UofMUSCLE.com – M.U.S.C.L.E. Figures from Mattel

There’s nothing to follow-up on from last week and that feels very anticlimactic. I was also surprised by the lack of reader response. I thought at least one person would have something to say. Oh well.

Because the holiday-buying-remorse listings haven’t started showing up (or, at least, it doesn’t feel like it to me), I was going to solely devote this Auction Watch to the least tagged M.U.S.C.L.E. figures.

But then lint-speed, The King of Class A Auctions, forced me to include his most recent Class A listing. So we’ll examine that first, and then take a look at some non-tagged figures.

The first auction, M.U.S.C.L.E. Men, Muscles, Kinnikuman, #93 Purple, Vintage Toys, 1985, Class A, features another Class A figure from lint-speed starting at $0.99.

I may call him the King of Class A Auctions. Other collectors may appreciate the opportunities he provides. Both of those things are perfectly nice.

But I would argue, more importantly, he is helping keep the M.U.S.C.L.E. hobby healthy and alive.

Dude, aren’t you exaggerating just a little bit?

No, not at all. As I said before, I think we’re in the midst of a M.U.S.C.L.E. figure bottleneck. I believe these types of $0.99 auctions help punch through the bottleneck.

And even if you don’t need the figure it creates a fun, interesting M.U.S.C.L.E. listing to be observed. Frankly, those feel further and further apart these days. I’m willing to overextend my voice and speak for all M.U.S.C.L.E. collectors when I say, “Thank you for your listings! They really help the hobby.”

The next part of Auction Watch will attempt to spotlight the four figures that only had one tag: #14, #101, #164, and #229. What can we find?

I started with the #14 figure. To my surprise, I couldn’t find a single figure listing when I searched. So then I had to start looking in lots. He popped up in one of the first lots I saw, but I wanted to keep looking. Two pages later he popped up again. On his third appearance I thought, “So what?”

Robin Mask is a popular character. Why wouldn’t this figure pop-up on the radar more often?

Maybe because there isn’t a Class A version? However the Dark Blue and Salmon are Class B. Wouldn’t a seller eventually get ridiculed for overpricing a Class B version?

Or is this figure overlooked because there are much better versions of Robin Mask? Is it that simple?

What do you guys think?

The next one-tag figure is the #101 figure. This time there were “better” results. I saw him listed from $1.95 to $12.95. I would characterize those prices as ranging from terrible to utterly laughable.

Like the previous figure, #101 does not have a Class A version. It does have two Class B versions: (1) Dark Blue; and (2) Purple.

I don’t dislike this sculpt. But I can’t remember anyone ever saying, “My favorite figure is #101!”

The #101 seems to have fallen through the UofM cracks because he is one of the “white noise” figures. Not good; not bad; just there. Hell, this figure didn’t even make it into the original field of 64 in the The 1st LRG M.U.S.C.L.E. Tournament. I’m left feeling kind of bad for this figure. Is that weird?

Next up is the #164 figure, and like the #101, there were some search results. For this figure the single figure prices ranged from $4.78 to $22.95. I think those prices range from offensive to fucking crazy.

The #164 does have a Class A version – Green. It also has three Class B versions: (1) Dark Blue; (2) Light Blue; and (3) Orange.

This leaves me mystified. By accident it feels like this figure should have been tagged more than once in the span of almost 10 years. Especially since the figure is pretty cool too (in my opinion).

I can’t offer any logical explanation for this figure being tagged only once. I really would love to hear any explanations you guys can come up with?

I’m stumped and a bit frustrated.

Finally we have the #229 figure. As of writing, this was the figure that had the highest number of search results. The price of this figure ranged from $1.95 to $32.95.

$32.95?!?!?!?!

I don’t know what to say.

There isn’t a Class A version of this figure, but it is (now embarrassingly) flush with Class B versions. This mass Class B classification really felt driven by popularity back in the day. Over ten years later this feels like a figure I would drop down to all Class C. But I don’t want to retype this post.

Maybe the #229 figure is a secret code for hardcore M.U.S.C.L.E. collectors? If you come across someone trumpeting a Class B #229 figure, then you know that you’re dealing with an inexperienced, greedy seller. Instead of calling sellers assholes, or some other derogative term, you can just say, “Be careful, you’re dealing with a classic 229.”