It may just be the young lad in my old farts, mind and body, but there has been an hero, thats stood the test of time with me. From a comic store on an old market every other Saturday after a frenzied surch for a new issue. To plastacine models and then converted toys, battles with Airfix and Drafts for robots. I`ve strugled but taken great delight in bringing Magnus and is fights to life. This comic book hero first "Gold Key" comics for 50+ issues, went to several other printed releaces and is still available in original and new formats, he as even taken on the "Predator". Now the Robots are so varied, and are ideal because heads, bodies, torsos, are interchangable for various models. You can creat your own basic machines the "Pol Rob" a police machine has many variants and goes right through to military "Riot Robs". Here are a few classic covers from the original "Gold Key " comics a blast from my past.
If we brought a Licence? Magnus Robot Fighter.
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As you can see arms are the same on most of the basic Robotic styles so with varied bodies, Heads, Hands etc the variaty is only limited by our imagination the civilians wouls be great for any Si/Fi and I should think the licence cheeper than some. I grew up on "Gold Key" their other titles listed delights as :- From TV, Voyage to the bottom of the sea, The Invaders, Time Tunnel, Lost in Space, Land of the Gaints, and from comics M.A.R.s, Marine Attack Rescue Service that went on to feature in the "Morrow Project" Welcome to my old brains "blast from the past" Cheers all.
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Hm... I dont know if I had ever heard of Magnus. At least not directly. But it sounds cool. Definitely has a retro flash gordon vibe based on the artwork you have shown. I am a fan of retro bronze robots and rayguns if that is the vibe of this?
Always been a fan of Vril or tesla energy ley line tech. So would support that.
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It was not retro at the time but the robots were well drawn as wellas the characters the stories ended in each book but items carried on to give a bigger picture of the world being 4000AD there was no science behind every item. Lazers worked and anti grav allowed cars to fly all this in the 1960`s, Magnus was an "Orphan" raised by avery intelligent robot that could see advances in Robotics creating problems for mankind his solution train "Magnus" in forms of martial art`s to destroy robots with a steel denting and smashing strenght, aimed at their weak spots.
Stories were diverse dealing with rouge "Pol Bot`s" ,Mad scientists , To intelligent Robots with their own agender, boarder clashes crime, and everything else that you could imagine even a robot "Magnus" to replace the real one. At time "Magnus was for Robot against each story put over moral values even amachines life had worth.
No 5 had areal twist it had an "Imortal Robot shown on the cover being Killed once again (when killed it would transmit all it memorys to another body near bye .) That way it could not be destroyed by "Magnus "in that means again. The destroyed shell would "Teleport" away as the new arrived leaving a shocked "Magnus " to return to the fight.
All these advanced stories before we even watched "StarTrek" I may be biased but the chance to build a collection of these type of "Robot" would put a smile on this mans face bigger than the "Joker".
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So let me get this straight, this man finds a different robot every episode, and then just beats the snot out of it with fisticuffs? im suprised theres not a saturday morning cartoon about this.
Magnus, HE PUNCHES ROBOTS airing every saturday at 8:00am
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@Davy Jones Never in 100`s of magazines have I seen a plate were he punches a robot, a real bone breaker for sure. You missed the point that Robots have been requested for some time now and this range of Books now in it`s forth generation, as some reasonable multi part Robots that would be a good sprue for people to mix and match designs. and the Licence for this first series should be a reasonable price.
I have not listed all storries told in these magazines, he doe`s not just fight Robots, is problems are varied, dealing with Humans and Intelligent Animals. It would make a very reasonable RPG.
Have you read any ?
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@Geoff Maybury in pictures 1,2 and 5 of those you shared it certainly looks like he is punching some robot. :)
but yeah, robots have often been requested. I guess I misunderstood though as you said "purchase a license" so I thought you meant more the whole setting versus just multipart robots. Though he could probably be recreated with a dark age Irish sprue.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zKQfxi8V5FA
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Magnus is a skilled martial artist able to break steel with his bare hands. Because that's a thing. Pretty sure he does use rayguns sometimes. Definitely uses jetpacks.
I doubt we'd need any kind of license here. The Magnus look is pretty much generic 50's pulp SF. Just label them Atompunk or Pulp SF. Magnus dates from 1963, but those sort of costumes go back to Flash Gordon (1936) and Buck Rogers (1939), while that robot look was cemented in pulp magazine art of the 1940's and 50's. All very much genericised by now, even if a figure HAPPENS to look just like Magnus or Flash.
(Planet Comics No.34, Jan 1945)
I am totally on board with this. The Magnus look is basically a superhero one too, so there's great minor conversion potential there.
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I'm pretty sure that he's in public domain now.
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@Estoc Unlikely. The original run of Magnus was 1963-1977 and Jim Shooter purchased the rights in the 1980s, then managed to keep it in publication on and off through the 90's and 00s. Dynamite Entertainment picked up the rights and published a version of it as recently as 2018.
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Also, the original author and artist Russ Manning only died in 1981, so trademark and corporate IP ownership issues aside, the earliest Magnus could become public domain in the US is 2051. That's when his estate loses control.
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@William Redford Hi Bill , I think i`m right, in 1 the neck blow is an open hand, 2 he thinks is a human or Cyborg, so he can`t use his full strenght,hence fists, 5 the death blow to the neck is open.
Not really important how "Magnus fights. The fact that 95% of the "Robots are of a modular design perfect for us to swape around their parts and get all kinds of robots from say one box, and an add on if requested.
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@Mark Dewis Nice one Mark so the rights could be an issue might be still worth a post of some mech pics showing how the many varied designs come from standard head, upper torso, hands and feet. Never totally apreaciated how ahead of its time those stories were till now.
If WGA went for this approach we could all get our Robots , and even swap parts, if we want, to get more of how each one of us likes to build.
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@Estoc So mate whats your`e favorite "Robot"
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@Geoff Maybury Well, Magnus was not so much ahead of his time as one of the last gasps of the old Burroughsian style of unbeatable hero. He fits in perfectly with Tarzan, John Carter, Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers.
Russ Manning is even on record that he swiped a few elements of Magnus from Tarzan (orphaned boy raised in isolation by nonhumans who becomes a superman as a result. Though the "raised by wolves" trope goes back to classical times. and Mowgli predates Tarzan.)
Rights won't be an impediment to a miniatures kit - WGA can do a Not-Magnus as long as they don't infinge on trademarks, since everything in MRF is drawn from generic SF sources anyway.
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@Mark Dewis Well when I thought of Magnus it had 5 of our requested items at least, so I decided why not, 1. Robots, 2. Apes (Gorillas), 3. Civilians, 4. Cultists, 5. Mixed rescue groups with drones etc, and talking animals.
They may well exist in others as well but being modern it had a nice flow.
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And favourite robot is Bender. Followed by Marvin.
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@Mark Dewis Red Dwarf classic , "Brain Fart" with sad and longing Marvin can`t remember the bloody programes name "Going Senile" old mate.
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Marvin is from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The Red Dwarf robot is Kryten.
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@Mark Dewis Were the heck have I got my robbots in such a mix, and now whos Bender? I remembered Hitch Hickers this morning "Tell you our kid I`m losseing it" ,"Big Time "the old grey cells are crumbling even as I type.😭
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Bender is from Futurama, which also uses the same 50's retro look as Magnus, or the original Legion of Superheroes, or the Jetsons.
"Bite my shiny metal ass"
😉
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