Rogues' Roundup: Runner-up Space Guys and Space Girl???

 

It's the weekend, and I still haven't done two of the three posts I was planning for this week. One of the things I promised myself was that I wouldn't just fall back on a fiction post. That led me to a new set of acquisitions I've been meaning to cover, from a line I had debated whether to purchase at all. Here are the Ajax space guys... and girl?

Now for the backstory, these figures are a line that would have been made and sold alongside the Marx Space Guys (see also my Space Guys To Astronauts post) in the 1950s and (perhaps...) early '60s. We previously saw the "off brand" side of vintage Space Guys with the Archer Space Woman. At the time I made that acquisition, I was looking into another figure that might add some diversity, an Ajax figure often described as a lady. Inevitably, I gave in and bought one, along with a couple others. Here is the figure in closeup.

What struck me about this is that this figure is, if anything, distinctly ambiguous in gender. Sure, the hair "looks" like a woman's, especially for the stereotyped '50s. For that matter, it seems to have been the only sculpt out of the entire line with visible hair, so it would make far more sense if it was "supposed" to be different. (Make sense. Space Guys. Ha. Ha. Ha.) To me, however, this still isn't open and shut. The long-hair look was quite common for very masculine adventurers of the serials, pulps and comics of the 1930s through the 1950s, enough that there are probably people who would call it the "Prince Valiant" look without ever setting eyes on that or any other vintage example. It also has to be said that there is nothing else about the figure to suggest feminine anatomy, beyond the fact that it is a little shorter and more lightly built than the other two in this set. (I'll get to that momentarily...) My verdict is, it could go either way. 

That still leaves the question if this is a "vintage" figure. The plastic of all the figures is distinctly of the "hard" variety, even more so than the Archer figures. I tried a "clack" test, i.e. banging them together (see the now-tragic Ukrainian Marx figures), and concluded that all three were of separate origin. With this one in particular, there is an unusually pronounced mold line that looks actually skewed. It all fits with this being an inferior reissue, but the original couldn't have been a lot better. Here's a couple pics. This gets gruesome...

I suppose I should stop making fun of the "scar" on "Moxon". Nah.

Now for the other two, what's most interesting is that the uniforms are clearly based on the Tom Corbett, Space Cadet TV series, which I did absolutely no research on in the course of developing a story around the Marx Space Guys I knew were based on it. I consider it conclusive that the Ajax line is effectively a Tom Corbett knockoff, though it is debatable if they copied Marx or drew more directly on the show. The odd part is that I now know that the knockoffs look far more like the uniforms of the show than many of the Marx figures, possibly because the latter were influenced by the Dell tie-in comic. The most striking thing about them is that in many ways, the Ajax figures differ even more from Archer's space figures than their Marx counterparts. The Archer figures have an almost Greco-Roman look that belies the wonky outfits and accessories. The Ajax figures are simply cartoonish, and the look works in its own way. One more thing is that there are extensive reports of considerable variations in size, with some described as no taller than "large" 63mm army men (see the Timmee nuclear guy/ firemen) and others reportedly up to 3.5 inches tall. These proved to be about 3", just the wrong size to fit easily with the Marx Space Guys, and appear to be sculpted on the same scale. Here's pics of the other two. I am inclined to say the green one is a later, less detailed copy, but I've seen enough weirdness that I'm holding off on judgment.

The big bonus with this lot is that it came with another Archer Space Lady. It is definitely some kind of copy/ reissue, as there are very visible contact points where the sculpt was altered from the original mold. The clothing and other details are close enough to the one I had that they could be used as the same character in two different poses. On the other hand, it has quite distinct facial features, which makes me wonder if they were trying to hint at racial differences. (I know, I already joked about taking Space Guys seriously.) It's still a nice addition to my collection. Here's the new girl with my previous find (the one with her hands on her hips) and my other Archer figures. I don't recall if I noted before that the Archer ladies are very well-endowed, which is a significant consideration in interpreting the Ajax figure. Clearly, few if any designers considered the possibility of space suits bulky enough to hide secondary sexual features.

"Clearly, shoulder pads will be the trend of 1988..."

"I surrender to your fashion sense."

And here's a rear view. This will give a better sense of the style and the level of detail in the sculpts. As often happens, the "copy" is if anything sharper in detail than the original/ older figure.

And here they are with the, um, Non-Binary Space Person! 

And here's a lineup for size comparison. There's a 70mm Marx Space Guy, plus an MPC police office and a Halloween figure I hadn't featured before.

And here's a line-up of ladies, an MPC Teenette and a couple Evermodel train figures!

And that's enough to wrap this up. This brings me to the end of the Space Guys, except for one more acquisition still incoming. Only time will tell if I do more with the Ajax line. And here's one more pic...

"That's right, run from my unisex hair cut!"

Thats all for now, more to come!