Last week, Curt Wootton (Jack Yaeger) shared a link to an AMAZING collection of vintage Christmas catalogs from the 70's, 80's, and earlier.  Pages upon pages of the cheesy toys and technology we grew up with, along with the hilarious ways department stores presented them.  Since we're such fans of all things retro, we've collected a few pages here for enjoyment.

Let's start with the cover.  I mean that's one heck of a snow day, when you get to go sled riding with Mr. T, Starscream, the Gremlins, and My Little Pony.  (I thought Gremlins couldn't get wet?)  And I'm pretty sure Mr. T is punching snowflakes.

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I wanted to pass along a great sci-fi (steampunk) web series that is currently showing at Syfy.com. Riese: Kingdom Falling is a 10-part independent series produced for roughly $200,000, which uses really impressive production design (and even an iPhone game narrated by Felica Day) to create a full story "world."  While only the first four episodes have been released, it's VERY clear that creators Ryan Copple and Kaleena Kiff have created a large and rich story world to play in and have only taken viewers a few first steps into it.  This is a series, like The Mercury Men, designed for a large expanded universe of TV, books, games, etc.  Here's hoping the series draws enough viewers to permit them, their fans, and ME the opportunity to explore more.

If we specialize in two things here at The Mercury Men it's 1) making you wait forever to see the actual episodes and 2) celebrating retro 70's & 80's kids stuff.  It's nearly Halloween, and if kids today are anything like I was than they already have their costumes bought/made and have been wearing them every waking moment they're not in school.  You remember those cheap vinyl costumes with the characters body printed on them (along with their name and cartoon logo?!?), which always came with a thin plastic mask that would slice into your lips and eyelids.  You'd sit there trying to eat cereal through the mouth slit while watching the cartoon of the character you're wearing, but unfortunately all you hear is your own breathing and the mask is off in a few minutes because your face is dripping in sweat.

What was YOUR favorite Halloween costume?

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It's quiet.  A little too quiet.  And while I unfortunately can't break the silence on a release date, I did want to give you a small update.

WHEN IS THIS SERIES COMING OUT?!? Soon.  Hopefully VERY soon.  In fact all things are still on track for a 2010 release.  While the process of distribution discussions/negotiations took longer than we expected, we're closing in on reaching a deal with a great and exciting distribution partner.  So keep your eye on this blog, our Facebook page, and Twitter feed for that release date announcement we're dying to finally make!

In the meantime we've been hard at work preparing more great stuff for the upcoming release.  We've built up a barrage of really freaking cool digital props (wait till you see the fake line of retro action figures!), behind-the-scenes videos (including how to build a Lumiere), and another retro commercial (Mercury Men cereal!)  These will all be released throughout the run of the series.  We've really spent a great deal of time building the fictional "world" of the Mercury Men and are eagerly counting down the days until we can finally share it with you!

As always, please share your questions in the comments section below.

I've been working on a new digital prop, action figure card backs for a few of the TMM characters (get a sneak peek on the first prototype HERE).  With every digital prop I always do a bit of research, which lead me to Googling a bunch of vintage action figure lines.  I love how unique each card is to the movie, cartoon, or comic it's from.  And while a picture of the actor from the movie is all fine, nothing beats a great action painting of the character. (Remember how cool the little photographed scenes of GI Joes fighting in the rocks of some creek were?)

Card backs were also essential in giving a bit of background information about the characters you couldn't find elsewhere, either through short descriptions or a cut-out bio card.  Storytelling through merchandise.  In Star Wars, we never hear a character name the X-Wing, Y-Wing, or Princess Leia's Blockade Runner, but we know the names because of the toys.

So what is YOUR favorite action figure card back?

We wanted to drop a quick update and answer a few questions about all things Mercury Men!

WHERE IS THE RELEASE DATE?

I know I sound like a broken record, and it's not the answer you were hoping for, but we will be announcing it soon.  We're not holding the series back to make you mad or try to artifically build fervor.  We are trying to get the series released as soon as possible.  We worked really hard so of course we want you to see it and we wish you could see it RIGHT NOW!  We're smack in the middle of negotiating licensing/distribution offers and until we're done and signed we've got to keep quiet.  These things take longer than anyone would like, but that's a part of this business.  (No wonder it took nearly 20 years to get a 4th Indiana Jones made.)  I can assure you that discussions on all fronts have been going VERY well and should it continue that way, The Mercury Men may be premiering on what I think is a great place.

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We've got a new website!

You may not have noticed, since we didn't drastically change the design, but we've actually rebuilt the entire site from the ground up.  Why?  Our original site was split between our main portal mercuryseries.com, and our blog themercurymen.blogspot.com, which was dividing our viewers.  Some were visiting one site, some were visiting the other.  This new site incorporates the blog right into the main site so you can view all our updates and behind-the-scenes stuff in one place!

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