I had maybe about a dozen of years obsession with Playmobils, I had a lot of fun with them, I still have part of what I collected-converted-transformed-even painted details on!… on my cabinets… and play with my grandchildren with them… great funny toys for children if you ask me… (an insidious way for me to interest them im my collections I guess… LOL). BTW both sides of a castle window… in one side a musician plays the piano… in the other side the “Guard” is inspected… guess which was the most popular in Facebook? (Playmobils Pictures and Dioramas)… the redcoats of course!… we are like that.
Just to show you the potential… to get those you have to learn to dissemble, add stickers, buy resin headgear and paint the last one… quite fast and simple once you know the tricks… but on the whole not cheap… as for collecting them it is fine… but wargames better be skirmish type.
My first post of 2023… well… I guess it would be a continuation of a theme… a la Oliver Curwood (if you know who he is)… as a child I was fascinated by the North West Mounted Police… and recently got the sledge I was waiting for… so here it is… on the trail up North!
You know I also indulge in Playmobils… do not ask me why… I explained in my book no longer in print (LOL)… Actually waiting for a sledge from a standard set to go patrol up North… he always get his man… And YES I will post a pic of the mountie on his sledge once received…
Seriously they are fun to manipulate and even role playing with them.
Enjoy!
PS: I achieved (the Blog) 130.000 visitors today… I must thank those who do assiduously!
I sold half of them to an ex-legionnaire, but the main thing was to experiment with a black&white pic for a change!
Hope nobody comes restless again… I just love the films about it… romantic and post-romantic stuff (see BEAU GESTE all versions and also BEAU IDEAL… BEAU SABREUR -with Gary Cooper_ has been “lost” for decades… UNDER TWO FLAGS… MARCH OR DIE… spectacular “irreal” battle scenes (the “arbis” would have shot them away from a safe distance) in full colour and a great Gene Hackman and a very subdued and nuanced performance by Terence Hill in one of his best roles)
Curiously enough I still have a couple of dozens of Playmobils to play with… habits die hard!
You know I am a 6mm orthodox (more or less) solo wargamer… a collector of 54mm Toy Soldiers (part of them used in traditional old style games)… but also a Playmobil fan with my grandchildren. Let me explain why… probably you do not care at all for those german toys (mainly quite pacific oriented!)… but some of us perversily used them in wargames and role-playing… LOL
As always a picture is worth a thousand words so here have some… have in mind I collected Playmobil soldiers mainly for years without knowing they could be dissembled and rebuilt exchanging parts!… quite easy once you know how… the method of kitchen scissors and a towel is my own as seen in YouTube!
Lets start with the US Cavalry (You all know I have a fixation with the French Foreign Legion thanks to P.C.Wren) but this is not my only obsession… John Ford and John Wayne (and Richard Widmark, Ben Johnson and a lot of other mainly from Ford’s stock company) plunged my young imagination into it… as Errol Flynn of course!
Well, here is a theme overdone by Playmobil thanks God! See some pics:
The head act as a plug that keeps the lot together (german engineering), actually a great idea that permits personalization.
More pics:
Many times only a change of hat does the trick! In subsequent entries you will be introduced to my battle of Dorking outfit (not related to Dorca at all) and will see how my French Foreign Legion Playmobils double as Prussians with the change of hat!
Playmobil has a policy of not encouraging War Toys or Wargames (idiotic if you ask me when the most popular sales are the Pirate Ships… nothing worse than pirates in my book… and also produce Imperial Romans and even a Circus (Roman you know)… hundreds of fans indulge in making for themselves Napoleonic Armies (a forever popular addiction)… why Playmobil do not produce sets os soldiers or Military Bands eludes me completely… after all they do the pieces that you can collect bit by bit and then mount on… the most difficult part to get are Hats (some astute manufacturers in resin do) the rest is fairly easy to get. There are even flags adhesive manufactured! So there you have it we have those Armies after all… and Playmobil can manufacture James Bond Aston-Martin etc. Toy Soldiers are NOT their forte (a part from the ACW which they did!… and a lot of soldiers to do AWI/7YW… and cowboys and redskins)… a strange world we live in.
Well, this is a pic from ebay (and not a very good resolution) but once the parcel arrives I will substitute for another one… yoou get the idea I guess.
I once sold a collection of ACW Playmobils because I did not want my grandchildren to fight brother against brother… LOL… if I had new they will enjoy playing videogames with plenty of shooting and killing with machine/laser/guns… oh dear!… I feel like a Neanderthal sometimes…
Recently have bought Playmobils (AGAIN) Prussians to fight the Brits at Dorking à la Wells… missile launched from canons… hope that the smaller of my grandchildren will appreciate… have my doubts (sometimes he thinks older than me).
Congratulations to the British. The civic attitude was paramount and those public and privately professionally involved gave a lesson on “how it is done”. There is no better example to compare. Long live the King!
This webpage would again be alive as from today with the usual business of giving you your daily ration (or dose) of Toy Soldiers. Cheers.