Mini Cantina is Live!

 

Want a place for all of your 3 3/4" action figures to hang out, but don't have much space?  Try a mini-cantina!  

This smaller SpaceBarr fits in an Ikea Billy Bookcase, or any shallow, low shelf.  One piece, no frills, but lots of fun!

The made-to-Order listing is live now on Etsy!

Making a Cantina - Part II

The Whole Mess

The recent minor explosion of retro-styled 3 3/4" figures made me need an excuse to keep buying them.  I'd been planning to make a party skiff out of one of the newfangled Hasbro Desert Skiffs, but never got around to it, and they just didn't have enough space.  What I wanted was a Kenner Creature Cantina, but it wasn't big enough.  

So the Cantina started with a booth.  Restaurant booths are deeply and fondly engrained in my memory, but that's a story for another post.   I didn't know of a booth big enough to seat four action figures (just the right amount to negotiate passage to Alderann), and set out making one.  

The design was simple enough, though I had to print in pieces due to my tiny printer, but the concept worked!  A little wider and another half, and the booth would be enough room for four figures.

Hammerhead is suspicious of Party Palpatine

But the important thing was the bar.  A booth isn't much on it's own, it needs a bar to gather 'round.  The bar required a new printer.  Once that was dialed in, so was the desing.  And once that started, it got elaborate.  I couldn't leave the bar without lights, or a glow-in-the-dark bartop.  Because that is my way.

LEDs in the bar, and tables that glow.

Add another module for an entrance, and another for small booths (perfect for disposing of pesky bounty-hunters), and the Cantina was done.  At least for the first pass. A place for every 3 3/4" action figure to hang out, swap stories, and drown their toy sorrows (and an excuse for me to keep buying Glyos, Super 7 ReAction, Mezco 5 Points, etc.)

But WHY do The Gods Hate Kansas?

But why? (Also this scene doesn't happen in the novel)

I read the story so you don't have to!  

Circa 1950s - There was a saying that "The Gods must hate Kansas" because more meteors were being found in Kansas than anywhere else.  So the Gods hated Kansas so much they threw lots of rocks at it...  I don't know if that was ever actually a saying, or just made up for the novel, but Kansas does seem like a good place to find meteors.

Controlled by aliens?  Drunk? You decide! (this scene does happen in the novel)

Story-wise, The Gods Hate Kansas feels like a prototype for It Came From Outer Space:  Aliens crash on the moon, need resources on earth to fix their ship, and travel there in meteors that keep landing in Kansas.  It gets much, much more convoluted from there, but in the end, the aliens are reasonable and just didn't think to ask humans for help.  Oops.

My pulp copy lacks the standalone editions excellent cover (I first saw that one at Powell's books in the 90's, begging the fascination), but it does include several nicely weird Virgil Finlay illustrations (see above), and this vintage Carhartt ad:

Pete, buddy, you might want to workshop this one a bit more

Making a Cantina - Part 1

Welcome!  

Decided to dust off the old blog, because sometimes rambling into the void is helpful:

Kenner revived Star Wars figures in the mid 90's.  Ever since, I've been expecting an update to the classic Creature Cantina playset.  Kenner was eventually bought by Hasbro, and there were a few tries at a new Cantina - a cardboard layout, a few pieces of bar, a table here and there, but nothing complete.  Nothing comprehensive.  I figured at some point, Hasbro would give it another try. Especially now that crowdfunding through Haslab was making giant, expensive Star Wars playset dreams a reality.  A new cantina was surely in the works, right?

And it was! About forty years since the original, Hasbro finally released a new cantina playset! 

... For the Navarro Cantina in The Mandalorian.

The set was a wall, a bar, some chairs, fiddly beverage containers, and very tiny shot glasses.  The gimmick was that cardboard inserts and alternate parts could show the cantina 'wrecked' as it was in the show.  The playset could also be expanded by purchasing additional copies.  But at $50 a pop, that didn't feel like a good investment.  

The Navarro Barro (credit to Adam Pawlus at www.16bit.com for the name) eventually dropped in price until being blown out (no pun intended) for under $20, which is when I bought mine.  Even at that price, it didn't feel like a good value.  It wasn't fun.  But it was the Navarro Barro that made me realize I didn't want a new Hasbro Cantina.  I still wanted Kenner.  Something big, chunky, and funky. Something a 70's kid could only dream of.  A place where 3 3/4" figures from every line and era could hang out.  Thus the Space Bar started it's journey.