THE STORY
Six action figures that never existed.
Stiff Competition is built around six invented characters from 1994 — now loose in 2026 and getting everything wrong with total confidence.
Meet the six: Major Wood, The Rear Admiral, Hammerin’ Hanky, The Grip, Slick Willy and The Velvet Python. One gang, six egos, zero self-awareness. Follow the chaos in your daily feed, get them on mugs, tees and totes, or collect one-of-a-kind digital art.
The characters come first. Everything else here exists to serve them.
The Spark
Remember when Saturdays meant waking up before the sun, grabbing a bowl of sugary cereal that turned the milk neon, and plopping down right in front of the tube?
You weren't just watching cartoons—you were holding the plastic heroes that ruled the universe. Those action figures didn't just sit on a shelf; they fought the epic battles inside our heads.
I'm bringing that exact, unadulterated spark of joy back into the daily grind. Because a little bit of that 90's magic is exactly what the modern world needs to keep standing tall.
The Idea
It all started on a Wednesday afternoon trek to the pub with a £1 job lot — a random purchase of 3 old toy action figures.
A few raw phone snaps caught these 90's toy characters in poses so lifelike—and so loaded with innuendo—that they had to become something.
Years later, I worked out what: six lifelike characters of my own, with an invented past, set loose in today's world.
While the original trio is history and locked away in red tape, the originals were copyrighted and couldn't be used — which turned out for the better. Nothing here is borrowed. After months grinding through AI and figuring out the tools, they were ready.... Welcome to
An elite squad of six ultra-rigid prototypes from a defunct toy titan.
Deemed too "extreme" for retail in 1994, these relics were left to rot in an industrial vault. But 32 years of confinement couldn't hold them. In 2026, they've blown their seals to dominate a world that finally craves the raw energy that kept them off the shelves!
I'm bringing them to life through:
- Digital NFTs
- High-End Apparel & Merch
- Collectible Art
- Everyday Adventures — designed to brighten up your social feed.
Physical figures
None exist yet. Enough people have asked that there’s now a waiting list — join it and you’ll hear first if it happens.
The tone
The comedy is in the collision. Six figures moulded in 1994 into a permanent state of readiness, meeting a world that has moved on without them. Self-checkout. Flat-pack furniture. Everything going contactless.
They take all of it entirely seriously. That’s what makes it funny.
The names are jokes. The descriptions are jokes. It runs on innuendo from top to bottom, and that is very much the point.
About the name
In English, “stiff competition” means the opposition is tough. Hard to beat. The competition is stiff.
It also means exactly what you think it means.
That’s the whole joke, and it’s the reason everything here exists.
So no, they’re not competing with each other. There’s no tournament and no fight. They’re the competition — the six you’d be up against, standing there, entirely unbothered.
It doesn’t translate. Nearly every language has a phrase for tough rivals, but the word won’t also mean rigid, so half of it falls away the moment it leaves English. We’ve made peace with that.
The backstory
There’s a full fiction behind the characters — a cancelled 1994 toy line, a company called RIGID-DYNE, thirty-two years sealed in storage. Seven surviving documents, a glossary, and the record of what happened to them. Read The RIGID-DYNE Papers →
Where this stands
Launched in 2026. One collection, built from nothing over a matter of months.
The blockchain record and the work itself are public, and all of it can be checked.
