JediDefender.com Forums
Community => Watto's Junk Yard => Topic started by: JediMAC on March 26, 2003, 03:03 PM
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So how long have all of you been into collecting Star Wars "stuff"?
Me, I'm pretty much a "lifer". Ever since that opening scroll of STAR WARS with John Williams majestic theme trumpeting, I knew I had to start snatching up anything and everything related to this Saga!
Going on the better part of 26 years now, with an obvious break during some of the downtime for SW in the late 80's. I missed out on the Vintage Early Bird set, but was definitely snagging those original Kenner 12-backs the moment they first hit retail way back in 1978. Actually my parents were the ones doing the actual buying, since I wasn't making too much money when I was 7 years old... :P Continued on with the obsessive compulsive completist collecting through the ESB and ROTJ releases, right up to the release of the Vintage POTF wave, when we moved out of the country for several years and I was pretty much forced out of the hobby. I returned back to the States for college in the late 80's, but still took another couple years off.
But then around 1990, when I discovered the existence of that coveted Vintage POTF line which I never even knew existed to that point, I hit the collectibles convention circuit pretty hard in an effort to track down the rest of these Vintage figures I was missing. Fortunately the POTF prices weren't too bad in the early 90's. I spent several years doing this, up until the initial Galoob offerings started to trickle out around 1993/94. Jumped into that scene, which led right up to the release of the modern line in late '95, which I've obviously been collecting hardcore ever since!
So I guess since I got my first SW T-shirts and lunch box back in 1977, with the exception of a 5 year hiatus from 1985-89, I've been collecting SW non-stop. So around 21 years of really solid collecting for me! :o 8)
How about you guys? Who's a Star Wars collecting "lifer", who's a "Prequel Newbie", who's just been "off and on"...? Let's all keep in mind that no matter how long (or briefly) we've been in this hobby, what's most important is just that we're in it and enjoying it right now. Nobody's "better" than anybody else just because they've collected longer... :) So with that in mind, what's your tale?
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Well I guess I have been a lifer, but I have taken a few long breaks ;)
I grew up with the OT. I saw Star Wars a couple of time when it came out and was hooked. My poor parents. Well I do remember getting the 12 backs and so forth because I would look at them for what seemed like hours agonizing over what one I would want next. I would also cut out the little squares and wish book ads to make my christmas and birthday lists.
I stayed with SW up till 83 then switched into GI Joe. My brothers stayed with SW until the end of the line.
I got back into SW toys in 1993-4. I got out of the service after some pretty bad injuries and thought about the little things more. I unpacked some boxes at my parents house and found my old toys. I started looking for some MISB items and found little. I really didn't know where to look at the time. Well then I went back into the military for another period of time. SW was kind of pushed in the background again.
Then when EP1 came out I would take my youngest brother to the stores looking for the new figs and of course I had to get a few myself ;)
Then I was lucky enough to have some cash stashed away when I found the huge bargin sales at TRU and so forth and really built my collection up then. I have been sticking with it since. I have been evolving my collection on an ongoing basis. selling off newer items and going back to vintage. Although I will collect anything that relates to SW that catches my eye. Lately I have been looking for all the PB books and odd movies, interviews and soforth.
But that just about sums it up
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I'm a "Prequel Newbie". I started collecting when Ep1 figures came out. I was only going to collect the Prequel stuff but once the KB/TRU clearnces hit I started buying POTF2 figures. I started to get some vintage while I was on jury duty last year and had time to spend looking at attinque stores in the area.
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I started during Christmas of '95, when I got my first POTF2 figures. I haven't stopped since :)
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My first figure was the Vintage Chewbacca. I saw him all alone on a peg at Fay's Drugs in February of 1978. Well if you have Chewie, you have to have Han. And they'll need someone to fight, so I had to get a Stormtrooper. Then a classmate gave me a bag of others for free (his dad "worked for the place where they painted them" ::) ). By the end of that summer I had all twelve and my collection was complete.
Until the following spring when I discovered X-wing Luke, R5-D4, Greedo, Hammerhead, and some Walrus Man guy. "They're making MORE?!" Wow, I had no idea!!!
...and I've been collecting every 3 3/4" figure ever since.
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I was born in 84, so I never saw any of the original Star Wars movies in the theatres, however I collected them through my youth as an avid fan.
During the pre-POTF2 years, I was able to scrounge up a semi-massive collection of vintage figures, as that was all there was to play with...
When POTF2 came out, I bought all of the stuff... I still got my he-man luke w/ 12 foot lightsaber (you know, the steriod one). I remember when I first got the POTF2 stuff and saying to myself... God these are horrible, but they're better than nothing.
Anyway, I've now got over 80 vintage figures, and darn near every modern figure that I ever wanted (I'm in no way a compulsive completor). I'm definately a lifer.
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I always had Star Wars toys when I was a kid and never got rid of them, but I'd have to say I really didn't start "hardcore" collecting until EP1 toys came out. After that I have been addicted since.
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i also didn't get into collecting HARDCORE until the release of the ep1 line, have always had my vintage figs or what was left of them in the attic.
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I was born in 78, and my parents took me with my older brother to see Empire in 80, although I really dont remember any of it. I remember bits of Jedi in 83 though.
I was brought up on Star Wars toys, I've had them all my life. Some were lost during the great garage sales of the late 80s, but I managed to hold onto some. I became a serious hardcore collector when POTF2 started up, and have been going strong ever since! :)
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Well I have been a fan of SW ever since I was 5 and first saw it at the movies. Unfortunately I got into the collecting of SW way late in the game. I've been collected SW Lego since the line began but didn't start with the Hasbro toys until last January. I can thank Target and their after xmas clearance sales for that. ;D I picked up a POTJ Vader, Han Solo and X-Wing Luke all for less than 2 bucks each and that's all it took. I've been collecting full bore ever since and have no plans on slowing down.
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Fan forever, but just old enough that having toys wasn't cool when they came out. Now is just payback for quasi-childhood denial.
I saw ANH 7 times in the theater in its original release and have been a fan ever since. Didn't own a single toy until 1995 with the release of POTF2. What started innocently enough in grad school, bought myself a Vader, my supervisor an OB1 and my office partner a Leia (hey-she's a girl). Thought it would be easy enough to keep up, only 8 or so available. Whoops. Kept up pretty well, but being Canuckian, it's been tough.
POTF2 dried up just as RH vader came up. Grrr.
EU never available in Canada, able to scrape together most from fan club. Grrr.
Commtech was bleak. My WM had them in only once and never found R2, Stormie at retail. Grrr.
Flashback was ok, but we seemed to miss Anakin in the stores, limited supply. Grrr.
Ep I was great. For a while. Canadian stores stopped carrying at Christmas 99 and so after the second R2 fig, nada. Grrr.
POTJ was cool and got me back into collecting. Whoops, last two waves of POTJ never made it to Canada. Grrr.
Saga pretty cool. Lots of choice, many figs. Canada drops the ball at Palpatine (Palps and Puhr locally, nada beyond that though pilot wave reported, nothing in between) Grrrr.
Many Kudos to all the people I have traded with that have kept me sane and in the hobby. Canada, the Star Wars wasteland. ;D
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I was about 4 when I got my ESB Milly Falcon, of course, my parents just got me what was hot at the time.
When I was 5, ROTJ came out, so I got alot of those figures, but I actually saw that movie.
I feel into sports from ages 6-18, so I was basically just collecting sports cards and such.
My SW collecting days actually started right around the time of TPM. I mean, I have been an actual fan of SW for a while now, I just never thought to collect the memorabilia.
Now, between 1999 and 2003, I have had ALOT of memorabilia, comparable to Adam's collection. However, hard times took their toll on my 300 + figure collection, as well as the tons and tons of other toys I collected.
So, now I am back to the basics. I have streamlined my colletion a few times and really only own the bare essentials like the HTF Episode 1 figs, the best POTJ figs, figures of the essential/favorite OT characters, and alot of the newer Saga figures, as I see appropriate.
I have alot of non-figure memorabilia, such as vinyl banners, and alot of display pieces. I like POP. :D
Now, my Jango Fett collection is a whole 'nother thread altogether. I have everything jango imaginable and it seems likely I will be closing the door on that chapter in my SW collecting within the next year, mainly due to lack of product. :(
Oh well, I love collecting, and I am anxious to see where it will take me in the future.
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I had a ton of stuffwhen I was younger, when the movies were actually out (wishing I still had a lot of the stuff). Well one of my friends went off to college and got addicted to buying figures, so wehn Episode 1 came out I went on a toy run with him. I thought "That Darth Maul figure looks neat. I guess buying one won't hurt anything" . That set off a buying frenzy that has lasted until today.
John
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Ah, the story of my beginning......
As a child of the late 80s, I was very much into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Of course, as the completist I am, I loved trying to get every one. Then, my friend, who loved Turtles almost as much as I do, told me about some movie that he just loved. The year was 1996. There was a teacher at my school(mind you, I'm still in fifth grade at the time) who gave out prizes to the children who did extra credit for her. She'd have "Trenchak Days" or something like that, and give us Trenchak dollars to buy stuff she'd gotten at yard sales. Now, there were some, oh how do you say, "vintage" figures from this movie that my friend had seen. I thought they were cool-looking, and would go well with my other action figures, who now also included several GI Joes and Batman figures. Little did I know that it would spark a revolution.
I had R5-D4, Gamorrean Guard, and C-3PO Removable Limbs, which I had gotten over the past five years sometime. Since I didn't mind getting them as my prize, I started collecting more. I got the Royal Guard(for which my mother made a new robe, since he didn't have one, and yes, he still wears it rather than the true vintage robe), a Hammerhead, and a wonderful little Yoda, who happened to come with everything but a snake. I was still missing a Darth Vader, my favorite character. By this time, I had seen the re-releases, and was thoroughly collecting. I entered the comic book store world, also known as the scalper market. I'm now very good friends with the owner of the store where I bought my first figure, a mint, though loose Squidhead. Over the years, I've amassed over fifty figures or so. I'm biding my time, since the store's still there, and all the figures I can collect have been there since I started there(except the eight Ewoks, who barely ever show up). I also finally managed to buy some TMNT figures I had never gotten, including my holy grail, Wingnut. So, I have Star Wars to thank for that.
Soon, I managed to start out into the retail market, buying all the SOTE figures except Prince Xizor, who I still haven't bothered to try to get, and various early figures. Now, as a loose collector, I opened all my figures. After a guy at the comic book store I go to told me Ben Kenobi was worth $30 on orange card, the dollars rolled before me. I started a small carded collection, which only has grown to a peak of six figures at one time, though I've had about twenty different figures. I now have two thirds of the POTF2 set, having missed all EU figures(except for SOTE), and pretty much all of the last eight waves. Then Episode 1 came. Small set, which I've nearly completed. I consider it greater than most people appreciate it for. Then POTJ came and went. I didn't get as many figures, as other things bought my money. Now Saga has come. I have the first half of the set, and for some reason, have essentially stopped with Lott Dod and Teemto Pagalies. I don't know what's wrong with me, but I'll rise again. Hopefully soon.
Glad I could share this with you. I've enjoyed reading all of your stories.
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1978 or 1979 I believe even before I saw SW on the Big Screen...which I don't think I was able to do until the SE's
Anyway some of my friends had SW swag and I'd play along as any 3 or 4 year old would. On the way home from the doctor after getting a shot my mom brought me to Target and I got to pick any figure or toy I wanted. I chose a Han Solo, I can't figure out when that was though. It had to have been '79. ESB came out soon after and I was really gung ho into it by then plus we had moved and most of my new buddies were also heavily into Star Wars. My love dried up around 1983 though because I only have 2 ROTJ figures from my youth, 2 Jedi Lukes. I had moved on to He-Man and GI Joe for the most part. Which is strange that I moved from a more sophistacted thing to a more kiddy friendly world which was cartoon dominated. I do remember part of the switch had to do with size (He-Man) and articulation (Hasbro) for the money it was hard to pass up
Come 1995 and my girlfriends brother at the time who was big time into Vintage showed me this magazine called the Insider which had pictures of New Figures. Since my girlfriend worked at Target I swung by the toy section and rest is history!
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I've had star wars toys my entire life. I have an older brother, so when I was growing up, he had already amassed a large amount of vintage, and we would play with them together.
It's kinda weird, as I write this, remembering my childhood and trying to come up with a complete story to tell. It's amazing how star wars has just always been one of those "things" that was there, and that I liked. It's kinda like you know wendys and the jr. bacon cheeseburger will always be there. Star Wars was the same to me, cause it was always just "there."
My sisters used to be in gymnastics once a week. Every week while they were in their hour session, my mom and I would go shopping. I was like 3 or 4 mind ya! I remember she would always let me pick out one Star Wars fig, which was cool. I remember her getting mad at me even cause for like 3 times in a row I picked wicket- my favorite character at the time. She didn't realize I was doing this until my older brother was like "Mom why are you letting James get the same figure!" My wicket days were over at that point (but I still have those three little guys lol).
Being a kid, I didn't realize I could actually own the star wars movies to watch at home. I actually sat in front of a tv one time and taped ROTJ- stopping the VCR between commericials and starting it back up when the movie would come back on. I still have that tape, though it's beyond annoying to watch :)
Then in the late 80's early 90's I went to Costco and saw the Star Wars Trilogy in a box set. I was like "this is the greatest day of my life." I got my parents to get the set for me. By 1992, while still a "kid," I was back into collecting big time. I wanted all the vintage figures. At the time, we lived in Seattle, so there were lots of comic shops and antique stores. I would get my mom to take me to all of them all the time, and I would get loose vintage figures all the time. Star Wars was kinda dead back then, so I could get a loose vintage fig for 2 to 5 dollars in really good shape. Unfurtunately, I missed the Star Wars garage sales, as they prolly happend in the 80's. But I sure did get TONS of G.I. Joes that way (but that's another story!!!).
To tell everyone the truth, I really do owe the expanded universe credit for getting me die hard back into star wars. I mean I watched the movies, I got the NES and SNES games, I collected the vintage figures for the fun of it (my prized possesion at the time was an boxed Ewok Handglider)..... But it really got fun when the Star Wars books started coming out. No longer was I contained to 3 movies. Suddenly, a huge universe was becoming even BIGGER. I read each book as it came out, my mouth dripping with drool in anticipation for more more more! The Dark Horse Comics were great. I know I am not alone when I screamed in joy when I read Boba Fett was BACK! I was also into CCG from day one (which I've since quit, back in ohhh 98?), so that was a neat form to get into Star Wars also. Plus there was the micro machines. I remember i was on vacation in New Port, Oregon, and I went into a wal-mart and saw star wars micro machines. Didn't even know they were coming out so I got all of them. They were cool.
So then in July 1995, the new figures came out. All was good. I was a happy little man. My sister worked at Target at the time, and she was able to score me a Obi-Wan and someone else... I forget now. I remember I would call TRU everyday and ask them if they had the new star wars figures in. So I collected them with joy, and all was good. I remember my TRU would hold figures for me, and then I'd get my mom to take me up there to get them. Then the fateful day happened when an employee told me he was NOT going to hold a figure for me. TRU was a 20 minute drive, and I didn't drive at the time, so calling was the only way to get my mom to take me. Oh the horror when the employee told me that... UGH. It was the first release of the Jawas too. I was so mad. I ended up NOT getting it then, but I did get it later.
Well I moved in the end of 97 to south carolina... I was starting to loose interest in SW. It had been pretty much my main focus from 1990 and on. All my friends I talked to Star Wars about were no longer around cause I moved. I was in 10th grade, at a new school, so I didn't bring star wars up to anyone there lol. Believe it or not, one day I walked by one of my teachers computer and he had a star wars themed background, so he became my first new "friend" in my new location that I could talk to about star wars. I would let him borrow my Insider when I was done reading them. He was a cool guy, and gave me an A+ in the class lol (but I really did earn the grade too!). So anyway, this is getting long... At this point in my life, I was just getting my first real job, and my parents were getting really strict with money. I suddenly realized that spending all my earned money on figures was not worth it, as I wanted to go to movies, eat food, get a car, and so on. So suddenly my collecting got put on the backburner big time. I didn't get any of the FF, Flashbacks, or Commtech green cards. I skipped on the TPM figs (and at the time I Was really pissed at the movie, but now I love it???), and I skipped on POTJ cause I thought they were WAY too much (6.99 for JUST the figure, and I had payed 4.99 a couple years ago).
So anyway, fast forward to this past summer... AOTC comes out, and I'm in love. I see it 5 times in the theater, once in IMAX. I love it. I keep looking at the figures, but keep telling myself "no, you don't need to get into that habit again." And then my girlfriend tells me i should buy them if I want. And my MOM KEEPS SHOWING ME new figures when they are out. She even called my at my place on a sunday morning at 8 am to tell me that walmart had new SW figs in. I wasn't even collecting them, but I guess the habit still hadn't died in her after all these years lol. Needless to say, I broke down I bought the Yoda when my girlfriend found him. He was just so cool, and I foudn and bought dooku at the same time. the rest is history. I'm hardcore back into CARDED collecting now ( up until this past summer, everything was opened) because it's easier to display, and I really have no reason to open them, as I enjoy them more packaged. I've now started collecting the figures I missed. I have all the of the ep1 line excecpt 5 figs. Now I am trying to aquire the Flashbacks, FF, and POTJ figs. I don't collect the vehicles anymore, and I just get a 12" here and there when I like them. I don't collect action fllet anymore... Basically I collect the stanadard figures and the lego line...
That's all. Congrats if you made it through all that lol.
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For the new figures, I started in 1995. I was amazed that this figure line was being released & started to buying them. Still going to this day.
As for the vintage line, when I got my new computer, I was in awe with what I could find on the net.
Guess it all came down to one word, Ebay. Then the hunt began. Figure by figure, playset by vehicle, piece by piece etc...
I registered on ebay in 1999, but started buying in Feb of 2000. In 14 months I completed my loose collection.
The last figure I needed was a Sensorscope R2.
The first one was Yak Face. I got all the hard ones out of the way first. What the heck, go for the gusto first. ;D
I am slowly picking up carded figures. Not really a focus but just to have them. Not much else to get now. I do keep an eye out for a bargin here & there whether loose or carded & soon I will have a new Trophy. But that will be in another post. ;)
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did ya know if ya stare at ur buddy icon for more than 2 minutes, the outside world no longer exists? It just happened to me. lol :P
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hey man, I am definitevely interested in your Teela.......got a few things of your needs, please e-mail me at rx-78-2@juno.com
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...So I guess since I got my first SW T-shirts and lunch box back in 1977, with the exception of a 5 year hiatus from 1985-89, I've been collecting SW non-stop. So around 21 years of really solid collecting for me! :o 8)...
Just updating to 22ish now. ;)
Anyone else wanna chime in?! 8)
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My first figures were R2-D2 and C-3PO. My mother will attest to buying these two many times, as I managed to lose 3PO's removable limbs quite often, and my R2 figures had a knack for losing their legs as well.
I got a few more here and there, never more than twenty total. By then, (1985) the line had waned, and I was big into GI Joe, Transformers, and especially He-Man, like every other kid my age.
Around 1993, I saw an ad for the Micro machines. I picked them up and the Bend-Ems too. I was collecting Toy Biz's X-Men line half-assedly at the time, and I was reading a copy of Lee's when I read about the new Star Wars line. I got a set of the first nine for Christmas 1995, as well as the Landspeeder and Classic 4-pack.
Silly me thought that was all there would be. :D
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I was a SW fan since I saw the ANH in my childhood. I started collecting in 2001 when my little cousin Roby (6 at that time) had a bad car accident. He was hit by a car when riding the bycicle. Then I tried to help him forget about the pain and found for him some toys. He was a SW fan like me and tried to find SW toys. It was hard to find them because in Romania there were no SW toys at all.
Some old thejawa friends helped me to find for Roby great SW toys and especially Action Fleet toys. I bought for my cousin some great items and then I started collecting for myself. Now both have almost identical AF collections. And don't forget please I'm coming from Romania, and my salary as university assistant is about $200/month
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Only since I bought Qui-Gon Jedi Duel on Euro card in April or May 1999.
I had a lot of toys around the time of ROTJ (when I was 7), but I didn't really consider it to be"collecting" at that point. It was all just toys to me back then :o ;)
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I had the toys as a little kid - but destroyed them all playing with them...
I started collecting, like many late bloomers, in 1995 at the age of 15. 9 years...wow.
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My first stint: 1977 or 78 until 1983/4
The current stint: 1998 to present
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I've been accumulating (it wasn't "collecting" at first) SW toys pretty much continuously since 10 or 11 -- 1995ish, orange card POTF2 timeframe. Roughly the same time I became a fan of the movies -- really I became an EU and toy fan very shortly after the movies. I had 3.75" scale stuff and a bunch of MicroMachines and Action Fleet. My first action figure was Boba Fett; my dad was buying me one figure and letting me pick. I recall my two finalists were Hoth Han and Boba.
My parents and grandparents bought me stuff, and I would spend some of my birthday/Xmas/etc. gift money on the toys and Expanded Universe. At first they were just TOYS, but somewhere along the line it became "collecting".
Until relatively recently, I accumulated small quantities of stuff intermittently, but it was a distant second to my EU fandom (books, comics).
I was 13 when TPM came out, somewhere around when I stopped seriously playing with the SW toys. To be sure, I still open them and mess with the action features and have lightsaber battles, but it just ain't the same anymore.
Starting maybe a year or so ago, my emphasis has shifted more towards collecting and less on EU because I no longer have time to keep up with all the books and comics. Starting college last fall hasn't helped, obviously. Hoarding plastic effigies involves much less time commitment than scads of books. I still read the EU, but not as much as before.
I still have all the old childhood toys, and I don't think I've gotten rid of any of my collection.
I'm a loose non-completist collector, with a caveat. Recently I got the idea into my head that I'd like one representative carded figure from each line, and specifically that I should get an Obi-Wan from each line to provide some continuity. I'm still working on that one. But it's started me toward an extremely slippery slope where I'm seriously considering reacquiring carded versions of a few of my most prized (not valuable, just sentimentally significant) figures, for posterity's sake. Must ... resist ... slippery ... slope.....
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I never really got into "collecting" persay until about 1999. Up until that time I got SW and CORPS! stuff just to play with. Since then I've been pretty hardcore, been through all of Modern Line and have no intentions of stoping.
So, about 6 years of collecting...8 years of buying.
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Since the beging. I guess you can call me a lifer as well. Never got the Earliy bird set, nor early varients like the VC Jawa or DT figs, but I had good 3 3/4" collection until the POTF line when I was pretty much forced to quit due to age. :(
Once POTF2 hit, there was no one to stop me, so I've been full steam ahead on the 3 3/4" ever since.
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I've been buying figs since early 1997 (got my first POTF2 figs in late 96), and collecting since AOTC came out in 2002. I went on a hiatus after TPM came out, as no stores had any SW figures. Plus, I finally found the HTF Darth Maul, so I felt "complete." I started getting an interest again in early 2002, but didn't start buying figs again until AOTC came out.
So we're going on 6 1/2 years buying figs (excluding my hiatus in 00-02) and 3 years collecting. :)
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I started collecting (even though to me it was called "getting toys to play with") in 1979. The parents took me to a Hills department store and got me a Luke, Vader, and Chewbacca. I ended up getting into SW pretty heavily when TESB came out, and from then on, it was all downhill. :)
I never really had a lot of the figures or vehicles, but I remember getting the Millennium Falcon for my birthday in 1980 and being absolutely thrilled. There is a photo of me in a family album taking off the wrapping paper; strangely enough (and kind of appropriate), there is also a picture of me in the family album from 1999 opening the Naboo Royal Starship, which was my Christmas present that year. Kind of a "bookend" type of thing, or in SW terms, the circle was complete. :)
But, like a lot of kids and their baseball card/comic book collections, my mother decided that since I didn't play with the figures anymore (it was 1986), she could sell them without me getting upset. Imagine how you would have felt to know that about 35 figures, Jabba the Hutt, an X-Wing, and the Dagobah playset were sold in a yard sale for 30 bucks total. Yeah, I didn't feel so good about it either. There are a few things that inexplicably didn't make it into the yard sale and that make up my vintage collection today (Leia Boussh, Wicket, Yoda, Vader, the AT-ST, and the Falcon), but still, it depresses me to know that all of that cool stuff is gone now. :'(
I guess it was around 1991 when I realized that I just didn't give a **** what people thought of me and what I did anymore that I started to wonder about getting SW stuff again. Sadly, there wasn't any around, so when Galoob put out the Micro Machines in 1993 or 1994, I was all over them. When POTF2 came out, it was the greatest thing since sliced bread to me. Even though now I can see that the figures pretty much sucked, at the time, they were great to me, and I still look at them fondly (even Monkey Leia).
So, here I am, some 26 years later since that trip to Hills and I'm still buying SW action figures. And while I am considered a collector, and no longer "play" with the figures or vehicles in the traditional sense of the word, to me, it's still getting new toys more than it is anything else. :)
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Started in 78 with my mom buying me R2, 3PO and a Landspeeder. Continued to bug my parents until 1984 I believe then started the dark times in which during the 8th grade I sold all my vintage figures/vehicles except my Boba Fett. :(
Then it started back up in 1998 with the prequels although my first official figure back in the game was a EU Mara Jade. I bought it at a TRU in Paradise Valley,AZ during college. And Ive been with it ever since. I want to start picking up the vintage line again. Just for ol times sake.
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Hmm, probably arund '92 or so for me. picking up old vintage SW figures here and there in antique shops when I was a kid, and then a year or so later the Micro machines.
Then of course the big boom in '95 with the relaunch.. Not nearly as long as most of you guys though.
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I started Summer of 78 when I got my first Star Wars figures. Granted, I was 7 and they were my toys, but I think I still have the cardbacks from all my figures and that's not something I did with any of my other toys. Granted, a bunch of them are missing the proofs of purchase so I could score Boba Fett, Bossk and the Emperor by mail. ;D
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Well, since I wasn't lucky enough to be born when the movies came out originally, though a few months after ROTJ, my childhood was filled with other toys with very little related to Star Wars. During most of that time I would get MOTU, TMNT, X-Men, and Spider-Man figures along with LEGO sets.
It wasn't until the new line in '95 that I decided to get some. I'd get a few here and there and actually kept many of em carded (foreshadowing), but within a couple years, I didn't collect much figures anymore. I'd open many of them over the years and then it wasn't until the Summer after AOTC came out that I got hooked again.
More die-hard now, I guess it's only been a little over 3 years and 1000s of dollars later ...
8)
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Had all the(90%) of the original vintage figs ( including the sears/or jcpenny cantina mail away with blue snaggletooth) Had the Death star, droid workshop, some ships ect. Somehow it dissapeared after I grew up and went to recover it...All that remains is about 15% of the figs and one measely tie fighter that the wings don't stay on anymore LOL. Started SERIOUSLY collecting again from 1995 until present
My parents always remind me of how bad I cried before Christmas because I had to have 'that Death Star playset' sooo bad And I didn't think Santa was listening..C'mon I was 8! Anyway the story turned out good and bad...I got the death star AND the cantina mail away figs But to this day nobody knows whateva happened to that damned death star!
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I had a lot the toys when I was a kid. All of them are gone now except for a very worn Bespin Han. I always loved the movies but I was oblivious to star wars toys in my teenage years. I rediscovered them when TPM came out. Then it was the POTJ. I started going back and collecting all the POFT2 items i missed. I even inherited a college buddys old vintage figs. I dont know how I went all those years and didnt pay any attention to this stuff.