Several mysteries attend this series of four sets. They are very late, quite possibly 1985 rather than 1984, which marks the end of our remit. There are no markings or serial numbers to indicate who printed the transfers, so while probably it was Thomas Salter or their Action Transfers division, it is just about possible (however unlikely) that it was Special Products, who were starting up at around this time. There were rumours in the SPLAT Forum that at least one of these sets was spotted in Thomas Salter livery, & indeed many Thomas Salter sets list Dune as among their 'other titles', which is a very strong indicator. I am inclined without further evidence to believe that the origin of this series was indeed Thomas Salter — but we've only ever seen them in their French incarnation.
I'd like to get hold of Thomas Salter or PrestoMagiX versions to give them a good scanning! The images shown here were very kindly provided in the form of photos & A4 (& therefore cropped) scans by Ian Marchant & Mark Bennet.
Hachette Jeunesse are, of course, still going strong & marketing reading material such as Peppa Pig for the French-speaking young. I believe they acquired the French publishing rights to Dune, & produced other materials such as pop-up & story books. Of course, this might explain why we've never seen English-language versions of these sets…
"Fabrique en Belgique — ©1984 Dino de Laurentiis Corporation & licensed by Merchandising Corporation of America Inc."
This latter company seems to have been founded on 4th Nov 1965 for the purpose of "ADVERTISING AND BUSINESS: NAMELY, COMMERCIAL EXPLOITATION OF LITERARY PROPERTIES AND PERSONALITIES" …but by 30th Nov 1982: "ABANDONMENT - FAILURE TO RESPOND OR LATE RESPONSE" — & these Dune transfer sets are at least two years later! So they seem to have been on their last legs… (there was a lot of it about). The name is currently in use by a computer games company — clearly no relation.
Well, here are the sets. We've only been able to get at three of the four, so no "Le palais de l'empereur" for you today. The front covers show white borders around the figures, as if they were stickers, but this seems to be a convention of the times which we've seen with PrestoMagiX sets of the same vintage, & the transfers are perfectly normal with clear halos — not white. I suspect the culprit is an art director completely ignorant of the nature of transfers!
(Also I've shown them out of order — "L'assaut final" should, as the name implies, come last! But it was the best-looking set, so…)
L'Assaut Final
Scans courtesy of Ian Marchant
L'Invasion des Harkonnen
Photos courtesy of Mark Bennett
Scan courtesy of Ian Marchant
La Battaille du Desert
Photos courtesy of Mark Bennett
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