World’s Greatest Toys!

As I have stated in the past, I am astonished by the positive response to the book. Members of the Mego Museum have been almost uniformly supportive (when I say “almost,” all I will say is: There is a juicy blog coming up in the near future!).

In anticipation of the announcement and upcoming Mego Meet, I realized I needed to create something cool for the people who stepped up to support the project, and especially those who are able to attend The Gathering of Geeks next week in Wheeling, WV.

For collectors and aficionados of Super-Heroes, one of the more exciting elements of the book is a preponderance of utterly gratuitous, full page “splash” images (oftentimes featuring rare and/or special figure variations). Almost every character will enjoy a decadent, imaginative, full-size poster (finished dimensions of the book: 9″ x 12″). It’s not very sensible from an economical standpoint, but dammit, this is my love letter to Mego, and I’ll do whatever the Hell I want.

It’s not only certain individual characters that get this royal treatment. There are expository chapters, which detail the state of Mego during each and every year the company produced World’s Greatest Super-Heroes (1972-1982).

I needed a giant splash image for the inaugural year. This was a no-brainer for me. The moment I considered the chapter title (1972: 1st Wave Heroes), I knew exactly what I had to do.

I’m only mildly ashamed to admit that I spent more time on this single image than on (perhaps) any image I’ve ever manipulated.

Roughly 14 1/2 hours.

Ouch. But it usually takes a little extra effort to see a vision through to completion. Lord knows I’ve learned that lesson repeatedly while working on this book.

For this image, each figure was photographed independently. The logo and background are original illustrations. The finished image should be recognizable to any child of the ’70s. Upon completion of the image, I felt I had created something special. It was instantly clear that this should be my thank you to everyone who vocally supported the project. This should be the exclusive present to supporters and Mego Meet attendees.

I dropped some coin and had them printed. Those of you who joined the Mego Book Mailing List prior to tonight can expect one of these in your postal mailbox very soon (yes, including those outside the United States!). The importance of support is not lost on me, and I hope you guys enjoy this when it arrives:

Benjamin

____________