| Teebo Accessory Sculpts and Assorted Prototypes | |
| I've been fortunate enough to assemble a decent collection of pre-production material relating to the Teebo action figure. Above you see, from left to right, an unpainted hardcopy, a painted hardcopy that was likely used as a model for photography, and a first shot.
The unpainted hardcopy deserves special mention. It features a facial detail that did not make into the production figure: a snarling mouth. It was this detail that caused me to refer to it as the "sneering" Teebo when this hardcopy first turned up several years ago. The presence of the sneer isn't too surprising when you consider that Chief Chirpa and Logray, Kenner's first two Ewok figures, both had growling faces. My guess is that Lucasfilm requested the Ewoks be made to look less vicious, and thus Kenner began sculpting them with their mouths closed in Buddha-like passivity (Romba and Lumat, though, did show a bit of tooth). Lucasfilm was reportedly quite concerned with the appearance of Kenner's Ewok products. And several years earlier, Lucasfilm had required Don Post Studios to change its snarling Chewbacca mask soon after its release in order to make the Wookiee seem less threatening. So there's some precedent on which I base my theory.
With his dead-pig helmet, axe, and shoulder-slung horn, Teebo was one of the better accessorized Ewok action figures. Above you see the wax sculpt for the helmet. As you can tell, it's been broken in a couple of places, but a lot of the detail is still extant. It's sculpted over another hardcopy of the sneering torso.
This is the sculpt for the axe. It's done in wax over a base composed of an actual wooden stick.
This shot shows several axe prototypes together. From left to right: sculpt, hardcopy, first shot, and production. It's pretty rare to find this many pre-production accessories for one figure.
This shot shows the helmet and axe sculpts along with yet another hardcopy, this one showing the sneering torso topped with the helmet. It was obviously cast off the piece to its left at a time when the wax helmet had yet to be broken.
Finally, we have two additional Teebo items. One is an orange torso first shot. The other is a bagged production figure that has a helmet that is gray rather than the standard flesh-tone. |
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| Description by: | Ron Salvatore |
| Photo: | Ron Salvatore |
| From the collection of: | Ron Salvatore |
| Country: | United States |
| Film: | Return of the Jedi |
| Licensee: | Kenner |
| Year: | 1984 |
| Category: | Prototypes / Action Figure Related |
