Toy OTD: Electric Tiki Teeny Weeny Mini-Maquette: Little Lotta

By now, I'm pretty sure it's clear that I'm a Harvey Comics fan. I read tons of them as a kid, and I just can't shake my fondness for that slick Warren Kremer art. But there just hasn't been a lot of really good Harvey swag - until Electric Tiki came along. Then, the floodgates opened!

Electric Tiki has created a fairly substantial line of moderately-sized-and-priced Harveytoon figurines over the years (most being around five inches tall or more, so not really "teeny-weeny"), and they've covered most of the characters that you'd want. Little Lotta may not be Richie Rich, but she's still up there on the visibility-meter!

Tracy M. Lee is the creative force behind Electric Tiki, drawing most (if not all) of the character pose/turnaround art himself. Ruben Procopio, Rich Vanover, Tony Cipriano, Steve Schumacher, James Lopez, William Paquet, Sam Greenwell and Jim McPherson are credited with sculpting some of the products, but it's unclear who sculpted Lotta (maybe the packaging has a sculpting credit).

Regardless, it's a great sculpt! Mr. Lee did a wonderful job preserving the original character design in his pre-pro drawings, and the pose feels like it's right off one of the old covers. The colors are spot-on model as well, and the paint work is fine. The base is very simple, with no unneccessary branding or detail, and it eliminates any stability issues.

The packaging is also attractive, graphically evoking the old cover layouts of the comic books. If you're interested in variants, there's the version I have (sporting a red bow in her hair), a green bow version, and a red dress version, too!

You can still get the first two versions easily at toynk.com for $24.99 + shipping. Since it's a smaller run (fifty pieces), the red dress variant goes for $50 + shipping at dustcatchers.com. Grab your favorite now!

Casper Gets The Big Book Treatment

BOING BOING: 400 page Casper anthology coming in April
posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 11:02:27 AM

Leslie Cabarga and Jerry Beck have put together a 400 page Casper the Friendly Ghost comic book anthology, to be published by Dark Horse in April. Can't wait -- these are awesome comics.

I've made no secret of my love for the Paramount Harvey Comics of the 1950s and early 60s. These have been virtually ignored by the comics community, and unknown to animation fans. Now that we've completed our personal collections (through eBay and Comic-Con at bargain prices), Leslie and I are compiling a large volume of the 100 best stories, restored from printers proofs and original art, by permission of Classic Media and to be published by Dark Horse this summer. These comics were drawn mainly by the Famous Studios animators: Bill Hudson, Tom Johnson, Howard Post, Steve Muffatti and others. Warren Kremer's classic early stories will be presented as well. I'm also contributing an introductory essay to this 480-page volume and we've got big plans for further editions. I'll be plugging this again in the coming months, but you can place an advance order now, for Harvey Comics Classics Volume 1: Casper The Friendly Ghost at Dark Horse Comics.

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Thanks to Jerry Beck at Cartoon Brew for the source article, and for making this book possible! I'm a big Harvey Comics fan myself, so I'll be picking this up when it hits stores.