Black vs. Blue

From Tim Mee Production News: The M16 Army Men Reissues are getting a new color assortment, Black vs. Blue. They should be available before Christmas. Here's a photo mockup of the new guys:

— Jeff Imel (VictoryBuy.com)

Made of Metal

During a recent visit to Strasburg, PA I decided to wander off the beaten path of curious tourists and outlet junkies to find those antique shops I so love getting lost in. Honest to goodness time machines. Of course my main objective is finding one of the TimMee holy grails tucked away for decades on some dusty shelf that's nestled into the corner of a shop. My luck was no better than it usually is...not that I wasn't having a blast like I always do. However, as I was about to walk out of the last shop of the day, I glanced down into a little display case and several very familiar shapes caught my eye. Now we're talkin'! But after closer examination it was apparent that someone had created molds from the original 60mm soldiers and made crude castings in some sort of metal (I wasn't about to scrape off the paint to find out what kind). As you can see the finer details were lost in the process. The thick enamel paint doesn't help matters either. 

I debated for a good 10 minutes as to whether I should buy them or not. Since they weren't official castings, sensibility won the debate...for the time being. I just may wander back to the home of Witness and snatch those soldiers up before someone else does. It's a perfect excuse to fill my belly with more Amish scrapple. And yeah, I know what those questionable ingredients are (more or less) but I still don't care!

Semper Fi!

TimMee at the Movies

Apollo 13

Toys soldiers in feature films and television is a common occurrence; albeit an often obscure occurrence. Spotting TimMees, on the other hand, is definitely a rare treat. I first noticed them was in the Ron Howard film, Apollo 13. In one scene, Jim Lovell (played by Tom Hanks) is answering his son's questions and concerns about the upcoming mission. On the table beside a model of the Lunar Module are tan and green TimMee soldiers. Unfortunately, the prop department made a slight goof because there were no tan TimMee soldiers back in 1970 when the mission took place. They weren't released until 1991. Still, it's great to see them in such a hugely successful film. 

Napoleon Dynamite

In another very successful film, Napoleon Dynamite, there's a scene were Napoleon is putting a dance instruction video into his VCR and attached to the top loading door is a TimMee Vietnam era soldier with the flame thrower.
 If you know of any other TimMee cameos in films or television, send me an email with the information to timmeearmy@gmail.com and I will add it to this list. 

Meatballs

Paul Coca from the Galaxy Laser Team Facebook page posted this screenshot of Bill Murray from the 1979 movie Meatballs sporting a Tim Mee/ Processed Plastic 'Lunar Patrol' helmet from their Space Line of toys.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

In Steven Spielberg's sci-fi classic, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, little Barry is awakened from his sleep and watches in amazement as his room full of mechanical toys suddenly come alive. Among them is a TimMee jeep that can seen in the bottom left hand corner of the screen. Thanks to reader J. Mitchell for spotting this one.

Into the Badlands

Switching from movies to television, the AMC series Into The Badlands featured a scene in Episode 4 where Waldo gives Sunny a TimMee soldier that will get him an audience with the River King. Sunny later rides out and seeks his audience with the River King. He shows the soldier, and the River King agrees to give him passage out of the Badlands. 

The German TimMees

In 1957, TimMee Toys opened a manufacturing facility in West Germany to produce their plastic figures for the European market. Included in their product line were the 60mm WWII soldiers. In addition, they created four new U.S. poses: kneeling with rifle, kneeling with mortar launcher, prone with binoculars and prone with rifle. These figures had slightly less detail in comparison with their U.S. counterparts and the scale was slightly smaller. A pale green plastic was to used for several castings (which does not translate well in the photographs below) in addition to the usual shades of green and a butterscotch color. A mold was made specifically for the German factory and variations between the U.S. poses and their German counterparts (while often subtle) are evident throughout the series.

Kneeling w/rifle

Mortar launcher

Prone w/binoculars

Prone w/rifle

German logo

Made in Germany

U.S. nurse (left) • German nurse (right)

Butterscotch soldiers

Red soldier