Why The Phrase “3.75 Inch Scale” Has Meaning When It Shouldn’t

Update: Zarco Rey pointed out that the 3.75" scale predated the Kenner Star Wars line, which does question Dave Okada's story from The Toys The Made Us, and somewhat invalidates this article (except for the fact that it's not based on 6'). Per Wikipedia:

Adventure People was a toy series introduced by Fisher-Price in 1975.[1] The line lasted through 1985 and was targeted towards 4-9 year olds.[2][3] Although they served as an alternative to G.I. Joe and other, similarly themed action figures, they were the first figures to utilize the 3.75 inch size which was made famous by Kenner's Star Wars line. In fact, the designers of Star Wars figures used Adventure People to help conceptualize how the figures would look.[4] The Adventure People line featured "real life" heroes and adventurers such as park rangers, scuba divers, astronauts, and emergency worker

Original article:

I thought this would be a fun subject for a Saturday article. If you said, "3.75 inch scale," to anyone outside of the collectibles hobby, they'd likely stare at you like the insane person you are. That's an otherwise meaningless statement. Scale is not a size. It's a ratio. Black Series figures are 1:12 scale. Hot Toys are 1:6 scale. The Vintage Collection is approximately in the 1:18 scale (it's actually 1:18.4). To jump to another popular product, Hot Wheels are 1:64 scale. No one in the die-cast community refers to Hot Wheels as the 2" scale. At least I don't think they do. I don't travel in their circles due to the odor.

There is an exception to this ratio rule, and that's when there is a standard. For collectibles based on humans, that standard is 6 feet tall or 72 inches. So when we say a figure is in the 6" scale, we mean that 6" represents a 6' character. Or 6 inches to 72 inches, which is 1:12. You're all fascinated, right? The 12" scale is 12 inches to 72 inches and thus 1:6. (This is surely going to be one of our most read articles.)

In the Vintage Collection, 3.75" does not represent a 6' tall character. It represents a 5'9" character. The standard for Star Wars is not based on a size. It's based on a character: Luke Skywalker.

It may be apocryphal, but the story goes that Dave Okada was becoming desperate to set the scale for the Kenner Star Wars line so the designers could get to work. He knew that everything would be based off of Luke Skywalker. Okada walked into Kenner President Bernie Loomis' office to force an executive decision. He asked how tall Luke would be in the line. Loomis held out his hand with his index and thumb separated. Okada measured the distance, and it was 3.75 inches. Thus 3.75" in the Kenner line represents a character that measures 69" or 1:18.4 (usually rounded down for simplicity). So how does this relate to the 6 foot standard? 72 divided by 18.4 equals 3.9 inches, which is close enough to say that if Star Wars were any other figure line, it would be called the 4" scale. You fools probably thought we were done with math in the previous paragraph. I'M NOT EVEN A THIRD OF THE WAY THROUGH!

So what's the take away? It's astounding that every toy collector knows what 3.75" scale means. It's even applied to lines like G.I. Joe which have no reason to be based on Hamill's 5'9" height. I think this is all testament to the revolutionary Kenner Star Wars line which is the best selling action figure line in history. Once you get to 1:18, it becomes the 3.75" scale instead of the 4" scale.

---

comments powered by Disqus