February 2009 New Specialty Toys — Collectibles

Dark Horse presents a Spirit mini-bust based on original concept art by Will Eisner. Modeled from an unpublished drawing from his archive as sculptor reference, thereby bringing Eisner's creation to life. Sculptor Tony Cipriano has captured the essence of Eisner's art perfectly. Included with this bust is a separate Central City manhole cover, to be placed on or near the bust by the consumer. First published in 1940, The Spirit kept newspaper audiences enthralled for more than thirty years with stories about a masked vigilante who fought crime with the blessing of the city's police commissioner.

A special deluxe package featuring Burton's hardcover book, The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories, packaged with a specially created figure of Voodoo Girl. The four PVC figure sets based on characters from the book have been available, but Voodoo Girl is being brought forward for the first time exclusively for this package, which is a deluxe 7" x 4" x 9-1/2" double-sided window box. One side displays the book cover and the other side frames the elaborately detailed figure.

In the years following World War II the major export from Japan wasn't electronic equipment, but toys, specifically tin toys. Crafted in the shapes of submarines, planes, trains, cars, and horses, one of the most popular motifs were toy robots. Constructed in virtually every shape imaginable from the 1940s throughout the 1960s, they ranged in appearance from horror to science fiction characters. Today, these toys are not only fondly remembered by collectors but are being re-created for a whole new generation. Capturing this period in history became a passion of painter Eric Joyner's and in Robots and Donuts he celebrates this forgotten era with images marrying the metal creations with images plucked from his imagination. And, almost always, with donuts. This book also features a look finto Joyner's painting style as well as a glimpse at some of his other non-robot themed artwork.

Never before and rarely seen artwork, outlines, and entire stories from Jeff Smith's Bone are collected in this full-color hardcover volume. Bone is an international publishing sensation with hundreds of thousands of loyal readers and no end in sight to its growing popularity. Now, for the first time anywhere, see the homemade comics, sketches, and grand plans that set this masterpiece of literary fantasy in motion. From there, take a tour through piles of promotional art, holiday cards, and pivotal storytelling moments from the revolutionary self-publishing years, where Bone went from "the little comic that could" to an industry leader that changed the face of comics. Finally, revel in the wonder of Bone as a complete 1300-page graphic novel, a work for the ages, filled with comedy and tragedy and adventure for generations to come.

Based on the new motion picture and television series The Clone Wars comes this quarterly, graphic-novella series from Dark Horse. Dark Horse’s first offering, “Shipyards of Doom,” is a digest-sized graphic novella written by Henry Gilroy, the head writer for the TV show, and illustrated by the prolific Fillbach Brothers.

In an inexplicable worldwide event, forty-seven extraordinary children were spontaneously born by women who’d previously shown no signs of pregnancy. Millionaire inventor Reginald Hargreeves adopted seven of the children; when asked why, his only explanation was, “To save the world.” These seven children form The Umbrella Academy, a dysfunctional family of superheroes with bizarre powers. Their first adventure at the age of ten pits them against an erratic and deadly Eiffel Tower, piloted by the fearsome zombie-robot Gustave Eiffel. Nearly a decade later, the team disbands, but when Hargreeves unexpectedly dies, these disgruntled siblings reunite just in time to save the world once again.