Previous Chapter: In which we visit Mandarake Shibuya
On 8 January 2010, the day we were due to fly out, we revisited Mandarake Complex in Akihabara again.
I really wanted to see and feel this place again before we left Japan. Wanted to stand in the presence of their awesome collection of G1 Transformers and feel again what I felt at stores like Isetan, Daimaru and Sogo when I was young.
It felt great.
When there, I noticed that they have already replenished their stock! There were more Transformers compared to 5 days ago!
E bought the Ravage USB for me and I bought an MISB Battletrap in C9 box, no flap crease. This is such a beautiful Battletrap and its a little pity that the tape at both ends have come apart a little from age.
MISB Ravage USB and MISB Battletrap from Level 8 of Mandarake Complex.
We then went down to the artbook section on Level 3 of the complex to look for Transformer artbooks. What I found tops even the Raiden Giftset as the surprise find of the trip.
I found several Transformers "pocket manga" sized books by Kodansha Publishing and, very significantly, I found some large format picture books published by some TV station, probably as part of their marketing campaign back in the 80s (bottom 3 books in picture below).
Top Row: Headmasters and Victory super compilation by Kodansha Publishing.
Bottom Row: Issues #22, #33 and #85 of the TV Artbooks.
These picture books are a treasure house of vintage Transformers art that puts even the recent Transformers Visual Works to shame. In fact, since VisualWorks was marketed as a definitive compilation of vintage Japanese Transformers art, I'm certain that Million Publishing did not have access to these TV picture books because there is simply too much in these that are absent in VisualWorks.
I will show pictures of some content of these TV picture books in the next Chapter.
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