The Duncan Midnight Special was introduced in 1988 and first appeared in the Duncan Toys 1989 catalog. There is little that distinguishes the Midnight Special from the standard Duncan Imperial other than the body color and silver foil stamp.
Hard plastic body with a fixed steel axle, starburst response, and cotton string. The card is in all English on the front, while the back is bi-lingual in Japanese and English. This version was short-lived. It wasn't long before Bandai licensed this same yo-yo from Duncan. As a result, Bandai had "Midnight Special" changed to "Hyper Midnight" and also changed the packaging to all Japanese and Bandai-branded.
This little known version is from late 1996 to early 1997, the start of Japan's largest yo-yo boom. The Midnight Special and Hyper Midnight have been out of production for more than 15 years (as of 2018).
