The Long And Twisting Road To Acquiring A Personal Grail

This will be a long and winding tale. I hope I don't run out of energy telling it, and leave out something important. You may recollect a vague mention of this story. I wrote about it in the preface of this Figures that Make Me Happy entry. At the risk of this article becoming too long, I have to wind things back a little further than this past March. As many of you know I'm obsessed with the Last 17 figures and the 1985 Kenner product in general (especially Droids). This past December, I received a modest Christmas bonus. With it, I bought a loose Luke Skywalker (in Battle Poncho) figure. Then I noticed the same seller had EV-9D9 for a good price. I have a bit of a thing for EV-9D9. After some spousal pleading (read whining), the torture droid came home too. It was officially on.

I tend to get really obsessive and single minded when I set out to collect something. I was then determined to get all of the Last 17 with their coins. In my day job and in my hobby, I tend to work from hardest to easiest. Step 1: Yak Face. I found a CAS 90-graded one with the coin:


I was only planning to collect ungraded figures, but I absolutely loved the presentation of the figure next to the coin. My mission now had focus. I was going to put together a set of CAS graded Last 17. I sold off the remainder of my MOC vintage Kenner graded collection to fund this new obsession. Yes, that 12-back Vader that I said I would never sell, has been sold. The man put me to the test with a number I couldn't refuse.

When I first started talking about this event in March, I said I will tell the full story eventually, even though part of it will paint me as a villain. Finding high grade loose samples of the Last 17 is exceedingly difficult. Plus I would be panicked about getting reproduction accessories. So I decided to buy the figures on beat up cards and open them. I know this is highly frowned upon in the vintage MOC community, but it's my collection and my money. It was the only way I could be sure I was getting the real deal. I knew that the solid black Stormtrooper blaster with the Luke Stormtrooper was particularly tricky. Flush with cash from my sell off, I started gobbling up the figures I needed. That Luke was my top priority because I've been obsessed with that figure ever since I saw it on the back of the POTF card. It took a while, but I found a sample I was happy with, and I (over)paid for it.

Once I had it in hand, I wanted to get it graded immediately because the limbs are so susceptible to yellowing. I wanted it in a UV protective case as soon as possible. I gathered up the handful of other Last 17 I managed to acquire to that point and sent them off to CAS. So excited was I for that Luke that I even opted for the $300 expedited grading just so I could get it back to sooner. I need to repeat, I opened a MOC Luke Stormtrooper for this submission to be sure I had the proper solid black Stormtrooper rifle. Then a few days after CAS had my figure, I received this email:

We are reaching out to you in regards to the Loose Luke Stormtrooper figure from your recent submission on Order No: xxxxx. This figure was submitted with a blue-black blaster and it requires the solid black imperial blaster in order to be complete and receive a numerical grade.

I could feel the blood rush to my head. I explained that what they were saying was impossible since the blaster came right off the card. I even sent photographic proof of this. This was also around the same time as the CGC scandals, one of which was a CGC employee swapping out customer submissions for lower grade comics. I had to wonder if some employee had pocketed my rare blaster, and replaced it with a common blue-black blaster. I expressed this concern as well. I won't lie and say I was composed in my correspondence. I was literally shaking as I was typing. This was part of the reply I got:

The blaster looks 100% black until you hold it next to a solid black blaster.

Huh? How can something be 100% black, but not black? I told them to send all my items back immediately, and not to grade anything. I started contacting every vintage Kenner expert I could think of. I quickly learned that some Luke Stormtrooper figures did in fact ship with a blue-black blaster. Why CAS didn't tell me this is disappointing. I then called a big (and somewhat famous) vintage toy store to see if they had a solid black blaster that I could buy. The owner explained that they didn't, and even if they did, they wouldn't sell it individually. He would need to keep it in case they ever got in a Luke Stormtrooper without the accessory.

We then started chatting about my situation, and he was in mild disbelief. Without prompting him, he said, "but Luke Stormtrooper also shipped with the blue-black." He advised me to stick with AFA. I explained that I liked the CAS figure and coin presentation. The owner then gave me some sage advise. He said I shouldn't encase the figure and coin together because it limits my future options. If I ever need to cash out part of my collection, I wouldn't be able to sell one without the other. If I graded them separately, I can choose to sell either the figure or the coin, and keep the other. I was sold on the idea.

Tim from Bossk's Bounty contacted UKG on my behalf, and they too were bemused that CAS wouldn't grade it since it was a legitimate accessory. They also said they would grade it for me if I shipped it across the pond. I was still puzzled because I swear the blaster I had looked black. CAS said it looked black. I have blue-black blasters. They never look black. You can always see the blue. Then John Miko solved the puzzle. He found this post on the Rebelscum Forum:


We have a winner. I must have had what is designated as the POTF no2 blaster. It's blacker than the blue-black, but not proper black. When I got my figure back from CAS, I tested the blaster against a flashlight and it was exactly as described in that post. It was a little translucent in areas, and looked green by the scope. Case solved. After much deliberation, I decided I was going to follow the advice from that toy dealer and submit to AFA. I also decided to source a proper black blaster. The Thall Joben figure from the Droids line also comes with the solid black Stormtrooper blaster (as well as the Kez-Iban figure). I found a cheap Thall on Ebay, and submitted that blaster with my Luke. The result of the story is a happy ending:


I have to credit CAS in that they refunded 100% of my money. Per their submission policy, once a figure enters grading, only a 50% refund is permitted. They made an exception, so other than the shipping to and from, I'm not out anything. I thank them for this. I'm just disappointed that they apparently didn't know about this other legitimate accessory. If they had just explained that their policy was to only grade the solid black blaster even though the POTF no2 is a legitimate, I would have been disappointed, but I would have accepted it. I'm also disappointed that upon sending them pictures of the packaging, and offering to send it to them, they displayed zero professional curiosity. If something appears to contradict one of my collecting world views, I'm going to dig into it. They seemed uninterested. I will still buy items already graded by CAS for my collection, but I won't be making any submissions through them. I'm back in the AFA camp. Oh, and if you're curious about the rest of my submission (keep in mind we don't do videos here, so this is amateurish):

---

comments powered by Disqus