Thursday, April 4, 2013

Freedom Fighters by Sungold?

Baltard released under the title of Freedom Fighters. Oddly, this appears to be a Sungold release. The Sungold emblem is visible on the bottom left of the blister card. Judging by the shape of the blister card I would guess this was a late 1980's release, or even early 1990's.



The blurry image above is Huk released as a Freedom Fighter by Sungold. Although it is hard to see in this small image, the artwork on the card is a copy of the Frank Frazetta painting that inspired the design of the character Huk. (For more information about the design of Huk see, The Frazetta Connection)

The back of a Freedom Fighters card (below), showing all twelve re-released Galaxy Warriors. Ygg and Anubi have different color schemes here, making them the most intriguing of the re-releases. There are also two new shield stickers replacing the tiger and bird stickers from  the original Galaxy Warriors line.


Sungold stamp:
The original releases of the Galaxy Warriors were stamped "Sungold: Made in Hong Kong" on their right leg.  The next releases, what I call version two, came with the stamp on their backs (see image below).


I have recently seen a Thor figure with the stamp on the back, but the stamp has been simplified and the "Made in Hong Kong" portion has been removed (below). Could this simplified stamp be a sign that this figure was a re-released Freedom Fighter?



Questions still to be answered:
1. When were these released?
2. Are these figures stamped with just Sungold on their backs?
3. Where were these released?

4 comments:

  1. Hey man,

    First of love your work
    But i see you are using multiple pictures from my collection and from a site i frequent

    It would be nice if you ask before usage (if the owner is known), or at least referer to the site where you found them.

    I can help you out a bit with several questions

    My cardback (south american) dates from the 90's, this is of a card that is not marked SGI on the front (so not Sungold). The CE mark on the back is the tell tale that this is from the 90's, since that was introduced worldwide then

    The figure on the front of my card, baltard, has longer leaner arms than a normal galaxy warrior (like the Huk on Thread_art_undergrounds card). So FF where released with normal galaxy warrior arms and more modern longer arms. The normal galaxy warrior arms can still be from the late 80's. So we can date them to at least begin 90's maybe even late 80's

    The ones with the galaxy warriors arms are stamped sungold on the back, the ones with longer arms don't have any markings. FF figures seem to be releases with balled legs instead of banded legs, that is a 90% sure way to tell a FF a part from its GW counterpart in case there are no color differences (think of a baltard)

    Where were these released? Thats a good one i guess world wide but can only confirm with 100% certainty: Argentina, Australia, UK and Italy

    If you need some pictures just ask and I'll see what i can do. I have a large motu ko collection and know a thing or two.

    DREKKUS from http://actionfiguresca.proboards.com/ (join up (its free) and contact me there, don't want to put my private mail out in the open)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Drekkus ! Sorry about not crediting some images from your collection. Please let me know which pics are yours and I will update the page to acknowledge this. Also, thanks for all the great information. Sorting out all the variations of these figures can be tricky and its great to hear from other fans that have been able to figure out different aspects of this toy-line and its subsequent re-releases and knockoffs.

      Delete
  2. The pic in this thread with drekkus all over it is mine, its hard to pick out all the other pics in the different posts you have going on but maybe you can reference to: actionfiguresca.proboards.com
    There's a ton of ko info for others to find there

    are there any particular lines you still have questions about? I might be able to answer some.



    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi,

    I just found my Galaxy Warriors type figures in storage and was really confused on them. They would be from the early 90s, I remember my mother buying them for me when I was a child and they were not hand me Downs. The figures match Freedom Fighters colours, but have absolutely no markings on them anywhere. They also have no quality control issues like Galaxy Heroes, they are well painted and have no errors in the mold. Harnesses are the standard original square and sun. Shields are a mix of the the domed one, one with a dragon sticker and lastly one with a tiger and spiked iron ball sticker. The molding is Galaxy Warriors, as the belts have the detail. I have everyone but Huk and Triton and these are from Australia.

    What do you think I have here?

    ReplyDelete