, come up with an alternative one.
00:27:29
Speaker
So I was like, all right. And I just, you know, I always look at color palettes, you know, and what colors go good together and what colors are eye catching. You know, that's what I did with Starkiller initially with the orange. I looked up what color is most attractive to men's eyes between ages like 18 to 35 or something like that. So I got you motherfuckers. Well, you sure did.
00:27:58
Speaker
But that's the truth. And then I looked at what colors on the color wheels that compliment those, that color, and that was green. And I just started playing with it from there and just made his color palette. And I always kind of do certain things like that.
00:28:23
Speaker
So yeah, that's kind of where it came up with. Knuckle Dusters is another one of his classic colorways. So for his second version, I had to do the OG, the second original colorway.
00:28:40
Speaker
And I think one of the things that's always so interesting about the variants too is the card art. Especially with Super 7 and the reaction line, I open everything. I have nothing meant on card. But the reaction line, I actually...
00:29:03
Speaker
I very meticulously take an Exacto and cut the bubble off so that way I can keep the card nice with hopes of one day that I will have enough space to display all of the cards because they are gorgeous. And specifically, we were talking about this a little bit before we hit record this evening, but the art on the Phantom Star Killer with the foiled element to it is just the coolest.
00:29:32
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. So beast me and beast rec, um, have been, he, uh, we worked on that together and, um, that was a cool process to, you know, figure out how to incorporate the holographic glitter foil cardstock into his artwork. And, um, it just looks great with the glittery star color or star killer color. It's kind of a mouthful.
00:30:03
Speaker
The Glittery Starkiller colorway. Yeah. Yeah, it looks great. But yeah, Super 7 gives me a lot of range to do whatever I want, really, within the realm of card art and packaging. So yeah, me and Jared did a Beastwreck. It did a piece for the skeleton faces and laser swords.
00:30:31
Speaker
Art show I did it toy du jour last year and he just killed it and he did such a good job and I love his style his stuff is just so so awesome and Yeah, getting the opportunity to work with Beastwreck is is is great and he's a great dude and for knuckle dusters card This is That's Joseph Schmalki my partner from the star killer comic book. This is his third card back
00:31:01
Speaker
And yeah, he killed it, man. He does a great job with my characters. Joe's always doing a really great job with my characters. And he's got a lot of practice drawing him over and over from that comic book, I tell you what. So he could probably do him blindfolded in his sleep.
00:31:25
Speaker
And the thing I like about that card art too, is it reminds me of like, you know, it could be like one of those 80s vending machine stickers. And I think that like, it speaks to the kind of nostalgia vibe of the figure itself. Yeah, 100%. Yeah, we were...
00:31:46
Speaker
definitely looking at references. I was typing in all types of weird, you know, things, you know, the products that were made back in the 80s and 90s to see how they incorporated the paper to the, you know, printing. Yeah, it's it's amazing. So you mentioned the comic book. So we know that the comic book is coming. Yeah. Tell us tell us more. Yeah. So they they're all printed and they've been
00:32:15
Speaker
getting delivered, so anybody who's ordered them should be getting them any, I guess, day now. So yeah, we did a Phantom Scarkiller comic book with Scout Comics under their black caravan imprint that my partner on the comic, Joe Schmalki, is the co-publisher with Rich Woodall.
Phantom Star Killer Comic Book
00:32:43
Speaker
Yeah, the comic turned out great. It was an awesome project. I got to stretch my wings a little bit and do some writing on the project. I wrote the whole thing and colored the whole thing. And Joe drew the whole thing. And it was a really cool process, the way we worked on it, because I had never written a comic before. And a lot of this was kind of outlined on the cardbacks that I had written
00:33:11
Speaker
in 2013 and 2014 for Knuckle Duster and Starkiller. And it was kind of weaving those storylines into it that were already established and have been established for a long time and kind of weaving them and weaving a story into those storylines, backstories, I suppose, and kind of dancing around within there, you know, and
00:33:41
Speaker
In the comic, there's a flashback that goes through kind of a brief history of Starkiller, the whole story of what happens on the back of the card back. So every time anybody's bought in one of the Phantom Starkillers they've seen on the back of the card, there's a story that is the same backstory I wrote in 2013. And that plays out over a few pages during the story.
00:34:11
Speaker
So I think a lot of people are like that. And, you know, it kind of then jumps back into a more fast paced kind of hack and slash comic.
00:34:22
Speaker
Yeah, that was going to be my question about the book because the character has the backstory on the back of the card. That's what we know about him. Did you enjoy the opportunity to kind of take that story and run with it and really kind of give him a much richer tale? Oh, yeah, of course. I actually wrote so much that it
00:34:52
Speaker
I've been breaking it up into the second comic that we're doing. I've real long winded, I suppose, in the way I write. And I was writing it actually to be kind of more descriptive and, you know, describing things that you obviously couldn't, you know, show or I guess you could show, but I was describing it to Joe. So when he was drawing it,
00:35:20
Speaker
that he could see what I was really thinking and how I was thinking and how even the room was lit. And if there was, you know, just so many details that I wrote into it and a lot of it had to be edited way down to make dialogue for a comic and to make panels and everything. And so, but yeah, it was great to be able to,
00:35:44
Speaker
to tell the broader tale and just a segment of it. This is really just the beginning, guys. This comic that's coming out is just one mission that he goes on. I've got a lot outlined for a lot more stuff and hopefully
00:36:09
Speaker
Hopefully that it can someday be presented in a different multimedia format, whether it be a movie or animated film or an animated short, animated series.
00:36:26
Speaker
Do you see this character going into any other mediums? And if there are like, you know, it sounds like you're already planning for it, but are there any in particular like that? Because again, like it's just with the iconography of this character and the way that this character looks and especially like now with how
00:36:47
Speaker
popular nostalgia is, I mean, I think, to an extent, nostalgia is always popular, whether it's, you know, in the 80s, people were nostalgic about the 50s. And like now we're, you know, people are nostalgic about the 70s and 80s again, it's just kind of like, there's always that circle, right. And, and I feel like now with
00:37:06
Speaker
the popularity of the character, like now would be like I could totally see an Adult Swim show, you know, where it's even even like aqua teen format where they're like 12 minute episodes. Right. Like I could totally see a Phantom Star Killer show like that. Yeah. So can I. And I hope that we do someday. You know, I've been.
00:37:31
Speaker
I've been working on stuff. I don't want to say too much. I don't want to say too little, but we're definitely working on stuff. I hope that everybody's ready when the boom comes because it's coming, boys. Oh, man.
00:37:57
Speaker
Well, speaking of the boom, you also had as if, as if there weren't enough things for you to be talking about this weekend, you had an additional announcement. Yeah. A change to your, your, your title. You, why don't you tell us a little bit about, uh, what, what you're doing with, uh, with Scout. Okay. Um, yeah, so, uh, it's hard to contain myself, but.
00:38:24
Speaker
Uh, it was hard to contain myself for this long, but yeah, so, um, yeah, scout comics, um, the comic company that put out Phantom Starkiller, um, is starting a toy company, like a sister company called tracker collectibles. That's going to be like the toy biz to their marble. Whereas, um,
00:38:46
Speaker
Tracker will have exclusive rights to all the IPs that Scout, Black Caravan, and Scoot currently have publishing and merchandising deals with. And producing toys, collectibles, action figures, games, all types of stuff that we've been talking about, working on. And you are going to be? Yeah, the CEO. So I guess I'm in charge.
00:39:15
Speaker
So yeah, it's kind of cool. Yeah, congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations. This is amazing news. Yeah, pretty crazy. That's awesome. Congratulations. Thank you. Yeah, and they and and Scout, you know, they have so many they have so many IPs. So you have you have quite the sandbox play in there. Yeah, of course. There's so many great titles from
00:39:41
Speaker
Metal Shark Bro, Stabity Bunny, Gut Ghost, Electric Black, The Mall, Phantom Star Killer. There's quite a few that we're gonna have some fun making some toys, some really cool toys out of. Yeah, the, the, the, and I'm just, I'm actually refreshing my memory right now, scrolling through the list. There is a lot of toyetic things that you have to play with here, so.
00:40:11
Speaker
Yeah, we're very excited to see what happens with that. Because it's also been a little bit since there has been kind of like a toy company directly linked to a comic book company.
Toy Companies and Comic Publishers Resurgence
00:40:26
Speaker
I mean, the most recent one, and unfortunately they just went under, was DC Direct producing toys for DC Comics. But there really isn't that kind of relationship anymore. And hopefully, this will kind of
00:40:41
Speaker
you know, spur some things to come. Yeah, you know, I think that, you know, that me coming from the more of the designer toy world and, you know, collect, you know, lower run, higher collectibility products, you know, that this kind of lends itself to the, you know, the clientele of what Scout already has, you know, it's,
00:41:10
Speaker
you know, these are higher end comics that are, you know, lower run and not Superman, Spider-Man, you know, and that have rabid fan bases and, you know, all have independent fan bases and popularity. So I think that, you know, to do some things that aren't so, you know, ambitious, like let's say DC direct would do and make
00:41:41
Speaker
5,000 units or something, you know, or 10,000. I don't know what they were making of their toys, but they, you know, apparently were losing their ass on toys that are some of the most beloved characters, so they're doing something wrong.
00:41:57
Speaker
Yeah, you know, I think too that the thing is, you know, some of those DC direct products were gorgeous that they were putting out, I think. And it seems to kind of be the general consensus is that, you know, Warner Brothers, you know, kind of bought DC and there was a big like shakeup with, you know, how they were structured and everything. And there's still a lot of the DC direct product that's still up in the air. Like people don't know.
00:42:27
Speaker
If like the stuff I've announced is even going to come out, if, you know, there's, there's a lot of question marks right there with that. But, you know, to your point, I think kind of harnessing that, that indie and, uh, collector culture that you know, and, and kind of have been operating in for so long is, is huge. I think that's a, that's a really smart way to enter, to enter into that venture.
00:42:57
Speaker
Yeah. And that's the way we're looking at it. And, you know, just want to make cool stuff for cool people of cool properties, you know. I think that's the way to go about it for sure. I think you're right on. Yeah, for sure. I mean, it taps into the collectability for sure.
00:43:25
Speaker
So what, um, what, what's next? So what's
Upcoming Projects: Draco Knuckle Duster and Little Star Killer
00:43:30
Speaker
next for you? So you have all of this, you know, this incredible stuff that you just announced, you know, you're starting a new company, you have the future of Phantom star killer. Um, you know, now that we're kind of like out of con season, you know, you know, virtual or otherwise, um, what, what's, what's the next, what's the next step for you? What can we expect to see next?
00:43:54
Speaker
So I'm working on the next comic book, which is going to be a Draco Knuckle Duster focused story. And I'm also working on and that also that Knuckle Duster comic will also be with Joseph Schmalki under Black Caravan.
00:44:16
Speaker
And then I'm also working on a children's book for Scoot, which is Scouts imprint for 12 or four to 12 year olds.
00:44:27
Speaker
So this is going to be a children's book called Little Star Killer, or Little Star Killer, with C.P. Wilson, who was an artist that also made art for the Skeleton Faces and Laser Swords Star Killer group show last year, and he
00:44:53
Speaker
has this Winnie the Pooh meets Where the Wild Things Are style that he does. And he did like 20 images of Phantom Star Killer, Draco Knuckle Duster, Vice Admiral Acre and Absolute Rulethu been all kind of doing these cute Winnie the Pooh type things. And so when Scout announced Scoot, and a couple weeks ago,
00:45:24
Speaker
I talked with James Haight, the president of Scout, and the creator of Stabity Bunny, Richard, who is heading up Scoot. And we just all decided, yeah, it was a no-brainer to follow it up and do a children's book. Because, you know, I mean, I have children. I don't know about you guys, but a lot of- I have a five-year-old.
00:45:53
Speaker
A lot of the guys that collect my stuff and that are fans of Phantom Starkiller all have children and I do too and you know I think to have something to share with your kids and you know have this that you can share with your passion with them and you know your love for this character with your children and you know
00:46:19
Speaker
have something that you can bond over is a great thing. I know when the Star Wars books came out five, six years ago that were like Goodnight, Little Vader or, or, uh, I remember getting those for my kids and reading them and those being the books that I would gravitate towards when it came to reading time at, you know, bedtime and all the books that I,
00:46:49
Speaker
went and found thrift stores and stuff that were all Star Wars or Ewoks books and these old
00:46:57
Speaker
books that I think, you know, my character would fit nicely into, especially with, you know, CP's work, man, like they're just so good. We were discussing it when he did the show, like last year, even before we knew that there was publishing that we could get for the book. We were already like, we got to figure out a way to make this a children's book, you know, and
00:47:28
Speaker
Yeah, so that's gonna happen. That'll come out next year, early next year. And that'll be, you know, and be able to be bought in bookstores because Scout just signed a big deal with Simon and Schuster for distributions, for books and stuff. So yeah, that's something I wanna be able to, people to just be able to go into Barnes and Nobles and Buyers, you know, something like that.
00:47:59
Speaker
And yeah, so I've got that toys, uh, you know, uh, just, uh, design the next figure, hopefully for the reaction line. Um, just some more reaction stuff coming. Um, yeah, I mean, I'm still going to be doing my killer bootlegs, my like independent stuff as well. Handmaids, you know, uh, probably lower run.
00:48:28
Speaker
Kind of like what I've been doing with the reissues of Starkiller, just like low run, handmade stuff here and there. And, you know, yeah, I'm gonna keep busy.
00:48:43
Speaker
It sure sounds like it, but I love the idea of you doing a kid's book because my daughter loves going over the toys with me in the collection and I'm actually looking at it right now.
00:49:00
Speaker
that carbon freezing chamber playset from from Hasbro. And and I actually have I have Phantom Starkiller up there with with Darth Vader right now. I'm staring at him. And my daughter, I was always like, you know, she watches the movies and everything with us. She's like, who's the orange guy? I don't remember him from the movie. That's funny. Oh, my God. That's Darth Vader's friend from another galaxy. And I was just like, you know, Goodnight, Little Vader is just like
00:49:31
Speaker
just thinking of that has has be fired up for like, you know, gifting gifting the book because I thought Goodnight Little Vader is hilarious. Yeah, yeah, we have all of them. Yeah, the all of those the Star Wars and they've actually been doing them with the some of the Marvel characters, too. Like we have a Goodnight Baby Groot one that's hilarious. There's one that's like, Dave, what's the one that you got for for her? It's like Grow Up Ant-Man.
00:50:01
Speaker
Yeah, grow up Ant-Man. And it's like Ant-Man and his and his daughter Cassie and like he's basically playing a joke, like how big can he grow? And it's it teaches you like big and small and it's it's adorable. But yeah, like all of those ideas, taking these characters that are, you know, meant and kind of now for an older audience, making them accessible for kids, I think is is the best. It's just the best. Yeah.
00:50:31
Speaker
Um, before, before we, we let you go, the other thing we like to ask all of our guests is what is the, the weirdest or your favorite piece in your collection?
Favorite Collection Piece: Polish Bootleg Storm Shadow
00:50:46
Speaker
Like what's, what's, what fills that, uh, that category for both? It is, it will check off both of those.
00:50:56
Speaker
marks in one answer. All right. So maybe three or four years ago, I acquired unpainted unassembled storm shadow Polish bootleg that was not on the card back or anything. So it's I mean, I have a
00:51:21
Speaker
Polish card as well that's not used. It's like a mint card. I had two of them actually. So I collect Polish bootlegs and this is like a storm shadow Polish bootleg that's not assembled. So it's still like on the sprue and it's not painted.
00:51:41
Speaker
And I sent that to not AFA, but the other one, CGA or no, that's comics. But what's that other collector grading? Yeah, the great, I can't think of the acronym right now. You know who I mean.
00:51:59
Speaker
Sorry, guys, for not shouting. Yeah, it's been a long week. But yeah, so I have it graded. And it's like I said, next to like an unused card. And I think it's like a one of one. Like, I don't think that's like something that other people have. So it's like, it's like, yeah, it's like the version two storm shadow from 88. But it's a Polish bootleg of him. That's unpainted unassembled.
00:52:28
Speaker
85 like a u85 grade or 90 in this big display case where he's like all Set up like unassembled, you know in like how that company what the fuck are they called collectors archive? collectors archive something but they do that they started doing it first with like the pegs and kind of like how they would I
00:52:53
Speaker
us display the weapons and stuff instead of how AFA did just taping them on the inside like they used to and now AFA kind of copied them. Collectors archive services. Yeah, so C-C-C-C-A-S, C-A-S, C-A-S, C-A-S, C-A-S. So C-A-S, I sent it to them and they do such a good job with their display pieces that I sent it to them and they have all the weapons, you know, displayed and the way that they do where they're like kind of
00:53:23
Speaker
vacuum formed kind of into a spot and the figures like all broken apart with his head, his body, his two arms, his legs, like all spread out. It's very nice piece, very nice. And it's like a one of one, one of my favorite pieces. It's in my living room. And yeah, somebody's gonna have to pry that out of my cold dead hands.
00:53:47
Speaker
That definitely does check both of those boxes at once. Yeah, rare. Yeah, that and I have like a this so it'd be like the second card from Return of the Jedi is like the desert scene of Boba Fett graded AFA graded.
00:54:10
Speaker
but it's a 60, but I think I should have it regraded because it's literally like perfect. And the only thing that's wrong with it is a hanger tear that isn't even noticeable from the front. You can only see that the hanger tear is from the back because when they put it in the case, they like laid it perfect on top of where it ripped. And it's underneath that flap that holds the card straight at the top of the case.
00:54:39
Speaker
So it looks like a mint, mint AFA graded Boba Fett, Return of the Jedi Fett, but it's a, it got a 60 and it's like an 85 figure, 80 card, the bubble's perfectly clear. Everything's perfect about it, but that hangar tear. And I, I feel like he got somebody on a bad day or something. Yeah. I've talked
00:55:03
Speaker
I've talked to the guys at AFA, at like San Diego Comic Con and gone by the booth with pictures of it and they're like, yeah, send it in. The worst that you'll get is the same grade. But to me, I don't know if the grade matters. It was just the opportunity to get one that was perfect. Like I didn't think I would ever be able to get one like that. And I got this maybe 15 years ago. So I think I got it for like $600 or maybe $700.
00:55:30
Speaker
But it was, at the time, I kind of convinced my wife, like, this is a once in a lifetime thing. We're never, I'll never be able to find another one that's like this clean for such a cheap price that looks so good. Like, and the only thing that has against it is this hanger tear and kind of a shitty grade, you know? But so that's my other like, prized
00:55:57
Speaker
piece, I guess, and then all my, I kept like the paint masters of all my handmade figures. Uh, so that'd be like the first piece that I casted out of the mold and assembled and painted. And then all my other, like the whole edition I made, whether it be 25, 50, a hundred, two, three, 400, some figures I made so many additions of, but I would, uh, copy, I would be copying that first one that I did. And I have all those too.
00:56:27
Speaker
That's gotta be awesome. I think I didn't you not too long ago weren't you going through some of those original ones? Yeah, yeah, I got rid of some like I've so in the last year I kind of dedicated my life I suppose to Phantom my like Phantom Star Killer IP and like my original IP I suppose like my own shit and not making any more like pop culture and
00:56:55
Speaker
figures. If my own creations are getting me where I want to go, I don't think I need to focus on other people's creations anymore. I made that decision late 2019. That's when I decided I started cleaning house of some of the things that I don't
00:57:24
Speaker
I mean, yes, they have some kind of sentimental value to me that I made this thing years ago. But there's guys who have these great collections of my stuff and to have something like that would be like I was just describing these crazy
00:57:44
Speaker
things I collect and I like and I want, to me it's my, you'd have to pry out of my cold dead hands. To somebody else, that thing that I'm just walking past every day that's collecting dust that I made seven years ago, that might've been the first thing that they saw that introduced him to this weird, wacky world of bootleg figures. And then they started collecting things and then they started making things. Then they met a friend and now that some guy that they've been talking to online is their best friend,
00:58:13
Speaker
It all started because this fucking Frank and Fett figure I made and they happened to see on Facebook is some group in Thailand posted on a Facebook group. And now he's got the chance to buy that figure. Like to me, that that means more that he has it than I do. You know, it does get crazy like that. I mean, I wasn't. That's like a real example. I wasn't just making it up. But that's true. Yeah.
00:58:38
Speaker
So I mean, it's kind of wild how this art scene has inspired so many and made so many lifelong friendships for people and how far it's taken me to where this has been my job for the last 10 years, almost, and I've been doing this, pursuing my art full time.
00:59:07
Speaker
You know, I don't know. It's all very moving and touching, you know, and I think it's a good thing that people are doing this and that, you know, I'm happy that I started doing it and it all happened from collecting toys. Well, even, you know, people who now make toys because of you, you know, like that's another kind of
00:59:30
Speaker
awesome kind of thing to think about. Yeah, it goes it's pretty wild because there's like generations of guys that have started making toys or that have been toy makers. I would be like considered like a first generation guy. And then there's guys that I inspired that started making toys that are no longer doing it that inspired guys and inspired guys. And it goes
00:59:55
Speaker
I don't even know, you'd have to talk to somebody like Dove from DKE Toys who is kind of maybe like more of a historian, I suppose, on the resin bootleg game. But it's, you know, there's guys that are, that their first figures at New York Comic Con, they're not their first one, but they have their first release at Dove's booth at DKE Con this weekend that, you know,
01:00:23
Speaker
maybe some guy that started five years after me that was inspired by four guys before me that all inspired each other. It's so wild how it's just kind of grown into this worldwide art scene. So just before we wrap things up, where can we find you on the internet? And is there anything that you'd like to plug? Go for it.
01:00:50
Speaker
So yeah, you can find me at Killer Bootlegs on Instagram or Twitter or Facebook or PhantomStarKiller on Instagram or PhantomStarKiller.com or KillerBootlegs.com. I got some new thing I'm doing every week, multiple things. So just as long as you're following those accounts and I'll be posting and sharing and all the progress that goes on with all these cool projects I'm working on.
01:01:21
Speaker
And we'll of course be doing our due diligence to share everything that we see on our feed. We have nothing but the utmost of respect for you, what you're doing. It really is art and we love it. We're inspired by it and we can't wait to see what's coming next. So Peter, thank you so much for joining us tonight and it has been a hell of a weekend for you and get some rest.
01:01:51
Speaker
Yeah. Thanks for having me, guys. I've been following you guys and I love what you guys are doing. And I'm happy to be apart. And anytime you guys want me to come back and talk about any of this goofy stuff that I it goes on, I'm happy to more than happy. We're we're we live for the goofy shit, man. We live for it. Me too. It's definitely like a weird movie
01:02:19
Speaker
that I don't understand what's going on sometimes. I'm like walking in halfway through it, you know, and it's in French and I'm just enjoying the ride, you know? Enjoying the ride. That's a good way to send it off.
01:02:35
Speaker
Thank you, dear listener, for hanging out with us today. Subscribe, rate, and review us wherever you listen, and then tell your friends to do it. Thanks also to Joe Azari, the golden voice behind our intro. Our music is Game Boy Horror by the Zombie Dandies. Find more about them both on our show notes.
01:02:51
Speaker
Follow us on social media at AIC underscore podcast on Instagram and Twitter. Stop by and say hi. Show us your toy hauls and share your toy stories. Maybe we'll talk about it in a future episode.
01:03:15
Speaker
This has been a non-productive media presentation. Executive producer Frank Kablaui. This program and many others like it on the non-productive network is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives license. Please share it, but ask before trying to change it or sell it. For more information, visit non-productive.com.