Jr 5 This & That Explained

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Junior 5
This & That

Release Date: Rumored 1/27
Price: $8.95

These pictures were found on VinylmationTraders.net. The 5th of the Junior sets is themed This and That and pairs up either objects that we are used to putting together or total opposites.

 Apples & Oranges


How does this Jr compare to the others? I like the use of orange and red in the ears and arms.
Bells & Whistles

One of my favorite designs in this set. It’s clean, simple and visually pleasing.
Bread & Butter

I knew the body had to be bread, but it took a few minutes to see it… then it was genius. The use of the arms and neck for crust is great.
Chicken & Beef

I just think of the Cow and Chicken Chick Fil A battle here.
Hats & Streamers

It’s party time on this colorful figure.
Hearts & Flowers

I like the contrasting colors here.
Comedy & Drama

We assuming a Dramatic mask face on the back.
Moon & Stars

A little empty for my taste, but works well in this theme.
Pins & Needles

Are you on these for this set? In all honesty, it will probably be a pass for myself but only because I focus on more Disney themed figures due to the slew on products coming out.
Stop & Go

A perfect fit in this set.
Rice & Beans

I’m thinking of sending this one to Dave Ramsey. Any financial talk radio fans out there? Ok, maybe I shouldn’t. He would yell at me for buying any Vinylmation based on my income.
Thunder & Lightning

This one seems so simple, but is one of my favorite designs in the set. I like the font choose on the Boom! How often do I get to praise a font style on Vinylmation?
Unicorns & Rainbows

I’d bet my Park 1 chaser Maria Clapsis had something to do with this one.
Up & Down

Make your own variant. Turn it on it’s side and its Left & Right.
A Wing & A Prayer

I was going way too deep on this one before MC pointed out what it was. I started looking up Greek Gods to figure out who went with Mercury.
Xs & Os

Kind of like play book from Sports Jrs. This can also be Hugs and Kisses for you romantic thinkers out there.
Mystery Chaser 1

Click image to reveal chaser. Highlight white space below for commentary.

My favorite figure in the entire set! Smoke & Mirrors. I seem to always like the chasers from Jrs.
Mystery Chaser 2

Click image to reveal chaser. Highlight white space below for commentary.

We don’t get it. Can you help?

Juniors 5 found in WDW

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Another great tweet from @vinyl79. He found this Junior 5 box at Frontierland. The picture is a little blurry, but it seems to match up with the figures we talked about earlier this week. We don't even have an official release date for these from Disney.

Japanese Zodiac Review by Annemarie

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

I have a pretty sizable Vinylmation collection, and I get most of it from the Disney Stores and Disneyland in the typical boxing fashion. But ever so often I have to head over to Ebay to catch that ever elusive and special variant I just can’t seem to get my hands on, or an unobtainable set stateside. Later this year, I’m headed to Japan, and Tokyo Disneyland/DisneySea obviously, to check out what they have to offer in the Vinylmation world, and the trading scene in general. I planned to pick up some of the Zodiacs there, but when I saw an almost complete set for a steal on Ebay I had to jump on it.

I’ve been wanting these for months, ever since they were unveiled last year. And now that I’ve got my hands on them I can say they are without a doubt one of the best Vinylmation sets ever, in my opinion (if not THE best).

The color scheme is unlike any other set we’ve seen. The gold/silver/bronze scheme is slick and gorgeous. Other than the jet-black outlines used on the details, these are the only three colors used on the set. It keeps them cohesive and fits them together as a set perfectly. I love the choices they used for these figures. They are:

Year of the Rat- Remy from “Ratatouille”
Year of the Ox- Maggie from “Home on the Range”
Year of the Tiger- Tigger
Year of the Rabbit- Thumper from “Bambi”
Year of the Dragon- Elliot from “Pete’s Dragon” (not pictured)
Year of the Snake- Sir Hiss from “Robin Hood”
Year of the Horse- Pegasus from “Hercules”
Year of the Goat/Ram- Bo Peep’s sheep from “Toy Story”
Year of the Monkey- Abu from “Aladdin
Year of the Rooster- Chicken Little
Year of the Dog- Patch from “101 Dalmatians”
Year of the Pig- Pumbaa from “The Lion King”

Here’s a helpful graph in case you’d like to figure out your animal:


I’ll start with my favorites: Abu, Bo Peep’s sheep, and Sir Hiss.


Abu is my favorite in the set. His face is captured perfectly on the vinyl, his expression is great and it looks like it was taken from a moment in the movie exactly. I have to mention the detail and model of each character is captured perfectly on every single figure. Sir Hiss is a great, obscure choice (anyone who has read any of my articles knows I love the obscure choices best!) I love how they chose to include his basket as the feet. I think the best design is the sheep from Toy Story. If you turn it to the side, there are two more sheep on each side, designed so the arms are their faces. Amazing!


My next three faves are Maggie, Chicken Little (my year!) and Pegasus. Again, the colors look so unusual and fantastic. Maggie will be rare in particular, as there isn’t much merchandise of her (with reason). That movie wasn’t very great, but no one can argue it didn’t LOOK fantastic, and this figure is a great example of that. Love the Chicken Little figure, and Pegasus’s expression is great.
We finally have a Thumper figure! Not much to say about him, or Patch even.. they look pretty great. I normally might complain about choosing Patch or even Pumbaa again since we already have them in other sets (and there are so many other dogs and even pigs to choose from) but the set is so beautiful and they look so unique I can’t bring myself to care. I prefer this Tigger’s face to the Animation 2 Tigger, but they are both great for their own reasons. And Remy is cute… I don’t think I’d seen him (or remembered him if I had) when I made my own custom of Remy, but I anticipated in that article that they’d probably just do him facing frontwards and we might lose a bit of his “rattiness” this way. I still think this, he looks a bit more like a mouse here than a rat. But again, the figure’s so adorable I don’t mind.

My FAVORITE feature of the set is the detail on the back of each figure: a footprint with (I’m assuming) the Chinese character that denotes each year! The detail in each footprint is awesome, here you can see Abu’s monkey foot, a sheep’s hoof print, and Sir Hiss’s slither tail. Each character’s footprint is equally awesome, and unique to that specific character. If there’s anyone out there who can read Chinese and these say something different, please let us know!
I haven’t been able to get my hands on the chaser, which is Si/Am from “Lady and the Tramp”

I’m not sure of the significance of this choice for this set, but I love it. Anyone care to enlighten me?

Overall, a fantastic set. I think they could even do more series with this idea: Just to name a few ideas off the top of my head,

Year of the Rat- Ratigan from “Great Mouse Detective”
Year of the Ox- Babe the Blue Ox from “Paul Bunyan”
Year of the Tiger- Rajah from “Aladdin”
Year of the Rabbit- Roger Rabbit (OF COURSE!)
Year of the Dragon- Maleficent
Year of the Snake- Kaa from “Jungle Book”
Year of the Horse- Widowmaker from “Pecos Bill”
Year of the Goat/ Ram- Djali from “Hunchback of Notre Dame”
Year of the Monkey- Terk from “Tarzan”
Year of the Rooster- Allan-a-Dale from “Robin Hood”
Year of the Dog- [Insert practically anyone here]
Year of the Pig- Hen Wen from “The Black Cauldron”

Just some thoughts. Again, I like these obscure choices.

What characters would you use for a Zodiac set? Leave a list in the comments.
Will we see a Japan Zodiac Series 2? I hope so!

Also- if anyone can help me complete my set with a Si/Am or Elliot, please tweet me @AdmiralAkbrown. I’ll do custom work for these! 😉

-Annemarie

Release Weekend News

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

A few interesting notes about the latest slue of Vinylmation releases. First off, D-Tour. One of the original six designs that we saw Disney release photos of was NOT available for purchase at D-Street this weekend.

Flowers & Vines has not yet, to our knowledge seen the store shelves. In it’s place was a design Disney hadn’t told us about.

Headphones Mickey, a figure we reported for sale on eBay a few days ago, is fully stocked at D-Street. Here’s a peek at the shelf as it looked last night.

I saw a lot of interest in these new designs. We also learned via Disney Artist Eric Caszatt’s Twitter that: “Artists at DDG created flat 2D art that Maria Clapsis translated to the Vinylmation Mickey platform.” I was wondering about that as the first thing I did when I ripped open my first D-Tour was check the bottom of the feet… no credit given.

Next up, when Disney released the turn around pictures for the Theme Park Favorites, there were two we had not seen on the series poster.

They are variant designs of the yellow “Classic Fan” figure from the poster. A look in the D-Street display case…

…and the shelves…

…show no sign of the Red and Blue versions. Might these be more variant Cast Traders? In retrospect, this is a great series to have such traders. As this is series geared toward the guests of the parks that are not necessarily into Vinylmation yet and Disney would like to hook them on the idea of trading. A concept that hooked a lot of us into this hobby in the first place. Your thoughts?

Also available this weekend for the first time state side, the Chinese Zodiac series.

No oddities here. And the final release was this 9″ Valentine’s Day piece from Holiday 3.

Also of note around Downtown Disney…

The shelves where stocked with plenty of Astrology, 2012s, Flags and Nerds Rock! (minus Daisy) but notably missing from D-Street were the WDW 40th figures and Sea Creatures. Granted, there are a ton of new releases, so they probably had to move them around property to make space.

We also saw signs that Urban 6 is on sale for Buy One, Get One 50% off. Did you pick up any new Vinylmation this busy weekend?

Episode 056 Herbie

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Ep. 056 Herbie


This week we talk about the latest releases including the Chinese Zodiacs and Theme Park Favorites. We review the D-Tour series. And Annemarie joins us to talk Variants… do we like them? What ones make sense? And as always, we open the Mystery Mail Bag and read your questions and comments.

Play in Pop up Player


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Release Dates Confirmed

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Today Disney confirmed some release dates.

On Friday, January 27, this Bernard and Bianca 2 pack from Animation 2 will release a D-Streets for $26.95. It is an LE 1200.

Jr 5 This and That releases at D-Streets and other park locations on Friday, January 27 as well. We have seem these around the parks already, but things get official tomorrow.

It wasn’t a misprint… this ONLINE EXCLUSIVE 9″ Park 8 Main Street Electrical Parade Dragon retails for the ridiculously high price of $74.95. No 9″ has ever been priced so high. They made 1500 of these! Its already just an OK design in my opinion. I have a feeling this one will be 50% next Christmas. This is our first look at the turnaround and Maria did a great job. I’m actually coming around on liking this design after seeing the whole thing, but not for 75 bucks.

Our best look yet at this trio. Love it! Can not wait to pick this Fife and Drum set up for $44.95. It is an LE of 5000 and is also an ONLINE EXCLUSIVE.

Tapestry of Nations Set

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Update: 01/28/12 Pictures of set taken at trading event. We also learned that this 6 figure set was designed by Casey Jones and is five 3″ and one Jr. Remember, it releases February 3rd for $99.95 and is LE 2000.

Box Set
Tapestry of Nations figure
Tapestry of Nations figure
Sage of Time
Tapestry of Nations Jr.
Tapestry of Nations Puppet
Tapestry of Nations Kite

01/27/12 Among various announcements, Disney has sneaked in a release under the radar and onto the Events page. On February 3, a 6 figure set depicting the Tapestry of Nations Parade will release at Walt Disney World and Disneyland D-Streets. This LE 2000 set will retail for $99.95. In addition to D-Street, this set will also be on sale at select locations at Epcot including MouseGear, Disney’s Traders in World Showcase, Mission: SPACE Cargo Bay and World Traveler. No pictures have been released yet, but here is a look at what could be in the set. The parade ran through EPCOT from 1999 to 2001 and had a unity and world peace them. The parade was populated by large puppets on rotating drums.

 There are a lot of puppets and performers to choose from. The only one I would be on being in there would be the Sage of Time shown above. That was the leader of the parade. The pictures below show examples of what could be in this set.
*pictures from MousePlanet.com

Cutesters at the Beach Explained

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Cutesters at the Beach
Release Date: February 10, 2012
Where: Disney Stores and D-Streets
Price: $9.95
Details: This is the 4th set in the Cutesters series. The second released as a Disney Store exclusive.

Update: 01/26/12 Pictures of entire set added. (taken at WDW trading event) We also found out this series, unlike Cutesters 3 Like You, will be released at D-Streets as well.


Update: 01/26/12 Besides the three figures confirmed at the Florida Project (Lifeguard, Snorkeler, Beach Ball) the rumored set list is as follows: Crab, Turtle, Volleyball Player, Snow Cone Stand, Snow Cone, Seagull, Starfish/Sand Dollar, Surfer.

 Lifeguard


This set premiers some new accessories. Lifeguard has a visor. The swim suit has the white cross on it and a whistle is painted on around her neck.
Snorkeler


We saw this one at the Florida Project. The goggles look good in person and are a fun addition. The bubbles in the ears really help this one pull off the underwater feel.
Beach Ball


This is a very good fit and a perfect use of the entire canvas. A splash of water at the feet, footprints in the sand, beach ball in the head and a sun shining bright in the ear.
Crab


Absolutely brilliant design. Cartoonish crab peeking out over the sand with sea shells in the foreground. The crab fits perfectly.
Turtle


For sure fits the title Cutester. 
Volleyball Player


A neat design with the goggles shaded in over the eyes. She has a big volleyball painted on the body.
Snow Cone Stand


What a smart design and goes perfectly with the Snow Cone vinyl. Really three parts to this one… sand in feet, stand and sign in body, and the order window in the head! Great.
Snow Cone


Another design that just fits in so many ways. A clear body and clear ears are used and I agree 100% with the choice.
Seagull


For sure a cute face. Many of the faces, especially on the animals, have similar characteristics blending this set seamlessly together. 
Sea Shells


Simple, but effective and fits the set nicely. 
Surfer

Maybe the most ordinary figure in the set. A blond girl with sun screen on the nose and wearing a wet suit. I do like the bird in the ear.
Mystery Chaser


Sand Castle, Scuba Diver, Metal Detector? What are your thoughts?

Cutesters Set List Washes Up On Shore

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Cutesters at the Beach will be the 4th set in the Cutesters series of Vinylmation. Like the 3rd set, “Like You”, Beach will be a Disney Store exclusive. We have heard about a February 10th release date although now announcement yet by Disney. What do we know about this set? 3 figures were put on display at The Florida Project back in September: Lifeguard, Snorkeler and Beach Ball.

We have since heard rumor of the rest of the set list: Crab, Turtle, Volleyball Player, Snow Cone Stand, Snow Cone, Seagull, Starfish/Sand Dollar, Surfer.

A crab would be great! They can put the claws or eyes up in the ears. Or maybe claws instead of hands… its been done before.

A turtle would also look great. Neck extension so you can extend and lower the head? Accessory shell on back?

A snow cone fits mighty well onto the canvas. Will it be like above or more “cute” with like a cartoon face?

A seagull could be drawn very cute and can certainly look great on the canvas. Questions: Beak? Tail? Wings?

Again, like the snow cone, will this be drawn “cute” with a face? Or just some shells against the sand?

It’s rumored to be a surfer girl in a wet suit. will she have an accessory surfboard or just painted on?

Besides the mystery chaser, that is what we know. The DV team’s chaser guesses: Sand Castle, Shark, Metal Detector? What are your thoughts on this set list and a guess at the chaser?

Spotlight On: Custom Vinylmation Artist Shannyn

WDWNT on February 9, 2012

Shannyn sent us in some more customs. This time she focuses on the Disney ducks.

First, a great looking Donald and Daisy painted on the front of this colorful canvas. It even has hearts stuck onto the head and ear.

The back shows a love letter from Donald to his sweetheart.

Then she made a 3″ set of nephews. Each one individualized with their colors, different facial expression and varying ear designs.

I have always struggled with my duck tails and all three of my customs have a different style. I really like the way Shannyn approached the tail and might give it a shot myself. Great work Shannyn!