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

If I had to think about it, I would say my most memorable M.u.s.c.l.e. collecting moment would be the first time I discovered some of them.

I was helping out at a church rummage sale in the toy section and someone told me that they had spotted a small bag of toys in the house wares section. So I go over their to pick them up and in a small baggy was maybe 2 dozen or so random flesh figures.

Being a kid myself at the time I though “WOW THOSE LOOK COOL” and asked one of the dealers running the rummage sale how much they where and he quoted me 10 cents. Looking back on it I can’t believe how unbelievably cheap they where.

This was in the early 90’s a while after the toy line had been defunct for several years so it was amazing that I was actually able to look up and discover just what these fascinating toys where online at the local library when I got home.

It’s funny to think that if it hadn’t been for that random discovery I probably wouldn’t be collecting today years later.

~Goldenjustice

I knew the answer to this question right away. Although I have had many remarkable and memorable moments in the last two years since is restarted collecting muscles, the one memory that stands out the most was the first one.
After many years of keeping my muscles from when I was a kid safe, I decided to try to get back into it and try to find out more about them and finish a set of fleshies. so I found nathan’s page, I found University of Muscle, and I found LRG. After reading up and learning much, I ventured into Ebay and started shopping…
I soon found a wonderland of little pink wrestling dudes! I bid, I won, I jumped for joy! Then I waited.
I got my first package and was really excited. I opened that package up quicker than a 4 year old at Christmas presents.
The sight hit me like a ton of bricks. There they were, a bunch of Muscles that I didn’t have. I opened ziplock bag they came in and gave a giant sniff. AAAaahhhh! that smell! The smell more than anything took me back to childhood memories of many hours of sorting, playing, and enjoying these little guys. I started sorting and looking them over and i was giggling the whole time…

My most memorable M.U.S.C.L.E collecting moment hands down is my first Christmas when the M.U.S.C.L.E craze started between me and my friends when I was in 4th grade. I was constantly bugging my mom to buy me a four pack every time we went to Zayre’s, Walgreens, and every other store that had a toy section. I even would give up allowance on some occasions to get a 10 pack garbage can of them. So that Christmas I was at the local Walgreens in the Back of the Yards neighborhood in Chicago and my eye’s saw the most beautiful thing I ever saw…A M.U.S.C.L.E figure board game. I screamed, shrieked, and begged my mom to have it…proclaiming that I didn’t want no other gifts but that. I didn’t get it but that Christmas morning to my child hood eyes surprise I unwrapped the gift from my mom and it was the board game! I was so happy and played with that thing till it fell apart for the next few years. I even tried to play it the correct way which as all of you know was silly and as kids we would rather throw them all in there and have a battle royal. I still have some of my figures . I have held on to them for over 20 years…and slowly have been able to purchase both the classic and new lines when the money allows it. Sadly, I can’t find the board game any where, but will always remember that first one. One of these days I will find one again (hopefully with all the pieces)

🙂

Best,

Juan

I was a greasy theif.
Due to circumstance and a extremly tight single mom, until I went to live with my Dad I had very few toys. The few MUSCLES I had, I had bought myself at a church flea market with money I stole from the offering probably. MY mom was the organist and this allowed me access to parts of the church I shouldn’t have been. It was with this original small collection of MUSCLES i would battle my friends. I was a “Have Not” in a communty of “Haves” My neighbor was that kid that got every toy and a room built for his GI JOE air craft carrier. (That kid) Everybody knew one. Anyways my most memorable day of collecting MUSCLES was plundering his collection (HE had buckets)everytime he left the room. I must have had every flap in my socks and every pocket filled. I was a Sucker for the snake dudes and MUSCLEman varients. I don’t know how many I stole that day or how many I stole from him in the future. I just remember having to leave very fast at some points when MUSCLES threatened to spill from my jeans. The hardest part was explaining my newly obtained figures the next time we battled……….

Easily my most memorable moment collecting M.U.S.C.L.E.’s was the day I was dragged to a swapmeet with my friend Larry and almost completing my collection in one fell swoop.
I wasn’t in the mood to wake up on at Saturday at 6:30 in the morning mind you and drive over an hour to Orange County to go to this amazing Swapmeet my friend always talked about. He always told me stories of grandeur of how he found treasure after treasure at this place. With my arm twisted I gave in and said I would go. The only reason I got up on time was that my friend opened the window to my room at 6:25am and pretty much yelled at me to get out of bed. So anyhoo, after many curse words I grabbed whatever clothes I couldn find in the dark, stumbled putting them on and out the door we went. I barely remember the drive over since I slept most of the way, waking only a few times to reposition myself and tell him to turn down this music which always seemed to creep up just as I fell back asleep. An hour and 20 minutes later we finally arrive with my friend talking crap because I slept the whole way, and I started in on how I didn’t want to come in the first place.
After going down the first two rows with him I start getting antsy at the fact that he’s the type of person to look at everything and talk to each vendor, and I’m more of a quick browser. Into the third or forth row I decide to just go ahead and let him do his thing, I tell him I’ll call when I’m done and I’ll meet back up with him. I push on through four or five more rows looking at odds and ends and buying a few things along the way, a few NES games, a few loose G.I. Joes and a few broken G1 transformers for parts.
I had just got back into M.U.S.C.L.E.’s a few weeks earlier and had about 20-30 figures. Also it’s been a handful of years after I sold my first set after my GF at the time said I was too old for toys.
So anyways I go down this row and see a guy selling primarily comics and toys, I start browsing through what he has and I over hear him say he bought this all from a storage unit and was selling everything at a low price. That perked up my ears and I started picking up things he was labeling $.50 cents and $1.

Until~!!!

I walked through to the back of his little area and pushed aside a box of posters or something like that and I saw a clear Tupperware box covered with GPK and Nintendo stickers. I open it up and I see a few M.U.S.C.L.E.’s mixed in with what I think was McDonalds toys, I pull out a few of the crap toys and realize the bottom is filled with M.U.S.C.L.E.’s~!!! (192 I believe was the exact number, with 30 – 40 doubles). I drop the few toys and comics I had in my hand, push to the front and ask the guy what he wanted for them, box and all. In his broken English he asks what they are. I tell him random army men type toys i wanted to give to my kids.

He’s says “Maybe $20~?”
I have to hold back from screaming, but i say,
“Seems reasonable.”

So I reach in my wallet and realize I only have $16 (mostly in $1’s), I gasp, I sadly tell him that’s all I have and he said OK happily, since he needs small bills for change. Again I hold back my excitement, thank the guy and walk away the happiest dang son of a gun at the Golden West Swapmeet. And of course I had to call up my friend so I could meet up and I could gloat about what I found. He wasn’t so happy, but I didn’t care.

Haha
🙂

While I’ve forgotten most of the details, the memory of getting my very first MUSCLEs is still most notable to me for what I do remember about it. I had been introduced to the figures already, a friend of mine had some and the ring, I believe. I can’t remember who paid (me or my parents), but I do remember going into it what I was looking for. I was totally committed going in to find one of the six armed guys. I didn’t know how many kinds of six armed guys there were, but I wanted the pack I got to have one. Only flesh were on the marked at the time. Searching through the packs to find one however I ran into #15, Sunshine Arch, and was immediately struck by it. I vaguely remember having to make an agonizing decision between Sunshine Arch and a six armed guy. The coolness that was #15 won out and I ended up settling for #174 as the only six armed guy I could get and still get #15. I had preferred one without the broken arm. I think the choice was necessary because I could only choose one 4-pack, possibly two, but I think it was only one. I vaguely remember having just the 4 MUSCLE guys for a while, which I brought everywhere with me. I’m pretty sure one of the other two was #223 Mr Barracuda. The fourth one escapes me at the moment.