You can’t go wrong with G.I. Joe. No, not the little 4-inch crappy ones with dumb names. The 12-inch mac daddy of toys. The guy who makes Barbie swoon and Ken pee his pants. The guy who wouldn’t bother to fight Cobra Commander because of the latter’s lameness. G.I. Joe ruled when I was a [...]

Like many kids, I always wanted to be an astronaut. My love of science-fiction and comic books was born from a love of space and being an astronaut was high on the list of “coolest things to be.” Major Matt Mason was the greatest astronaut toy and was the next best thing to being an [...]

Definitely the largest toy on my list is the Space: 1999 Eagle Transporter by Mattel. At two-feet long, it was very difficult to play with without hitting something, but I was willing to make that sacrifice. I watched the show religiously (back then, any science-fiction on television beyond Star Trek repeats was a rarity), despite [...]

Strictly speaking, I didn’t actually own either the Silver or Gold Knight (or Johnny West, for that matter). They belonged to my brothers, John and Tom. But, as I’ve mentioned, I inherited various toys from them. Sometimes, though, they really didn’t want to give them up. The Marx Noble Knights were such cool toys that [...]

I had a lot of cap guns growing up. I had a lot of squirt guns, too. I even had a couple of camera guns (from various spy playsets). But the best guns of all were the Star Trek Tracer Guns.

Sure, they looked nothing like the phasers from the show and shot little plastic disks [...]