Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Mucha Lucha and So Much More with Boss Fight Studio's Erik Araña
661 Plays2 years ago
This week we launch ourselves back into the squared circle with one of Boss Fight Studio's founding designers Erik Araña to discuss his current and upcoming contributions to the wrestling figure world with BFS' Legends of Lucha Libre and MLW lines. Also - hear Erik answer questions from Adventures in Collecting followers and more!
Follow Boss Fight Studio on Instagram @bossfightstudio and visit https://bossfightshop.com to learn more!
Interested in investing in Zencastr? go to wefunder.com/zencastr to claim your slice of the Future of Podcasting!
Get 20% OFF @manscaped + Free Shipping with promo code AIC at MANSCAPED.com
Follow us @aic_podcast on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube
Intro and other voices by Joe Azzari
https://www.instagram.com/voicesbyjoe/
Theme Music is "Game Boy Horror" by the Zombie Dandies
Proudly part of the Non-Productive Network
Recommended
Transcript
Zencastr's Crowdfunding Initiative
00:00:02
Speaker
You've heard us talk about how much we love Zencaster. We've told you about how awesome their podcasting platform is, how easy it is to host, record, and publish adventures in collecting with their all-in-one web app. Well, now they're giving you, our listeners, the opportunity to support us and the nearly 30,000 other podcasts powered by Zencaster. That's right. Now you can invest in the podcasts you love
00:00:29
Speaker
through Zencaster's crowdfunding campaign. For as little as $100, join a community of other investors who seek to help Zencaster and independent podcasters like us succeed. If you're interested in investing in Zencaster, go to wefunder.com slash zencaster or click the link in our episode description below to claim your slice of the future of podcasting.
Introduction to Adventures in Collecting
00:00:54
Speaker
That's wefunder.com forward slash z en c a s t r. Are you ready, kids? Get your parents permission, check your mailbox and grab your shopping cart. It's time for the adventures and collecting podcast.
00:01:17
Speaker
I'm Eric. And I'm Dave. Welcome to Adventures in Collecting, where we talk toy news, culture, and halls, along with our journeys as collectors. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Adventures in Collecting. Hi. Dave, we're back.
00:01:40
Speaker
We are. And we are back with another guest again this week. This is another first time guest. Yes. Technically. Now. Technically. There's an asterisk here because you actually had the opportunity to interview today's guest during our first toy fair experience, but it never made it to the podcast. It was only on our Instagram. So. Yes. It was only on Instagram. Technically.
00:02:10
Speaker
technically today's guest is a first time guest. It was a really awesome conversation that just turned into interview, that turned into Instagram posts. Yeah, it was one of those things where I remember awkwardly, like you guys are having, and you know, us being, having never been to an event like that, you know, you were talking and I awkwardly was like, can I film this? But anyway, we're burying the lead, Dave, and that's not something I should do, right? That is not something we
Interview with Eric Arana from Boss Fight Studio
00:02:40
Speaker
do.
00:02:40
Speaker
So, Boss Fight Studio entered the collectible scene in 2013 with a team of artists set on bringing the play back to toys, making the kind of action figures they wanted.
00:02:51
Speaker
From their Hacks line to reinvigorating iconic licenses like Bucky O'Hare, Popeye, and Flash Gordon, to now making wrestling figures in their Legends of Lucha Libre line. Joining us today is one of the founding members of Boss Fight Studios and lead designer on the Legends of Lucha Libre line, art director Eric Arana. Eric, welcome to Adventures in Collecting. Thank you for having me.
00:03:17
Speaker
So as we were talking about off the air before we started here, we do not often find ourselves in a situation where we have two Eric's with a K in the same conversation. This is a rare feat.
00:03:34
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's an uncommon spelling. We actually have another Eric who works for boss fight and his is spelled with a CH. So there's like two uncommon Eric's wow at boss fight already. So it's like it's like an Eric of the Von Eric's almost.
00:03:57
Speaker
Yeah, to keep things in theme. Yeah, there you go. Perfect. Perfect little tie-in. But before we get into your history with toys and what's going on with Boss Fight Studio, as this is a show about collecting the first thing we ask all of our guests, what are you currently collecting and what are some of your recent pickups? My collecting is a lot smaller than it used to be.
00:04:24
Speaker
Nowadays, I'm not a completist about anything anymore. I just kind of get the things I like from certain lines.
00:04:37
Speaker
I'm currently I'm, I'm doing a super sevens, Joe GI Joe ultimates, uh, which just hit. Um, and they're just gorgeous. Um, I do the carded, uh, retro Joe's from, um, Hasbro that they've been doing, which isn't a lot. So that's good for me.
00:05:00
Speaker
Uh, I do for like Joe classified, I do collect, uh, uh, dreadnocks and, uh, slaughters marauders, but I keep it to just those two groups. So I'm not broke. Um, I do Marvel legends stuff, but again, I, uh, just captain American for characters and, um, only pre 1993 ish era.
00:05:26
Speaker
I kind of steer clear of modern or not that I don't like stuff after that, but that's like my heyday of Marvel Comics. I still buy the random Aquaman thing or Katrina and I kind of, we buy food related toys a lot.
00:05:50
Speaker
So we have, you know, we have toys in the kitchen on the wall, like on shelves, like really random food related things. Uh, we, most of it is a gashapon stuff from Japan and stuff like, because they're always doing weird little dessert things and stuff like that. You know, those gashapon pods are, are awesome at, uh,
00:06:12
Speaker
We got a chance to go to Anime New York this last year, I should say. And they had a whole booth of just those gashapon machines. And I'm staring at my amazing little turtle friend that I have here. Those things are so cool.
00:06:29
Speaker
They're all, they're all over Hong Kong. So whenever we go to visit the factory, we come back with just suitcases full of that stuff. Cause we just can't, it's a, it's so inviting and it's so much fun. And you just kind of go and start dropping coins and you're like, you can't really lose on those things. All of them are really cool. Like even if you don't end up getting the one that you want, the thing that you end up getting is something that's
00:06:59
Speaker
the only way you're going to get it is through one of those machines. So it's always fun. Yeah. Yeah. And I remember just getting random back when I was like super young, whether it was like, you know, football or baseball helmets or just the most random toys that came from like one of the quarter machines. So the fact that that still exists and you can still kind of live that is really cool. Yeah.
Eric's Journey into Toy Design
00:07:25
Speaker
So, um, how did you get into,
00:07:28
Speaker
you know, the toy business and getting into designing toys. Well, you know, I mean, the thing I always say is that I kind of tripped and fell into toy design while I was trying to break into comics. You know, I had spent years my college degree is in sequential art and I am so like I spent years trying to break into comics and I started doing toy freelance work.
00:07:56
Speaker
on the side while you know to kind of keep funds coming in and it just picked up faster and faster and more work and more work and more work and before you knew it I was
00:08:12
Speaker
you know, talking a little more seriously with Hasbro and everything and moved up to out of New York and closer to Hasbro. So, because it was becoming clear that I was being, you know, kind of groomed, I guess, to come in-house and, you know, that's what eventually happened. And I'm glad because I don't think I have,
00:08:40
Speaker
I don't have the fight in me for comic books. It's a fight every month for every artist I know. And I don't have that fight in me. We have a good friend of ours that's an editor over at currently at IDW. And she always tells us all the time, it's just like constantly clawing and scratching. And it's not an easy industry to be in.
00:09:09
Speaker
Nope. As you mentioned, you grew into the role that you were in at Hasbro. And I mean, most people who end up in the toy industry, I'm sure that's a target landing place for them. One of the companies they'd most want to work for. What led to kind of the founding of boss fight studios? Yeah. Well, like you said, Hasbro's kind of, it's one of the brass rings. There's a few of them like Mattel or
00:09:37
Speaker
Lego and you know things like that. Those are kind of the big ones and um You know Hasbro is the only company I ever Worked for actually for the toy come toy industry. I I did some I've done since I left Hasbro I've done some freelance work for Bandai and and Mattel and stuff like that, but um Actually being an employee I only worked at Hasbro and uh
00:10:05
Speaker
In 2013, the beginning of 2013, Hasbro had that massive layoff. And I was part of that along with a bunch of the other boss fight team.
00:10:20
Speaker
After that layoff, we knew we all wanted to do toys still. We're all toy collectors. We're all customizers. We're all artists. We wanted to keep doing it. And we ended up deciding that we didn't want to work for another corporation. So we started Boss Fight. And it was a big deal because we had to scrounge every penny.
00:10:49
Speaker
fight and then we did the Kickstarter, which helped get us off the ground. The first line was big. It was a huge hit at the time. At the time, it was the biggest Kickstarter for a toy company. There's been since a few that have beaten us now, but it was a huge deal and it was a lot of product.
00:11:15
Speaker
You know, we, we all worked really hard. We worked long hours, long night, late nights, and, uh, um, yeah, it's been 10 years now. So that's pretty crazy. Yeah. Congratulations, by the way, that's, that's true. You had the 10 year anniversary. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, next week, uh, all coming up, uh, we're doing the boss Fest.
00:11:41
Speaker
And, uh, we're going to be doing videos all week and revealing new stuff and talking about stuff, uh, new, new product, showing new product. Um, it's going to be a lot of cool stuff and, uh, we're, we're super excited about it. So yeah, that actually kicks off. Uh, this, this is airing the 13th. So the 14th, yeah, it kicks off tomorrow, right? Big, big day. Um, yeah. And, and I mean, it's, it's so interesting, right? Like, you know, all of these.
00:12:08
Speaker
smaller indie toy companies, the plunderlings, the savage crucibles, the animal warriors of the kingdom, all these companies now that are using Kickstarter as kind of their launch platform. I mean, you guys literally laid the tracks for that and showed that that platform is viable.
00:12:31
Speaker
Yeah. And we, we actually, you know, we know a lot of those guys and we've talked to a lot of them and help to help them out on theirs, their Kickstarter with advice and everything like that. Yeah. We want every, we want everyone to, to succeed. We, like we did, we, you know, we're, and not that we don't struggle all the time. We do. Um, we're, you know, we're a company and we have to run it and everything. And so it's, uh, but we want everyone to succeed. We, we want there to be.
00:13:01
Speaker
You know, more, you know, the, the, the more creative, smaller companies that you have out there, the better the competition gets, you know, you, you have to up your game exponentially all the time and they do, and we do, and everyone does. And then that's, that's great actually for the consumer. So.
00:13:25
Speaker
Yeah, it's true. I mean, what's the saying, right? The competition brings out the best in everybody. Yeah, you don't want 20 years of just the WWE. You know, you need AEW and you need MLW and you need all that, you know, you need that other stuff out there. Otherwise it stagnates. And I mean, that's, that's, you know, such a great, you know, example, because look at the WWE product now versus, you know,
00:13:53
Speaker
four years ago, you know, pre pandemic WWE versus post pandemic WWE. They're effectively like two different organizations at this point. It's wild. Yeah. And you know, it's the pressure of the other, you know, the competitors coming into the market and showing that they're, they're legitimate. Yeah. They've had to up their game and that's, that's great for the, for the viewers and good for the talent too. Cause then they get, they all start making more and they all start, you know,
00:14:22
Speaker
Yeah. And, you know, the more awesome of anything that's out there, you know, it definitely gives like, well, you know, it makes the decisions either harder or makes you like kind of rethink how you collect because it's just like, well, there's this thing, but this thing's really cool too. And I want to start looking into that. And then you start picking up a little bit from everywhere, which is amazing. Yeah. I was saying before, yeah.
00:14:52
Speaker
It's the usual dilemma. How do I get, you know, there's so much of everything out there that's awesome. You got to kind of figure out how to do that. Yeah, and actually, Boss Fight is the most recent company that has actually done that to me.
00:15:15
Speaker
Small tangent here before we get into the bulk of things, but I'm a huge Popeye fan. I love Popeye. And I grabbed the Popeye figure, the Popeye Classics figure, and I was like, I'll just get Popeye. I'll add him to the shelf as just Popeye. And then he showed up, but I started playing with him. I was like, yeah, I'm going to get Bluto too.
00:15:35
Speaker
And then i'm looking at the pictures of the two of them like yeah but like now they have nobody to fight over so probably get all of. And then yeah and now it's just forget it i'm i'm i'm hooked i'm in and i can't get out.
00:15:49
Speaker
Damn it. Oh, thank you for your addiction. That's likely going to be me with fraggles too. The fraggle stuff. I mean, the Popeye stuff is gorgeous. The fraggle stuff is looking unbelievable with just, you know, there's something so.
00:16:08
Speaker
Appealing and satisfying about seeing those Muppet characters sculpted with those Those textures and those that you know, they're big open wide mouths and they're like it's just such so appealing and so great Like all Muppet toys are every company that's done Muppet toys. They're always at least good if you know at the bottom You know, the worst one is still good like and then you have palisades which were perfect. So yeah
00:16:37
Speaker
Yep, I still have my Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem, the drum set with the stage and animal from Palisades. Oh, so good. We still have a lot of ours too. Yeah, that was a fabulous line. But yeah, damn you and your Popeye figures. Stepping away from Popeye, Dave. Yeah, yeah.
Legends of Lucha Libre Collaboration
00:17:01
Speaker
One of the big projects we saw and discussed back in 2020 at Toy Fair
00:17:06
Speaker
was Legends of Lucha Libre. So how did that land at boss fight? So the previous Toy Fair, the Masked Republic licensing team found us and we started talking.
00:17:26
Speaker
And, um, it sounded really cool. And, and, you know, there's a bunch of us that are wrestling fans and me in particular is Lucha Libre fan. So it started to sound very good. And, um, even, you know,
00:17:43
Speaker
not if you're not a lucha libre fan you know that lucha libre looks cool you know the masks and the the the costumes and everything like that so you know we started talking about it and we started talking with masked republic and then uh the first the first time we met
00:18:01
Speaker
With with Kevin Klein rock from masked Republic, you know, you know when you meet somebody and everything just clicks into place and you know that you're gonna know this person for the rest of your life like That that's kind of how it was with Kevin and you know
00:18:18
Speaker
It just was one of those things that was like, Oh yeah, we need to do this if for no other reason, then we need this partnership with them. And they're such good partners and so much, it's been so much fun and stressful, you know, it's a with, with, uh, wrestling, it doesn't matter which company is doing it. It doesn't matter which, which, uh, which toy company, which wrestling Federation, it doesn't matter.
00:18:44
Speaker
The talent is always bouncing around and going over here and going over there and going, you know, you know, two of the guys in our first wave of MLW aren't at MLW anymore. In fact, one of them's at WWE. Like, and you know, before, before we had even shown, you know, our fully painted Penta and Phoenix figure,
00:19:12
Speaker
they had gone to AEW and jazzwares had announced their penta and phoenix figure like it just happens so it all happens so fast and and so there's always gonna be those those outliers and that can be stressful but at the same time you still get to do the figure like after a certain point you know you're still gonna put that figure out and um so yeah it's just it's it is a lot of fun and um i i love getting to
00:19:42
Speaker
to, to meet a lot of the talent. I'm like I said, I'm a wrestling fan, so it's, it's always fun for me to, to be able to talk or, or meet them, um, Be backstage with them over, you know, and seeing how wrestling works backstage has been amazing. Yeah. And, and, you know, like you said before, even people who aren't necessarily familiar with the breadth of, you know, Lucha Libre talent that's out there.
00:20:08
Speaker
It's hard to argue, if you close your eyes and think, okay, what current wrestler is the most toyetic wrestler in existence? You close your eyes and it's Rey Mysterio. It's the mask, it's the costumes, it's the creativity, it's all there. And Lucha Libre is so toyetic, so unbelievably toyetic. And it's just been cool to watch
00:20:36
Speaker
You know, watch these some of these guys go from, you know, AAA to into into AW into NXT into into all these different brands. Like it's just it's it's amazing. And no matter what show you watch, you're exposed to to Lucha Libre in some form or fashion. Like there's there's somebody on the roster, at least one person, multiple people in most cases where
00:21:03
Speaker
Like you're exposed to that style of wrestling, which is great because just like we were saying before, just one thing, one style isn't going to make for an interesting watch. You need a little bit of everything, which, you know, is is great to see and great to see to a lot of. These wrestlers that you've, you know, kind of only heard about or you've seen on indie shows
00:21:33
Speaker
make it to worldwide television. Yeah. So you mentioned it was cool to start to see behind the scenes and meet some of the talent as you've put the line together. Has it been more exciting to work with legends like Conan or Ultimo Dragon and Vampiro? Or like you said, more modern stars like Penta and Ray Phoenix and Black Taurus? Yeah.
00:22:01
Speaker
It's, it's a lot of fun. Like, like I said, I, you know, I am a fan and, and my, uh, my, my favorite era of wrestling is that the Monday night wars. Um, and I was a big WCW Mark. I was not the WWE guy. I was, uh, and it was because of Lucha Libre and you know, the NWO. And I just thought WCW was doing more fun stuff. And, um,
00:22:31
Speaker
You know, so guys like Conan and who V in Vampiro and stuff like that were very cool for me to be able to meet and work with and have, you know, Vampiro's called me on the phone. You know, I shoot emails back and forth with him all the time. Not even always talking about.
00:22:52
Speaker
figures like, you know, like it's this random stuff now. Like, so that's really cool. Like being, being able to hang out and talk to them. And a lot of them are, you know, they, they all kind of, um, participate as much as they want to, which is, which is what we want. If you're really into it, be really into it with us.
00:23:17
Speaker
If you're not, that's fine too. None of them have been bad to work with in any way. They've all been at least fun to talk to and stuff like that. Tia's amazing and she's the only one who intimidates me and I'm kind of scared of.
00:23:39
Speaker
He's got a very big personality. She does. But, you know, Ultimo Dragon is great. Like he's he wants things to be right. You know, and that's that's awesome. That helps us, you know, like he wants them. He catches like angles and stuff on the mask and everything. You know,
00:24:01
Speaker
The Pedo Agayo family has been great and Jacob Fatu was really great. I spent a bunch of time with the MLW guys at a bunch of taping stuff and got to take photos, close up photos of their tattoos and all that stuff. And while I was talking to them all and stuff, they were all really, it's really crazy because you meet these guys and they're enormous and they're scary.
00:24:27
Speaker
looking and stuff, but they're all sweethearts. All of them are really nice and they're all like, um, and, you know, so many of them are so excited, so excited to get that they're getting figures. Cause in some cases it's the first time that some of them are getting figures. Um, you know, in some cases it's not like, you know, obviously, you know, uh, killer cross has had a number of figures before, um, who V has had.
00:24:56
Speaker
one figure, I think ever the, the figures toy company one, I think was the only one. So he was pretty excited and he, you know, he's always out there talking about it and stuff like that on his social media and stuff. So, um, so that's great. And, you know, so yeah, it's, it's, it's always really fun. And see, you know, the, the difference in the way some of them react to everything is always very interesting to you.
00:25:26
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, in some cases, like, you know, somebody like Vampiro, he hasn't had a figure since what, like, was Toy Biz Marvel, you know, like... Yeah, the Toy Biz ones. Yeah, going way, way back. And then the CMLL one before that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that's, yeah, so he hasn't had a lot, and that's... And he's one of our keystones, you know, because he's Vampiro. Like, he's awesome, and he's got a lot of great looks, and he's got, you know,
00:25:55
Speaker
And, um, yeah, so, yeah. So a lot of them haven't had figures in a really long time. I think Conan was kind of the same. His last figure was like in from the TNA line, I think from toy biz. Yes, I think so. Yeah. Yep. So. Yeah. And I mean, it's, it's one of those things now where, you know,
00:26:15
Speaker
for the guys that haven't had figures before, you couldn't pick a better time to have a wrestling action figure. I mean, just with the way that these things move and the amount of deco and detail and the tattoos and the ring gear and everything. And then somebody like a Conan or a Vampiro, I mean, the last time they had an action figure,
00:26:38
Speaker
They were what they were at the time, which was great, but now they get to kind of see proper execution of... And Conan has never had a figure of him wearing the mask from his Mexico days, from his pre-WCW days. So that was really cool to be able to do.
00:26:59
Speaker
And, you know, we're like boss fight. We're, we're obsessed with the details and the, the kind of hyper realism of the tattoos and the body sculpt and the Conan's hair on his chest. Like we're a little obsessive about that stuff. Um, and we know we don't have to be, but we, it's the toys we want.
00:27:22
Speaker
I mean, if there's one audience that appreciates that stuff though, it's definitely the wrestling figure audience. I mean, those little details count. They do. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, you know, like you think like, Oh, I just saw Taya on impact, or I just saw black to roost on impact. Like these are, you know, now you can pick up everybody in this line. And it's what's cool. It's company agnostic in a way where it's,
00:27:48
Speaker
people from all over the place. Yeah, it really is like, you know,
00:27:54
Speaker
DC versus Marvel out there right now. It's everybody's on our line specifically. Some of the guys we have coming out are at WWE. Some of them are at AEW. Some of them are on Impact or AAA or CMLL. They're all over the place. Our line is a lot of fun because it covers all of this ground.
00:28:19
Speaker
The forbidden door doesn't exist on people's shelves. No, it does not. It's permanently kicked open. It's starting to get swinging open and back closed in real life anyway. And now, a word from our sponsors.
00:28:46
Speaker
This segment
Chubsy Wubsy Toys and Retail Challenges
00:28:47
Speaker
is brought to you by our friends at Chubsy Wubsy Toys. A traditional mom and pop toy store in Little Falls, New Jersey, Chubsy Wubsy Toys brings you the best new toys from the brands you love without the hassle of pounding the pavement searching for them at larger retail stores.
00:29:03
Speaker
Visit them in person at 106 Main Street in Little Falls, New Jersey, or online at ChubsyWubsy.com. That's C-H-U-B-Z-Z-Y-W-U-B-Z-Z-Y.com. And tell them Adventures in Collecting sent you. Level up your collection with CGC, the world leader in pop culture collectibles grading.
00:29:27
Speaker
CGC recently launched its video games division with experienced, knowledgeable, and passionate graders to help you maximize your value on all the games you love. Ready to give your games an extra life? Submit today at cgcgrading.com. That's cgcgrading.com.
00:29:51
Speaker
This is a public service announcement. Manscaped now has beard products and is going even further with their brand new Weed Whacker 2.0. Go ahead and tell the world the leaders in below the waist grooming are traveling north of your South Pole with their revolutionary grooming products. The new Weed Whacker 2.0 and their new beard line confirms they have all the best tools for your hygiene toolbox.
00:30:21
Speaker
it is time for you to upgrade your game. Go to manscaped.com and use our code AIC to save 20% off and get free shipping.
00:30:32
Speaker
The brand new Weed Wacker 2.0 offers improved blades and skin safe technology with a no tugging guarantee. It's never been so painless to mind your manholes. And now that you have your face looking great with the beard hedger, you have to try Manscapes Performance Package 4.0 for the full body grooming experience. And this just in, the Performance Package 4.0 now comes with the Weed Wacker 2.0
00:31:01
Speaker
and all of the other below the waist grooming products that Manscaped is known for. We love the full suite of grooming tools from Manscaped. It's never been easier to take care of our hair. What are you waiting for? Save on Manscaped today. That's right. Get 20% off with free shipping at manscaped.com when you use code AIC. Always use the right tools for the job with Manscaped.
00:31:34
Speaker
And now back to the show.
Upcoming Events and Releases for Legends of Lucha Libre
00:31:38
Speaker
Now we mentioned all of these great wrestlers that are coming out. We've seen two waves of the premium line and, um, one wave of fanaticos in hand with a second on the way. Um, what's next for both lines? Um, so yeah, the, the next, uh, the next, uh, wave of fanaticos were already at
00:32:01
Speaker
the tooling stage, we're working on packaging, we're working on Deco with the factory. And that's, you know, of course, that's Black Taurus and Vampiro, Ijo del Pero Agayo and Ultimo Dragon. We're really excited about getting those guys out, especially the, you know, guys like Ultimo Dragon and hasn't had a whole lot of figures, certainly not like mass release type figures. And, um,
00:32:25
Speaker
And Ijo del Pero Agayo has been that's great to get him out there. And I think Black Taroos might be the most toyetic wrestler in the world right now. Yeah, absolutely.
00:32:44
Speaker
By him and put them with like their mythic legions collection You know the Marvel Legends their D&D stuff like this is gonna be a you could tear it up anywhere and So yeah, you know we're you know, so that's that's a lot of fun We're not ready to announce the next wave yet, but the next wave is gonna make people pretty happy. I think it's got It's got a great legend in it a maestro and in and it's got
00:33:15
Speaker
three others that I think will make people really happy. The modern wrestling fan, both, both in Mexico and the US. Uh, so we're really, really excited to, when we get to, when we're able to announce the next wave. Um, and then, you know, premium wave three, we we've announced and it's, uh, you know, uh, Taya, uh, a super articulated Taya with, you know, she's got the extra head and she's, she's wearing the, um,
00:33:43
Speaker
The AAA invades America costume from the AAA vs. Impact a couple years back in New York. Laredo Kidd in his awesome triple mania gear with the giant wings that he entrance gear.
00:34:02
Speaker
uh, tonight was junior and he's, you know, super tall. He's got that classic mask and everything. And, uh, WSX era, vampiro with the WSX title belt. So, all right. That's awesome. Yeah. Ghoul vampiro. He's got the, the, the braids and the ghoul makeup and everything. So real excited to get that one out. And
00:34:27
Speaker
And getting Wrestling Society X out there too. Yeah, right. That's, that's a lot of fun. And, um, and you know, we have so much stuff coming up and including some stuff that's, uh, like I mentioned, uh, my favorite era. We've got some stuff coming from my favorite era of wrestling. So I think people will be really happy about that. So just to plug boss Fest again, you know, will we see any, any updates for these lines during the boss Fest announcements or.
00:34:57
Speaker
So I'm going to plug something else here because at the end of the month, beginning of April, uh, boss fight will be at wrestle con in LA the weekend of WrestleMania. And so because of that, though, we are saving wrestler Lucha Libre and MLW announcements.
00:35:21
Speaker
Uh, until Russell come because we need some stuff to show at the booth and, uh, announce there, but we will have some big announcements then. Um, so, uh, yeah, a lot of our wrestle Lucha Libre, uh, legends and, and, uh, MLW talk will be a little slim next week, but, uh, but yeah, we, um, we do have plans to show some new stuff.
00:35:45
Speaker
at, at Russell Con. So looking forward to it very much. So, uh, so speaking of, of things that are on the way, uh, you know, a ring is on the way with, with the, uh, the accessories drawer and, uh, and, and some accessory sets, uh, are there, are there plans for any more like that? Any additional accessory sets or, uh, or additions for the ring? Uh, yeah, actually we're,
00:36:12
Speaker
We're working in sculpt phase for the accessory sets wave two, and they're going to be very popular. I think they're a lot of fun and, um, possibly stuff that, uh, some more professional toy companies would probably say, maybe we shouldn't do that, but we're a little bit more on the side of, yeah, let's do that.
00:36:42
Speaker
Well, I mean, you were bold enough to put light tubes in the first one. So I think we can make some stuff. And barbed wire, yeah. Yeah, barbed wire. I mean, other companies will do the barbed wire and stuff like that. And I think people would do this. It's just, yeah, one of the sets is a little iffy.
00:37:06
Speaker
It pushes the boundaries. Yeah, that's all. It's not the PG era of WWE. It's probably the hardcore era of episodes of Lucha Underground.
00:37:31
Speaker
But yeah, so we're really excited about that. And, you know, with the ring is, is a lot of fun. And I've always, you know, the toy designer in me is always thought that the, all that wasted space.
00:37:46
Speaker
in underneath a ring was unfortunate. So that was the real push for the drawer. Of course, that did double our tooling for a ring, which has raised our price. But I'm still really proud of it. And we got it down to a decent price, I think. So that's why all that space is there. Yes.
00:38:12
Speaker
Basically, we told one ring and then one slightly smaller ring worth of plastic that goes inside of it. No wasted space. Yeah, that's the goal. Also, as all collectors know this, we have bins and bins of pieces and parts. Every figure comes with extra heads and hands and stuff like that now. You can't put all of it on display.
00:38:42
Speaker
Correct. And if it's a kid who's playing, now they can put stuff under the ring. Or take everything on the go. That's what I would have done with it. It's absolutely brilliant.
00:39:01
Speaker
It's one of those things where it's like, how did this never happen before now? Yeah, well, it's it's it's interesting because at one point I was trying to figure out how to make it fold up, fold up into a carry case. But because of the ropes, it's it's nearly it's a big problem without taking it apart each time. And I that's not the point to a carry case. So it must be fast so that it ended up becoming a storage drawer instead.
00:39:27
Speaker
So speaking of awesome things, we mentioned this partnership before. Major
New Collaboration with Major League Wrestling
00:39:31
Speaker
League Wrestling was announced recently. How did this pairing come between MLW and Boss Fight? Well, you know, the main marketing guy at Master Republic also works for MLW. So the introductions were made and we started talking. And again, you know, Court and Jared are
00:39:54
Speaker
Fantastic people to talk to and brainstorm with and and talk, you know and and kind of Get to know and um Yeah, we all kind of clicked and it seemed easy easy it seemed uh, you know, there's crossover between the two lines, uh, you know, taya is is the the featherweight champion at mlw right now and um
00:40:20
Speaker
Penta and Phoenix have previously been tag team champions over at MLW. So, you know, it just kind of, there's a lot of crossover we can do. And there's a lot of, of course, in wrestling toy world is a lot of, uh, tooling sharing that we can do, which is, is important for cost. Um,
00:40:43
Speaker
And, you know, for me, getting out belts has been one of my, you know, we didn't, we didn't, we don't have belts really available to us at, at Legends Alucia Libre. Like we can't do AAA belts. We can't do CMLL belts. We, you know, the, the WSX belt is a kind of a outlier that we can do that one.
00:41:09
Speaker
So that's why we we rushed the belt set for MLW. Also, they have great belt designs, which helps a lot like they're really cool looking and. Yeah. And with the weight glasses like and everything like that, it's it's a unique kind of. You know, yeah, it's a unique belt styling for sure. Yeah. And you know, I don't.
00:41:33
Speaker
I don't remember, I know Mattel has done a number of belt sets, which are awesome. And I'm always, I mean, I just bought that new Rey Mysterio figure mainly because he comes with the WCW. Mm-hmm. Cruiserweight title. Yeah. Um, also he's like my favorite wrestler in the world.
00:41:53
Speaker
But like, you know, there's so it's like it's just one of those things like, you know, I know fans buy figures just for belts and stuff like that. And we do have a number of figures coming with belts as well. But we wanted to get the set out right away of the belts because it's it's such an important part of the play with wrestling. So yeah, it's and you're absolutely dead on. I mean, there are
00:42:19
Speaker
Uh, there are people out there that are just like belt collectors too. Like just, um, belt guys as it, as it were. Right. Um, but yeah, it's awesome to see, uh, again, yet another, uh, wrestling brand kind of come into the fray and. You know, continue to kind of grow the, uh, the fig fed and, uh, in, in everyone's houses.
00:42:43
Speaker
So with MLW, we saw we've seen Wave 1. It's up for pre-order. What are the plans past that belt set and Wave 1? So we have the next wave is moving into Deco.
00:43:07
Speaker
And the next wave is actually going to be called Fusion. So it's not a premium wave. It's similar to our Fanaticos for Legends of Lucha Libre. So it's the lower price point. They don't have the extra hands and heads and accessories and stuff like that. But the four figures in that, I think people are going to be really happy with. Again, not ready to announce them, but
00:43:33
Speaker
And then, then the next wave of premium is already moving forward as well. And that has some truly great talent guys in it. Like, I mean, all of them are so, so good. And, um, and what, one of the things that's great about MLW is they have a huge
00:43:54
Speaker
like variants of styles of builds of you know they have big guys they've got you know giant muscular guys they've got little dudes they've got you know i mean it's just
00:44:07
Speaker
It's it's such a like myriad visual. If you get to go see an MLW local show somewhere, you really should, because it's it's crazy fun. And I've over the past couple of years, I've become a big fan of the smaller shows. Even like local shows, I love going and seeing kind of that raw
00:44:32
Speaker
No, no filters, no, no gimbal cams. No, like I really enjoy kind of seeing that stuff. Um, yeah, we're, we're very lucky here in, uh, in New Jersey, we have, uh, uh, an array of local, you know, wrestling organizations to, to go see Dave. You just, you went to GCW not too long ago, which was.
00:44:55
Speaker
Or was that already, it's probably already almost a year ago, actually. Yeah, I was gonna say that was a year ago. That was Hammerstein. That was a year ago. Time. It passes. You guys are probably close enough to Philly that I know MLW is often in the old ECW arena. We have to make a trip down for that. It's not far from us. Yeah.
00:45:24
Speaker
And they have a bar, a really nice good bar in that building. That's always good. That's always nice. And on top of that, MLW is carrying on the legacy of Lucha Underground, too. Yeah. Yeah, as Tekka shows, it is fantastic. And they have so many people over there now from Lucha Underground, and now Morrison's over there. I'm sorry, Johnny Fusion. Yeah.
00:45:54
Speaker
It's impossible not to call him that. It's impossible. No. It's Johnny Nitro. He'll always be Johnny Nitro to me.
00:46:02
Speaker
All right, so our next section takes us into our follower Q&A. So if this is the first time you're listening to Adventures in Collecting, welcome. Hope you're enjoying the episode so far. Make sure you're following us on social media at AIC underscore podcast because when we have a guest on, we will post and give our followers a chance to submit questions for this very section here on the show.
00:46:29
Speaker
So, uh, Eric, are you ready to take some questions from our followers? Yeah. Dave, would you like to do the first one? Yes, I would love to. Um, at Snuffy Smith guy asks, will there be a second wave of King features Sunday morning comic figures? Um, maybe.
00:46:55
Speaker
We're not sure yet. I know we've been talking about it and stuff. The Sunday to morning comics line is not mine. That's Andrew Franks who manages that line. But it is something that we, everybody at the company was very excited about and stuff. I mentioned earlier that I went to school for comics and yeah, I was trying to break into the comic book
00:47:23
Speaker
You know, adventure comics type stuff, Marvel DC and all that stuff. But my, my introduction as a kid to comics was three strip comedy comics, like newspaper stuff. Uh, you know, Garfield peanuts, all that stuff, Curtis and stuff. And that, so we were really excited to get that. And some of that stuff has never had any product in any way, like Curtis and, and.
00:47:51
Speaker
There's maybe been some figurines for Hallmark and stuff like that, but never like these. So we were really excited to get that stuff out there. So we're big fans. We're really hoping to get a second wave out soon. But yeah, we don't, not for sure, but we're hoping to.
00:48:15
Speaker
All right. Our next question comes from at the Berg five 11 who asks what vintage character would be your dream license to work on? So this is a, I struggle with this because there's a lot I would love to work on. Well, maybe give us a few then. Yeah. So, I mean, some of it I have worked on, you know, I've, I've worked on star Wars and GI Joe and transformers and stuff. But for, for me,
00:48:44
Speaker
Uh, my first love for the fiction, uh, for, for, for fictional worlds is the DC universe. Um, I would love to do a line of, uh, of the DCU, um, specifically pre what I call the dark age of comics, uh, before that, uh,
00:49:13
Speaker
Um, you know, bronze age stuff, silver age stuff, uh, that that's really my cup of tea. And, um, but yeah, especially though the green liner and core Superman Aquaman, Wonder Woman, like all that stuff, team Titans, like all that stuff is so close to my heart. I, uh, I would really love to do that someday. Hey, you never know. Yeah.
00:49:37
Speaker
Everybody has a slice of something now. I think we're the only company not doing turtles. I was just about to say, when do the Ninja Turtles drop? Not that we don't love the turtles, we do. Hey, listen, I'm sure at this point, if you guys picked up the phone and called, then sure, you can make turtles. Everybody's making turtles. I don't personally collect turtles, but I get to walk into
00:50:07
Speaker
Andrew's office and I think he has every turtle thing ever made. So I get to play with his turtles. Yeah. And, and a whole, a whole new, uh, a whole new world of turtles is about to be unleashed with the, with the new movie. Oh yeah. So the new, yeah. Uh, Dave, next question. Yeah, sure. So at Johnny underscore C underscore dagger asks,
00:50:33
Speaker
With the release of Sarozoic Warriors, will boss fight studio be exploring original IP and other genres? Short answer is going to be yes. The long answer is. Swordzoic Warriors is doing amazing. It's our pre-sales have been fantastic and it's it's just such a gorgeous and wonderful line to look at. There's bright colors, there's.
00:51:00
Speaker
funny kind of things going on in the designs and, and they're just a lot of fun and kind of goofy. There's kind of this spirit of, of kind of like not being so taken so seriously, which is really hard to do sometimes. Like, cause even I love lightweight stuff and everything like that. But when I get working and dig back into Vitruvian hacks, um,
00:51:27
Speaker
It, but Irving Hacks gets a little dark with the bios and stuff. Like it's hard not to be like there's fantasy things and skull heads and eyeballs and all sorts of crazy stuff going on and Gorgons and you know, like, so it's, it's hard not to be dark. So it's fun that we have a line that's, that's ours and, and.
00:51:48
Speaker
And it's like these bright colors and it's this kind of fun story and everything. And again, that's all Andrew Franks. That's his wheelhouses to do that kind of stuff.
00:52:04
Speaker
When we can, we, we're hoping to do some new IP that original IP stuff. That's ours again. That said, it takes a long time to settle on what we're going to do and how we're going to handle it because you need to fit in with kind of the zeitgeist of the age and you need to do something original and fun or put your own twist on something.
00:52:33
Speaker
Which is what we, you know, we're always trying to do that when we're doing Vitruvian Hacks is put our own kind of twist on a, on a well-known concept. So it's, so it's new, but it's also familiar. But when you're creating something completely new, like source or wires, you got to be even more careful than that. Cause you're, you're almost other than them being dinosaurs and having guns and knives. Like, you know, there's other lines that look like that have that part of it.
00:53:03
Speaker
But then, you know, we kind of have to push past that into a different realm, which is, you know, why you see the colors and why the weapons and everything are kinda. They're designed very differently. It's not like these guys just have like an M 16. They've got something that's a little more goofy and fun and chunky. Yeah. It's just, it's, it's, it's really cool to kind of see those, those come to life, you know, cause like you mentioned with like Vitruvian hacks, you have this.
00:53:32
Speaker
this base now like you have a effectively that line is turned into a platform and like there's already this kind of like established world to kind of play in. So anytime we see any sort of original IP coming in, especially now where, you know,
00:53:48
Speaker
We've said it a million times on the show, but anything can become a toy. If they can sell toys from the office, they can pretty much sell toys from anything. As much as we both love the office, it's not a very toyetic show. It's just you love the characters. Collectibles culture is very much so driven to things we already know and hold dear and seeing them become toys.
00:54:17
Speaker
We love and are fascinated with our original IPs breaking into the community in this given time. If you think about it, all those things that we grew up on, the story was being told at that time. It was a new story. It's cool to see it almost come around full circle where it's like there's this new story being told with these new characters.
00:54:45
Speaker
It's not the thing that you know already or are familiar with, but it has something that hits you in that nostalgia area. Familiar elements. Yeah, it's got that element to it. All right. Well, that takes us through our Q&A section. So thank you to everybody who submitted questions and shouts to those who got featured in this section. Eric, you survived the Adventures in Collecting Q&A round.
00:55:13
Speaker
Well, thank you. And thank you, everyone, for the questions. So before we close out and let you go, Dave, would you like to fulfill your role as this podcast's James Lipton and ask Eric our final question? Why, yes, I would. The final question that we ask all of our guests, what is your favorite and or strangest piece in your collection? It can be one of each or it can be both.
00:55:45
Speaker
Uh, strangest is probably my, uh, party pants, which, uh, are, okay. There's a story, a Hasbro story that goes along with the party pants, the legend of party pants. Okay. Um.
00:56:13
Speaker
Which had become my nickname at Hasbro for awhile was party pants because of this. And, uh, I was doing a, uh, an exclusive set for target for, uh, captain America, the first Avenger. Okay. And, um, I decided it would be funny.
00:56:36
Speaker
to put, cause I had to repaint the figures, uh, the, the existing figures for this pack. Like I couldn't, I couldn't, I didn't have a tooling budget. So it was just, and I could mess with the deco of the movie captain America. And, uh, I thought it would be funny to put captain America in camouflage red, white, and blue pants.
00:57:07
Speaker
And the pattern I chose to mimic, to pattern the camouflage after was that desert
00:57:19
Speaker
camouflage that the the military uses that's called like chocolate chip basically because it's got little dots yep yep of different browns and um but i turned it all red white and blue because he's captain america and that's funny and uh the paint the paint sample the painter who painted the the figure for for us
00:57:46
Speaker
He mimicked the pattern so perfectly that it had these little dots of red and then these big splotches of red and big splotches of blue over white pants, basically. And it looked like confetti. I was like, oh my God, no, we have to remove the red from the camo.
00:58:10
Speaker
So by the time the figure came out, it was just blue and white camo. So it looked a lot more toned down, but the, uh, but I have, but the painter, because we, everybody thought it was so funny. The painter, when he repainted the pit figure, he didn't paint over those legs. He kept the legs and painted a new set of legs and then gave me the legs. So on my desk, I still have that.
00:58:39
Speaker
Just the legs. Just the legs of Captain America with this red, white and blue camo pattern on it. So one could say that you have America's ass in party pants. I do. I do have America's ass. And then the the the I guess the the rarest are my favorite. I don't know which one this is now. I have a GI Joe tin wind up jeep.
00:59:09
Speaker
Oh, from the 1940s. Wow. And it was my father's. And it's not very rusty. It still works. And it's in my collection. And that's that's just this like one random kind of thing I have. And you know, my favorite toy line of all time is probably GI Joe, like
00:59:38
Speaker
And yeah, so it's a very cool piece for me to to own. That's really cool. And it's before it's before G.I. Joe was a brand. It was just a term for military guy. But this is one of the first toys that ever had the words G.I. Joe on it like and it's it just says on the back. It's like G.I. Joe Jeep or something like that. That's super cool. That's so cool. Yeah, I actually I am today years old. I didn't realize that there were that there were
01:00:09
Speaker
There were pre Hasbro GI Joe. Like I didn't realize that that was a term that was used on, on just kind of military toys. Well, it wasn't really, it was a term for people in the military. They called them all GI Joe. Oh, wow. Like in the thirties and forties and stuff like that. That's just what they called like, Hey, that's a GI Joe. Got it. Like that was just a.
01:00:35
Speaker
Interesting. General issue man. And the most common name was Joe. Got it. Yeah. Well, Eric, thank you so much for taking the time to be on our show. This was awesome. Thank you for all the insights and stories. Before we say good evening, let our listeners know where can they find out more about Boss Fight Studios on the internet. Where can they find you?
01:01:03
Speaker
Um, so yeah, uh, boss fight where, you know, our social media is boss fight studio on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. Um, our, our store is boss fight shop.com. And, uh, you know, boss fest is, is all next week and it's all this week and it's going to be, you know, on, on all of our social media and, um, you know, Hey, wrestle con in LA, WrestleMania weekend. Uh, come see us.
01:01:33
Speaker
Maybe meet some wrestlers and some luchadores and luchadores there. We'll have some parading through I think and You know get your figures signed and You know if you want to follow me personally like I'm not that interesting, but I'm just Eric Aranya on Facebook I think is the only thing I'm on nowadays so
01:01:59
Speaker
Well, awesome. And we'll make sure we put links to all of the things that Eric just mentioned in the show notes. So head over there, click away, browse the shop, browse the Instagram feed and everything. And also stay tuned here because we'll make sure that we have everything covered coming up from Boss Fest. Eric, thank you again so much for joining us. Thank you, guys. Thank you for having me. Thank you, everyone, for listening.
01:02:29
Speaker
Any time you want me back, I'll come on. Awesome. Thank you, Eric. Dave, send us home. Now you can put stuff under your ring, too.
01:02:44
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.
01:03:00
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.
01:03:24
Speaker
This has been a non-productive media presentation. Executive producer, Franca Blaui. 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.