Company : McFarlane
Series : Movie Maniacs 4
Character : Army of Darkness : Evil Ash
Year : 2001
Ages : 13 & Up
Barcode # : 787926176032
This was such a good era for toys, early 2000’s music store shit. Through whatever machinations of capitalism and the economy, this was a period where companies like McFarlane were dropping absolute bangers like this Movie Maniacs and the first Marvel Legend series, among other gems – but there was nowhere to buy them. Big box retailers like Walmart were re-tooling and their toy departments were allergic to anything as horrific and decidedly adult as McFarlane’s movie homages or moderately upscale. Comic book stores were at their all time low, as dead as arcades. I remember my mid-sized town had exactly ONE (1) comic store at this time and it was tucked away in a small residential neighborhood ran out of the first floor of a converted home and always seemed to be one bad week away from shuttering.
This meant you had to SCOUR for sources, and music chains like HMV and Sunrise stepped up to fill the void. What a cool fucking store for the time. You could walk in, listen to a sample of the latest NIN album, pick up a CD, and grab a cool figure of Evil Ash all at the same time. It was kind of magical. Little counter-cultural oasis for weirdos like me to soak up whatever we could find.
The past is always rose tinted. The prices were terrible, nobody ever knew when anyone was getting anything, and it was impossible to get a complete series of anything. Still, it’s a little slice of time that I miss – and toys like this Evil Ash transport me back.
The Toy Archivist 