By Kevin Guhl in
Daily Lists, Toys
Wednesday, Dec. 2 2009 @ 7:58AM
15) The Ball
Looks like Wilson from Cast Away finally got an action figure!
14) Cubeman
Hey, everybody, it's Rubik the Amazing Cube! In the Kinnikuman manga, the only way you could defeat him was by solving him.
13) Keyman
He really knows how to lock in a hold. Granted, if he's as strong as the typical dollar store bike lock he appears to be, all it will take is the brute strength of a 12-year-old to defeat him.
12) Mr. VTR
This jumble of 1980's technology desperately wants to be a Transformer. He failed.
11) Parthenon
Little known fact: The Parthenon is not just the temple of the Greek goddess Athena and an artistic masterpiece; it was also the Intercontinental Belt holder from 1984-86.
10) Snakeman
Does he control the snake or does the snake control him?
9) Smileman
This just scares the shit out of me.
8) Sunshine
Sunshine was a shapeshifting brick shithouse who turned into a lot of bizarre things, include a stone arch and a top, the latter which gave kids the options to spin him around and knock down all his opponents. Sunshine's most visually striking form, as seen above, looked like a New Wave dreidel.
7) Kendaman
Based on the cup-and-ball toy, Kendaman swings his own head around on a chain. Amusingly, one figure depicts him after having lost his head; the strings on those cheap cup-and-ball toys are always breaking!
6) Spray Devil
He looks freaky, but the worst you can expect is to get tagged with gang symbols.
5) Teapack Man
I have a bad feeling his finisher has something to do with teabags.
4) Mixer Taite
His defeated opponents all get to personally answer that burning question: "Will it mix?"
3) Benkiman
This guy is a walking ode to a Japanese toilet, complete with a hat made of poo. In Japan, he was defeated when Kinnkuman took a crap in him, thus clogging him. And Japanese boys everywhere learned why you shouldn't take a crap in a urinal.
2) Paper Mummy
And here is Benkiman's natural tag team partner, a toilet paper monster! (Although, as Matt from X-Entertainment once pointed out, he does look a bit like Rosie the Robot Maid from The Jetsons.)
1) Sunigator Shotai
Ask anyone who even remembers M.U.S.C.L.E. vaguely and they'll likely name "the Hand" as their favorite character. The shape-shifting reptile Sunigator, who is actually represented numerous times in the M.U.S.C.L.E. toyline in his various forms (including what looks an upright frill-necked lizard wearing sneakers), had only a short run in the original Kinnikuman story before being defeated by its titular hero (a.k.a. Muscleman). Despite that, the toy depicting him as a giant, disembodied hand with four digits, warts, claws and a scary face on his middle finger was both the coolest and most frightening figure in the whole toyline. Could you imagine having to fight this monstrosity without wetting your wrestling tights? These days, Sunigator can he hard to get your... ahem... hands on, as he's the most in-demand M.U.S.C.L.E. figure.
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14) Cubeman
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13) Keyman
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12) Mr. VTR
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11) Parthenon
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10) Snakeman
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9) Smileman
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8) Sunshine
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7) Kendaman
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6) Spray Devil
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5) Teapack Man
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4) Mixer Taite
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3) Benkiman
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2) Paper Mummy
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1) Sunigator Shotai
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43 comments
Comments
ZADL said:
Mr VTR (#12) looks like a karaoke machine to me... I wonder if he'd be beaten by getting drunk and singing into his arm or something.
Kevin said:
Quick Addendum: Among M.U.S.C.L.E. collectors, there is also a highly in-demand figure called Satan Cross, which commands high prices due to its supposed rarity. Regardless, Sunigator Shotai does seem to be the most desired figure among the most people.
Zach Oat said:
This could easily have been the top 100 strangest MUSCLE figures. Where's that furry bean guy? The slinky-pipe guy? Trash compactor man? Hammer head? Devil dude? Watch face? Mind you, I am making all of these names up.
suboken said:
"The Hand" was the most in-demand figure in 3rd grade, mainly because he was near unbeatable in the MUSCLE "wrestling ring" that we played with. He wedged in just right to the little clamp that held the figures. I still remember being really excited when I finally traded with someone for him.
Also, I bet half these characters had side jobs as Rockman bosses.
Max Power said:
Black Hole (number 25) reminds me too much of the FFF featuring the drill and the brain... *shudder*
Mr. Poopoopachu said:
I wish they would remake the M.U.S.C.L.E. video game they had for NES
Kevin replied to Mr. Poopoopachu:
And make it good? ;-D
Actually, there are Ultimate MUSCLE games that could be seen as follow-ups to the old NES game: http://search.ign.com/products?query=ultimate+muscle
Wyngarde said:
I still have the mail away poster and a giant bag of these things.
Man, I loved these guys.
JOE said:
I had most of these guys (still do, in fact, they're in a box somewhere) I used to play with them all the time.
Was the female version (C.U.T.I.E.S. or something like that) also imported from Japan or was that just an American thing?
I'm pretty sure they were just an American thing. There's a good article about C.U.T.I.E.S. here:
http://www.x-entertainment.com/articles/0772/
JOE replied to Kevin:
I didn't buy CUTIES at the time but in retrospect I shoulda picked up a pack or two. Even at that age, something struck me as a little off about having such a large all male ensemble.
Rob said:
FYI, this list was written by Kevin Guhl, not me. For some reason I don't have his name in my new authoring system, but I hope to have this fixed shortly.
Also, since I'm a huge Kinnikuman fan, you should know how tortuous it was not to include a bunch of meaningless Kinnikuman trivia into these entries.
Geoff said:
King the 100 Ton looks more like an evolved Dalek (LEGS~!) than anything else.
demoncat said:
seeing this list one has to wonder if the ones who had to name the characters where just going around their work stations just using every thing. espically with benkimen and his tag team partner and smile man that one has cheesy mussle horror film guy all over him. not to mention the talent to make the figures come out looking like they do on this list.
Tyler said:
What a coincidence, I am currently reading the Kinnikuman manga.
Xenos said:
Man. I had a couple of these and wish I had a couple more. Rollerman, Mapman, Personalman. I really liked half tree Bam Bam Ji. Of coruse I didn't know any of their names because I didn't keep booklets, if there were any, from these figures for some reason.
I had a regular Sunshine one. When I was in Japan on vacation, I saw a 12 inch tall Sunshine figure that was pretty nifty. Due to packing space I passed on it as well as an awesome JoJo figure the same size.
lou-bert vs. q-bert said:
I bought all of the MUSCLE Things abut I couldn't keep track of all of them so I gave 'em away.
Bill said:
Man....I actually had a few of these guys. I usually used them as cannon fodder for Cobra Commander to use in his insane plans of world conquest.
JOBSQUAD said:
Awesome, I swear I had ALL of these at one point! Most of my MUSCLE guys got lost
or melted (So many childhood toys didn't survive my 'playing-with-fire' phase), but
I still have ONE trashcan packed with my faves.
Including 'the Hand'!
Hmmm, I wonder how much I could get for 'em on ebay?
daguru said:
Holy crap... I used to have almost all of those!
TheOrgg said:
If you're interested in seeing some of these guys in action (Including Tea Pac, who indeed beats his opponents with a teabag), check out the translation project at http://teamkinniku.50webs.com --all but one storyline from the original manga is avaible there in its complete form and in english.
wingdarkness said:
Holy Shit!! I used to have these things when I was a kid...I had no clue this had anything to do with the Ultimate Muscle anime series (Which I didn't watch until I was like 23)...Wow mattel just pawned off the whole toyline on some pink mini-monsters kids would like...Those basterds sure got me! Screw Man used to get mad play in crayon box! Ha!
Charro Ninja said:
Smileyman reminds me of The Psycho-Pirate
Asat said:
Personalman, Personalman...Personalman hates Triangleman....
clark said:
This is one of my favorite lists so far. Oh the memories, I had most of these at one point. Snakeman was always one of my favorites, and I think I still have the toilet guy in a box somewhere.
fakeassname said:
is it bad that as i sat here and read through the list i started ticking off what ones i had and did not have as a kid? i ended up with something like only 1/4th of the list I DID NOT OWN. how the hell can i remember this shit?!?! i was like 5 years old or something.
BoredLizzie said:
#21 - Dalekman???
Red Gamer said:
I had these in first year High School! I ditched the wrestling ring and created a wrestling board game with individual stats and moves for each wrestler. The highlight was a cooking class where every boy sat around playing the game instead of cooking spaggheti. The home economics teacher was happy enough with the arrangement...
Was the wrestling ring part of the Japanese toyline or a Mattel invention?
ColdFusion Developer said:
I used to love MUSCLE! That damned arena could never withstand a few weeks worth of matches. They should have made the plastic prongs out of metal.
Zinc said:
I still have everyone of these except #16, Pinchman! I keep them in a small blue suitcase that says, "Going to grandma's" on the front. Yeah, I know, I'm cool.
GR3 said:
I had 15 out of the 30 listed!!
I loved to play with these along with silly putty and make silly putty armours and silly putty clones, ahhhh those where the days...
Gwen Harper said:
I laughed so hard. Thanks for the good laugh.
