Jingle All the Way was one of my favorite christmas movies I saw as a kid and even as I grew up I continued to like it. I was shocked to find later on that the general consensus was that it was a terrible movie since to me it had always been very clever and an over the top yet accurate picture of what happens during this season. Over the years the general consensus has changed and now I can say opinions are more divided about the movie with them leaning towards it being good. I guess kids who loved the movie just grew up and were able to defend the movie they love. But I’m not here to talk about the Arnold Schwarzenegger film with future Anakin Skywalker Jake Lloyd but of Turbo Man the superhero that becomes the toy of the year.
Even though it’s clearly a parody of shows like Power Rangers and other superheroes I still saw the character of Turbo Man and his foes/allies as rather cool and wanted to see more of them and secretly hoped for a show based on them. The actual figure being so big I thought looked stupid but I wanted a Turbo Man figure after the movie sadly I didn’t know they existed until later when I saw it on sale at a store. I don’t remember it being too expensive but I felt “older” at the time and couldn’t ask for such product anymore. I remember searching for it on ebay a few years ago and it was fairly cheap but never bit the bullet and got one but I’m still unsure if I regret never getting it or not, apparently they’ve become a little rare now and can go for as much as $100 USD. You can see some reviews here and here which also provide a little more info on it.
Now for some reason someone saw this and decided to make a kickstarter to make a figure for the movie, if you look at the page it’s all barebones and very suspicious but also odd. Apparently this guy wants to make a more accurate version of the figure from the movie and even got the figure from the director of Jingle All the Way which he’ll do a 3D scan of it. Now What makes it odd is that he’s limiting the production to 100, some people say it’s so it can be like the movie where there is scarcity of the figure but it kind of doesn’t make much sense business wise or to do something for the fans as by this point with over two weeks left int he Kickstarter it has already sold out. He also doesn’t seem to have the license and the figure won’t have any voice commands so he won’t even be 100% film accurate so in a way the original figure which does have voice commands even if it doesn’t look the same as the movie version might still be the better choice since it’s not like the film version looked amazing either. He might make more later or might not as the project doesn’t seem very well planned, hell he might not even make any at all given the suspicious nature of the page..I don’t really know if it’s a scam or a hoax that is playing a trick on people as it re-creates the problem of the original film. The figure is over $100 anyway so definitely not cheap.
With that said I still think Turbo Man is kind of cool and while I may never own a figure of him or want a show anymore I definitely wanted both as a kid. And yes I even thought Booster was kind of cool, he’s basically a pink wookie, what’s not to like? So Merry X-Mas and happy toy hunting whether the Christmas toy of the year is a Tickle-Me-Elmo, a Furbi or a Wii. It’s Turbo-Time.
