Action Jackson is a discontinued line of action figures and accessories manufactured by
Mego Corporation in the early 1970s. It is Mego's first action figure series, and was an initial success but then lost sales to
Hasbro's
G.I. Joe
''G.I. Joe'' is an American media franchise and a line of action figures owned and produced by the toy company Hasbro. The initial product offering represented four of the branches of the U.S. armed forces with the Action Soldier ( U.S. Army), Ac ...
line. It became the template for Mego's popular later lines of 8-inch action figures based on licensed characters from such franchises as
DC Comics,
Marvel Comics, and ''
Star Trek
''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the eponymous 1960s television series and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has expanded into vari ...
''.
History
Similar in theme to the
G.I. Joe
''G.I. Joe'' is an American media franchise and a line of action figures owned and produced by the toy company Hasbro. The initial product offering represented four of the branches of the U.S. armed forces with the Action Soldier ( U.S. Army), Ac ...
line of toys by
Hasbro,
and the
Captain Action toys by the
Ideal Toy Company, Action Jackson came in three varieties: two
Caucasian
Caucasian may refer to:
Anthropology
*Anything from the Caucasus region
**
**
** ''Caucasian Exarchate'' (1917–1920), an ecclesiastical exarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Caucasus region
*
*
*
Languages
* Northwest Caucasian l ...
models, one with a beard and one without; and one
African-American model with no beard. The toys were marketed with a line of accessories, including battery-powered vehicles such as a wire-controlled Jeep, a rescue helicopter, and a snowmobile.
The line is one of Mego's first attempts at producing action figures with interchangeable bodies. Generic bodies could be mass-produced and different figures created by interposing different heads and costumes on them. Constructed primarily in an 8-inch (200 mm) scale, the figures helped set an industry standard in the 1970s.
Heavily promoted on television commercials and in newspaper advertisements, the Action Jackson line was a big seller on its 1971 launch, but by 1974 had faded in popularity.
References
Sources
*Bonavita, John (2001). ''Mego Action Figure Toys'', 3rd Edition
External links
Action JacksonMego Museum
Action figures
Playscale figures
1970s toys
Products introduced in 1971
{{toy-stub