Retro Toys From The Super Groovy 70s: Shogun Warriors
Written By: Ken Hulsey Imagine being a preteen boy in the late 1970s when Mattel unleashes a series of three-foot-tall Japanese robots that shoot missiles out of their fingers upon a generation that had just begun to discover quirky Asian sci fi via afternoon and late-night movie features (Godzilla, Gamera and Ultraman). Everyone I knew had to have one of these toys. Number one, they were huge, and two they fired stuff across the room. In a pre video game America this was the pinnacle of cool toys and it gave my generation the ability to wage giant robot wars in our living room. Insert some HO scale model train buildings and some Hot Wheels cars and you could recreate any scene from a Japanese movie ... if you imagination was good enough. After the toys initially were introduced, Mattel inserted Godzilla and soon Rodan to the toy line, taking the product to a whole new level. The somewhat smaller Godzilla figure was an instant hit, and every kid had one at the top of their Christ...