Conquering the galaxy and subjugating humanity

Sounds harsh but today’s post is all about a pair of characters who are pretty set on accomplishing this feat.

Who could that be? … well of course it is none other than the legendary Kang and Kodos from the Simpsons.

I love these guys, not just because they are hysterical on the show but also because they have such great designs. Very 1950s B-movie horror/sci-fi… sweeeet.

Anyway what prompted me to pick them today? Simple… look what I got last week.

How totally awesome is that? (Don’t worry you need not answer, I already know). At about 6″ tall this vinyl figure was made by Kidrobot and came in two versions. The one you see above is Kodos and is the more common of the two. I think he is the coolest of the pair, I just love his drooly snarl.

As you can see the other version, Kang, is much milder looking but he does have a cool ray gun so I would watch it if I were you. These were shipped with the following ratio: two Kodos figures to every one Kang figure. When I bought this for the bargain price of $30 I definately had my fingers crossed for the more common version. You may remember me mentioning before that I hate it when the coolest piece is the hardest to get (click here for a refresher) well fortunately as far as I am concerned they did it just right here.

Even the packaging is great. Cool retro looking indeed which fits well with the characters’ origins, namely an early EC Comics cover (according to Wikipedia… anyone know which one?).

Believe it or not Kang and Kodos have popped up in the merch-a-verse a bit more than you might imagine or have noticed. Here is a quick run down.

Their first appearance came in a Toys R’ Us exclusive set of action figures by Playmates. Second in the series of Treehouse of Horror playsets it is pure toy gold. When the toy line was at its height this set would sell for $100 all day long and you would be hard pushed to even find one. Now you would be super lucky to even recover its original purchase price of $50. It just goes to show how fickle collectors are and just blinded by the next greatest thing, to this day I still believe this may be one of the best Simpsons toys ever.

Here they are out of their box, I rest my case.

K & K made an apearance as christmas ornaments, constructed from PVC but lacking their signature helmets they are kind of cool but definately second tier if you ask me. Why? Well look…

Hold on a minute these keychains look almost identical… that is because they are. How lazy is that?

Well not as lazy as this is…

Using them a third time as just plain bendable figures… come on guys. Totally shameless!

This metal version is very tiny indeed at under an inch tall. It came as part of the Simpsons Monopoly set (and to be precise the regular version and surprisingly NOT the Treehouse of Horror version - yes they made two).

Kodos appeared as a premium in some Argentinian snacks. He is only a couple of inches tall but is hand painted.

He even turns up again as a Burger King kids meal toy.

For some reason though I do love these.

Sew on patches are just so 1970s but what the heck, I just wish I had a hole some where on my jeans.

That is about it for now so I leave you with this video clip showing the BK/Simpsons promotion for the movie, be sure to watch all the way to the end to see who Kang and Kodos really are.

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