ZippyNL said:
Great post and nice memories from everyone. My hunting grounds were Camberley Toys and Woolworths, both on Camberley high street. Camberley Toys was best and kept going right up until the Last 17, when the interest sadly just fizzled out. I saw Luke Stormie there once but didn't have the money, and just a couple of days later it was gone, and a few weeks after that, they all were.
But then Woolies began their infamous sell off, which coincided nicely with first paper round.
I was a long way from having a set in 1985 and although I was 15 years old, Star Wars figures remained a huge obsession. The figures I was most proud of included a Greedo on a Kenner ESB card I had bought in 81', a Hammerhead I found on a ROTJ Palitoy card around the time of the movie in my local Woolworths and a Tri-Logo original Princess Leia in the summer of 84'.
The thing about the last 17 is that when they were originally released in those pre-internet days, nobody knew how many there were and what the set consisted of. A letter in Return of the Jedi Weekly was from a fan who had picked up a figure called Barada which sounded terribly exotic. Letters in subsequent issues mentioned a few more from the range. I bought a Han Solo in Carbonite and Luke Skywalker Stormtrooper Disguise in the shops and was struck by the apparent drop in quality. The comic might have attempted to put a list together in one issue.
Even though I had become more adventurous and was scouring London and all of the local towns for Star Wars by bus, I only found around half of the Last 17. Tri-logos were everywhere but there was nothing out of the ordinary. Perhaps as you indicated ZippyNL, the last 17 did not hand around in the shops very long. The Woolworths sell off was fantastic but it was only vehicles and playsets that I ended up buying and tottering down the road with.
It was only when I began buying second-hand Star Wars advertised in local newspapers that I finally bagged EV-9D9, Imperial Gunner, Imperial Dignitary, Amanaman, the last Ewoks, Anakin Skywalker and those illusive final Cantina Creatures. It's funny that the very last figure that completed my set was that Barada I had read about years before. I had begun clubbing together with other collectors by then in the late 80's and we managed to figure out what the entire set actually consisted of, Blue Snag included. As I had completed my loose set I could concentrate all of my efforts on collecting MOCs. My first job was only £40 per week, so that didn't go very far.
One of the main enquiries I received when I ran the old fan club was regarding the set of figures. I had a typed list and a photocopy of the range ready and waiting to post back to people. Those happy days when the postman would arrive with something interesting!
Craig.
