Voltes V, Mazinger Z, Daimos, Gunpla and the peculiar economics of delayed gratification. Some childhood wishes take forty years to arrive. Then you have to work out where to put them.
There is something faintly ridiculous about being in my fifties and still getting excited over a small plastic robot. Not just any robot, obviously. I’m talking about the ones that occupied a substantial part of my childhood imagination, back when Japanese animation dominated our afternoons and the idea of owning a proper Voltes V, Daimos or Mazinger Z seemed about as realistic as piloting one.
These days, I can actually buy them. Not every premium edition, and certainly not every character somebody decides to release, but enough to make my younger self thoroughly impressed. Some arrive ready to pose, while others are an intimidating collection of plastic runners and instructions. A few require considerably more patience than I remember having as a child.
The curious thing is that I never really stopped wanting them. I merely got busy with the rest of life. School, work, marriage, children, bills and all the things that fill the space between childhood and middle age. Then one day I discovered that the same robots were still being made, only with much better joints and considerably more convincing paintwork. Unfortunately, they also needed somewhere to live.
When the television was the toy shop
Growing up in the Philippines in the late 1970s and 1980s meant catching Japanese super robots at precisely the right age. Voltes V, Daimos, Mazinger Z, Grendizer and their mechanical relatives were more than afternoon programmes. The theme songs, combination sequences and shouted attack names formed a kind of common language among children who watched the same channels.
I still associate the week with a procession of robots: Mekanda on Monday, Daimos on Tuesday, Mazinger Z on Wednesday, Grendizer on Thursday and Voltes V on Friday. Memory has probably straightened a few crooked television schedules, but the rhythm of those afternoons remains clear. I remember the anticipation, the theme music and the improbably complicated machines much better than I remember what homework I was supposed to be doing.
These programmes had another particular place in Philippine memory because the cancellation of several robot shows under the Marcos government became part of the story we inherited. As children, though, we were primarily interested in what happened to the heroes and when the robots would return. The grown-up explanations came later.
Imported toys were another matter altogether. Seeing a Japanese robot on television did not mean you could stroll into the nearest shop and pick up a decent die-cast version. Even when merchandise was available, it could be expensive. The imagination had to do much of the work; in fairness, it was quite good at it.
Voltes V: five machines and forty years of wanting one
Voltes V still has a different weight in my memory. Its five machines each had a job, a pilot and a place in the elaborate ritual of combination. The transformation was practically the main event. Watching the components connect was as satisfying as the ensuing fight, possibly more so, and I could have sat through that sequence every afternoon without complaint.
Now I have the Action Toys Mini Action Voltes V, which offers a satisfying version of the very gimmick I wanted in childhood: separate vehicles becoming one robot. The figure is small by collector standards, and that’s part of its charm. It doesn’t need an enormous display cabinet or a price that makes me question my life choices.
I also have the Bandai Robot Spirits Voltes V: Legacy figure, which belongs to a different generation of design. Where the Mini Action version speaks to the original cartoon, the Robot Spirits figure reflects the more mechanically detailed Philippine live-action interpretation. It concentrates on sculpting, articulation and the modernised armour rather than trying to reproduce a complete five-vehicle transformation.
As a designer, I enjoy comparing them: the original’s immediately readable silhouette against the elaborate surfaces of the new incarnation. As a child, I would have been thrilled to own either. As an adult, I’ve somehow convinced myself that two versions are perfectly reasonable because they do different things. That’s probably how collections begin to get out of hand.
Daimos: the robot that knew how to throw a punch
Daimos never felt quite like the other super robots. Its martial-arts movements gave the battles a physical quality that the usual flying fists and energy beams couldn’t entirely match. The Tranzer-to-robot premise was wonderfully strange, but the big attraction was watching a giant machine apparently fight with the instincts of a human martial artist.
My Action Toys Mini Action Daimos is one of those purchases that would have seemed impossible when I was little. It’s compact, recognisable and full of the angular details that made the television design stick. I’m particularly fond of the way the chest, shoulders and head preserve that uncompromising late-seventies styling.
I no longer need to spend hours staging imaginary battles. Sometimes I just look at the figure, adjust the pose and put it back. And there is a slightly embarrassing moment when I find myself handling an ageing piece of childhood mythology with the caution of somebody carrying an expensive camera lens.
Mazinger Z: from rocket punches to the pleasure of construction
Mazinger Z was arguably the cleanest of the lot. That head, those chest plates, the red and blue accents and the huge mechanical fists were all the visual information you needed. The original animation did not have to explain every bolt and panel line. At television resolution, the silhouette did the work.
I have the Bandai Integrate Model Mazinger Z, a wonderfully odd idea built around separate capsule components that assemble into a substantial robot bust. It’s precisely the sort of miniature engineering solution I would have wanted to investigate as a child, although I probably would have lost one of the small components before finishing it.
The Bandai HG 1/144 Mazinger Z (INFINITY Ver.) takes the design in another direction: a familiar character reinterpreted with far more mechanical surface detail. There are visible layers, panels and articulated sections that make the finished model feel like a small study in imagined industrial engineering.
I can appreciate that without necessarily believing that more detail always means better design. The older Mazinger has a directness that still works. The INFINITY version is more elaborate, more tactile and very appealing as a kit, but sometimes I think the designers of the original television robot understood something about restraint that modern merchandise has forgotten.
One reason I enjoy these model kits is that they invite me to pay attention to how an object is put together. After decades in graphic design, looking at surfaces, shapes and visual hierarchy has become almost involuntary. With a model kit, those habits suddenly have somewhere physical to go. I can examine the articulation, think about how a joint is concealed and wonder why a particular armour panel is separated in that way.
A larger Mazinger Z model in the same INFINITY design language makes an interesting comparison too. The character is instantly recognisable whatever the scale, but the construction and proportions can feel surprisingly different. That’s probably the collector’s trap in miniature: the temptation to think that one more version might finally be definitive.
Grendizer: the more alien-looking relative
Grendizer occupied another corner of the same childhood imagination. It looked stranger than Mazinger Z, with its horned head, imposing shoulders and the Spazer flying-saucer arrangement. It seemed less like a giant machine somebody had built and more like a mechanical visitor from another world, which was probably the intended effect.
My HG UFO Grendizer (Infinitism) kit keeps the unmistakable form but complicates the surfaces in much the same way as the modern Mazinger. The redesign has aggressive edges, layered plates and mechanical detail almost everywhere. It’s an interesting exercise in updating a cartoon icon for people who grew up looking at that icon and now have money to spend on plastic.
The difficulty, as always, is knowing when the redesign has gone far enough. A good kit should preserve what made the character recognisable in the first place. Grendizer’s silhouette remains the main attraction, even when the smaller details threaten to take over.
I enjoy posing the models, but I can spend just as long looking at them from different angles, studying how the new lines relate to the old ones. That is a fairly designerly way to play with toys, I suppose, although it doesn’t stop me wanting the Double Harken to look suitably dramatic.
Bio Robo: two jets, one very good afternoon
Bioman brought the same enthusiasm into live-action television. Bio Robo’s combination involved two large jets rather than a convoy of five different vehicles. It was simpler, and arguably more sensible, although sensible wasn’t exactly a priority in those programmes.
The Bandai Super Mini-Pla Bio Robo kit gives me the pleasure of assembling the separate components and then displaying the combined robot. The design has a direct, blocky authority that I still associate with the era. It doesn’t try to disguise its shape. It looks like an enormous television robot and is completely unapologetic about it.
Super Mini-Pla is an attractive compromise for me because the build is part of the purchase. You’re not just paying for an object to occupy a shelf; you’re also paying for a few hours of focused work. That matters when so much of my day takes place on a screen. The instructions, the runners, the feel of parts clicking together and the gradual arrival of a recognisable form all have their own appeal.
There are plenty of times when an old robot design looks absurd under contemporary scrutiny. Bio Robo’s proportions were never going to pass for plausible military hardware. But that’s beside the point. The proportions were designed to make sense in action scenes and on children’s television, not to satisfy an engineering department.
It still works for me. Perhaps I enjoy it even more now that I can see the creative decisions behind the design rather than simply accepting it as a machine that happened to exist on television.
Voltron: five lions and the tyranny of choosing a display mode
Voltron offered what may be the simplest irresistible idea in the entire combining-robot genre. Five mechanical lions become one giant hero. Each lion is distinctive enough to be interesting on its own, and together they form something greater than the sum of the parts. There is probably a sensible marketing explanation for why that idea works. I prefer the version where five robot lions are simply a very good idea.
I have the Bandai Super Mini-Pla GoLion kit, based on the Japanese design adapted into Lion Force Voltron. Its appeal is precisely the thing that the television programme sold so effectively: five separate machines that can be assembled into the robot you already know by heart.
The kit also exposes the compromises behind the trick. Depending on the configuration, some pieces need replacing or setting aside, and the finished lion forms don’t always behave like independent toys. I can live with that. The pleasure is in putting the whole arrangement together and watching a familiar mechanical silhouette emerge from smaller pieces.
The frustrating part is display space. Five lions look rather good spread along a shelf. Voltron itself looks even better standing upright, preferably with the Blazing Sword. Unfortunately, the shelf cannot have both arrangements at once without some very optimistic mathematics.
As a child I never had to work out whether the five lions could fit beside a Gundam. My collection existed mainly in my head, where there were no rent payments, no dust and no limits on display cabinets.
Gunpla: when buying a toy turned into making one
At some point the interest in owning robots developed into a fascination with building them. Gunpla is not quite the same proposition as an action figure. The box contains plastic runners, numbered parts, instructions and the promise that with enough care the finished object will look something like the illustration on the lid.
I like that relationship between effort and result. A model kit slows me down in a way that buying a ready-made figure doesn’t. After so many years producing work through software, there is something satisfying about having a physical task in front of me. I can concentrate on a single piece, trim it, test the fit and slowly make an object appear.
My interests have included the Gundam Astray designs, particularly the Gold Frame with its elaborate finish, as well as the more flamboyant Sengoku Astray and other builds. I’ve experimented with weathering, airbrushing and the occasional overenthusiastic application of rust. It’s useful to have a hobby that reminds me that making mistakes can be part of learning instead of a reason for somebody to request another revision.
The kits themselves are also wonderfully designed objects. I appreciate the box art, the instruction diagrams, the progression of construction and the way colour separation is worked into the plastic. At their best, they are small lessons in design and manufacturing as well as science-fiction collectibles.
Of course, having the money to buy a kit doesn’t magically produce the free afternoon required to build it. I have a Space Battleship Yamato 2199 kit waiting its turn. I prefer to think of the unbuilt boxes as future entertainment rather than a monument to overambitious shopping.
Blokees Transformers: a short build and a familiar face
Transformers appealed to a different part of my childhood. They weren’t machines piloted by humans; they were characters in their own right, capable of changing into vehicles and making a surprising amount of emotional sense while doing so. I still remember how persuasive the simple idea of a truck becoming a robot could be.
The Blokees Transformers figures I’ve gravitated towards are an appealing way of revisiting that world. They are buildable and articulated, but not necessarily transformable. That’s fine with me. I can appreciate a good robot form without insisting that every limb fold away into a convincing truck.
A smaller build is sometimes exactly what I want. It doesn’t require several evenings of sanding and painting or a permanent corner of the dining table. I can put it together, appreciate the articulation and move on. Not everything needs to become a major engineering project just because I’ve reached an age where I can afford a hobby knife.
Star Wars and Marvel: learning not to collect absolutely everything
Star Wars occupies its own long-running shelf in my head. I don’t need to explain the appeal of a Darth Vader figure to anyone who grew up with the films, and Hasbro’s Black Series allows those characters to exist as detailed, articulated objects rather than memories of much simpler old toys.
I also own a Hasbro Force FX Darth Vader lightsaber. It’s one of those purchases that would have sounded completely unreasonable if I’d tried to explain it to the child who first saw Star Wars. A lightsaber that lights up and makes noise is precisely what he would have wanted. It just happens to be rather larger, dearer and more awkward to store than he imagined.
The Marvel Legends range poses a slightly different challenge. There are hundreds of characters, countless costume variations and the recurring temptation to complete a team. I don’t intend to try. I prefer to buy selected figures that mean something to me, rather than collecting for the sake of filling gaps in a checklist. The same goes for the Black Series. A line can be enormous without my part of it needing to be.
Product photographs here illustrate the figure ranges rather than document every exact figure on my shelves. The distinction matters. A personal collection doesn’t have to include everything that a manufacturer releases, whatever the marketing department might prefer.
The economics of getting what you wanted
There’s a peculiar calculation involved in buying something you first wanted forty years ago. Part of the price is the actual object; another part is the weight of all those years of wanting it. That can make an ordinary plastic robot seem unusually important, or persuade a perfectly sensible adult that a new release is somehow different enough from the three versions already in the cupboard.
I’ve become more selective with time. I don’t chase rare editions just because they are rare, and I don’t assume that the most expensive item must be the best. A small, well-designed figure can give me more satisfaction than an enormous die-cast showpiece. In fact, if the showpiece is too large to display or too delicate to touch, the cheaper toy may be the more enjoyable one.
The greatest trick of modern collecting is its suggestion that a collection can be complete. There’s always a recolour, a different finish, a revised sculpt or a supposedly definitive edition. As somebody who has worked in advertising and marketing as well as design, I know perfectly well what’s happening. Knowing the trick doesn’t always make me immune to it.
The issue that refuses to negotiate, though, is storage. A childhood collection occupies as much space as your imagination allows. An adult collection needs shelves, cupboards, dusting and an occasional conversation about why the living room has acquired another robot.
The child wanted the robot. The adult notices the joints.
Sometimes I try to imagine what my younger self would think of all this. He would probably recognise Voltes V, Daimos, Mazinger Z, Grendizer and Voltron immediately, and he’d be delighted to discover that the figures can actually stand, pose and in some cases come apart and recombine. He wouldn’t care whether the kit was an exclusive or whether the secondary market had decided it was valuable.
He might be surprised by how much time I spend looking at engineering, paint applications and the arrangement of armour panels. When you’re ten, the whole point of owning a robot is to play with it. When you’re older, you develop an appreciation for the people who figured out how to design and manufacture the thing. Perhaps that’s one of the few genuine advantages of being a collector with decades of design work behind him.
I’m not trying to reconstruct childhood. It was a particular time, in a particular place, with television programmes that arrived when I was exactly the right age for them. The objects on my shelves are not substitutes for that experience. They’re small, rather well-made reminders of it.
The younger me would still probably want to take one down and stage a fight. I’d let him, I think. But I would ask him to be careful with the joints.
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