Far Men's Far Boys - crazy early '80s Playmobil knock-offs from Spain

[El Hombre Nuclear]

There doesn't seem to be anything out there on this line in English, so I thought I'd post this little "feature" on them here, in case anyone might find it interesting. All images are courtesy of these great Spanish sites:

http://www.famobil.ekiwi.es/

http://elkioskodeakela.blogspot.com/

http://www.todocoleccion.net/

Far Men was a Spanish toy company who liked to produce knock-offs, and around 1979 they started their "Far Boys" line of Playmobil clones. Playmobil was known as "Famobil" in Spain, and was extremely popular there, spawning numerous knock-off lines from many of the major Spanish toy companies, most notably Airgam's "Airgam Boys" which, starting in 1976, expanded on the original Playmobil concept in very imaginative ways, gaining great popularity throughout the country. Enter Far Men, who, instead of cloning the originals, decided to basically knock off the knock-offs! They started simply, with your basic western pieces, etc., but soon moved on to more interesting ideas. Their monster figures were obviously based on Airgam's "Terror" line, but I believe the superhero toys actually predate Airgam's more well-known mid-'80s "Super Fantastics/Super Diabolics" by a few years.

There are plenty of fun little details on these guys that I love, such as:

- The Hulk and Frankenstein are wearing the same pants
- Their very odd take on the Phantom and Flash Gordon
- He-Man's striped pastel loincloth/leg-warmer combo and three-headed flail (!?)
- Dracula is basically just a guy in a rubber Halloween mask, faux-tuxedo t-shirt and blue jeans
- An inexplicable cross between the Wolfman and Chewbacca (???)
- An alien that kind of looks like Walrusman's head surgically attached a wind-up toy robot's body

And finally, you will witness an image that brings me more joy than I can ever explain. Flash Gordon, He-Man, Conan, and that Wolfman/Chewbacca thing, all together. Riding dinosaurs.

As the Ultimate Spinach once said, "Behold and See"...

[Earth 2 Chris]

Those are insane! But cool.

Chris

[Confessional]

Thanks so much for posting this!!!

I acquired some of these while hunting the Soldier Ape (Mutante (counter to Airgam's Space Ape)) and other than being told from collector to collector how rare they are, I didn't have much intel.

[Iron Mego]

The Airgam stuff is pretty awesome too. Like this pic:

[El Hombre Nuclear]

Thanks so much for posting this!!!

I acquired some of these while hunting the Soldier Ape (Mutante (counter to Airgam's Space Ape)) and other than being told from collector to collector how rare they are, I didn't have much intel.

Oh yeah, the Airgam Space "simio" guys...



It's kind of hard to figure out if Far Men were actually trying to clone those with the "Mutante", because although there's a definite PoTA vibe, the fact that it isn't clothed and has that sort of sash-thing made me think of Chewbacca, and the Raffotek site has it listed as part of the Terror line (as the Wolfman). Then, that ad has him riding a triceratops with a bunch of fantasy figures... I'm thoroughly confused.

Speaking of the Airgam Space line, that's probably their craziest. It's like Playmo Space on acid. The alien designs are all over the place (one looks just like Ultraman!) and then they had these sets that included monsters and dinosaurs for no apparent reason, which is undoubtedly where Far Men took their whole "Fantastic-Saurus" idea from. Oh, and then there's this ad, which is one of the greatest things ever:

[El Hombre Nuclear]

The Airgam stuff is pretty awesome too. Like this pic:

Yeah, the "Airgam Comics" stuff was great. The second wave figures had more articulation, moving them further away from the original Playmobil style. The Far Men stuff was cruder and even more copyright-infringing, so I think in this case they were actually first off the mark by at least a couple of years. Although, Airgam did do an earlier Superman knock-off that was more along those lines:

[Confessional]

^^ I hear ya! Airgam's Space Aliens are wild.

The vintage mash-up of pop culture in these is a blast, and now the Fantastic-Saurus takes it to a whole new level of irresistible fun. For me that ugly face, bando and club were enough to chase Mutante for another Ape City oddball/ko addition.

I also love the Grim (great skull!) Reaper figure in the set. I'll have a couple others for sale in a new Marketplace thread in the coming days if anyone wants to venture into the world of Spanish madness with us.

[Earth 2 Chris]

I'm loving the looks of these things! Those Airgam figures look like Halloween knock-off costumes!

Chris

[toys2cool]

that's pretty darn cool