Happy Beatles Birthdays Part 2

    Finally, here is the second half of my Beatles dolls and figures review!(See the first part HERE.) It's been a while, but since there was going to be a gap anyway I thought I might as well make this one a Beatles birthday post too. Today would have been John Lennon's 73rd birthday. It's also Sean Lennon's 38th birthday. (And although it's not a Beatles birthday, it would also have been the 69th birthday of John Entwistle, bassist for The Who, one of my other favourite bands.)
  I have a couple of my doll sets in rather unaccessable boxes at the moment, so maybe I'll get to the Sgt. Pepper Applause dolls by February and do a part 3 for what would have been  George's 71st birthday.(See that post by clicking the link.)
   There is another set made by Applause that are slightly shorter than the Forever and Pepper dolls. The shorter dolls wear the gray collarless suits. They came in a box made to look like a stage, and they also have instruments.The faces look the same as the Forever dolls. I never even saw those in the stores and I don't own any. I wouldn't mind having a set though.   There's a new set of Yellow Submarine 'rag dolls' out now that would make a nice continuation of a collection of the Applause dolls. I haven't seen them in person, but they are for sale on The Fest for Beatles Fans page. (Used to be Beatlesfest.) One of these days if  I come across them at a cheap enough price...
  There is another set of vinyl dolls made by Hamilton in the early 90's.They are about 9 1/2" tall, and the set comes with bases, microphones for John and Paul, and Ringo's entire drum kit. I have these, but, like the Sgt. Pepper dolls, they are in hibernation right now, all but Paul.  Paul has need of some medical assistance at the moment, as his arm keeps falling off. This seems to be one of the problems with this set. The arms are only glued on and the glue has dried out over time. Paul is a multiple amputee, but it's all been the same arm...over and over again. The arms pop back on, but they should be reglued. The resemblances to the actual Beatles are pretty good though, and the little instruments look good. Ringo's body seems a bit concave. There is one other problem with this set. The legs turn red. Not a dark red, but it looks as though the legs were made of red vinyl and eventually it shows through the paint. In my set it was George's legs that turned red. 

I still think this set is worth having though. The likenesses and the little drum kit override George's legs and Ringo's body (Sorry guys.)
   This item isn't a doll or a figure, but it's doll related. 

  The Ya Ya Ya sweatshirt was made by Ideal in the 60's for their Tammy doll. It isn't licensed by Seltaeb,(the Beatles' licensing company.),but it's so obviously meant to be The Beatles. 

It came in a package by itself, and came in various colours, including white and mustardy yellow. It's just about the most valuable piece of Tammy clothing I think, because it's sought after by both Tammy and Beatles collectors. I've seen one sell for as high as $75! It's crazy! I got mine online for much less. It was in a bunch of Barbie related stuff that didn't even list it. Luckily I spotted it in the photos though. 

Tammy looks a little wary of Hamilton Paul, but she needn't fear him. To use one of Ken's old English jokes, "He's 'armless." (HARMLESS, that is. Use the Accent.)

  There is also this set, which technically are not dolls or figures. 

The glue dries out on ornaments too easily. One of my drums has jumped ship.

They did get the stances down pretty well.

   They are Christmas ornaments made by Hallmark  in 1994. They aren't very good likenesses, although they have John and George's,(especially George's), stances down pretty well. Unfortunately George's accurate stance makes it nearly impossible to keep the figure standing up! (Wonder how the real George did it...) He does tend to fall over and I have to resort to leaning him against the drum riser. Even that doesn't work that well. Of course, they are meant to hang on the Christmas tree, not stand, but I like mine out all the time. They stand on our piano (which none of us can actually play.) since they are musical guys. (I wonder how they feel about being accompanied there by The Three Stooges, playing a violin, the spoons, and an upright bass. Well, at least Larry did actually play the violin and the piano. Go Larry! He was one up on us. At least he could actually play the piano.) 
 

John: Being a musician makes it so easy to get chicks. Larry: It does?

  Again, I love the little instruments. I also like the fact that the instruments are separate pieces, and not part of the body mold. Unfortunately one of my kids, or maybe our cat, (Kitten off the keys.) broke one of Ringo's delicate little drumsticks off. Ringo also recently suffered a decapitation when the glue holding his head on dried out from age. Don't worry. As you can see he has gotten himself together.
   And while we're talking about ornaments, I also have the Hallmark Yellow Submarine ornament.

 And while I passed up the Hallmark mini lunchbox ornaments, (I think Hallmark made a dome top Yellow Sub and the early rectangular box.), last year I got both of the non Hallmark mini lunchboxes.

  

  I saw them first at a fancy ornament store in a mall and balked at the $6 price. I held out and found them at Walgreen's for a couple of dollars. There is a Please Please Me lunch box out this year, so I'm already on the lookout.
   I got really excited last year when I saw that there was a mini Beatles record player ornament, which was a replica of an actual Beatles record player from the 60's. It was made by Kurt Adler, and was just the right size to use with Barbie sized dolls. Then I got a good look at it and was VERY disappointed. The paint job wasn't very good and it was molded all in one piece. I passed it up. I was hoping the company that made the really good light up, music playing, mini record player ornaments last year, (They had Elvis, Marilyn Monroe--but not her voice! Boo!---Peanuts, Rudolph, and Disney Princesses.), would make a Beatles record player this year. But it looks like they have given the licensing to Kurt Adler for a while. This year is a Beatles record case, (to go with last year's record player I guess.) It looks a bit better than the record player, but it's also molded one piece resin. That's disappointing. It would look good from a distance in a display I suppose, as it's fairly 1/6 scale. I just wish it would open and have a separate latch instead of being molded. That's me though. I like realism in my miniatures. Maybe I'll have to make one myself.
  As I said in the first half of this post, I love the cartoon Beatles and my husband got me this ornament made by Carlton Heirloom. 

  I have no idea why they are yellow, and I think it should have played music, but other than that I love it. It's from a few years ago. Heirloom also made a Yellow Submarine ornament in a similar style, but as I said before, Yellow Submarine isn't my favourite Beatles thing, so with budget restrictions I let that one go.
  There were a series of Beatles cars ornaments last year too. If I were rich I would have them all, but I'm not. The Kubrick figures are pretty cool. They are sort of like large Lego people, only with detailed heads. The bodies are still squarish though. I might think about obtaining some of those someday.  There are loads of other Beatles figures, dolls, toys, ornaments etc. There is no way I am ever going to own all of them.

   To conclude, here I am with my favourite Beatles figure, and a fine one it is.

1986. I'm a bit stunned. I had just been thrown at Paul. I don't think he was happy about it. For the story behind the picture you can go HERE.  

 It's an old picture. My figure was finer then too...    

Happy Beatles Birthdays!

                                                                                                                                                 7 July, 2013
 Happy birthday Paul,(belated) and Ringo!
  I have had a busy few weeks, as I said last time. I had been planning a two part post covering some of my Beatles dolls and figures, starting on Paul McCartney's 71st birthday on the 18th of last month, and continuing with Ringo Starr's 73rd birthday today. Since I am so far behind, part one is going to be today, and part two will be coming sometime soon...I hope. In any case, happy birthday guys!

 The oldest Beatles toys in my collection  are these two guys.

The short chubby fella was made by Remco in 1964. He's an actual licensed Beatles doll. The little guy is actually a cake decorating figure made by Gay-Gem. He's unlicensed, but is obviously meant to be a Beatle, or at least cash in on their popularity. He has John Lennon's singing stance and seen closeup, if it weren't for the bad paint job, he would actually resemble John. I found some pictures of this set online. The bass drum says Go Go Swingers instead of Beatles, but they have a left handed bass player with a Hofner bass, and two guitarists, one of which is this guy. Similar enough that, these days, they'd get sued.



   I got the Remco Paul in a box of more 'serious' dolls at a doll auction. I promptly sold one of the dolls, which paid for the box, so Paul was free. He's a little discoloured, but he does have his bass. The cake topper came in a bag of vintage cake decorations at a yard sale. Unfortunately none of his band mates were in the bag with him.


  Skipping ahead a lot of years we have these guys. 

Unfortunately, I only have the Paul and Ringo of this 2004 series by Macfarlane. I love the look of the animated Beatles. I used to watch the cartoon as a kid and my sister and I had a couple of the inflatable dolls. I think we had Paul and Ringo, but my Mom threw them out years ago, so who knows? (She tended to throw out inflatable toys as soon as the air leaked out, even if it was just natural flattening from the course of time and not a hole.) There was a cool set of the four Beatles with an alligator too. (Sounds weird, but strange things were always chasing them in the cartoon.)
   Then there are these guys.

  

  They were also made by McFarlane. Yellow Submarine isn't my favourite Beatles thing, but these are pretty neat. There are loads of other YS Beatles and other characters from the movie, and I think I have the other two guys in this particular series, but I couldn't possibly buy all of them. I got these for Christmas I believe, from my ever spoiling husband.

  This is a strange little fellow I found recently.

 Apparently he's a redo of a vintage model by Hawk. He's in the same style as Weird-ohs and Rat Finks, which always make me think of Mad Magazine. Here's a close up from the back of the package.

 

 He's obviously meant to be a parody of The Beatles, or at least bands of that era. He is so gruesome that even my Beatles loving oldest daughter wouldn't take the extra I bought for her!
 
These are by Applause.

 

I love the instruments. There is a Sgt. Pepper set too,(also have those),but I wanted these way more. In fact, I have wanted them ever since they first came out in the 80's. A friend drove me an hour to see them because she knew I would love them, but I couldn't justify spending $100.00 on dolls, or on myself! (I'm still that way! Maybe even worse now that I have been an at home mom for years without an income I could wastefully spend with no one but me to answer to!) In a way, I almost wish I had bought them then because they came with a cool cardboard drum kit. I bought a Ringo from this set at a doll show a couple of years ago. He was a bit dingy and the lady didn't know who he was. She charged me $5, so even dingy he was worth it. I washed him carefully and improved him a little. I figured If I was lucky I could find the others to add eventually. I tried to search for the set every now and then. One day I randomly searched online and found a set for an amazing Buy It Now of about $45 with free shipping! I immediately bought it and later sold my lonely Ringo for almost that amount! I think this made the set end up costing me $17.00! (And that's including the $5 I spent on the Ringo in the first place.) Now THAT I can buy and not feel too guilty about. I also told my husband to include them as part of my Christmas gifts, but he refused to wrap them because I bought them myself. (The nerve!)

  
There was also a set of very similar, but slightly smaller dolls made by Sugar Loaf. I think Sugar Loaf supplied toys for claw machines. The only one I have is the John.

  

  These dolls are a bit shorter than the Applause dolls, have no guitars as far as I know, and are made of cheaper fabrics.(Maybe you can't tell, but John's hair has turned a nasty shade of green and his arm has fallen off. No fear. I have it and will repair him sooner or later. As for his boots, they're very like the Applause dolls' boots, and are probably with the arm...) Supposedly this set is pretty hard to find. For some unknown reason John came wearing a red wooden drum on a ribbon around his neck. (I removed that!) Poor guy must have had an identity crisis, or was desperately trying to start a 'John is also Ringo' rumour, to paraphrase "All You Need is Cash". I got him at a thrift store for a quarter I think. He looks a lot like the Applause John. He may actually be a better likeness!

He's smaller though, so maybe he could be young John.

 

Well, that's it for this time. Stayed tuned for part two. If I manage to round up the rest of my figures I'll be posting it soon!
Update: If you're interested in The Beatles check out my post 'Exactly What constitutes a Doll? Happy Birthday Paul McCartney and How to Meet a Beatle'.