Lords of Light Prototype Figure Found

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I'm really happy to showcase this neat discovery of this lost Lords of Light toy. I've been smitten with these figures since the mid 1990s when I first found out this hidden treasure.

A bit of a background on Lords of Light: After Mego Toys folded, a company known as PAC packaging (who light assembled many of your childhood favourites) got into the manufacturing game and produced several Toy lines in the early 1980s.

Lords of Light were produced using retooled Micronauts molds, with the added gimmick of having a glow stick in their chest cavity. It was all the brain child of PAC toys founder Joe Ruzzi (you can read my interview with him here)

The line had all the trappings, a comic book insert telling the story of the brave Izzurians (get it) fighting the dark evilites. There was even a big budget TV spot set to air, which thanks to my pal AcroRay I have a beautiful print of to show you below:





Unfortunately, the Lords of Light were cut short in mid launch due to company legal issues, so only the four villain figures ever saw (limited) release into the market and without the TV promotion, they simply faded away.....

The series of good guys, vehicles and even ride on vehicles just never happened and were thought lost to time, that is until Joe Ruzzi himself recently found this figure in a box:

This is Leborio and he's described as the Izzurian battle computer, he is designed to walk and according to Ruzzi, he was meant to have a slight limp.




Leborio has a removable head in order to place a glow stick in his chest cavity. I am tempted to pop one in.




The most notable element that is from the Micronauts is his head, which comes from one of my favourite characters ever produced in the line:





REPTO! I'm sure you can see the family resemblance. Hopefully more Lords of Light will finally surface!

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[cjefferys]

That's a fantastic get Brian! And man, I can't believe I didn't even catch the Repto head when I was looking at him!

[Remco Monster]

AMAZING! What a find!

[El Hombre Nuclear]

Oh, that's awesome! As someone who was both massively into the original Micronauts and the early '80s fantasy wave, this line really hits home with me. They fit right in with stuff like Crystar, Power Lords and Blackstar, but still have lots of the cool Micronauts sci-fi flair. Maybe under other circumstances, they could have been a real success.

It's really cool to see those commercials in such high quality, too. I wonder if they already had others in the can, since they say "Episode 5!" and "Episode 7!" at the beginnings?

[Earth 2 Chris]

Wow, very cool! What a find!

Chris

[kinostadt]

I like this line, and I absolutely love the commercials.
I noticed that in addition to the Leborio, the Equestrian figure was also moving in the commercial. Interesting that they could have added a motorized feature to the rather slim design of the Centaurus body.

[Bantha5]

Love vintage prototypes, especially from short lived defunct lines. Nice score. Ryan

[tmthor]

The lower legs look like they are from Membros

I like the Prototype of Equestrian I think it would have made a cool toy