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Are there any books or documentaries about Toys you guys find interesting?
Stuff like how toys are made or how certain companies were invented?

I'm really interested in learning more about the Japanese figure industry in particular. I wanna know how they became so advanced. They went from simple die cast and plastic toys in the 70s to figures that can now move like a human, I'm interested in how that happened
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>>11682272
there was a show called "The Toys That Built America". I didn't watch all episodes but I liked the one about board games and the toy car wars.
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>>11682279
Never watched it but I remember my cousin telling me about Kenner and Star Wars, describing it as a tiny irrelevant toy company that made it big with the license. Either he was misquoting it or they didn't exactly show that Kenner wasn't a backwater company, it was wholly owned by General Mills during its diversification era. They already owned Play-Doh and were merged with General Mills' other subsidiary (Parker Bros.) when they got spun off as an independent company in the late 1980s.
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>>11682517
>Honestly no bones about it but America revolutionized how toys in this day and way work

Oh so we can blame Americans for labubu as its no different than what cabbage patch dolls were in the good ol' days
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>>11682272
The LEGO documentary was enjoyable. While not specifically about toys, the Wonder Women documentary spent a fair chunk of time talking about the male collectors and so there was some interesting action figure and other collectibles coverage there.

Even though it's soulless garbage and some of it is now badly dated given all those videos of entire cases of Funko being crushed in landfills, the parts about collecting were interesting in that documentary.

I actually would read a book about design and engineering but I think you need to be specifically into a line or type (say trains) to get into a book like OP's image.
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>>11682648
Man it seems like this kinda thing is an overlooked subject, might just have to do my own research on it.
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>>11682272
I haven't read any books about toys but you can find them on Amazon and Ebay
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>>11682279
there are netflix 'toys that...'docs to, the transfromers one talks about japanese toys, takara
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There was a really good book that came out in 1990 about the toy industry that I used to read a lot. I don’t remember what it was called. I just know that it had one guy’s hand. pretender Bumblebee’s shell and in another person’s hand a doll
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>>11692075
Got it. I fucking love the Internet, I swear.
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>>11682272
Carbon Scoring is a guy on youtube who covers comic book history and action figures who has a giant ass collection.

Also Plaid Stallion has some great videos on mego and vintage stuff.
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>>11682272
this one makes up for me missing old Simpsons merch.
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>>11682272
Had this book for a long time now, my favorite chapter has to be the whole section dedicated to the crazy history of Marvin Glass, who can only be described as "what if Tim Burton's Willy Wonka was less a creepy Michael Jackson sendup and was insanely driven to keep all his stuff hidden from competitors".

...dude's completely cracked in the head and probably warrants his own full book. Daddy issues, his weirdly veiled nightlife deal, how paranoid he could get about hiding corporate toy secrets...

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