UPDATED 01/22/06 - One of my all time favorite lines is the World of Springfield from Playmates.  This amazing line of over 200 figures and three dozen playsets will always remain a centerpiece of my collection.  And it should be no surprise that for any line I loved that much, I'd try to pick up some pre-production stuff.

One of my favorite items is a test shot of the Be Sharp Apu, complete in his test shot packaging.  As you can see, they used whatever box they had lying around at the time.

Next up is a basic test shot of Milhouse's pop, Kirk Van Houten.

The next test shot is of Uter.  Again, you can see the use of odd plastics that happened to be available.

These next three are all packaged test shots once again.  These are the three re-releases - Homer, Marge and Maggie; Krusty and Milhouse; and Grampa and Apu.  They are packaged in plain white boxes, with plain white stickers on the enclosed dioramas.  Not only are the dioramas there, but the entire package of accessories is also included in each box, cast in funky plastic.  And I have absolutely no idea why Maggie as 'A2' on the front of her.

There was a rash of 'prototypes' for WOS that showed up on ebay, all jet black.  I bought a few dirt cheap, but I suspect these are not pre-production pieces at all, but just somebody spray painting some figures black and trying to make a buck.  While the seller claimed they were authentic, Playmates has no recollection of black test shots, and I've never seen anyone dust figures in black before.  Gray, yest, but not black.  Still, they make for an interesting addition.

The next set of test shots are from two specific exclusive sets.  First, there's Homer, Marge, Bart and Lisa from the NYE set, and then Burns and Smithers from the Future Burns sets.  These are basic test shots, but some are done in some pretty odd colors.

Of course, Playmates isn't the only company that's done Simpsons merchandise.  Sideshow did their series of busts, and this Apu might look like nothing special:

But he was sent to me by the company months before he was actually released, and is an unnumbered early production sample.  They use this type of thing for their tour samples.