Cyclops

History

The optic blast power for Cyclops took a long time to get right. I remember making multiple complex prototypes trying to make it work until this design which was much simpler. It is just a piece of paper that slides up and bends at the fold to fall forward when it reaches the top of his head. The slider is made from aluminum flashing.

Some of the black marker has bled through the paper over the years which affects some of the detail. This really shows from the X on his chest and belt as it's not as clear as it was when I first made him. Cyclops was one of the first designed before I experimented with light shading as seen on some of the other figures made later.

Most of the X-Men characters I made into cardboard figures have some sort of sliding mechanism that makes their powers work. I still like this method better than just putting a piece of red plastic jammed into his eyes as most of the modern toys.

The Cyclops action figure in the 1990s from ToyBiz had a cool light up eye feature but was very barrel chested. I loved all of those original X-Men figures but I wanted something that looked like it jumped off the pages of the comics.