1st time at Bangor Market Bazaar - Northeast Collectibles

Part of my old routine for toy hunting in Bangor Maine was K-Mart. Next door was the Hands Of Hope Thrift Store, which was actually quite large and I'd gotten some good stuff there over the years. When K-Mart closed down in April of 2017, Hands Of Hope followed not long after, leaving me two less places to frequent for toys. I didn't have that many to begin with. A car dealership now occupies the old K-Mart lot, but next door, in the old thrift store, a new place opened a couple months ago. The Bangor Market Bazaar Craft & Flea Market. I try avoiding the mall area on weekends during the day and they're only open on Saturday from 10:00 to 5:00 so I hadn't been yet.

Today, I don't know, I just had one of those feelings I get. Intuition or perhaps divine intervention from the toy gods. Those feelings lead me to hidden caves, unknown waterfalls, ledges with beautiful views, all of which I write books about, and of course, toys. I walk into a store and can feel it, there's something good here. I am so glad I braved the crowds today because I couldn't have been more right. Northeast Collectibles.

The flea market is awesome, there were tons of crafts, some stunning log furniture, delicious smelling food, lots of great artwork, and amidst all the homemade goods, a toy dealer with so much product, he took up two booths. Now, toys around here are, well, they're Star Wars and superheroes. And that's about it. You'll find a few wrestling figures here and there but collecting the stuff I collect is not easy in northern Maine, or really New England in general. Let me tell you, Northeast Collectibles is a breath of fresh air to Bangor collectors. Bobby Verge has got it all and surprisingly, the prices were amazing. I walked away with 13 action figures and only spent $50. And holy s**t did I get some good stuff. Let's get into it.

The first item I saw that sparked my interest was the Battle Armor Skeletor from POP Vinyl, yes, the very one I was searching lower New England for in the days following Christmas. He was sold out everywhere, they still had the others from his series, but no more Skeletors. So when I saw him for $10, I grabbed him immediately, and almost Battle Armor He-Man to get two for $15 but decided to pass on him. I really hate POP Vinyl figures, mostly their un-detailed faces, but Skeletor oddly looks good, maybe it's due to the whole skull for a face thing he's got going on. So I was pretty excited already.

Then, among the carded Star Wars figures, I spotted a Thundercat. Mumm-Ra, the 6" vintage style Bandai figure from the 2011 line. I wanted him back when he first came out but couldn't afford him, in fact, I was just talking about those figures in a blog post from last week. Even when they went on clearance at Walmart, I wasn't able to get him. I hadn't seen the new show yet and just assumed I would hate it (couldn't have been more wrong, easily one of the dopest shows ever) but I at least wanted the vintage style Mumm-Ra and Lion-O. So for $5, I couldn't pass him up, in package at that.

Awesome, I was ready to call it a day. Until I realized there was a booth right next door that had even more toys, pegs of MOCs and bins of loose figures. Multiple bins. The vendor told me he had some MOTU and Thundercats in one of the buckets. And boy did he ever. Unfortunately, I recently got my hands on all of the Thundercats he had except one, Tygra. We've already discussed what happened to my Thundercats collection but this marks another one off my re-collection list. Tygra puts me at 12 Thundercats so I'm slowly getting there.

Now, I have all the vintage MOTU figures, most of them nearly complete but I still love to look at them. It takes all my strength not to purchase every MOTU figure I see, no matter how many of them I already have. However, when I was a kid, I didn't feel the need to get every He-Man variant they made, though I did have most of them. I bought Flying Fists He-Man a couple years ago at the Toy Vault, he was in pretty rough shape but for a few dollars, I didn't mind. That left me needing only one, Thunder Punch He-Man. My eyes lit up when I saw him in the bin of MOTU and Thundercats figures. Really good shape too, beautiful figure, I kinda wish I had him as a kid now. Oh okay, I think I remember why I didn't, caps scared the crap out of me and that's kind of his action feature.

In that same bin of figures in baggies, I spotted something I never thought I'd see in Maine, I've only ever seen one other, even in lower New England, and I bought him last week. The Sectaurs. Not one but two of them, two freakin' Sectaurs, and not the two I already have, but two of the good guys, Mantor/Mantys and Zak. I'm sorry but what kind of name is Zak? They don't have their weapon holsters but whatever, I wasn't going to let Sectaurs pass me by. Oddly enough I was just reading about them last night and saw that someone acquired the license to them and got a Kickstarter campaign going to produce new figures. They met their goal and the figures should be out soon. They look awesome by the way and I'll definitely be picking up a Spidrax if possible. Wish I knew the campaign had been going on, I would've thrown some money their way.

A couple was going through the toy bins for quite a while so I got to talking to the vendor, a cool dude name Bobby Verge. He sells on eBay and goes to the conventions. It's nice to see someone selling action figures around here, this area is so dry for collectors. He said he rotates figures out every week so I'll be going back again and again. And luckily he takes cards if you spend over $10 because I don't usually carry cash on me, turns out today I would've had just enough.

When the couple finished digging through the crates, I took their place, sweating a little in my coat because it was hot in there and, ya know, action figure excitement. Oddly enough I didn't have to poop, usually I have to poop when I spot action figures and get all excited. Too much information? Ah, whatever, you don't mind. He had tons of Ninja Turtles but I'm only after a select few, just replacing all my favorites that I sold off during the poor college kid years. In one of the bins I found Triceraton, one of the last TMNT figures I need. He's missing his tail but for $2, who cares, I don't see him from behind anyway.

In one the Christmas trip blogs, I discussed my Mortal Kombat figure collection. I hope to one day complete it once again which sucks since I pretty much had the komplete kollection (see what I did there, k's instead of c's because it's Mortal Kombat, sorry, I couldn't resist). When matching up my new Rayden and Shang Tsung figures to their weapons recently, I noted how impossible it would be to get my hands on some of the rarer figures. Well, today I got my hands on three of them. The movie edition of Rayden, who I unfortunately do not have accessories for, but that's okay. Smoke, who's in rough shape with some marker markings on him and his sash ripped off after it was colored red, but I actually have both of his swords in my little weapons bag which is almost empty now. I also grabbed a movie edition Goro who I didn't have as a kid, I had the regular one without the extra markings, I wasn't sure if the same kid colored him as well but if he did I was quite impressed by the work on this figure. Turns out, no, that's a factory paint job. Unfortunately his ponytail has been ripped out and he had a foot amputated and an attempt was made on his other foot. Diabetes possibly? I think I'm going to try to attempt to re-sculpt his missing parts and take it back to my customizing days. Other than that he's in great shape and amazingly, he stands despite having only one foot. I also grabbed a GI Joe Street Fighter Ryu figure who I miraculously have all of the weapons for in my box, all 7 and his stand. Who needs seven freakin' weapons? Ryu, that's who. I bet it was him who cut off Goro's foot, after all, he's got seven blades to choose from.

So, I had all the Mortal Kombat GI Joes, what I didn't have as a kid were the enlarged versions of them. I didn't know they even existed until a few years ago. I finally saw my first one in real life last week at one of the Toy Vaults, Sonya Blade, in package. I almost bought her too but the card was a bit damaged. I would have absolutely loved to play with these, they stand at 5 inches tall and have the exact same articulation as the regular sized Joes. So I snatched both of the ones they had this week at Northeast Collectibles, Liu Kang and Johnny Cage, both in excellent condition. I believe they're from the Mortal Kombat Trilogy series from 1996 or so, and now I want them all.

There was also a large selection of wrestling figures, almost bought a loose Sunny and yeah, probably should have grabbed her. I have one out of package but plan on using her for a custom because she doesn't have her special Legion Of Doom attire. Quite a few Mattels and Jakks, none of which I needed for my collection. There were also some video games and consoles, some cool artwork of comic characters by a local artist, some Star Wars figures, Lord Of The Rings, DC and Marvel, and lots of random figures you don't typically see at places like this. This felt like the type of flea market vendor I'd find in southern New England, but with much more reasonable prices, some of the guys down there are charging more than the figures are even worth. This place is f***ing awesome. I'm already looking forward to next Saturday. You can check them out on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/Northeastcollectiblesbrewer/