The PopCult Toybox

Today I’m going to bring you a brief photo essay which is a preview of a much bigger photo essay that will (with luck) be posted here next week.

Six years ago I told you about my friend, Steve Corn, who bought the original molds for Johnny West’s horse, Thunderbolt, and put them back into production. You can see the full story of Steve’s quest for Thunderbolt HERE and HERE.

Steve sold out of his first run of white and black horses, and now he’s back with new horses, still made from the original molds, but this time in gray and dark brown. You can order these from Stevo’s Toys, and they are an absolute treat. the definitive horse for 1/6 action figures.

Steve sent me a couple of his new horses, and the plan was to get them all kitted out and take them out and photograph them in the wild. And I do plan to do that, weather permitting, this weekend.

However, the horses look so fantastic that I wanted to give my loyal readers a preview. So today you get to see one of the new gray horses decked out in dark brown riding tack.  Chuck Wheeler, of the CXR clan, stepped in to show how cool the full set looks with a rider.

Steve hand-paints each horse, and he offers several styles. He also has the saddle and other riding gear molded in three colors, dark brown, white and red. Next week you’ll get to see both the gray and dark brown horse in action, and they’ll be sporting different colored tack. You can order them HERE, and be sure to check out the rest of his site for other cool Western accesories for your 1/6 scale cowboys.

But for now, I wanted to bring you a quick preview of one of the horses, photographed in the wilds of my kitchen floor,  to show you how cool these new horses are. As an added bonus, they are made entirely in the USA. If all goes well, next week I’ll have way more spectacular photos and won’t have to resort to digital painting for the header image.

Here is the horse, in all his (or her) nekkid glory!

Here we see Mr. Horse with a his full tack, including blanket, saddle, reins, rifle scabbard, bit, headgear stirrups, cinch and saddle bags.

Detail on the saddle, and a tip: You want to have an X Acto knife or small scissors handy to separate the pieces, and you want a pair of tweezers to aid in the assembly. Reading glasses might not hurt any, either.

The saddle seem from the other side. When I was a kid, I developed the bad habit of tucking the saddle bag flaps inside the bag, because it was so hard to get them to stay closed. I still do that out of habit. Sorry.

Here we have Chuck, ready to ride. This is the style of figure for which this horse was made, but they also work perfectly with GI Joe, Barbie (if it’s a doll whose legs bend), and many other 1/6 scale action figures.

This has just been a quck preview. We will bring you more elaborate photos of more of Steve’s horses, in more exotic locations, next week.