DUKES OF HAZZARD 8" LINE The Dukes of Hazzard first appears in the 1981 Mego catalog. Mego paid a mere $2,500.00 to acquire the Dukes of Hazzard license. The line became surprisingly popular and sold well due to the Dukes of Hazzard television show, which ranked as high as number 2 in the Nielsen ratings. Unfortunately, even this unforeseen popularity was not enough to save the floundering company.
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The 81 line consisted of only four figures with two temporary additions, but is filled with numerous variations to keep hard core Dukes of Hazzard collectors busy.
The
image in the 1981 catalog showcases the four 8" figures.
The Luke, Bo and Daisy figures appear as they were initially
sold at retail, but the Boss Hogg figure hardly resembles
the marketed figure and is very interesting for many reasons.
See the Boss Hogg section for details on this figure and the
possible reasoning behind it.
Kids and collectors were puzzled as to why Mego never made
the General Lee car for the 8 inch figures. Some people have
bought the 11 inch General Lee car under the impression it
was for the 8 inch figures...Don't do that. This is an odd
omission since the whole point of the show was racing around
in the General Lee. One wonders why Mego didn't simply repaint
the Starsky and Hutch Torino car. With the 8" format
giving way to the 3-3/4" format, there were no accessories
or playsets produced for the 8" figures.
Dukes
of Hazzard Packaging
The 8" Dukes of Hazzard figures were all packaged on
blister cards measuring 8-1/2" x 10-5/16" and featured
fantastic illustrations of the characters related to the show.
It even possibly confused and tortured children/collectors
by featuring Uncle Jesse and Rosco P Coltrane, who were never
offered in the 8" format. With no checklist of figures
reflected anywhere on the packaging, parents or children had
no idea what figures were actually available and could have
been searching endlessly for characters that never existed
with no chance to succeed. The card design was the same for
every figure differing only by the character's name and item
number on the front.
The artwork on the back of the cards was identical for every character with no character specific information. The back featured the same illustration as the front, but smaller. A film-strip ran down the right side of the card with actual photos from the show. The only non copyright text on the back was: "The Dukes of Hazzard" and "Collect Bo, Luke, and Daisy to create your own adventures!"
There is only one card variation that exists for Bo, Luke,
and Daisy. Only minor text changes were made to the copyright
statements by adding the registered trademark symbols to the
line and character names. When the figures were introduced,
initial cards reflected a 1980 copyright date. The main reason
for the card revision was to add Copyright/trademark symbols
when the show and character's names were mentioned on the
card.
The revised cards now reflected a 1981 copyright date.
The 1980 and 1981 cards both have two lines of copyright text
located at the bottom left corner of the cards. The top line
on the 1980 card is significantly shorter when compared to
the top line of the 1981 card. It is possible to distinguish
between the two cards without being able to read the text.
The easiest way to differentiate between the 1980 and 1981
is by the copyright text located in the lower left corner
of the card. The text reads:
1980 card:
The copyright information reads:
1980 WARNER BROTHERS., Inc.
Manufactured for Mego Corp., New York, N.Y. 10010, in Hong
Kong
1981 card:
The copyright information reads:
TM Indicates trademark of WARNER BROTHERS INC. ‹1981
Manufactured for Mego Corp., New York, N.Y. 10010, in Hong
Kong
The
text doesn't even have to be legible to differentiate between
the cards. The top line of text on the 1980 card is much shorter
than the bottom line so as long as you can see the two lines
of text, you can tell which card it is.Ê The back bottom
left corner of the card features the same text respectively.
The majority of cards remaining are the 1981 cards.1980 cards
can be found, but are more difficult to find when compared
to the 1981 cards. With such a slight difference between the
cards, most collectors will not pursue one particular version
over another.
Even though the Dukes of Hazzard line was introduced in the
twilight of Mego's existence, the figures were all well done.
For Mego and Dukes and of Hazzard collectors, all the figures
can be found loose and packaged at very reasonable prices.
The limited amount of characters, with numerous variations
do create a challenge that is very obtainable if pursued.
It is somewhat sad to realize that this was the last 8"
line Mego introduced and sold at the retail level. That alone
does adds some nostalgic ties to collecting these figures.
Click on the pics to see original Mego Dukes of Hazzard Ads and the Dukes sections of every Mego Catalog!