Spinjas - Toy de Jour 310

Went looking for a toy archive of Spinjas recently and found out that the internet only has mentions of them usually in the form of "I totally forgot about Spinjas!" so I figured since we just got in 18 of the 24 that were ever made that we should archive them for other folks out there searching for more info. These were released in 1987 by Parker Bros and from what I can tell didn't make it passed this first series. Definitely seems like a precursor to Hasbro's Beyblade by putting characters on top of tops that "battle" one another when released into a controlled arena. 

I was finally able to find a list of all 24 from a photo on the back of a sealed set on eBay so let me put the list here. I'll bold the six that we don't have which we won't have photos of - somehow we are missing exactly three of the good guys and three of the bad guys. Something to note is that all of the good guys have dark color bases and the bad guys have gold bases. 

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The Eliminators (Good Guys)
  1.   Emperor Gar
  2.   Champion Shotgun
  3.   Stalker Blud
  4.   Stalker Tangle
  5.   Stalker Gash
  6.   Stalker Scorcher

Fire Knights (Good Guys)
  7.   Iron Top
  8.   Volcano
  9.   Nightmare

Ice Knights (Good Guys)
10.   Blowgun
11.   Whip Shot
12.   Trident

The Dread Force (Baddies)
​13.   King Deth-Blo
14.   Champion Switchblade
15.   Stalker Gore
16.   Stalker Mangle
17.   Stalker Klaw
18.   Stalker Blowtorch

Muckers (Baddies)
19.   Bludgeon
20.   Odor
21.   Butcher

Rotters (Baddies)
22.   Slug
23.   Maggot
24.   Sloth 

#2 - Champion Shotgun

First up (since we're missing who we assume is the good guy leader - Emperor Gar) is Champion Shotgun. He looks as though his name should be Champion Shogun since he looks a lot like a Shogun Warrior figure. He has two red horns off of his helmet and his eyes are yellow while most of his body is blue along with some blue on his helmet. The helmet is angled above his eyes making him look angry.

#4 - Stalker Tangle

Stalker Tangle looks like sort of a robotic knight (as do most of these figures) with a weird almost antenna looking device on his left. Or I guess it looks a bit like he's doing an Ultraman pose, which wouldn't be far off since he resembles Ultraman quite a bit. His three paint colors are yellow, silver/gray and blue.

#5 - Stalker Gash

I'm giving a Steve Harvey/Family Feud look at the camera right now as if someone just gave "Stalker Gash" as their response to "Names You'd Find on a Toy Package". I'm assuming someone thought 'gash' sounded cool like 'wound' or whatever. It doesn't. No one takes this dude serious. Which is sad, cause he's my favorite out of all of the Spinjas we have. I've said it before and I'll say it again, you can't go wrong with a blue and purple color scheme. Something that comic creators figured out in the early 80s. 
Mr. Gash looks like yet another knight and less like a ninja. Yellow eyes which seems to be commonplace among the Eliminators. 

#6 - Stalker Scorcher

Numbers 6 - 9 are all part of the Fire Knights, one of the two elemental subsets for the good guys.
I'm not certain what qualifies you to reach "Stalker" level within the Eliminators ranks, but I'd like to think it means that you follow your opponent around the ring relentlessly until they give up or you both fall over out of exhaustion. Three colors again with white and red making up the most of the figure and of course yellow eyes. He's also got a cool mace on his back that he probably uses for stalking or scorching. 

#7 - Iron Top

Iron Top is the only character to acknowledge exactly what these toys are in his name. I doubt they're iron, but they most definitely are tops. Iron Top looks a bit like a samurai with the crescent moon and horns on his helmet. Red and gray are the majority and yeller eyes once again. Most of these dudes, including Iron Top look like they're fighting with their arms crossed. That's pretty badass to go into a fight like that but I guess if you have your arms out when you're spinning like crazy you may lose a limb.

#8 - Volcano

Volcano holds the distinction of being the only Spinja that not only has no paint apps, but is also made of translucent plastic. He lives up to his name with the bright red making him stand out in a Spinjas party. When I saw him in the lot we got I assumed he was rare or like came in a play set or something, but no. He's just a dude just like the rest of us. Except he doesn't have yellow eyes like he should. 

#10 - Blowgun

Blowgun is the first of the three Ice Knights a subseries of the good guys. I dig the big eyes on this guy, and of course they're good guy-yellow. There's a little McDonald's pull back robot from the 80s that looks a lot like this character. That dude was always one of my favorites so I like this guy too. His three colors mix blue and dark blue which we haven't seen thus far on these guys. 

#11 - Whip Shot

So Whip Shot is straight up just playing baseball. I'm not sure he knows what's going on, but these are battles to the death. Hopefully that futuristic baseball bat will help him out in the arena. Probably will help a bit more than an actual whip would, but who knows. I've never personally entered the Spinjas' arena and don't nintendo. (That's not autocorrect, I'm gonna start using "Nintendo" instead of "intend to".) Colors are gray, blue and yellow.

#12 - Trident

Okay so it's not 100% for your name to match your design at all if you're a Spinja. Meet Trident, the resident football player. I guess if 'Whip Shot' can play baseball, then Trident can play football. This is the last of the yellow-eyed dudes. And while his main colors are yellow and blue, his little football thingy is the only application of orange on the entire figure.

#13 - King Deth Blow

So I should mention again that the image I was pulling their names from was very low-res and I'm assuming that his name is spelled this way, and I guess that this is his name at all. So the photos are a bit washed out, but the king is light blue, gray and orange. He has an actual crown which helps identify him as the leader of the Dread Force. He's also apparently holding a book in his right hand, which when it comes to a toy line, what could be more evil?! His base, like the rest of the bad guys is gold.

#14 - Champion Switchblade

I'm guessing the marketing team had a list of approved names and "beetle" wasn't one of them so this dude is Champion Switchblade. That's smart of him though, going into battle with the name Champion is sure to put you at an advantage against your opponent. And if that doesn't intimidate them, Switchblade is sure to drive them mad while they're looking all over expecting you to pull one out. He does look like he has a knight helmet behind those green fists. I'm starting to wonder if the term Spin-Knights was taken or something. There's like zero freakin' ninjas in this toyline. He's gray, green and yellow.

#16 - Stalker Mangle

Oh! So the bad guys have 'Stalkers' too. Look at that! You'd think all the stalkers would be friends. This one looks like a dude wearing a cobra costume. The bad guys give zero fucks about what color their eyes are too. Some are yellow, some are blue and some are yellow. Stalker Mangle is dark gray, yellow and green. His favorite movie is Hope Floats.

#19 - Bludgeon

Bludgeon is another badass that looks like she's going into battle with her arms crossed. Yes I just assigned her as female, as far as Spinjas go this site is cannon based off of the amount of information here versus any other so deal with it. She's orange and blue with black on her mask making her look like a tiger. Rad name, awesome paint job and a bad attitude makes Bludgeon one of my favorites. 

#20 - Odor

The best name yet. Can you smell what Odor is cookin?! It's friendship. Odor is dark gray, yellow and green with quite the impressive headdress. Arms crossed yet again. I'm starting to think it's less badass and more afraid to get their hands hurt when spinning like crazy.

#21 - Butcher

We have a friend that's a butcher and he's a delightful human so one could only assume that this dude is as well. Getting a lot of green/gray/yellow with the bad guys and this guy is no exception. Butcher is the last of the Muckers, which I assume is a shortening of the words 'mother' and 'fucker'. Good team name guys! If I were a Spinja I'd ask to join. 

#22 - Slug

Well Slug looks like a Mantis so nothing in this world makes sense. I would have a done a whole lot better if I had realized that from the get-go. Green/blue/yellow. His eyes on on the side of his head so it's probably pretty easy to not get dizzy when in the arena. Slug is the first of the three members of The Rotters. They all look like bugs and have green as their main color. 

#23 - Maggot

"Hey, Barb - we have this figure that is all green and looks just like a beetle, what should we call it?"
"Oh that's easy, call that one 'Maggot'."
​"Nice! That's why you're the president of stupid operations here at Parker Bros.!"
I mean, it could be a gray little maggot wearing a beetle coat of armor to toughen itself up. But I think I'm helping too much here. Maggot is dark green, light gray and yellow.

#24 - Sloth

You know when you've got 24 characters to name and it's 4:56 on the Friday before the three-day Labor Day weekend and if you don't get these names out your toy line is going to miss the deadline for shipping to get to the states for the Christmas season? This fucking green bug dude? This is Sloth. SEE YA NEXT TUESDAY, FUCKERS!!
Black, green and yellow with crossed arms, fly-like bug eyes and he somewhat resembles Buzz-Off from Masters of the Universe. But as long as the folks at Parker Bros. had a good Labor Day weekend, who gives a crap about all that.