Beardy's Toy Bin: WWF LJN 8" Figures Pt. 1

For Christmas of 1985 my parents gave me a rubber figure that was a bit odd looking. All rubber with a bald head and a green tongue. He was also hairy but the hair was flesh colored and he came with a poster. That toy was George "The Animal" Steel from the WWF Wrestling Superstars toy line by LJN.

In 1984 the LJN toy company partnered with the WWF to release the first wave of the Wrestling Superstars 8" figures. These figures were made entirely of painted rubber and lacked no articulation. Despite the fact that the figures were stuck in a single pose, the figures were a big success and would last for six years. There are a few factors that made this toy line stand out.

Front of package

The packaging for these figures really stood out due to the artwork on the front. The artwork on the front consisted of drawings of your favorite wrestler in the squared circle. The art was also very colorful and was the perfect backdrop to the big rubber figure sealed in a clear plastic bubble on the card.

Back of package

The back of the packaging came with a bio card and a
picture of other wrestlers you would have to collect,
because as a kid you wanted to create your own Wrestlemania so you needed the entire
WWF roster.

These figures were pretty big. The average size figures at this time were around the three and three quarter inch size figures. The Wrestling Superstars figures were eight inches and no other wrestling figures around this time would use this size. If you were lucky enough to have a complete wave of figures, you had to carry them in a crate and were unknowingly building up you tiny muscles because these things were pretty hefty.

Terry "The Giant" Funk!

All of the figures also came with a poster inside. The poster is the same artwork from the front of the package with one slight difference. The poster was a meant to look like a promo for a wrestling event, and no matter what figure you had, that particular wrestler was in the highlight of the event according to the mini poster.

Yeah.... Ted Arcidi was always a top draw.

Some of the figures came with accessories(usually hats) but the most prized accessory of them all was the Heavyweight title belt. Only one wrestling figure came with the belt.

This Guy!

The line had a good mix of good guys and bad guys which let kids re-enact their favorite matches. All they needed was a wrestling ring for the figures.

Sling' Em-Fling' Em Wrestling Ring

The ring was a nice big size, almost a perfect scale.

Cage Match Accessory

WWf and LJN were also smart enough to sell an accessory to the ring, the cage match box set.

Because the ring was big enough to fit a lot of the figures in it at one time, you could have a battle royal match and smack the toys around until the paint would rub off.

If you look online for these figures you will see that almost all of the loose figures have one thing in common, lots and lots of paint wear. LJN decided that since these were wrestling figures and boys would be smashing them together they would make these figures entirely out of rubber. These rubber figures would be painted over and after kids re-enacted their favorite matches, the paint would rub off on the other figures. The lack of articulation, paint wear and size of these figures did not deter kids from playing with these figures over and over again. The Wrestling Superstars figures were a success and made other wrestling companies realize that there was a market for wrestling figures. This venture by WWF and LJN also started a long history of wrestling figures by the WWF, and it all started with nine rubber figures.

Series 1

HULK HOGAN