Voltron collectors in the Action Figure Junkies Facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/AFJunkies/) have recently spotted some of the second-wave Voltron Legendary Defender basic action figures at a Walmart store in California. Figures spotted include Shiro, Keith, and Lance. Thanks to fellow Voltron fan and collector Mark Oliver for the scoop!
Other collectors have reported that Metal Defender Lions of Voltron, a box set of all five Metal Defender lion figures, have been seen at Target stores, priced at $69.99, roughly $5 less expensive than when the Metal Defender Lions are purchased individually. (Each Metal Defender Lion has an MSRP of about $15.)
There have also been numerous sightings of Voltron Legendary Defender, an all-new box set of all five Legendary Lion figures, which had originally been released individually as part of the toy line’s first wave. The Voltron Legendary Defender box set is a Toys R Us exclusive, and it can also be purchased on Toys R Us’ website (https://www.toysrus.com/product?productId=131665686).
On August 1, 2017, Simon & Schuster will release two new Voltron Legendary Defender chapter books, and more books are scheduled for release later this year. The books are being published under the Simon Spotlight imprint.
The Rise of Voltron (ISBN 9781534409194), Book #1 of Voltron Legendary Defender, is a 64-page adaptation of the first episode of the television series, written by Cala Spinner and illustrated by Patrick Spaziante.
Battle for the Black Lion (ISBN 9781534409224), Book #2 of Voltron Legendary Defender, is a 64-page adaptation of “The Black Paladin,” the eleventh and last episode of the first season of the television series. The book is written by Natalie Shaw, and it features illustrations from the Voltron Legendary Defender style guide.
The chapter books are being marketed to children of ages 4 to 11 and Grades K-4, and their list price is $6.99.
But that’s not all!
The Paladin’s Handbook: Official Guidebook of Voltron Legendary Defender (ISBN 9781534409033) is a 96-page adaptation of the first episode of the television series, written by R. J. Cregg, and it features illustrations from the Voltron Legendary Defender style guide. This book is being marketed to readers of ages 4 and up and Grades 1 and up. With a list price of $6.99, the book will be released on August 15, 2017.
Space Mall (ISBN 9781534410213), Book #3 of Voltron Legendary Defender, is a 64-page adaptation of the second-season episode of the same name. The book is written by Natalie Shaw, and it will be released on December 12, 2017.
The Blade of Marmora (ISBN 9781534410183), Book #4 of Voltron Legendary Defender, is a 64-page adaptation of the second-season episode of the same name. The book is written by Cala Spinner and illustrated by Patrick Spaziante. The book will be released on December 12, 2017.
The books can be pre-ordered or ordered from your favorite online or brick-and-mortar bookstores, as well as from The Voltron Store (https://store.voltron.com/).
Although Voltron Force lasted for just one 26-episode season, in 2011-2012, and the show didn’t have much in the way of tie-in merchandise, some of the tie-in merchandise that was made was pretty cool. Among these items were six Voltron Force childrens’ readers.
Published by Vizkids between 2012 and 2013, each of the six readers was basically a mini-graphic novel. Each was a self-contained story, and each was a fun read. The books were marketed to kids aged 7 and up.
Listed below is information about each of the six Voltron Force readers. If you are a fan of Voltron Force, then I recommend tracking down and buying these now out-of-print books!
* * * * *
Voltron Force Volume 1: Shelter from the Storm
Story by Brian Smith
Art by Jacob Chabot
ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-4153-2
First printing: April 2012
Synopsis (from the back cover):
The mighty robot Voltron is back! And three cadets — Daniel, Larmina and Vince — are training to become defenders of the universe.
But King Lotor and his villainous minion Maahox have other plans. They’ve unleashed a horrifying storm, churning with evil energy. When Daniel, Larmina and Vince are sucked into the vortex, their worst nightmares come true!
My Thoughts: This story is surprisingly creepy, as the cadets face their fears head-on. Vince discovers a zombie-like Green Lion and a possessed Pidge. Larmina finds an Arus conquered by Lotor, and a beheaded Voltron. Daniel faces an evil duplicate of himself, in a sort of foreshadowing of the events of what would be the television series’ final episode. The ending features a welcome surprise: a cameo of a classic Voltron character. Good stuff!
Voltron Force Volume 2: Tournament of Lions
Story by Brian Smith
Art by Dario Brizuela
ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-4154-9
First printing: June 2012
Synopsis (from the back cover):
When a cargo ship in deep space sends out a distress signal, it’s the Voltron Force to the rescue! But without warning, Daniel, Larmina and Vince find themselves fighting the greatest warriors in the galaxy for the right to pilot the Voltron lions!
My Thoughts: Both the story and artwork are less impressive than in Volume 1. The art on the first page has some bizarre issues with perspective, and this image is featured again later in the story. Having said that, it is interesting to see the characters rendered with a different, more juvenile look. The story, while not as engaging as that of Volume 1, does raise an interesting question: Should the universe at large have more say in who operates the Defender of the Universe?
Voltron Force Volume 3: Twin Trouble
Story by Brian Smith
Art by Horacio Domingues and Pedro Pablo Perez Valiente
ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-4155-6
First printing: October 2012
Synopsis (from the back cover):
Now that Daniel’s a Voltron Force cadet, he can’t wait to show off in front of his former Galaxy Alliance Flight Academy classmates. He owns the skies in Black Lion, but not for long! Out of nowhere, two unknown ships appear and put Daniel’s flying lion to shame. Who are these mysterious new pilots? And is their presence at the academy an act of peace or an act of aggression?
My Thoughts: This is a fun tale. Lotor’s nieces, Zora and Roza, are a fun addition to the Voltron lore. But where do their loyalties lie?
Voltron Force Volume 4: Rise of the Beast King
Story by Brian Smith
Art by Alfa Robbi
ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-4156-3
First printing: October 2012
Synopsis (from the back cover):
No one knows for certain how Voltron was formed, but one ancient legend claims the mighty robot had a sixth part: a terrible warrior spirit called the Beast King. According to the story, the Beast King was separated from the five robot lions and forced into a deep slumber.
Now, an ancient evil is stirring. Has the Beast King awakened to rejoin its destructive spirit with the Voltron Lions?
My Thoughts: I’m of mixed minds about this story. The “Beast King” myth of Voltron’s creation is unique and enjoyable, but it feels too different from what was suggested in the television series to feel like a good “fit.” The Beast King’s visual design is cool, and the term “Beast King” is a fun reference to Beast King Golion, the anime program on which Voltron: Defender of the Universe was based. I’d almost prefer this story to be a tie-in to Beast King Golion rather than Voltron Force. Overall it’s a great read!
Voltron Force Volume 5: Dragon Dawn
Story by Brian Smith
Art by Albert Carreres Guardia
ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-4157-0
First printing: December 2012
Synopsis (from the back cover):
On Planet Doom, there’s a horrible species of dragon that hatches every hundred years. It’s just about hatching time, and Maahox orders the Drule army to ship thousands of dragon eggs off to Planet Arus! Will the dragon dawn be too much for the Voltron Force?
My Thoughts: This is a straight adventure story. I like it on those terms, although it doesn’t really offer anything that makes it stand out. The artwork has a bit of a Teen Titans vibe.
Voltron Force Volume 6: True Colors
Story by Brian Smith
Art by Jacob Chabot
ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-4158-7
First printing: February 2013
Synopsis (from the back cover):
All of the Voltron Force’s enemies from past battles — the Drule twins Zora and Roza, Daggor, Kai-Borg and Prince Nebulax — have joined forces with King Lotor for the ultimate battle of good versus evil. And this time, Lotor is in command of something he’s never had before — the Voltron Lions!
Could this be the end of the Voltron Force?
My Thoughts: This story is framed as the “finale” of the children’s readers. The events of the previous five books pay off here. The story also takes place just before what would be the final episode of the television series, as Allura, Pidge, and Keith have already stepped down from being pilots in the Voltron Force. Jacob Chabot’s artwork is as strong here as it was in Volume 1. This story is a big finish to some fun stories, and with this book having been published almost a year after the premature cancellation of the television series, in many ways, this book feels like the final goodbye to the Voltron Force characters.
* * * * *
Surprisingly, in 2014, Brian Smith and Jacob Chabot would team up once more with a comic book-style “sequel” to the Voltron Force TV program. The epilogue of Voltron: From Days of Long Ago: A Thirtieth Anniversary Celebration (ISBN-13: 978-1-4215-7540-7) provides a sneak peek of what might have unfolded in the TV show if a second season had been produced. The narrative becomes darker — darker than I suspect that the TV show would have actually gotten. Interestingly, the show’s viewpoint character seems to have changed from Daniel to Vince. Given the events of the story, the shift makes sense, and I rather like the change, since I had found Vince to be a more interesting character than Daniel. Unfortunately, the epilogue reads more like a visual outline of a couple unproduced episodes rather than an actual story, and it ends on a cliffhanger that it almost as frustrating as the one in the TV show — perhaps more so, since it’s almost certain that this cliffhanger will never be resolved.
Voltron Force was a fun show to watch, and these readers from Vizkids are fun, too!
In the mid-1980s, Voltron: Defender of the Universe was a big thing. The TV series was popular, and so were the toys. The first Voltron toys to hit retail shelves were sold by Matchbox Toys.
It seemed that nothing could stop Voltron — either the robot in the television episodes, or the toys on toy store shelves. Unfortunately, the luster of some 1980s Voltron toys would face a foe that would prove to be more formidable than a Robeast: lead paint. On November 12, 1986, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a warning that some of the Matchbox Voltron toys made in 1985 and 1986 had paint which contained levels of lead that exceeded what was allowed by law.
As described on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_layout), in the days before page layout software such as Adobe InDesign and QuarkXPress, newspaper page layouts were created… by hand. In the 1980s, a page layout was created by physically pasting images and blocks of text onto a rigid sheet of paper. This “camera-ready” page was then shot on film, and through a process called offset lithography, the film would control ink placement on the printing press.
Newspaper ads often incorporated hand-drawn, black-on-white line art renditions of product photographs. Line art was often preferred over photographs because the images were often small on the black-and-white printed page, so high-contrast line art often represented products more effectively than grayscale photographs did.
Line art for newspaper ads was often created by specialized companies. One such company was Kwikee, then a division of Multi-Ad Services, Inc. Kwikee still exists today, and it still provides product images — although now mostly digital in nature.
What’s the Voltron connection? In the 1980s, there were Voltron toys — lots of Voltron toys. These toys were often advertised in newspapers, so line art was made of these toys, by companies such as Kwikee.
A few years ago, I purchased from a vintage toy seller a small collection of 1980s product image pages made by Kwikee. The pages in the collection included images of toys from several 1980s toy lines: MASK (by Kenner), Photon (by LJN), Thundercats (by LJN), Wrinkles (by LJN), Robotech (by Matchbox) — and Voltron, by Matchbox.
Below are the four Voltron Kwikee product image pages from my collection. No copyright infringement is intended in their display on this website. The pages are shared here to show to fellow Voltron fans these amazing newspaper advertising artifacts from days of long ago. Enjoy!
The first page, apparently page 118 of a 1985 Kwikee catalog of product images, depicts Matchbox’s Voltron I toys. As I mentioned in “It’s as “Easy” as I, II, III: Being a Voltron Fan in the 1980s,”Voltron I was the inital name of the super robot that would eventually become known as Vehicle Team Voltron. Note that each image is represented in three sizes, which offered newspaper layout artists more leeway in how they composed the ad, physically pasting an image of the desired size on what would become a camera-ready page layout sheet.
The second page, page 119 of the same catalog, depicts Matchbox’s Voltron II toys. This super robot was ultimately never featured in the Voltron: Defender of the Universe television program.
The third page, page 120, depicts Matchbox’s Voltron III toys. Voltron III would become known as Lion Force Voltron, the overwhelmingly most popular of the 1980s Voltron super robots.
The fourth and final Voltron page in my collection, page 100 of a 1986 Kwikee catalog of product images, depicts Matchbox’s Vehicle Team Voltron and Lion Force Voltron toys. The company’s Voltron I and Voltron III toys from 1985 were, for 1986, repackaged and renamed to Vehicle Team Voltron and Lion Force Voltron, respectively. Interestingly, each image on this page is rendered in a single size, rather than three sizes as in the 1985 catalog. Perhaps subsequent pages in the catalog, not in my collection, provide alternately sized images.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this blast from the newspaper advertising past!
In the second episode of Voltron: Legendary Defender, “Some Assembly Required,” the paladins of Voltron struggle to figure out how to combine the Lions and form Voltron. At one point, Keith suggests, “I mean, let’s try literally building Voltron, like, stacking on top of each other.”
That episode was released on Netflix in June 2016. Two months prior, Lendy Tayag was already way ahead of Keith and the other paladins, because he had assembled his own Voltron… from LEGO!
On April 11, 2016, Lendy’s model, called “Voltron – Defender of the Universe,” was posted to the website of LEGO Ideas. LEGO Ideas allows anyone to submit an original LEGO creation, and if within a certain period of time, that creation gains 10,000 supporters — that is, people who register with the site, vote for the project, and answer a short questionnaire about the project — than a LEGO review board will consider making an actual LEGO building set from that creation. Exciting, huh?
Later in April, Lendy’s Voltron model caught the attention of Gizmodo and then Nerdist. Even better, in just 22 short days, Lendy Tayag’s Voltron model reached the 10,000 supporters that it needed for LEGO to consider producing that model as a licensed building set!
To celebrate this achievement, and to introduce Lendy to fellow Voltron fans, Marc Morrell and I welcomed Lendy as a guest on Let’s Voltron: The Official Voltron Podcast. Marc and I enjoyed chatting with Lendy, learning more about him as a person, how he became interested in Voltron and other giant robots, when and how he began designing them in LEGO, and what the experience was like of submitting his Voltron model to LEGO Ideas, seeing it gain so much support so quickly, and ultimately seeing it reach 10,000 supporters in such a short time.
Lendy Tayag’s Voltron – Defender of the Universe project is still under consideration. An update will be given during the announcement of the Third 2016 Review Results.
Would we all like to have heard that LEGO had decided to produce a Voltron building set? Absolutely! On the other hand, working with a licensed property — especially one that is new to LEGO — is not always a simple, straightforward activity, so the fact that LEGO announced that it is still reviewing Lendy’s Voltron model shows that they are very much interested in the possibility of producing a Voltron set. Congratulations again to Lendy Tayag for this astounding achievement!
Lendy has since submitted more Voltron-themed projects to LEGO Ideas. None of these has yet achieved 10,000 supporters, but perhaps they will. And even if they don’t, if LEGO ultimately obtains a license to produce Voltron models, then perhaps LEGO will still consider these other Voltron projects.
Lendy’s models are incredibly cool. As an enthusiast of all incarnations of Voltron, I like all of his Voltron robot designs. As a supporter of the underdog that is Vehicle Team Voltron, I give special kudos to Lendy for representing that robot in LEGO form. Lendy’s Vehicle Team Voltron robot even separates into all 15 vehicles!
Lendy’s Castle of Lions model, with a full interior, is effectively a play environment that rivals the amazing Panosh Place Voltron Castle of Lions playset from 1985. It certainly rivals any LEGO Star Wars play environment.
Lendy has also submitted some non-Voltron giant robots as LEGO Ideas: Voltes V and Grendizer.
Congratulations again, Lendy! Voltron fans across the universe salute your enthusiasm and your LEGO model designing and building skills.
In the pre-Internet era, fan clubs were fun ways for kids to feel more connected to their favorite TV programs, radio programs, and even toy lines.
Little Orphan Annie, a children’s radio program that aired between 1931 and 1942, had a fan club known as the Little Orphan Annie Secret Society.
Star Wars, which premiered in movie theaters in 1977, was accompanied by The Official Star Wars Fan Club.
G.I. Joe, which premiered on television in 1983, had a fan club that became known as the G.I. Joe Fan Club.
When Voltron: Defender of the Universe was originally in syndication, from 1984 to 1986, its viewers could join an official Voltron fan club called Voltron TeamForce.
Yes, TeamForce. The term is sort of like “possegang” or “Sahara Desert.” In defense of the club’s name, “TeamForce” is probably an awkward portmanteau of “Team” from “Vehicle Team” and “Force” from “Lion Force.” Whatever the case, who cares? The Voltron TeamForce was a club for fans of Voltron!
In the interest of full disclosure, as a kid I was never a member of the Voltron TeamForce — or any other fan club. It cost money to join fan clubs, and I chose to spend my allowance money on toys. Still, as a kid I was fascinated by fan clubs, and I remember reading ads for them and wishing I were a member.
When the 2011 debut of Voltron Force re-ignited my enthusiasm for Voltron, I began to collect all sorts of Voltron memorabilia — including two Voltron TeamForce membership kits. Let’s take a look at these kits and see what a member of the Voltron TeamForce received in the mail.
Each Voltron TeamForce membership kit arrived in a large, colorful envelope.
I’ve blurred the text of the first envelope’s mailing label. The second envelope’s mailing label is long gone.
Here are the contents of both envelopes. The first envelope contained everything shown in this photo except for the large, bagged, gray sheet in the lower center of the photo.
Voltron TeamForce – Contents of Both Envelopes
I purchased both envelopes in a single lot. Collectively the two envelopes appear to contain one complete membership kit, plus most of a second membership kit, although most of the contents had been stored inside just one of the envelopes. I suspect the kits’ original owners were siblings.
Here is the welcome letter. It was shipped folded in half. The front panel reads “WELCOME VOLTRON TEAMFORCE MEMBERS,” and the illustration includes the five Lions, a spacey background, and a stylized “V.”
Voltron TeamForce Membership Kit – Welcome Letter (Folded, Front)
The back panel features the 1980s Voltron: Defender of the Universe logo, plus a copyright notice.
Voltron TeamForce Membership Kit – Welcome Letter (Folded, Back)
Here is the unfolded welcome letter. Most welcome letters would be printed on simple, rectangular sheets of paper, but simple rectangles aren’t good enough for the Voltron TeamForce!
Voltron TeamForce Membership Kit – Welcome Letter (Unfolded)
The welcome letter reads:
We send you greetings from Galaxy Garrison, headquarters for all of us in the Galaxy Alliance! We are so glad that you have joined us. Being a TeamForce member is a very important job. We all have a TeamForce Mission. Your mission is to keep your home, family, friends and neighborhood happy and safe. This kit will tell you many secrets on how you can become a good defender of your universe. And…there are fun things to do, too!
Because you are now a member of the Voltron TeamForce, we will send you a very special letter just for TeamForce members. It’s called TeamForce Tales. It iwll tell you about the exciting things we and kids like you are doing to defend the universe. Maybe we’ll even write about you! Just let Voltron know how you are working to help him with the TeamForce mission at home. Write to:
Now that you are a member of the Voltron TeamForce, be sure to join our adventures every day on your local TV station. We’ll be looking for all of our members!
LET’S GO VOLTRON TEAMFORCE!
WELCOME VOLTRON TEAMFORCE MEMBERS
Here is the most essential item in any fan club membership kit: the ID card! Here is the front of the card:
Voltron TeamForce – ID Card (Front)
The card front reads:
Voltron: Defender of the Universe
I, COMMANDER KEITH,
DO HEREBY DECLARE
__________________
AS A MEMBER OF
THE VOLTRON TEAMFORCE
Presumably the name was left blank so that kids could invent a cool code name for themselves, like… uh… Pidge.
Here is the back of the card. Who doesn’t love this? It’s a full-color illustration of a Lion key! I wonder which Lion this key activates. The keys looked identical on TV, and yet each pilot seemed to know which Lion a given key would activate. Oh well.
Voltron TeamForce – ID Card (Back)
The card back reads:
VOLTRON
TEAMFORCE
OFFICIAL MEMBER OF THE VOLTRON TEAMFORCE
The membership kit also contained this single-sided flyer, which announced the forthcoming new batch of Voltron: Defender of the Universe episodes that would feature the Lion Force.
Voltron TeamForce Flyer
The flyer reads:
Hey kids!!
Brand new Lion Force Voltron episodes are coming to your local TV station this fall…lots of new, exciting adventures that will begin the week of October 20.
* Don’t miss the return of Sven!…
* Haggar’s new Robeast…
* The magic of King Alfor…
* And Lotor’s revenge!
Watch us battle 4 Robeasts that assemble to form an evil Super-Robeast!
Meet Lotor’s new evil assistant Cossack! And from the darkest regions of the Doom Empire, Lotor’s cousin Merla!
This September watch your local TV station for details on how you could win big Voltron prizes.
Commander Keith and Princess Allura and Pidge are coming to meet you at toy stores in your city this fall. Stay tuned for all the details.
The text in the flyer dates the Voltron TeamForce membership kit to sometime in early to mid-1985. By this point, all 52 Lion Force episodes of Voltron: Defender of the Universe that had been adapted from Beast King Golion would have aired, as well as all 52 Vehicle Team episodes, which were adapted from Armored Fleet Dairugger XV. (At that time, we kids knew nothing about Golion or Dairugger.)
The final 21 episodes of Voltron: Defender of the Universe would begin to air on October 21, 1985. Twenty episodes featured only Lion Force Voltron, and the final, double-length episode, “Fleet of Doom,” would feature both Lion Force Voltron and Vehicle Team Voltron. The twenty, Lion Force-only episodes featured everything described on the flyer — everything, that is, except the “4 Robeasts that assemble to form an evil Super-Robeast.” These Robeasts were featured in “Fleet of Doom.”
It’s interesting that Vehicle Team Voltron is featured on the flyer, when it’s clear that the flyer is reasssuring kids that Lion Force Voltron will return in the fall. By this point World Events Productions almost certainly knew that Lion Force Voltron was more popular than Vehicle Team Voltron, because this is the only reference to Vehicle Team Voltron in the entire membership kit.
This flyer was also printed in many Voltron coloring and activity books of the time. The coloring and activity books were published by Modern Publishing, a division of Unisystems, Inc., so it’s likely that Modern Publishing also published the Voltron TeamForce kits. (Modern also published the three-issue comic book mini-series.)
The kit also included a fold-out poster of Lion Force Voltron. The art on the poster is really cool!
Voltron TeamForce Poster
Another item in the kit is this… thing. It was packed flat in a plain, white envelope.
Voltron TeamForce – Rules for Good Defenders (Flat, Top)
In any case, the… thing is best described by what’s printed on the top face:
Voltron: Defender of the Universe
Rules for Good Defenders
Here’s the bottom face.
Voltron TeamForce – Rules for Good Defenders (Flat, Bottom)
The bottom face reads:
Let Voltron know you are a good Defender. Write to:
The… thing pops up into a twelve-sided, three-dimensional shape. I don’t know what a shape of this kind might be called. Because it contains rules for Good Defenders, I’ll call it a gooddefenderhedron.
Voltron TeamForce – Rules
Let’s examine each of the gooddefenderhedron’s six illustrations and associated captions.
The first of the six images features Keith presenting flowers to Princess Allura. The caption reads: “A Good Defender Shares With Family And Friends”
Voltron TeamForce – Rules (Side #1)
Keith and Allura, with a caption about family and friends. Were Keith and Allura married in this photo? Were they just friends? Let the fan fiction commence!
The second of the six images features Pidge sitting near a recently planted tree. The caption reads: “A Good Defender Loves His/Her Planet”
Voltron TeamForce – Rules (Side #2)
It makes sense that the pilot of Green Lion would have a green thumb. As an aside, I love that this caption is inclusive of boys and girls. Then again, the writers of the caption might just be confused about Pidge’s gender.
The third of the images features Hunk helping a girl across the street at an intersection. The caption reads: “A Good Defender Looks After Others”
Voltron TeamForce – Rules (Side #3)
Where are Hunk and the girl? On Arus? Outside the Castle of Lions and the Lion Dens, is there even electricity to power traffic lights? In the TV series, much of Arus is shown to resemble ancient Greece.
The fourth image shows Pidge putting a garbage bag into a trash can outside of what appears to be a house. The caption reads: “A Good Defender Helps Around the House”
Voltron TeamForce – Rules (Side #4)
In all of these images, Pidge is missing his headband. In this image he’s breaking a sweat from carrying the garbage bag. What’s in that bag? Lead? Robot Lion litter box… stuff? Maybe it’s better that we don’t know.
The fifth image shows a girl — or a boy with a mullet — holding a flower while standing in front of Coran, who is sitting in a chair. The caption reads: “A Good Defender Makes People Smile”
Voltron TeamForce – Rules (Side #5)
What would make Coran smile? The flower? The mullet? The chair? Or simply having a few seconds away from Nanny?
The sixth image shows Pidge once again, this time throwing a paper cup into a waste basket. The caption reads: “A Good Defender Keeps Neighborhoods Clean”
Voltron TeamForce – Rules (Side #6)
I’m just glad that throwing a paper cup doesn’t make Pidge sweat.
I’ve been picking on Pidge an awful lot, but in all honesty, I’ve always liked him. Having said that, in his honor I’d like to propose a seventh image for the gooddefenderhedron — a picture of Pidge with a guilty look on his face. The caption would be: “A Good Defender Avoids Inhaling Helium”
The final item in the Voltron TeamForce membership kit is a game and a glossary! These elements are printed on a single, glossy sheet of paper with perforations around each piece.
Voltron TeamForce Game & Glossary
The game consists of a game card, 25 tokens, and instructions. The game card resembles a 5×5 Bingo card.
Voltron TeamForce Game Card
The text in the game card reads:
Red Lion | Bendor | Lotor | Castle Doom | Yellow Lion
Zarkon | Lance | Castle of Lions | Sven | Coran
Allura | Blue Lion | Voltron | Keith | Black Lion
Alfor | Mice | Green Lion | Haggar | Romelle
Nanny | Yurak | Pidge | Blue Cat | Hunk
Each token is a circle that contains a small illustration of one of the items described on the game card.
Voltron TeamForce Game Tokens
Here are the instructions:
Voltron TeamForce Game Instructions
Instructions
1. Punch out all of the circles on this card to use as your game tokens.
2. As you watch an episode of Voltron, Defender of the Universe, listen for the words shown on your game card.
3. When you hear one of the words shown on the game card, place a game token over it.
4. You win when you have five game tokens placed in a straight line across the game board, straight up and down on the game card, or diagonally on the game card.
5. If you like, you can match the pictures on your game tokens to the words shown on the game cards, too!
So the game is basically Bingo — or a drinking game, minus the drinks.
Finally, let’s look at the Glossary. As a Voltron encyclopedist (Let’s do lunch, anyone in charge of Voltron licensing!), I like this sort of thing.
Voltron TeamForce Glossary
Let’s learn all that there is to learn from this glossary!
Alfor: The ghost of the good king and former ruler of Planet Arus.
Allura: The daughter of Alfor and pilot of the Blue Lion.
Bandor: Cousin to Allura and brother to Princess Romelle.
Black Lion: Piloted by Commander Keith and forms the head of Voltron.
Blue Cat: Haggar’s evil pet.
Blue Lion: Piloted by Allura. Forms Voltron’s right leg.
Castle Doom: The Black castle where the evil Zarkon lives.
Castle of Lions: Home of King Alfor and Princess Allura on Planet Arus.
Coran: The good counselor to King Alfor and protector of Princess Allura.
Green Lion: Piloted by Pidge and forms Voltron’s left arm.
Haggar: The witch who helps the evil Zarkon make robeasts.
Hunk: One of the Voltron Force and pilot of the Yellow Lion.
Keith: Commander of the Voltron Force and pilot of the Black Lion.
Lance: Member of the Voltron Force and pilot of the Red Lion.
Lotor: The evil Prince.
Mice: Allura’s furry friends.
Nanny: Allura’s nursemaid.
Pidge: Member of the Voltron Force and pilot of the Green Lion.
Red Lion: Piloted by Lance and forms Voltron’s right arm.
Romelle: Cousin of Princess Allura.
Sven: An original member of the Voltron Force before the defeat of Planet Arus.
Voltron: A might robot who defends the universe against the forces of evil.
Yellow Lion: The evil general on Planet Doom.
Zarkon: The evil monarch of the fearful Planet Doom.
I couldn’t help but notice some inaccuracies in the glossary. Maybe I should write to Voltron in Clinton, Iowa, and let him know. Maybe my corrections will be published in TeamForce Tales. I bet they would be if I took my letter to the post office in a garbage bag, while I broke a sweat and was dressed like Pidge.
On a serious note, this membership kit looks like a lot of fun. I imagine that, as a kid, I would have been thrilled to have received something like this as a gift. I don’t know what it cost to join Voltron TeamForce, but the full-color poster alone is really nice, the ID card is a must-have, and the rest of the goodies are fun, too!
