Anachronistic Figures

[Freeza Heika]

I was sitting around today daydreaming about all my DB merchandise, when I remembered some figures that my grandmother got me when I was 9. I'm 18 now, so this was Christmas 1999. They were Tapion and Vegetto (at the time I had no clue who they were and only knew that they were Dragonball related from the logo on the package). I know movie 13 didn't appear in the Funimation dub until late 06' and Vegetto's first appearance was 02'-ish. I know she wasn't importing anything over the internet, because she didn't have a computer at the time, and the only place she would've gone shopping would have been one of the major retailers. So, what the hell were these? Why were there figures of characters not to be seen in Funimation's dub for half a decade being sold in a regular old walmart or k-mart?

[Hao_Kaiser]

From what I remember, Irwin toys, the group that was releasing all of this merchandise back in the 90's (and into the early 2000's) had this weird knack for releasing characters that were wholly irrelevant to where the series was actually at on American TV (I used to have a tape that advertised their toy line... I know there was some Super 13, SSJ3 Goku, and Mr. Satan action going on there).

I remember that one year for Christmas, I got a VHS tape of some early Android saga episodes (it was new and relevant, mind you) and an SSJ Gotenks figure. With a gun. Beyond that, they used to release these sets of miniature figures. I had little figures of Fat Janemba and Hildergarn during the late Freeza episodes.

It's not impossible at all that your grandmother was able to pick up those figures at any random major retailer.

[aegoku]

Hao_Kaiser, you were right on. There were a bunch of minifigs released by Irwin that featured characters not even close to having debuted in the dub. Here's a link to a series with a lot of characters who would have been unknown to most dub fans.
http://www.dragonballtoys.com/archive/i ... ?FigID=322

[Supa Saiya-Jin Tullece]

The first DBZ figure I bought was Goten in like '99.

And they had Broli, but I thought he looked scary. I originally thought that it was some weird Gohan and that the figure was in a pis-printed/labeled package.

[Brangeta]

Those were AB (French) rereleases by Irwin Toy in 1998 and 1999. You should find a few Irwin Tapions on ebay if you take a look. He was a great figure.