Action figure collectors have a bad reputation of denying themselves the pleasures of indulging in their toys' true purpose by never taking them out of the box, but walking into Josh Waddle's bedroom, it's obvious that this collector isn't bound to any collector pretensions.
"You can enjoy them the most if you liberate them," Waddle said, showing off multiple shelves of action figures from a variety of collections: He-Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Marvel and DC comic book super heroes (and villains), Transformers, professional wrestling characters, G.I. Joe, and many more. "A lot of people think if you take it out of its package, it loses all of its value, but a lot of this stuff, even out of the package, would still sell for a good price on e-Bay."
The roots of Waddle's collection, which he estimates to be between 700 - 800 figurines, began, naturally, when he was a child, and never really let up.
"It's something I've done my entire life. I started when I was 3 and I never really stopped," he said. "I'm a bit of a pack rat. I still have a bunch of my old stuff. I refused to ever let my parents sell it or get rid of it."
Many of the figurines are acquired at local retail stores, like Wal-Mart and Toys 'R Us, and Waddle follows Internet forums to know when certain characters or series are going to be released.
"Sometimes I'll buy them online and pay a slightly higher price because it's a big headache to drive around place to place looking," he said. "Sometimes you start wondering if the Wal-Mart in Winchester has something different."
As a young man with a perceivably childish hobby, Waddle isn't concerned how his collection might be received among his friends.
"For a lot of them, even though they don't do it and they might think it's kind of silly, once they step in here and see everything, they kind of turn to kids again."