Silver Body Destro from Argentina on eBay?

[Tattoo Shane]

Like others have said, chroming isnt easy or cheap.

FWIW, choming/vac plating is easier and cheaper than most people think. I have a Star Wars customizer friend in the UK who has chromed a great deal of items, from figures to Lego stuff and more in between. He gets it done on a regular basis from someone who specializes in it in his hometown and it's fairly affordable. Certainly affordable if you're planning to make a fake and take someone for a few hundred dollars (or whatever the case may be here).

As far as the Mortal goes, people don't understand the amount of scrutiny that figure underwent before it was authenticated, made public and privately purchased. I was one of the first three people the original owner from Venezuela conatcted about it, well over a year before it was disclosed to the community. I gave the owner several suggestions to go about authenticating it and Ron Connor took the lead and followed up with all of it. The original owner of that piece went about it the right way - he found out who to ask, asked for their help and proceeded to work on finding out more information about it. He didn't just list it on ebay and hope for the best. In fact, he didn't even want to sell it at first and turned down some pretty hefty buyout offers from the outset, before finally selling over a year later long after it's history was discovered. In that time, a second one also surfaced, which helped to confirm our position on the first.

As was mentioned before, if this seller was really interested in determining it's authenticity and was reading these threads, he would have taken some of the advice that was pointed to him here, pulled the auction, gone out of his way to really find some provenance or send it to a person who deals in authentication and then sold it on ebay, probably for a lot more $$$ than it brought in.

But he didn't.

And that speaks volumes to me.

We've already pointed out the production process here in this thread. It's incredibly unlikely that this was an error or test piece done by someone screwing around. It doesn't work that way and even on the slim chance it did happen, it's certainly even more unlikely that it would have been carded. Yes, errors happen and QC keeps them from being released. Peter has error figures from Plastirama and they don't match this. Nor are they over painted or over chromed. They're underpainted/chromed, etc. Of course anything is possible, but none of it makes sense. When trying to determine an item's authenticity, you have to take the FACTS that you know and apply them against the good and the bad in the given situation. The bad far outweighed the good here.

[cobrasaboteur]

so what would happen if the buyer of this figure carefully took it out of the package, scraped off some chrome where there would normally be paint, and found only black plastic. If it was legit, he would have just opened up and chipped a real piece, but if it was fake, then the whole thing would be put to rest. I dont think this can be compared to the white mortal at ALL however, as this is almost definitely not a "variant".

-saboteur

[Tattoo Shane]

I dont think this can be compared to the white mortal at ALL however, as this is almost definitely not a "variant".

I agree. I wasn't comparing it to the Mortal. But because it's been referenced a few times in this thread, I was giving the history of how it surfaced and came to be authenticated and because it's a fully produced figure, it's a lot different and easier to authenticate than something that may or most likely may not be a one off error or test piece.

[starrcommand]

so what would happen if the buyer of this figure carefully took it out of the package, scraped off some chrome where there would normally be paint, and found only black plastic. If it was legit, he would have just opened up and chipped a real piece, but if it was fake, then the whole thing would be put to rest. I dont think this can be compared to the white mortal at ALL however, as this is almost definitely not a "variant".

-saboteur

It would be best to test it some where where there isnt black plastic. As we saw in the picture and know of destro figures are they are mostly black plastic. Best to test some where around the red paint like the collar or the missiles on the wrist or something like that.

[bluebikerboy1]

but if i open it wont that kill the value of the fig if it turns up to be a legit factory error?

[cobrasaboteur]

yeah, thats what i said in one of my other posts, if you test it and it isnt real, then you've put to rest the debate. If it is real, then you've just opened and scratched a legit piece.

The thing i dont get is why exactly there is "no way this could be real". Just look at all the sloppy and goofy midnight chinese figures that we've all seen. It can be presumed that there would be some sort of "midnight chinese" or in this case "midnight argentinian" figures back in the day. Like i said, this figure, like those midnight chinese figs, cant really be called a variant, even if it is proved real.

Just a question to anyone who has more knowledge about the mortal than me...what exactly is the white mortal considered? Is it a variant, or is it kind of like a midnight argentinian, or brazilian or whatever. Or is it even possibly a preproduction piece? ( not comparing this to the mortal, but curious as to what that figures status is)

-saboteur

[Tattoo Shane]

Just a question to anyone who has more knowledge about the mortal than me...what exactly is the white mortal considered? Is it a variant, or is it kind of like a midnight argentinian, or brazilian or whatever. Or is it even possibly a preproduction piece? ( not comparing this to the mortal, but curious as to what that figures status is)

The White Mortal is a legitimate figure produced by Rubiplas and released in Venezuela. It could be considered a variant because of it's use of particular body parts but that would be a misnomer, just like calling a De Aco or regular Mortal a variant. These are unique figures produced by legitimate foreign licensees.

As far as "midnight chinese" runs of stuff back in the day go, no, that didn't happen. The "midnight chinese" runs are items that are being run off after hours to specifically feed a collectors market that will buy these items. There are legit FSs that come out of China and there are a lot of factory overstock pieces as well but there was a lot of stuff cranked out specifically for people to make money off of.

For obvious reasons, this didn't happen in the 80s when there was no such thing as collectors paying money for "prototypes" or variants, especially in a country like Argentina. If you've read this thread and are still confused as to why the chances of it being real are so slim, then i'm not really sure how to break down even further. I think it's been explained *very* well.

Of course there's a slim chance it's really some odd one off test piece that was slapped together for who knows what reason. But that chance is sooo slim due to every factor that's already been posted here, sometimes several times over, that there's no way it can ever really be proven, especially when there are so many more obvious reasons pointing to it being fake.

[jabba the drunk]

The seller had knowledge of the G.I.Joe market, as was evidenced by his use of keywords in the auction title. Also evidenced in his acknowledgement of the other two Argen 7 figs he sold, and his activity as a buyer and seller or Gijoes and other action figures.

After being contacted with specific questions, the seller didn't respond with any information as to assuage any fears that the item was fake.

Had he been able to, and put concise, specific information in his auction description...the item would have sold for MUCH more than the paltry $243.50 it sold for.

He didn't amend his description with true info, because he could not.. as it is not real and he had no information that would assuage the concerns. So he just kept is "as is" and hoped for the best. I'm astounded it even sold for as much as it did.

Had it been real and had he have offered ANY specific, verifiable info...I'd have paid a very handsome sum for this. I mean...c'mon, I specifically collect only this stuff; hard to find and unique Destro items.

But enjoy it bikerboy. Seriously. I mean, even though it's not authentic, it is still at least a conversation piece. And if you determined it was worth whatever you paid for it (not sure if you were the winning bidder, or acquired it another way), then it's worth it to you.

- Peter