The PopCult Toybox

A few weeks ago I told you about the new 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands from Zuru. These are an extension of the 5 Surprise Mini Brands that I was raving about, which are not only a great and affordable blind-box collectible for kids and adults, but are also a godsend for scale-model dioramists who work in larger scales like 1/8, 1/6 or 1/4.

These are great blind-box toys, with five surprises (hence the name) in each package.  The price (Suggested retail price of $6.99) is low enough that these are affordable for everyone, and will make great stocking stuffers. These should be available from Walmart, Amazon, Target, Books A Million and more, starting in November.

Thanks to the kind folks at Zuru, I got my hands on some of the new 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands a couple of weeks before they should start showing up in stores and online. These things are a blast, and are going to appeal to even more collectors than the regular Mini Brands. We’re going to do a quick photo review right now.

Boasting a collection of great licenses, with tiny miniatures from Nickelodeon, Crayola, Wham-O, Rubik’s Cube and Zuru themselves, this first series is an absolute treat. The Nickelodeon license means that they have toys from SpongeBob Squarepants, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Nicktoons, Dora The Explorer and more. I am greatly amused that they included a minature version of the 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands. It’s always cool to go meta with your collectible toys.

With the original 5 Surprise Mini Brands, the miniatures brand-name items were scaled-down versions of the packaging. However, since a lot of toy packaging has visible or touchable items inside, the items in 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands are way more elaborate, with many containing miniature dolls or action figures inside tiny blister packs, and some of the boxed items even have little plastic recreations of the toys included inside.

I have to say, I’m impressed. They could have gotten away with putting flat cardboard toys inside, but many of these mini toy packages include actual miniature, three-dimensional and painted figures. Some of them are just miniature boxes, but I think close to two-thirds of them include an actual teensy toy inside the package.

Because these are packaged like the other 5 Surprise collectibles, there are limitations on the size of the items. This means that they have a wide variety of scales–wider than the original 5 Surprise Mini Brands.

After all, everything has to be small enough to fit inside one of the five cool segmented compartments.

While most of the Toy Mini Brands will work well with 1/6 or 1/8 scale action figures, some are even smaller. The Hula Hoop had to be small enough to fit in the 5 Surprise ball, so it’s about the right size for Green Army Men. The Frisbee would work for a 1/12 scale figure.

Regardless of the size, these are really cool toy versions of toys.

Let’s take a look at how tiny these are…

That Dora Figure is maybe an inch tall, and posts six paint ops. The Fingerlings package includes a full-color printed (both sides) backerboard, a half-inch-long figure, a blister pack with a paper insert and two stickers. You can see how tiny these are against the ruler.

Some of the 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands packages include shopping carts, shelves or, as seen here, a couple of paper shopping bags. Meanwhile, check out the level of detail on the Robo Alive and the XShot Reflex dart blaster. That Rubik’s Cube is just the right size for GI Joe or Barbie (although the solid gold one doesn’t present much of a challenge).

The MiPosaur replicates the packaging with an open flap that lets you see the toy inside (this one isn’t the complete toy–no need to go crazy here). That they made part of a toy so that it could be seen when you open the fifth-panel flap on a box that’s less than two inches long is astounding.

In Scale With Figures

A recent 1/6 scale Mary Marvel kitbash shows off the relative size of the XShot Reflex dart blaster.

Your PopCulteer’s very first GI Joe contemplates trying something new for Halloween this year.

Opening A 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brand Package

To open the 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands, find the zipper-like perforation on the shrink-wrapped label, and peel away. You’ll find a clear shrink-wrap underneath that, to keep the contents from spilling out.

Once the shrink-wrap is removed, you can pull the tab at the top and the ball divides into five pieces, each one sealed with a cool surprise inside.

One of the chambers will have a Toy Mini Brand along with the collector’s guide/checklist.

The second chamber on this ball gave up a tiny reproduction of the Karate Chopper SpongeBoby toy from a few years ago.

I had to get a second photo to show off more detail before Mrs. PopCulteer made off with this for her SpongeBob collection.

The third chamber gave us a JoJo Bow, which works well as a gift under a 1/6 Christmas Tree, or removed from the card, could adorn a Fashion Doll of your choice. Or an action figure. We don’t judge here.

Section number four gave us the Metal Machines Croc Attack Playset, which has a tiny version of the croc, which was exposed in the original packaging.

Build-able Extras

Both of these wheeled shopping carts are easy-to-assemble, and make a nice display piece, if you’re interested in 5 Surprise Mini Brands just as a stand-alone collectible. If you want them for use in dioramas, the “metal” cart is in scale with 1/18 action figures, while the plastic wheeled basket would work with 1/12 scale figures. The blue basket was in the fifth comparment of the package we opened above.

Here’s a closer look at the shopping cart. It comes in eight pieces, with a sticker. This all fits in one compartment of the 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands ball.

Likewise, this shelf unit fits in one compartment before it’s assembled, and has nine pieces and two stickers.

And that is our photo review of the 5 Surprise Toy Mini Brands. These should be available starting in November, and I’ll be including these in the 2020 PopCult Gift Guide, just to remind you.