Saturday, 24 February 2007 | Levent OZLER
Billy Bananas Makes His Worldwide Debut
Concept/design studio INTERspectacular and creative agency/toy brand Thunderdog Studios will unveil the much-anticipated Billy Bananas this weekend at New York COMIC CON.
On Saturday, February 24th at 3 p.m. at NY Comic Con, ToyQube Booth #124 will have an exclusive set of 30 blank and signed Billy Bananas figures ("Shooting Blanks Edition"), which will go on sale for $60 for the first time ever. ToyQube will also unveil the highly-anticipated X-RAY Edition, which is set to drop March 2007 and is exclusive to ToyQube.
Billy Bananas is a 5" tall, injection-molded, soft vinyl designer toy made in extremely limited editions, designed by Tristan Eaton of Thunderdog Studios. A blind chase assortment Billy Bananas set will be available in Spring 207 exclusively from http://www.thunderdogstudios.com
But who is Billy Bananas? Billy Bananas is a ladies man, a butcher, a scenester and a moocher. He's a two-bit hustler and a no good, dirty rascal pimp... but no matter what you say about him he's Billy and he's Bananas, love him or leave him. Or love him, then leave him. Either way, just make sure you love him at some point.
Blanco and Uman of INTERspectacular first collaborated with Tristan Eaton when they asked him to design an ID as part for their award-winning and highly lauded re-design of Comedy Central. Under Eaton's signature style and Blanco and Uman's direction the character of Billy Bananas was born -- but for television. Now, the dynamic trio of Blanco, Uman and Eaton bring Billy Bananas to 3-dimensionsional life for the fans at NY COMIC CON.
"I've always had a fascination with the secret lives of cartoon characters," says Tristan Eaton. "What do they do when the TV turns off? I think they're just like us, but worse! They do crime, fall in love and sometimes vomit. Billy has the look of a 1930s/40s vintage animation character, but he's an alcholic and a womanizer. He carries an ax. He's bitter about the entertainment industry. The imagination can run wild wondering what kind of trouble a twisted character like Billy can get into."
"The creation of Billy Bananas into a figurine was a natural extension of our collaboration with Tristan," says INTERspectacular's Michael Uman. "It made sense to evolve the character, who has great appeal for urban vinyl collectors as well as fans of classic animation,"
"For us this was a project of 'reverse engineering,'" concludes Luis Blanco of INTERspectacular. "It was great fun to develop and create a character first seen on Comedy Central who can now be purchased and taken home. Who knows where else Billy will appear."
INTERspectacular: http://www.dexigner.com/directory/detail/8655/
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