As many M.U.S.C.L.E. collectors know, we were given very little in the way of a backstory when they first hit the shelves in the 1980s. An incomplete checklist, a six-panel comic strip, two 30-second television commercials, vague and confusing graphics in print and on packaging... Without any prior knowledge of Kinnikuman, this was all you had to go on.
Though the mysterious nature of the north American version of the toy line is arguably one of the most endearing of it's qualities, the approach taken by distributors in the European market is no less fascinating.
Though only 40 Kinkeshi-based sculpts were used for the first series of Exogini, they were each given names reflective of their import to Italy (and the same was done for their subsequent arrival in France as Cosmix.) They were not portrayed as two opposing teams of wrestlers, but as a mysterious alien race of miniature mutants that worked together as one to invade every corner of the universe, for unknown reasons.
Not only was this expressed through advertisements and short blurbs on packaging, but a (somewhat) fuller account of the Exogini arrival and conquest of Earth was illustrated in a series of sticker cards and a collector's album released by EUROFLASH in 1988.
From what I understand, the cards were sold in individual packets.
Front:
Exogini Card 000.jpg 151.5K 0 downloads
The Mysterious Aliens
Exogini
The Biggest Extraterrestrial Collection
Back:
Exogini Card 00.jpg 219.92K 0 downloads
According to the back cover of the sticker album, it appears that you could buy bulk orders of cards, as well as specific numbered cards directly from the manufacturer.
This particular EUROFLASH set contained 180 cards, each labeled with the series title and a number on the reverse:
Exogini Card 01.jpg 96.35K 0 downloads
The collector's album contained numbered spaces for each card. A caption was printed below each space, which reads as a story when followed consecutively. The sticker cards add graphics to the story, though in some cases their actual correspondence is questionable.
A full version of the album with all the cards in place was scanned and compiled by Albertinoz, and can be found here.
Below are scans of the blank book, as well as all of the cards in the proper order with the corresponding captions crudely translated to English. The scans, like the translation, are not perfect, but serve well enough for reference at this point.