You’d be forgiven if you thought Seventh Market Thursday reviews were all going to be Glyos reviews. The January & March drops have swelled my Glyos collection quite a bit, but the Seventh Market is a big umbrella and one of my favorite things under it is the Outer Space Men!

I’m a little behind the times on this particular review. The Mel Birnkrant Editions featured here were an exclusive to the Toypocalypse 2 show in February. Since I’m not cool enough to attend major shows, I patiently (more or less) waited to be able to order mine from StoreHorsemen.Com a few weeks later. They arrived not too long after, but in the hubbub of site redesign, Spring Break, and a million other things they kinda stayed in there shipping box and waited for their time to shine. Well, except, Metalmorpho. That little guy accompanied me on my vacation, even posing for this Instagram Picture somewhere in southern Minnesota.

When I got back and started tearing through my unopened toys, it was finally time to check out the figures that Mel had so diligently redesigned. The most interesting thing for me was what Mel would’ve been thinking as he worked on his Cosmic Creations. If you’ve read along here at IAT, then you know how connected Mel is to the Outer Space Men. Mel woudn’t see this as an opportunity to change their clothes, but rather new opportunities for their story or for new characters. A quick read of Mel Birnkrant’s wonderful Outer Space Men Sketchbook shed light on my suspicions.

If you haven’t read Mel’s article on his approach to the Cosmic Creator Series, its well worth the read. It shows the thought that Mel put into each one and provides a hint of back story on some, while taking the opportunity to consider others all new characters. For this set we have:

• Blazing Inferno – If you followed Mel’s posts on the Fantastic Forums then you know he had a few ideas on how to improve Inferno including orange flames and paint masks that would allow light into the middle of the figure. As such, Blazing Inferno is the fruition of his improvements.
• Metalmorpho – Like Inferno, Metalmorpho is the same character from previous waves, but years later when he has transmuted his body into living metal.
• Deep Blue Ultra-Nautilus – A new character. A Cephalonaut that journeyed to and was changed by Earth’s Oceans. He possibly had dealings with Mystron as the Deep Blue Sea is only a stone’s throw from the Hollow Earth.
• Goldiac – A top leader on Saturn, Goldiac is also the father of Xodiac and has a shiny beard.

I don’t have a lot to say about the figure themselves. Mel did his best with these ingenious repaints to make them unique and interesting, but when it comes to a review they’re still repaints of figures that have been reviewed here before. That said, these are easily some of my favorite OSM, Metalmorpho & Blazing Inferno in particular. I’m so happy to be getting more painted OSM and that paintwork really made the difference here, both in terms of Mel’s vision and the final execution.

One highlight I do need to take time to point out though is what you don’t see on Blazing Inferno. The figure is molded in a clear yellow with a nice silver paint covering most of the suit, the entire thing has been given a translucent orange onceover to get this great ‘blazing’ look, but more importantly that silver paint has been left off of key areas on the back of the helmet and torso to let the light through. It looks great in person! Most of my pics are front-lit which doesn’t showcase it, but I’ve put a couple backlit pictures in the Page 2 Gallery so everyone can see how great he looks. Continue to the Page 2 Gallery…