I’ve been cleaning, and inevitably in the process of cleaning, you’ll come across some lost treasure or pet that you thought ran away or maybe some sandwich that you SWORE you finished but there it is, green as a springtime day and just as crawling with life. Well, maybe not in your room or mine, but it happens. So, I was cleaning and I came across an old box of Minimates. I was immediately re-entranced.

A few years back, the toy industry got a hardcore fetish going for mini block figures. You take a generic humanoid body form, usually squarish and simplified in shape, and using this simple body, make a ton of different characters by giving it different paint schemes. The sculpting cost is nullified, you get a variety of figures out of the exact same body, and you get a charming formal continuity between every figure in the line. Cost-cutting capitalization on known characters? Sure, but they’re cute enough to make us forget all of that. Medicom in Japan has been doing it for a very long time with their great Kubrick line of figures, so Art Asylum decided to jump on the minifig boat with a line of figures called Minimates, based on Marvel Comics characters. Marvel Comics, as a reminder to non-comic folks out there, include Spider-Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four and the X-Men, among others.

And MAN, did I collect those guys. Each wave of figures had eight characters, contained in four double-packs. Additionally, there was a variation on one of the packs in the wave, switching out a particular figure with a less common variation of that character, adding that ‘chase’ thorn in the side of collecting Minimates. And they were fun… until Art Asylum decided that we needed a dozen different Spider-Man figures in slightly different forms of undress and battle damage, packed in with figures that we actually wanted. The same thing happened with Wolverine. Classic Wolverine, New X-Men Wolverine, sleeveless shirt Wolverine, maskless Wolverine, Ultimate Wolverine, leather jacket Wolverine, and I’m sure there were others. President Wolverine, Wolverine Soufflé, You Got Wolverine in my Peanut Butter, newborn Wolverine. You get the idea. As human beings, we have a certain Wolverine tolerance, and we were now suffering from Wolverine Poisoning. Which would have also become a figure if the line were allowed to continue in this way. The full lineup is conveniently covered on my good friend, Wikipedia.

I joined the Art Asylum Collectors’ Club for roughly thirty dollars so that I wouldn’t miss any releases. Despite many promises, they actually had the audacity to send out paperclips and rubberbands as ‘membership bonuses’ and not much else. It folded under a myriad of frustration and undelivered items. The company nobly plodded on.

Art Asylum went on to create Minimates based on DC characters also, but due to licensing agreements, they could not be packaged as individual figures. Instead, they were packaged as accessories to Lego-like construction kits called C3, which immediately amplified the price of attaining the figures. The C3 sets were rife with problems - deformed building blocks, incomplete figures, missing pieces. An exchange program was formed briefly, but it was enough to solidify real doubts about continuing to collect the line. A handful of pieces that were shown at ToyFair never saw their way to production, and Art Asylum rounded out the C3 collection with a series of mini-vehicles and closed down their flawed venture into construction kits. Recently, they’ve revisited the license and have been granted the rights to sell individual figures of DC characters, which is ultimately where their strength lies anyhow. So, consider me thrilled and suitably pre-ordered. These future Minimate waves will include the members of the Justice League, as well as some of the Justice Society and a handful of tangential (but still fun) characters, and best of all, through twenty-four figures, there’s only two characters being repeated, and I can never, ever have enough Batman. DC Comics, again as a reminder, include such iconic figures as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel.

Art Asylum also ventured into Minimates based on Lord of the Rings and Star Trek but neither venture really gained enough of a following to continue, and many presumably-rare exclusive sets couldn’t be given away. We’ve entered a new era, though, and figures that were lost to time have once again become desirable. A Nightcrawler from the ‘Giant X-Men’ box set can reach as high as 21 dollars, which is a handsome price for a 2.5” figure that was released only a few years ago, but most of the figures are still reasonably accessible for now. There’s a very real, geeky appeal to comic fans when they can get figures of their favorite heroes that are compatible with each other despite being from different universes. Too many times, the sizes or quality of the different figures just don’t match up, so this universality between the two comic labels is pretty hot stuff and is sure increase the demand all around. If there was ever a time to try to catch up, it would be now.

And it’s infinitely cool to have a tiny, posable superhero team anywhere you go. I don’t care what you say, it is.

By way of concluding coverage of the pleasantly chaotic Toy Fair, I think that’s it’s really important to mention some of the stuff that people generally don’t get to see. There are three enormous floors worth of toys and games and ideas in the Javits Center alone. That’s without even taking the free shuttlebus to the Toy District, which has two towers interconnected by a bridge and each floor full of showrooms and offices, all dedicated to the pursuit of innocent pleasure. Far too much flies under the media radar, some of it exciting and innovative, and some of it hopeless and bound to crash and burn and give off highly toxic fumes. I’ll let you decide which is which in this small gallery.

By way of ‘collectability’, Spin Master has two different Marvel Comics items planned for this year. The first of these is a series of super-tiny comic books that can only be read with a magnifying glass, to be packaged in groups of seven, which reprint both recent and classic Marvel comics. Reprinting comics in teensy form isn’t a NEW idea, and DC Direct did it exceptionally well when they packed in mini-comics in their ‘First Appearances’ line of action figures, but these… seriously tiny. Eye-strain tiny. ‘Secret cabal with the optometrists of the world’ tiny. And presumably, one can also play games with these tiny comics, like a trading card game.

The second innovative collectible idea from them is individually packaged Marvel chess pieces, representing a wide array of superheroes and bad guys in 3D, mini form. I remarked that I was surprised to see Red Skull among the characters, given the fact that he has serious Nazi leanings and most companies shy away from using him, but Captain America DOES need someone’s butt to kick. These chess pieces will be sold at your local toy store for around 2 bucks. It may take a lot to fill up a chess board, but when you’re done, it really looks like a lot of double-nerd fun. They’re more like miniature statues than actual, delineated chess pieces, but they’re an interesting concept.

LEGO will be expanding their Star Wars line of products to include more mini-figures (arguably the best part of collecting LEGOs) and scenarios. I practically squealed with delight when I noticed that they’d finally made a Boba Fett in a little LEGO Sarlacc Pit. You know, the sand-hole-with-teeth that he fell into on Tattooine? Like a total goober? THAT pit, in blocky LEGO form. LEGO will also be rolling out the first in a Batman themed set of products, ranging from ten dollar vehicles to high priced playsets like the Batcave. Mini-figures will include Batman, Robin, Catwoman, Penguin, the Joker and Killer Croc, among others. There are no plans to release these separately, but if you get those late night Batman Mini Figure pangs like I do, you can always look up Art Asylum’s C3 line of construction kits, which include mini-figures of many DC characters at a cheap price. Be warned that many of these C3 sets had missing and malformed piece issues which can no longer be resolved with the company, as the line has been discontinued. You can’t beat Lego anyhow, and if you tried, you’d probably totally cut up your hands on their damned sharp corners. It can just about kill you if you step on a LEGO in the dark - I care not to fathom what one could do should you engage it in fisticuffs.

Also, be sure to check out the LEGO Factory, where you can custom design ANYTHING you want online and have them ship it to you. It’s amazing beyond words.

My number one favorite Toy of the Year [non-mainstream category] is by far Product Enterprise’s prototype ‘Space Vixens of Galaxy Vega’ line. Call it a love of retro-space-chicness (or ‘chickness’), or call it a simple appreciation of women in all of their spacebound forms, but Captain Peggy Rider took my breath away. She’s but the first 12” figure in a line of many that are planned, and while Product Enterprise (a European company who has previously focused on sci-fi vehicle reproductions) is searching for wide distribution on these, I’ll be dreaming of what could come next. If the final product is anything like the prototype, this will be one of the rare instances that an original intellectual toy property completely takes the market by storm. Keep an eye out for this - I predict great things.

Mimobot presents a completely useful functionality to the world of collectible mini-figures. Not only are these little guys very indie-art stylish, but you can pop open their heads and store a considerable amount of data on them via a USB port! Some people might call them flash drives. I call them ingenious. The ‘urban vinyl / designer toy’ market is burning up right now, merging pop surrealist artistry with toy culture, and now with computer culture and functionality. These start at about 60 bucks and work their way up in price as data storage increases. And it’s a lot more fun to store your term paper on a ninja.

One of the more literally rewarding items we found is ‘Perplexcity’, and by ‘rewarding’ I mean ‘solve a series of puzzles and get $200,000 in real cash money’ rewarding. Worldwide puzzle games with actual buried treasure are nothing new, but Perplexcity adds a new spin on the genre of real-live adventure by incorporating it into a trading card game. Collect packs of cards, solve the increasingly difficult puzzles on each card, trade them with other puzzle solvers and tally your points online to unlock deeper and deeper clues. Eventually, these clues will lead you to finding ‘the Cube’ somewhere in the actual world. I’ve played games like this before, and they’re HIGHLY addictive. Subcultures are formed around them, and the earlier you get in on them, the better off you fare in the game. Similarly, the wider your unmoving butt grows as you seek out each progressive clue. The second wave of cards is coming out now, and many of the players have almost 7000 points, so you’d better hurry.

I found myself wishing that I’d had a few more days just to take in the sites, see more costumed characters, pick up another sack full of free goodies and samples, but the highly inclement weather and fatigue and a lack of traveling companion prevented me from visiting the event on a second day. We sampled milkshakes and played drums and suffered through barely-English presentations of completely bizarre board games that promoted unhealthy lifestyles. Last year, I got in trouble for my lambasting of certain items by name, so I’ll avoid those strings of diplomatic eMails this year by being polite. Poke around through the photo gallery and see what we saw.

There’s dreams and aspirations packed into the halls of the Javits Center during Toy Fair. Sometimes, you recognize dreams from last year and you’re pleased that the dreams are still alive, no matter how crazy. Some dreams you never see again, and some blossom into incredible things. And some dreams are spandex-clad girls who giant metal helmets with Jimmy Durante noses on them, and you sigh and wander to the next booth.

I can’t wait to do it again next year.