It´s been quiet for a while surrounding these ¨Prototype¨ single packs and although over the past years a few have shown up every now and than just recently a larger lot of them showed up and after updating the list from 9 to 10 different Beasts know inside this packaging back in 2013 earlier on in this topic;
http://www.littlerub...134918&p=537419 it looks like we´ve to update that list again.
Because among the ones that showed up also these were found;
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Which makes that we can add 2 more figures (Cobra & Rooster) to the existing list of 10 making it now a total of 12 different Beasts found in this packaging style. The list is now as follows;
- #1 Pirate Lion (V)
- #4 Colonel Bird (V)
- #5 Killer Carp (V)
- #12 Blitzkrieg Bat (V)
- #15 Gruesome Gator (V)
- #16 Sly Fox (V)
- #54 Leapin Lizard (V)
- #59 King Cobra (V) UPDATED
- #61 Pixalated Pointer (V)
- #63 Rowdy Rooster (V) UPDATED
- #70 Harrier Hawk (V)
- #75 Pugnacious Penguin (V)
(V) = Verified
With this growing list it might also be a good moment to discuss/reassess the status of these packs because the name Prototype Packaging is slowly starting to become less plausible considering the ¨amount¨ of these around. At first there were ideas of only 4-5 of each version to be in existence but over time for some of them I believe we´ve exceeded this number already and in the case of it being actual Prototypes it´s not very likely to see a larger number of them around without any changes made to them showing they´d be part of a design process. And with these being ready to sell and after having a quick chat with a couple fellow collectors the tendency for these is that it´s becoming more and more likely that these might be an unreleased/pulled production run which was actually scheduled to be released in 1989 as the packaging shows.
I believe it´s been mentioned before somewhere earlier but these packs could´ve become the victim of the line being pulled from the market so unexpected which might have resulted in the fact that even though these might have been ready to be distributed they´d never actually made it into the stores. It´s one of those questions we might never see answered but who knows...
And apart from that this new discovery also raises the question how many more Beasts might´ve been inside this packaging type? I would make sense to look at the production molds in that case which I initially at a first glance expected to be solved now having 12 different ones meaning it could´ve been 6 mold partners and although that idea might go for a few;
- Lion & Bird
- Gator & Carp
- Fox & Bat
The Series 1 figs it certainly didn´t go for the Series 3 figs which seemed to be much more random until this find resulting in another mold pair;
- Cobra & Lizard
With a Pointer, Penguin, Rooster and Hawk remaining all of which are NOT mold partners of each other that leaves two options open.
1. The mold partner idea is correct which would make that there´s also a Orangutan (Pointer), Zebra (Penguin), Mandrill (Hawk) and Panda (Rooster) to be found in these packaging styles. This would add another 4 figures to the list making it 16 instead of the known 12.
OR
2. Where the Series 1 figs originated from the mold partners the Series 3 figs have been pulled/used from some of the ¨randomly¨ composed box sets like the Sunburst (9 Series 3 figs) or Clear Carp (6 Series 3 figs) sets which included Series 3 figs.
At this moment the odds are even on either option I´d say as we´ve been surprised before. So far, at this point, it´s also clear that NO Series 2 figs have been found in this type of packaging which also might give away a clue...
This updated probably caused more questions than it answered but to keep things on track it´s important for the puzzle to update the list from 10 to 12.
To be continued.