So kinda bored with all the gushing "OMG Want!", +1, blah blah blah topics here so I thought I might try to find some answers to burning questions in my mind. Specifically what's the story behind some of M1go's color schemes? I know Yugi is a oldskool collector so I thought some of the color choices (that seem to recur over an over) might be homage to something?

Specifically these:

Purple/Blue/Metallic Green/ Gold on black vinyl used on Matango, mini egg goji (recently), Kemur, etc etc

Bright Green/Yellow/Gold used on GID vinyl, used on the new GID Gabara, Dancing Goji, Gezora etc

I'm sure there are more examples of recurring color schemes but can't think of any at the moment.

Is it just an artist preference and not a homage at all?

Yuji spends a lot of time studying the old MaruBuru stuff to come up with authentic-lookng paint schemes, but sometimes he just strikes out and does something crazy that isn't a reference to anything. It's about 50/50.

Whatever he does, conclusion: IT WORKS!

And that's pretty much the only criteria he uses to make the final decision. He's got a stable of three nerds plus his wife hanging around the compound to bounce things off of.

Yeah, I think experience is key, too. Yuji's obviously no stranger to vintage vinyl, so he's seen mountains of kaiju colorways and thus has a good idea of what works and what doesn't. What's interesting to me is how M1 paint ops have evolved over the years. I don't know if it's an influence from modern designer vinyls or not, but M1 figures seem to be getting more and more creatively painted. Not necessarily MORE actual operations, but just more imaginative use of metallics, glosses, etc.

i heard a rumor that some of the vinyls that were done more recently on black vinyl were to catch the eye of the younger generation of collectors. Try to compete with the newer style vinyls.

Interesting. I never thought M1 would have to compete with newer vinyl styles? Message to you young whipper snappers "Collect M1, you won't be disappointed!" At least I've never met someone who has been.

As time went on, Yuji started doing more color versions utilizing clear vinyl, and glow vinyl with crazy sprays, but the core of what M1GO does has always been plain old "toy style." Nothing more or less complex than what you'd find on an old Marusan or Bullmark vinyl, using the same color pallette the original toys did.

This all raises the question of how "artistic" the original 60s/70s schemes were intended to be. I think it's fair to say that some of what has become classic or an ideal to achieve in the contemporary postmodern age wasn't given quite that level of consideration in the OG iterations, and I'm not just talking about the absence of a nostalgia factor back then.

Or is it unfair to say that?

i don't think thats unfair to say. some of the most popular color combos from vintage pieces do seem like they were applied without a lot of thought. you can see this in some of the old hawaii paint applications where toys from the same factory have variations in density of spray applied with placement of the colors only loosely similar. i like a lot of old vinyl paint apps because they seem true to their origins: assembly line work for kids' bath toys. the loose spray on top of fine-detail sculpts adds to their appeal for me. the imperfection amplifies my appreciation of the sculpt itself. of course awesome paint makes awesome toys look incredible, but in a different way.

M1 rules. best woo yet.

M1 does rule and it's great to read how he came up with the colors....but old"skool?" Cmon you're 40. That type of writing is gibberish.

41 actually soon to be 42 in October. 'Oldskool' comes from my many years as a jungle dj. Also when I was a buyer for a store we joked and used it as a term when catergorizing certain records so I guess it stuck in my head.

So to rephrase to make it more appealing to a grammarian such as yourself bryce:

"I know Yugi is a legendary collector from a finer age of kaiju, so I thought some of the color choices (that seem to recur over an over) might be homage to something?"

The answer to that is "not at all." The vinyl/paint choices were chosen with three things in mind: 1) will it jump out at kids from the shelf, 2) will it make character x distinct from character y, and 3) is it a paint job we can do quick and easily?

And honestly, I think that can be applied to the sculpts too. They seem to have been done quickly and by people with moderate sculpting skills (you can pay them less). The result is often an awkward looking interpretation of whatever monster they're aiming for. Cheap and dirty, done without any thought of them being revered decades later. But it's partially because of this that the toys have so much character. Similar in a way to brutalism.

To be honest, I was playing devil's advocate, there. Of course you're absolutely right, but that's one of the cool things about the tributes. What was once a reality of the production line became a craft and an art along the way.

Absolutely. The sculptors probably had a couple of black and white stills to work with and yet they still managed to convey the basic "spirit" of the monster designs. That's the main thing I love about these old toys.Ah, got it. This is how I play devil's advocate:

"RRRROOOAR!!! I AM THE DEVIL'S ADVOCATE! I AM TELLING YOU TO DO BAD THINGS BECAUSE THE DEVIL WANTS YOU TO DO IT! RRRRRRR!!!!"

Ah, so Roger's a method actor!

what about unlicensed highly stylistic ikb hedoran?


u are probably 100 % right, still this sounds too rational for my taste.
i have no idea what art is, but i could imagine that makers: sculptors, painters
had much more fun creating these monster figures than toymakers in the west doing
playmobil or lego for instance.

...just being passionate about what they were creating
would be enough to me considering it artistic in a way.

besides why would a child want one and the same toy in 5 different colorways???
very unlikely. ...only have a dog, but i know kids from being a goduncle.
playing with colors of paint in interaction with color of vinyl with no relation to tv series.
they did it for fun!!! and kept them MIB.

great thread. interesting discussion!


a friend of mine still tries to convince me that sponge bob is made for grown ups.

I worked at Nickelodeon when Spongebob premiered. You can assure your friend that the character was designed for a specific age range of kids, not for adults. Everyone in my division thought that Spongebob was totally bizarre ... we had no clue he'd turn out to be so popular with a much wider age range. At the time, the kiddie show "Blues Clues" was all the rage. The employees had a special fondness for the since-forgotten "Angry Beavers," which was a lot weirder than Spongebob.

Angry Beavers was awesome. It had a lot of elements of cartoons I enjoyed as a kid plus some interesting and fun new stuff. The characters, situations and reactions were wonderful. Sponge Bob has always seemed like a Ren & Stimpy rip to me as far as it trying to be "weird." But I guess anything after R&S seemed that way. I know, "Ren & Stimpy ripped old cartoons off Jeff!" but it's that case of "influence vs. rip off" I see with Ren & Stimpy where Sponge Bob just came off as "hey remember Ren and Stimpy? Let's do that again!" Not "hatin" on it, just never came off as genuine to me and generally bored me.

Sorry for the OT action there.