#Talking Animals

[therobotmonster]

What does the Comic tell us About the Brute Force Toyline that Never Was?

Brute Force was Marvel's failed attempt at joining in the toy-cartoon-comic fun back in 1990.

What isn't often talked about (if ever) is how much effort Jose Delbo (and whoever else was doing character design work in pre-production) put into planning for the realities of toy design, because it's not hard to suss out what was intended from the art alone.

Parts Reuse Was Planned From the Start:

The metal production molds are the most expensive part of toy production, so any time you can reuse parts across multiple figures is a savings. Each side has two unique members (Hip-Hop and Lionheart for Brute Force, Armory and Ramrod for Heavy Metal) three that share obvious parts with an opposing figure.

Uproar and Wreckless appear to use the same upper arms, upper legs, pelvis and probably chest. Uproar's bullets were likely planned as an accessory.

Surfstreak and Bloodbath appear to just have different heads, maybe tails, and either different accessories and limbs or just different accessories depending on execution.

Soar/Slipstream and Tailgunner appear to have unique add-on armor for the wings, heads, and legs. The wings might also been different, but I'd guess that when time came to mold plastic they'd have used the same ones.

Size Classes are Easy to Guess:

The "charge into battle" shot gives you every indication of what size everyone was going to be sold at. My guess, based on the art and the action features later shown off, is it would break down like this:

Small - Soar, Surfstream, Bloodbath, Tailgunner

Medium - Lionheart, HIp-Hop, Ramrod, Uproar.

Large - Wreckless, Armory, the toxic mutant (if they planned on making the off-theme guys)

Super Large - Heroic and Evil Transports

It's harder to place Heavy Metal since they don't seem to have add-on vehicles, but the art represents Armory as being huge and a major threat...

And uproar seems to have mass equal to Lionheart on his cycle, though he might have been packed in with the villain's large transport or had another add-on vehicle planned later.

It's likely that the vehicle-attached figures would have gotten solo releases, likely with different decos. As was the style at the time.

They Planned for Action Features, and I think I know what they were.

Furman and Delbo knew how to make a toy-comic, and everyone gets to show off their action feature in a toy-comic. Brute Force leaves some solid clues for what those features would have been. Now, there would probably have been launchers (Wreckless's Bearzooka), water-shooters (Surfstream almost certainly had one), etc, but I'm talking more about the showcase feature.

Surfstream and Bloodbath Were Low-Effort Transformers-

-or else they were biting MOTU Dragstor's style. Surfstream and Bloodbath clearly had both swimming/rolling configurations and upright figure configurations.

Soar (and likely Tailgunner) Had Blast-Away Armor

You don't do this trick twice in 4 issues if it's not your gimmick.

Wreckless and Uproar loved Hugs

My guess is there was at least some thought put into the possibility of Wreckless and Uproar having a "bear hug" feature that could work as general limb-swinging and chest pounding. In addition to the grabs Wreckless does a lot of right hooks and, oddly Uproar mainly fights with his mace for a character with bullet bandoleers. This one's harder to nail down because the actions are very obvious for bear/ape characters, but either a weapon-swing or a grab/bear hug seems really likely.

Wreckless's gun is the kind that you could mount on a figure's shoulder without them needing to hold it in-hand, so the arms might have been free for the action feature if my guess is right.

This Octopus Bastard Spins

You can't tell me Armory doesn't spin. perfectly radially symmetrical middle section designed in such a way the central body could spin while the legs and head stay stationary. arms that grip weapons or other figures, he's huge and clearly meant to be Heavy Metal's mega-weapon. He spins.

Hop-To Heroes

Now, if there's one thing the Brute Force characters do, it's leap. But the characters with the larger lock-on vehicle armor all leap out of the vehicle to attack a foe at least once.

I have to wonder if the vehicle figures were intended to be ejected from the vehicle as a leaping attack. (this would seem thematically in line with the armor-shed gimmick from Soar) This would be in addition to some general reconfiguration between low-riding "speed" modes and upright battle modes.

Ramrod would have had a headbutt gimmick.

It's literally all he does in the comic. I don't think he even has a gun.

Conclusions

Brute Force was intended into be a not just an action figure line, but a feature-heavy character driven line. The play patterns imagined were ambitious. I see Starriors, Transformers and Centurions DNA in there, and it would have been a lot more fun than Captain Planet for an eco-themed franchise.

The Marvel crew clearly learned a lot from the toy industry from working with Hasbro, Kenner, Mattel, Mego and numerous others through the years, and it shows. This concept started with toy ideas, it's just a pity no one was incentivized to make them.

[yellowbrickramble]

Remember what Logan said at the river?

If you like my comics, please support me at patreon.com/peprally

Or buy something from daisyfm.storenvy.com

[stonedragonisnthere]

I give you Snake Aran

He’s a common grass snake.

I like how Joe’s associated w deer, deer are my fave animal besides goats n sheep < 3

If the fandom agrees Little Mac is a rabbit, then I’d like to say Mr Sandman is just an even bigger rabbit/hare

[imthefailedartist]

Your teacher is a talking goat, but my good sis' skin being green is too much for you?

I'm gon' need for Elphaba to burn it all down.

[dimachina]

really good writers know when its good to mention an animal in the text and really bad writers will turn up the dial and have 15 different talking animals with their own side quests

[krissiefox]

(paw print image from here)

This is a list of blogs about furry characters or the furry fandom in general. If you are looking for specific furry art blogs, you can check out my art blogs list!

https://oekakidogarchive.tumblr.com/ Old furry Oekaki board art from the 2000s!

https://www.tumblr.com/glamfurarchive Collect of colorful furry art from the early 2000s.

https://hipster-animals.tumblr.com/ Animal art blog inspired by a book called "Hipster Animals".

https://anthrocon.tumblr.com/ A blog about Anthrocon. Lots of fur suit photos!

https://yestfurday.tumblr.com/ Old school furry art

https://ancient-furries.tumblr.com/ even OLDER furry art!

https://funnyanimalarchives.tumblr.com/ Collection of furry art ranging from the 70s to the early 2000s.

https://funnyanimalfandom.tumblr.com/ Furry art from the 80s to the 2000s.

https://antifafurs.tumblr.com/ Antifascist furry blog.

https://www.tumblr.com/furryfoundfootage Obscure furry animation & cartoons!

https://www.tumblr.com/199x-furry-archive Even more vintage furry art!

https://www.tumblr.com/vintagefurry Another nice collection of classic furry art!

https://www.tumblr.com/fursuit-gifs Fursuit gifs!

https://www.tumblr.com/soviet-furries Animal characters from USSR cartoons!

https://www.tumblr.com/furchive Archive of various furry things throughout history!

[ericdarkgoat]

Do other animals see humans like we see parrots and crows?

I mean we can imitate alot of animal sounds....

[ostdrossel]

I had to 😜 Sound on!

(He came back and the second video fit better so I redid it.)

[mermazeablaze]

All of our cats over the years learn to say "Mom" or "Mama". I'm not talking about random sounds that sound like speech. Our last cat, Salem, learned to say, "Hello, mama!" When he couldn't find me or wanted my attention he would yell this. Now our cat Frey, is upset he's being crated at night in our bedroom (naughty potty boy) & is currently chirruping & saying, "Mom! Mom! Mama! Mom!" It's both cute & unnerving.

[prairiesaddle]

The best animal voiceovers ever. No ifs, ands, or buts (one butt) 🦭 🦦 🐢

[luvinaeverdene]

The Cat Returns (2002)

Directed by Hiroyuki Morita

[yellowbrickramble]

The dungeons are under the castle.

Neither the Wizard of Oz nor the Scarecrow's ever used them. The last person to put anyone in the dungeons before today was Oz Pastoria II's mother, Ozma Scarbel. This won't be on the test.

If you like my comics, I'd appreciate if you subscribed to my Patreon! (link in bio)

[johnstonreviews]

Crossover art of the amazing digital circus and randy and friends, you'd think in a digital world full of fudge monsters and ghosts she'd be used to this by now as for randy being clueless as he is does not know pomni is actually not a kid

Pomni meets ranger randy

Pomni is owned by gooseworx

Randy is created by me

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

The book with the incest, the magic zoo boat, the talking snake and the talking donkey.

[worldofstoriesanddreams]

Billy vs his lion guardian.

Who do you think will win?

Find out in Billy the Lion Boy.

Get it from Barnes & Noble

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/billy-the-lion-boy-janice-wee/1147124637?ean=9798230215332

Or other bookstores