by I certainly dabbled in more than my fair share of toy lines as a kid, but one of the lesser ones turned out to be one of my favorites. Let’s remember M.U.S.C.L.E. in this edition of Retro Ramblings.
M.U.S.C.L.E. Men started out as a manga comic in the late seventies in Japan called Kinnikuman. It proved to be so popular, that an anime series of it was adapted and ran from 1983 – 1986, and focused on an intergalactic form of professional wrestling. Toy company Bandai quickly started producing the little two-inch figures as the show’s popularity soared. And like so many other things, when it became popular there, toy companies in the United States took notice, and Mattel launched its own line of the little pink warriors. Since the name Kinnikuman translates to “Muscle Man”, Mattel named the line M.U.S.C.L.E., an acronym that stood for “Millions of Unusual Creatures Lurking Everywhere”. M.U.S.C.L.E. Men were produced from late 1985 – 1988 before finally fading from store shelves. Although their popularity was short-lived, it was impressive, as M.U.S.C.L.E. was listed as one of the 10 Best-Selling Toys of 1986.
The little pink M.U.S.C.L.E. warriors were not really posable in any way and were so small that you couldn’t really do much with them. But the fact that they came in multi-packs, and that they were marketed as “wrestlers” was enough to hook me initially. It was intriguing to see who would win in a fight between someone with a motorcycle for a body or a human with a ripped body and the head of a wild boar. Of course, who won that battle was up to the kid in control of the action. That is until the Hard Knockin’ Rockin’ Ring Wrestling Arena came on the market.
It was a small yellowish-orange contraption with glorified rubber bands for ring ropes, and a plastic arm that held the two combatants. You and a friend would do battle by moving your wrestler side to side, Rock ’em Sock’em Robot style, in an attempt to knock your opponent off of his plastic control arm. If you did, you were the winner. The key was to find one whose body was slightly too big to fit in the controller, and then force him into it anyway. He would then be almost impossible to beat. My best friend and I would play this for a while, and for each match, we would select a combatant. The winner would win the losing figure from its owner. Both his and my collection of these increased and decreased, depending on who had the better day of competition.
The big drawing point for me was two-fold. First, their small size made them easily transportable. It was quite easy to stuff several in each pocket and head off somewhere and take the action with me. The second part was the cheapness of the toys. For a kid with a light allowance, being able to pick up multiple little M.U.S.C.L.E. warriors in one package was quite the draw. They were typically available in a blister card pack of four figures for around $1. Then there was the clear trash can pack that was stuffed with 10 mighty M.U.S.C.L.E. Men for the low price of $3. So as you can see, a kid could grow their collection quickly with minimum allowance spent.
M.U.S.C.L.E. figures were one of my favorite toy lines as a kid. Heck, I still enjoy the newer versions they put out today based on other popular properties like Masters of the Universe and Street Fighter. If you remember them, hit me up in the comments with your thoughts on them.
There was a store I used to go to, called Winn’s in the eighties, my mom used to buy me a pack of MUSCLES every week, along with an ICEE and some popcorn. I had a bunch of the multiple colored ones, purple, red etc. My favorites were the one who had a hammer looking head, the main heel with horns, the pyramid, I think his name is something like Mr Sunshine,and the extra small figure with the cape. Years later, I found the entire Kinnikuman collection from Japan for 250 which had hundreds of figures and a DVD booklet, it was missing the DVD’s but that made it cheaper. There’s a GameCube Videogame that released, along with a PS2 game here in the states, and in Japan, there’s 2 ps2 games instead of just one. There was an amine that used to come out on the Fox Box I think it was called ??? 🤔 Pretty funny show, it was based on the next generation of MUSCLES. I always wanted that Championship belt and the ring, maybe one day I’ll get them🤞
Loved these so much as a kid! Never had the ring or belt though. Id love to repurchase the whole set now. Do you have a recommendation for where to purchase them online? I’ve seen some scattered across eBay and mixed in with other similar Bandai figures that aren’t the official M.U.S.C.L.E. figures.
I really have no idea where to find the originals outside of eBay.
Had a bunch of these at one point, but must have got rid of them because I can’t find any of them anymore. Hoping they will still turn up at some point because I have good memories of playing with them,