If you aren’t chuckling right now, it means someone changed my subject line.  Anyway…at this point you have all seen the awesomeness that is the Ghostbusters Slimer Light-up Statue.  Well, I’m here to let you know that he was just the first of many such statues.  The logical follow-up - Mr. Stay Puft.  Using Bill Mancuso’s sculpt from the rotocast bank, we have created 2 versions of statue.  The mass release will be the normal white figure with the happy face.  The exclusive (or future mass release) will be styled after our “exploding” style (translucent red) with the angry face.  Please note that the photos are just early prototypes, so the lighting effects are not necessarily final.

Well, technically, you never see “him” until the very end of the film.  All you see is the wrappings he wears when he interacts with those he wants to be aware of his presence.  I’m speaking, of course, of the Invisible Man.  It took me so long to tell you all about Series 2 of Universal Monsters that I felt it only right to make it up to you by giving you a very early glimpse of series 3 (due Halloween 2012).  The Invisible Man will be available in 2 versions, a mass market edition with the iconic bandaged look; and a Universal Select version with a deluxe base and a new head sculpt from one of my favorite scenes in film - when he removes his goggles and fake nose, revealing emptiness beneath the bandages.  This figure was sculpted by Gabriel Marquez.  Stay tuned for updates regarding paint and additional series 3 characters.

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Hello again Monster Lovers!  It’s been nearly a year since I gave you the news about the glorious plans for the classic film monsters of yesteryear.  Today I’m going to let you see what is in store for Year 2.  Many of you have been lucky enough to see the prototypes on display at some of the shows late last year, but for those who didn’t, here you go.  This year’s stars are Dracula, Frankenstein, and Bride of Frankenstein.

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Back in 2001, a very young DST was releasing the Dark Alliance action figure series.  The first assortment included the ever-popular Lady Death.  Now, here we are in modern times and a seasoned DST is once again pleased to announce that we are working with Brian Pulido. Fans have been asking for a year if LD would ever be added to the Femme Fatales line, so here I am saying “Yes!”. Steve Kiwus did an exceptional job of merging 3 different concept images into one 9″ PVC beauty.  Stay tuned to see her in color…

At the time of this writing, all details about what I’m doing are super secret, but if everything goes well we will be doing something with a reduced sized version of the Slimer sculpt used for the roto figure bank.  This is really just a tribute to the amazing work some of the factories can do overseas.  Slimer was not produced by digital scan data, so the reduction was not simply changing the output size, it took a lot of effort and they did a great job.

…you’ll find a great AI.  Meet Cortana, the UNSC Artificial Intelligence that helped Master Chief throughout the Halo game series (although she did get herself into a spot of trouble for awhile there).  When DST first started looking at the Halo property, we thought of many of the normal categories, but I have to confess that my goal all along was to get Cortana for the Femme Fatales line of PVC statues.  I did it!  Microsoft had an image they called “Reaching to be Rescued” and I chose that for the basis of the pose.  I wanted something that showed the full form and strength of the character but also implied some vulnerability.  The base differs from that in the source image because, even though it is technically not game-accurate for the scene, I felt her chip was both the perfect setting for her AND the proportions are more in line with the rest of my Fatales.  Sadly, a lot of the tweaks that were done as this piece developed are not readily obvious unless you were in on every update, so trust me when I say that a HUGE pat on the back goes to sculptor Bill Mancuso for being so tolerant of all of my adjustments to the piece.  Painted images coming soon.

Everyone loves Deadpool these days (except me, but what do I know).  It’s obvious from all of his appearances in virtually every mainstream Marvel comic that is being published.  That means everyone wants to have their very own Deadpool figure, right?  And what could possibly be better than a Deadpool action figure?  A really BIG Deadpool action figure.  Welcome to the world of Ultimate Quarter Scale Marvel.  Yes, the 19″ scale we used for Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Star Trek, and Terminator 2 is now being applied to Marvel Comics.  Kicking off the new branch is the Merc with a Mouth, Wade Wilson.  I included a little pre-prototype collage for you but the eye-catcher is the fully-assembled prototype.  And, for those of you who want more, you’ll just have to wait and see additional details later (like the painted unmasked head and the weapons).  Now, giving credit where it is due, let me thank the team that made this possible - Bill Mancuso (heads), Kathy Grilli (outfit), Rudy Garcia (hands, boots, belt), Gentle Giant (weapons), Adam Smith and Irish Joe (castings), and Eddie Wires (paint).

Hold on.  Why do they always say that about the Juggernaut?  I mean, am I wrong or do they not find a way to stop him EVERY TIME?  Seems to me he gets stopped on a regular basis.  Oh well, who cares as long as he romps and stomps right up until the stoppage?  Whether he’s on the side of evil or good, everyone loves to see Cain Marko destroy anything in his path.  Our good friends at Gentle Giant have been itching to see Juggy added to the Marvel Select line, especially if they got to do the sculpting, so here you go.  Colors are brought to you by Eddie Wires…

“New Retro”?  Did I really just say that?  Yes I did.  You’ve been seeing a lot in the news lately about the fantastic things that EMCE Toys is doing with the Mego-style figures.  This has prompted people to wonder if perhaps there was some kind of parting of the ways between DST and EMCE since there haven’t been any new announcements from our camp.  Well, fear not gentle reader, DST and EMCE are just as close as ever and we’ve got exciting things coming up for you.  These images are VERY rough, so no comments and no reposting, but I wanted you to see what we’re up to.  In development we have 4 Trek (Captain Pike, Vina, Nurse Chapel, and the M-113 Salt Vampire) as well as 4 Universal Monsters (Dracula, Wolfman, Frankenstein, and Mummy).  More details will be revealed as they are available (and I can already tell you that at least one of these is getting a complete overhaul and another has a variant in the works).  Enjoy the super early look at the future…

About 6 years ago, DSTChuck wanted to design a house brand focusing on the popularity of ‘goth’ products.  The plan was to take some of the public domain fairy tale characters and give them a more modern look and feel.  A lot of people spent a lot of time at DST working on proposals for buyers, package concepts, category options, and marketing strategies.  Unfortunately, unavoidable circumstances caused the project to go to the backburner.  Now that the Femme Fatales line has taken off, DSTChuck is looking to reinvent some of the reinventions and use them in this PVC line.  Kicking things off is the new Little Red Riding Hood (Li’l Red, for short).  The images I’ve included show you how we went from the original concept sketch to Sam Greenwell’s sculpt and finished with Kat Sapene’s paint.