Monthly Archives: January 2012

Jan 20 2012

DC Universe Classics Wave 19: Hawkman by Mattel

I’ve already covered four of the six figures from the 19th Wave of DC Universe Classics, so let’s knock off the last two figures today and tomorrow and then we can check out the C&C figure, STRIPE. Today we’re looking at Hawkman and I’ve got some seriously mixed feelings about him turning up in this Wave. The running theme of this Wave has been the JSA and in fairness this is the Golden Age version of the character, but that doesn’t change the fact that we already got Hawkman all the way back in Wave 6, and if you already own that figure then all you’re really getting that’s new here are two new Golden Age heads and the C&C piece. Yep, except for one little change in the paint, this is a straight repack from the neck down. On the plus side… I actually don’t own the Wave 6 release of Hawkman, so…

There’s the DCUC packaging. I’m really anxious to see how the new All Stars packaging will stack up. I don’t know if its because its going away, but I continue to love the presentation of the DC Universe Classics more and more with each figure. Hawkman is carded holding his mace and he really fills out the card beautifully. Mine came packaged with his beaked mask, which I absolutely hate. I’m not sure if this guy was packaged as a variant or not (ie with the other head attached).
Out of the package Hawkman is a great looking figure. But then he was also a great looking figure when he was released 13 waves ago. As I already mentioned, he’s the exact same figure from the neck down save for the absense of the painted emblem on the red disc of his chest harness. The rest of the colors are all the same and the paintwork on my figure is all quite crisp and clean and free of slop. The wings have a nice feathered texture are are hinged on his back, and while the hinge is kind of big and ugly, its at least very sturdy and gives a nice amount of flapping articulation. The wings are also hinged at their peaks and they look quite majestic when spread out to their full span. I’m pretty sure the mace is the same one that came with the Wave 6 Hawkman as well.
I already let it slip that I hate the beaked version of Hawkman’s mask. It’s not any fault of the sculpt, I just think its a stupid looking design. The other head suits me a lot better, but I still don’t like it as much as the modern look. Maybe I can buy a trashed Wave 6 Hawkman for cheap and salvage the modern head, but more than likely I’ll wind up buying Mattel’s MOTUC/DCUC 2-pack with the Hawkman and Stratos, since I still don’t have Stratos. But, I digress…
Let’s run down the articulation. You get a ball jointed neck; The arms feature ball jointed shoulders, hinged elbows, and swivel cuts in the biceps and wrists; The legs have universal movement in the hips, swivel cuts in the thighs, and hinges in the ankles and knees. Hawkman swivels at the waist and features the ubiquitous DCUC ab crunch hinge.
I’ve said plenty of times during my looks at Wave 19 that I’m not going to do a lot of nitpicking regarding what characters Mattel decided to put in these final slots before the line goes bye-bye. They were never going to please everyone with their choices, and quite frankly its a good bet they didn’t even know the line was going to be ending when they populated Wave 19. That all having been said, I’m going to break from that because there’s just no way that I wanted a rehash like this one with only two Waves left. I’d be extra pissed if I already owned the previous Hawkman, but then since I prefer the more modern look, this figure is still nothing more than a placeholder in my collection. He’s a fine figure, and I’m sure there’s plenty of JSA fans and completists who will disagree with me, but I seriously could think of dozens of characters who should have gotten this slot in the penultimate Wave.
See ya tomorrow with a look at Magog!
Jan 19 2012

Thundercats: 6-inch Series: Cheetara by Ban Dai

As promised, I’m back with a look at the last of the three 6-inch Thundercats I picked up this week. Cheetara’s the newest release of the bunch and while I thought she was going to be really tough to find, just like her 4-inch counterpart, I stumbled upon a whopping three of them hanging on the peg at once. While Panthro and Lion-O are more or less just larger versions of their 4-inch cousins, Cheetara comes with a major, and much needed, overhaul in the articulation department. Let’s see what we’ve got.

And there’s the packaging. Once again, the printed insert has some nice character art to give the package some individuality. Unfortunately, Cheetara’s package is also a filthy liar with the whole”18 points” of articulation nonsense, but we’ll get to that later. Cheetara is carded with a bit more of an action pose than the other figures, and holding her staff. There’s a wee bit of warpage to her knee joints when she comes out of the package, but they seem to straighten out pretty well.
I’m really happy with Cheetara’s sculpt. It’s pretty close to what we saw in the smaller 4-inch version. BD did a great job with her long hair and this time you don’t have a ThunderLynx magnet sticking out of her back and through her hair. Her face sculpt is a bit soft, like Lion-O’s, but her being a female it works a lot better on this figure. In fact, it’s more of an asset than a liability. I think they amped up her boobs a bit over the 4-inch figure too, but let’s face it, she’s pretty well endowed in the cartoon. She’s also got the bangles sculpted onto her ankles and wrists. All in all, BD did a fine job capturing her animated counterpart in figure form.
The paintwork on this figure is pretty tight. Yes, we still have those unpainted joints, and honestly they’re pretty obnoxious here against the yellowish flesh(fur?)tones of her shoulders, elbows, and knees. They don’t ruin the figure for me, but you can’t help but notice them. I’m particularly happy with the little spots on her shoulders and hair, as well as the pink coloring around her eyes and on her lips. Nice.
Ok, so let’s deal with the articulation. The 4-inch Cheetara was a major departure from the articulation on the rest of the figures and as such somewhat disappointing. 6-inch Cheetara is so much better, but she is still lacking a few of the points that 6-inch Lion-O and Panthro have. The head is still ball jointed, although her hair really does create problems there. I’ll still concede that the joint is there. Her arms feature the same pin and hinge ball joints as the other figures and swivel wrists, but her elbows are only single hinged and she’s missing the swivel cut in the bicep. Her legs feature the same ball joints in the hips and swivels in the thighs, but her knees are only single hinged. Her ankles are hinged and still have the rocker joints. She doesn’t have the swivel in the waist, but her torso does swivel just under her chest. Her articulation is pretty good, but it’s not quite up to par with the others, and I don’t come up with the 18 separate points claimed by the packaging.
Cheetara comes with just one accessory, but it’s exactly what we needed to get with her: The iconic staff. There’s not much to say about it, it’s brown and has some wood graining sculpted into it. So, the accessory count here isn’t all that impressive, but I can’t really think of what else she would come with, so no complaints here. I suppose BD could have included a smaller version that clipped onto her somewhere, but honestly, I don’t feel that I needed it.
If it sounds like I’m a little down on Cheetara, I certainly don’t mean to be. She really is a nice figure. Obviously the extra articulation would have been nice, particularly the swivels in the biceps and I would have really liked the extra hinges in the knees. It’s just kind of odd that the super agile acrobat of the litter has less articulation than the hulking tank, Panthro. Still, she’s very poseable and she looks absolutely fantastic.
Jan 18 2012

Thundercats: 6-inch Series: Panthro by Ban Dai

Here comes the second installment of my 6-inch Thundercats Trifecta and this time we’re looking at the bruiser of the Thundercats, Panthro. He’s a big hunk of plastic, but does he live up to the awesomeness of Lion-O?

The packaging is pretty much the same as what we saw yesterday. It’s a huge bubble on a generic card, but the printed insert with Panthro’s character art adds a lot to the individuality of the presentation. While Lion-O looked pretty comfy inside his roomy bubble, Panthro’s looking a bit more crampt. He fills out the package nicely. He’s carded in a fairly prone position with his two accessories flanking him on either side. I thought it odd that he wasn’t carded holding his nunchuks, but we’ll see the possible reason for that in a few ticks.
Out of the package, Panthro is one satisfyingly large figure for this scale. One of my favorite things about the 4-inch line of BD’s Thundercats is the way each character is scaled accurately to each other, and that carries over to the 6-inch line as well. Panthro’s got a lot of bulk to him and he’s about a head taller than Lion-O. His proportions are awseome with huge fists and a big upper body. I’m absolutely loving the sculpting at work on this figure. Lion-O had a soft face sculpt, but Panthro’s is clear and full of character. I like the detail of the scarring on his shoulders and his face and I’m really digging the spikes on his bracers and chest straps.
Panthro’s paintwork is excellent and while he still has those pesky unpainted pegs in his joints, they aren’t nearly as offensive as the ones on Lion-O. He doesn’t have any exposed pegs in the front of his shoulders and the others don’t look so bad against the purple and brown of his darker color scheme. I like the mix of matte and glossy finish and once again, the Eye of Thunderra emblem on his belt looks crisp and beautiful.
Panthro features almost the same 18 points of articulation as Lion-O, so let’s run through them again. You get a ball jointed neck; His arms have ball joints in the shoulders, double-hinged elbows, and swivels in the biceps and forearms. His legs have ball joints in the hips, swivels in the thighs, double-hinges in the knees, hinged ankles, and his ankles have the cool rocker joints to keep his feet flat on the ground. Panthro has a ball joint in the waist and that same ab joint that is there, but doesn’t seem to really do anything. What’s the difference between Panthro and Lion-O? Panthro’s wrists aren’t really hinged, they only swivel.
Panthro only comes with two accessories, and they’re sort of the same accessory. You get his folded nunchuks and his unfolded nunchucks. The folded nunchuks can be pegged onto his back for him to carry, and I like this idea. The unfolded chuks are molded in one piece and the chain is flexible. I would have really preferred a piece of grey string connecting two pieces, but I’m sure this style was cheaper. The big problem here is that it is almost impossible to get the chucks into Panthro’s tight grips. Your best bet is sliding them into his grip at the chain and trying to slide it down to the batons and even then it’s really difficult. BD really needed to make his grip a little more flexible or give us a little more room to work with. Still, if this is the biggest gripe I can come up with, I suppose I can live with it.
As with Lion-O, I totally dig this figure and I’m having loads of fun messing around with him. Technically he’s a bit better executed than Lion-O since he has the sharper face sculpt and lacks the unpainted pins in the shoulders, but apart from that you get the same great looking and ridiculously fun type of figure. Sure, Panthro doesn’t come with as many goodies as Lion-O, but you do get his signature weapon in two forms and let’s face it, he uses a lot more plastic for his build.
Tomorrow I’ll be back to finish off this trifecta of thunderous kitties with Cheetara.
Jan 17 2012

Thundercats: 6-inch Series: Lion-O by Ban Dai

As some of you may know the Walmarts in my town are pretty sucky for toy hunting. Unless you’re looking for Star Wars, Transformers or toys from whatever the Marvel or DC movie of the week is, they really don’t carry anything else worthwhile in the Boys Action aisles. In fact, in the last couple of years the Boys Action aisles have gone from three down to two and now it’s one and a half as one of them shares with Nerf and all three of the ones in the city where I live are the same way. So imagine my surprise today when I actually found Thundercats on the pegs. There were no 4-inch cats, but two flexed pegs of the 6-inchers, along with the newly released Cheetara. I happily grabbed up Lion-O, Panthro and Cheetara. Sadly no Tygra or Mumm-Ra. Today, we’ll kick it off with Lion-O.

The packaging is pretty utilitarian in design, but it certainly gets the job done. Y ou get a huge bubble with just a bit of the cardback peeking up on the top with the neo Thundercats logo. Lion is carded in a fairly neutral stance, but holding the extended Sword of Omens and with his accesories around him. There’s a nice printed insert with some pretty cool character art and some stickers in tri-lingual nonsense. The back panel shows the figure as well as some of the other Thundercats toys available. These aren’t collector friendly packages like Ban Dai’s 8-inch Classics Thundercats, but that’s ok, I don’t mind shredding a package to get at my toys.
Once I got this guy out of the package in in my hands, I knew that I loved him. That’s not to say he doesn’t have some issues, so let me get those out of the way first. The face sculpt is very soft, especially when compared to Panthro. It might have something to do with the flesh colored plastic BD used, I’m not sure. It still looks good, it still looks exactly like Lion-O from the modern cartoon, but at first, I kept thinking I wished it was crisper and more defined. The rest of the sculpt is really good, albeit simplified to keep that animated style of the character design.
Secondly, yeah those unpainted pegs in the joints. The only one that really bothers me are the ones on his flesh colored wrists, and one of those isn’t even a problem since I have him wearing the Claw Shield while on display, but they are a bit of an eyesore, especially since the rest of the figure’s paintwork is really first rate. I love the contrast between the glossy blue on the armor and the matte finish on the silver shoulder pauldron. The paintwork on the face is clean and the Eye of Thunderra on his belt is crisp and beautiful. Ok, the straps on the back of his leg armor aren’t painted, but I didn’t even really notice that at first.
Lion-O sports 18-points of articulation, making him a difficult figure to put down. Like my 8-inch Classics Lion-O, he’s just so darn fun to play around with. You get a ball jointed neck; Arms with ball joints in the shoulders, double-hinged elbows, hinged wrists, and swivels in the biceps and forearms; His legs feature ball joints in the hips, swivels in the thighs, double-hinged knees, hinged ankles, and his ankles even have rocker joints to keep his feet flat when assuming a wide stance. Lion-O also has a ball jointed waist, and while it looks like he has a ball joint in the chest, mine doesn’t seem to want to move at all. The level of poseability here approaches what I come to expect in a higher end import, not a 6-inch American mass market release figure. My only concern here is that the joints feel like they may loosen up pretty quick. Especially when I can’t stop playing with him.
Lion-O comes with all the necessary accessories. You get two versions of The Sword of Omens, both extended and dorment. You get two versions of the Claw Shield, one with the claws out, and one with them retracted. The swords are fantastically done, and I’m particularly impressed that the extended sword, while obviously soft for safety purposes is perfectly straight and not prone to warping. The Eye of Thunderra is maticulously painted on the hilt of the extended version and closed on the dorment version. Both Claw Shields can be used to sheathe the dorment sword and can be worn by popping off Lion-O’s left hand and popping the Claw on in its place. He also has a plastic strap hanging off his belt so he can wear it as a sheathe. I couldn’t ask for anything more in the accessories department.
It’s unfortunate that popular opinion seems to characterize this figure by two of its faults, a soft face sculpt and unpainted peg joints, because everything else about him is amazing. I am absolutely thrilled to finally own this figure and he definitely ranks up there as one of my favorite recent purchases, and I’ve been buying a hell of a lot of toys lately. I suppose you could argue that that BD is sort of marketing these 6-inchers at the collectors grade end of the spectrum, and he certainly doesn’t appoach the glory of the 8-inch Classics Lion-O, but he is still a fantastic toy that still looks just fine displayed on the shelf. I’ll also note that it’s cool how the awkwardly large Snarf that came with the Thundertank is actually perfectly scaled for these 6-inch figures. He retails for anywhere between $15-17, which I honestly think is a decent price point for all that you get. And now, I’m going to go play with him some more!
Jan 16 2012

Young Justice: 6-inch Series: Artemis by Mattel

I’m back with the second figure of the first wave of Mattel’s 6-inch Young Justice series, and it’s Artemis. Yep, kind of an odd choice for a slot in the first wave, since she didn’t come into the series at the beginning, but that doesn’t make her any less welcome. I’ve already went through a lot of the concepts behind this line, so today’s feature should go a lot quicker than yesterday’s.

The packaging. It’s identical to the window box that Robin came in, aside from the back panel that features the character art of Artemis and her bio. Once again, the packaging here really shows off the goods nicely. As big as the box is, though, Artemis’ base is actually bigger, so it comes separated into two halves.
As with Robin, Artemis is essentially a smaller and slighter build version of the DCUC figures, but being kids these are completely in scale with the DCUC collection. The only thing frustraing here is that as good as Artemis’ articulation is, it’s still tough to get her to look really good shooting her bow. She’s a pretty awesome mix of paintwork for her costume and just enough sculpting here and there for her kneepads, gloves, and boots to keep her unique. Her belt and thigh strapped pouch are separate pieces, as is her removable shoulder-slung quiver. I’m particularly happy with the way Artemis’ head sculpt came out and the hinged ponytail is a nice touch and is completely removable if it gets in your way.
Artemis’ articulation is the same as we saw with Robin. You get a ball jointed neck; Arms with ball joints in the shoulders, hinged elbows, and swivels in the biceps and wrists; Her legs feature universal movment in the hips, swivels in the thighs, and hinges in the knees and ankles; Her torso includes an ab crunch hinge and a swivel in the waist. Not bad at all.
Accessories! Artemis comes loaded for bear with her compound bow and arrows. The bow is nicely sculpted with the plastic strings, a sculpted grip for her to hold it and it’s got a groove so you can actually notch one of the arrows into it. She also comes with four various gizmo arrows.
Robin’s base was big, but Artemis’ is huge. It’s two pieces that snap together to make up a cool little archery range. There’s a clear bucket to hold her extra arrows and a stand to cradle her bow when she’s not shooting. The other half of the stand has a target that you can actually plug some of the arrows into to make it look like they were fired into it. The little cracks and damage to the target are a cool little extra. Granted, when assembled, the target isn’t terribly far from her shooting position, but you can separate them to give them a little distance. Personally, I’m happy just displaying her on the half that holds her bow and arrows, although an extra peg on the target base would have been nice.
Artemis falls right in line with Robin as being an excellent all around package. While I think I like the display possibilities of Robin’s base better, Artemis’ is a bit more like a mini playset and that’s a really cool thing. She’s definitely worth the average $20 going price, and possibly even the extra five bucks that TRU will rape out of you if you have no other options without having to pay for shipping. Either way, I’m really pleased with my first foray into this 6-inch line and I’ll definitely be pushing forward and picking up Aqualad, Superboy, and Speedy.
Jan 15 2012

Star Wars: Vintage Collection: Princess Leia (Slave Outfit) by Hasbro

I had every intention of keeping my promise and stopping back today with a look at 6-inch Artemis from Mattel’s Young Justice line, but unfortunately my camera ran out of batteries and I was too drunk off my ass busy to run out and get fresh ones, so I’m going to go with a quickie that I’ve been holding on to since a little before Christmas. Holy shit, it’s Star Wars!

Yeah, not much Star Wars around here. In fact, every time I buy a new Star Wars figure, I consider it an epic fail of willpower on my part. Usually I can keep it in check until Hasbro decides to release some awesome huge new version of a classic vehicle or a figure that I really want for some reason or another. That having been said, I’ll freely admit that it is difficult to resist just about any of these Vintage Collection carded figures. And by that I mean the ones from the Original Trilogy, not the prequel figures on the crappy ret-conned cards.
So, Princess Leia in Slave Outfit. I really wanted to pick her up when she was released last year to go with my then new Jabba the Hutt figure and dias. Unfortunately, I never did see her in the stores, and I was not willing to pay the highway robbery of the online prices. Amazingly enough, I was in a Target about a week before Christmas and happened to be scooping up some new Marvel Universe figures when I spotted her hanging on the pegs. There were only like four or five Vintage Collection figures there and bafflingly enough she was one of them. I threw her on the pile and went off to check out. The register didn’t recognize her barcode so the cashier needed to come up with a price. I’m thinking, well you just rang up five Marvel Universe figures at $6.99 a piece, so that’s what she’ll call it and I’d be fine. Instead she says, “How’s three bucks sound?” Yeah, it sounded just fine.
Anyway, it wasn’t until I got this figure home that I realized she didn’t include the second set of legs that the last release did. The ones that allowed her to sit in a reclining position. I’m sure I could probably still get her to recline by my Jabba figure, but insteady I just opted to slap her in a Starcase and leave her carded. Yes, that means you just read all of this for nothing, because I’m not really going to review her. It also means for some bizarre reason I had a spare Star Wars Starcase lying around. Weird. Suffice it to say, the sculpt looks fine, the softgoods loin cloth is good, but maybe a little too full, and she comes with a pole arm and a… a drinking glass? Um ok.
I may get around to opening her sooner or later, especially since Hasbro slapped that ugly Boba Fett Mail Away sticker right on top of her photo, but for now, she’s staying carded. I will admit I found it surprising that her first appearance in this outfit wasn’t until the 1995 Power of the Force 2 line. Even more surprising… I actually still own that figure carded. Once again, weird.

By the way, Hasbro, can you please get the friggin Gamorrean Guard back on the pegs, please?
Jan 14 2012

Young Justice: 6-inch Series: Robin by Mattel

I did my best to resist Mattel’s 6-inch line of figures based on the excellent Young Justice cartoon, and opted to collect the smaller 4-inch figures and build the C&C Hall of Justice. But the harsh mistress of clearance overcame me when I was able to scoop up the first two figures in the series for just under fifteen bucks a piece. It seemed like a good opportunity to see what they’re all about. The first two figures consist of Robin and Artemis, so let’s start out by checking out the Boy Wonder himself and see if I turn out being overwhelmed, underwhelmed, or just merely whelmed.

The figure comes in a window box that does an amazing job of showing you exactly what you’re getting in terms of the figure and the base. Robin is in an action pose, the base is on the bottom of the package and his weapons are spread out off to the side. It’s possibly a little too roomy in there, but the base really is big, and unlike Artemis’ it doesn’t come apart. The packaging deco is pretty close to what we’ve been seeing on other DC Universe figures, but with the addition of the Young Justice logo and the character illustrations on the side panels of the box. The layout of the back panel should be instantly familiar to any collectors of DCUC, JLU or Infinite Heroes. It has a little bio of Robin and shows some of the other figures in the line. It’s pretty easy to get everything out and the packaging is certainly collector friendly enough to return it all to the box for display if you should desire. I was a little worried about the action pose wrecking my figure’s joints, but everything seemed ok when I got him out.
So what we have here is basically a somewhat stylized DC Universe Classics figure, and that is definitely not a bad thing. Mattel took the basics of the DCUC body and made it conform to the more animated stylings, while keeping it more or less in line with other figures in the DCUC lineup. More importantly, these figures are slightly smaller and thus actually properly in scale with DCUC. For example, does your DCUC Kid Flash figure piss you off because he’s too tall? Well then, these should make you happy. On the downside, Robin’s limbs feel very soft and rubbery. I’m not sure if its just a different plastic or if its because he’s slighter of build. Surprisingly, it doesn’t seem to effect the joints all that much.
Every bit of Robin’s sculpt is wonderfully executed. The body is a nice mix of paintwork detail and some sculpting, and he sports a short rubbery plastic cape. His head sculpt is complete with his dorky ears and his conceited little smirk and really captures all the personality of his animated counterpart. Articulation consists of standard DCUC poseability. The head is ball jointed; The arms feature ball jointed shoulders, swivels in the biceps and wrists, and hinged elbows; The legs have universal movement at the hips, swivel cuts in the thighs, and hinges in the knees and ankles; And the torso has the DCUC ab crunch hinge and swivels at the waist. I do think this new line would have been a good opportunity to standardize the double-hinged knees that we saw in some of the more recent DCUC figures, but sadly it wasn’t the case.
In addition to a great figure, you get a pretty amazing and impressively large base. Robin’s is the corner section of a rooftop with a gargoyle statue. There are three pegs on it, so you can securely pose Robin in a few different areas or pose more than one figure on it. It’s a really nice piece and versatile enough that you could probably use it for a number of DCUC figures too.
                                     
Acessories include Robin’s battle staff, a couple of batarangs, a very cool translucent blue hologram wrist computer, um, a gun of some sort… and two um… hmmm. Maybe explosives or mines or something. I’ve seen almost all the episodes of teh cartoon, but I can’t seem to remember what the hell these things are, and I’m a little iffy on the gun too. Either way, it’s a nice assortment of stuff.
In the end, I’m really thrilled with this figure. If you’re a fan of the series, and don’t give a crap about building the Hall of Justice from the 4-inch figures, these 6-inchers are definitely the way to go. They look great, feature nice poseability, and they make great display pieces with their bases. The only sticking point can be the price, which is admittedly all over the place. $20 seems to be the average, and I guess that’s fair enough. I usually spend between $15-17 on my DCUC figures, and here you’re getting a huge base and a fair amount of accessories. Toys R Us seems to be the odd man out, charging $25 a pop, which really seems excessive, so shopping around is a good idea. I should be back tomorrow to check out Artemis.
Jan 13 2012

Marvel Universe: Falcon by Hasbro

I’m almost caught up on my backlog of Marvel Universe figures, as I’ve got just a few more new acquisitions to feature here. Today we’re going to check out Falcon. I’m actually kind of surprised they didn’t save Falcon for the “Comic Series” of Captain America’s movie line, but the timing of his release was still fairly on point. Honestly, I’ve never been a huge fan of the character, but I certainly don’t mind him when he makes an appearance in whatever I happen to be reading. He was definitely a challenging figure for Hasbro to tackle what with the heavy reuse in the line. Did they pull it off? Let’s see…

Standard Marvel Universe packaging. The character artwork is quite nice. A bit more gritty than some, but you get a nice shot of him flying out of the card with Redwing in tow. Falcon certainly has no trouble filling out his bubble as his wings are spread behind him, and actually detatched from the figure, along with his personalized figure stand and his little Redwing accessory. It definitely feels like you’re getting more than your average amount of plastic on this card.
Despite being a relatively newer release, Falcon’s sculpt and articulation feels dated for the line. The paint job and the wash on the figure itself also makes him feel more like one of the somewhat lesser quality comic pack figures that we were getting back in the Secret Wars series. I don’t want to rag on him too badly, though, because in overall design and appearance, I think he makes up for those vibes. Hasbro nailed the look of the character quite nicely, particularly the head sculpt, and while I do find the wash over the white parts a little cheesy, the rest of the figure’s paintwork is quite nice, particularly the deco on his chest.
I’m still pretty undecided on the wings. They’re sculpted in translucent red plastic, which makes for a very nice effect, but the way they clip into the slots on the back of his biceps is a bit questionable. When he’s just standing there, I think they look pretty good, and you can get some pretty nice poses out of him if you’re focusing on the positioning of the wings. On the other hand, putting Falcon into some pretty standard action poses makes the wings look kind of wonky and awkward. I’ll confess, I’m not sure I could have designed a better solution, though, so I’ll defer to Hasbro on this one. All in all it works, most of the time.
Redwing is a nice little sculpted piece with a clip on the bottom so that you can attach him to Falcon’s arm. The bird itself looks great, but I would have preferred the clip be turned 90 degrees. Not only would I prefer that for clipping him to Falcon’s arm, but I think it would have looked more like Redwing’s legs and feet, rather than just a giant ring clip underneath him. I’m nitpicking, I know it. For a little 3 3/4″ scale bird, he’s pretty good.
When all is said and done, I’m quite pleased with the way this figure turned out, but it does still feel like one of the earlier MU figures, rather than one of the more recent waves. Maybe Hasbro had to save some money on the body to cost out the extra plastic for the wings. Either way, it’s not a deal breaker for me. I think he’s well worth picking up as I still consider him to be a fairly iconic character and he looks damn fine on my shelf.
Jan 12 2012

Captain America: Captain Britain (Comic Series) by Hasbro

I’ve surprised myself with how many of the Captain America movie figures I actually wound up buying. I was nowhere a completist, but I went in expecting to just buy a couple and I came out with more like six or seven. It’s a fantastic line that, despite being littered with the usual “hero in different climate battlegear” nonsense managed to add some excellent additions to the 3 3/4″ ranks of the Marvel universe. Today I’m going to check out Captain Britain. He was on my list of figures to buy from the Marvel Univese line, but when I saw this version from Cap’s movie line, I opted to get it instead. Why? Because he’s purdy.

Speaking of purdy, the Captain America packaging sure is nice. Too bad I won’t be seeing it much more, since I’m just about done with cherry picking this line. You’ll note on the package that this figure is from the “Comic Series” so no, you didn’t fall asleep during the part of the movie that Captain Britain turned up in. It’s worth noting that nearly all the figures I bought from Cap’s movie line were part of the “Comic Series.” Anyway, Captain Britain is mounted in the bubble standing beside his accessories, one of which is awesome and the other was thrown out the moment I was done taking pictures. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s check out the figure.
Yep, Captain Britain has one sexy paintjob. The white is done in a regular matte finish, but the blue and the red are the same style of lush reflective car lacquer that Hasbro likes to use for the Iron Man armors. Damn, he’s shiny. Now, I do have to note that the paintjob on my figure does have its share of issues, particularly where the white tends to bleed into the other colors, but its mostly in out of the way spots and unless you look really close it doesn’t hurt the figure’s aesthetics all that much.
Articulation? If you have any of the Cap movie figures, you’ve got a good idea what to expect. The head is ball jointed, although you really don’t get a lot of movement apart from side to side. The arms are ball jointed at the shoulders and elbows, and have swivels at the biceps and wrists. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, double hinged at the ankles and knees, and have swivels in the upper thighs. You also get the ball jointed ab.
How about those accessories? You get the awesome Excalibur sword. Getting Excalibur in a 3 3/4″ scale sculpt practically pays for the figure right there. It really looks great and isn’t all bendy and warped like you might expect. The other accessory is a horribly shitty firing missile that I’m pretty sure is just a repainted Iron Man missile. It’s crap, but at least you can throw it away and forget about it.
Captain Britain is one of those figures that just looked so snazzy, I was sold on him as soon as I saw him hanging on the peg. Does it mean I’m going to pass on the Marvel Universe one? Probably not, but having him definitely pushed that figure down the chain quite a bit for me. I just love the way this guy turned out on pretty much every level. Now I just need to finally pick up Super Combat Cap and I’ll be able to put this line of figures to bed.
Jan 11 2012

Doctor Who: “Enemies of The Third Doctor” Collectors Set by Character Options

Ever since CO abandoned the release of Classic Who figures in single carded waves, we’ve been getting story-specific sets. That’s fine with me, but now CO has opted to go right for the jugular and bundle different enemies of a specific Doctor together. Personally, I’d rather get classic companions bundled with my baddies, but this formula works ok for me too. This one is based on three no-good-niks that have plagued The Doctor in his third incarnation. You get the original vintage style Auton that appeared in The Third Doctor’s inaugural episode, “Spearhead From Space.” You get Omega, who was admittedly a bastard, but as we learned in “The Three Doctors” he got a pretty raw deal. This was the first story where we learn that the Time Lords are kinda dicks. Then we get the showpiece of the set, the giant Drashig that appeared in that surrealest of episodes, “Carnival of Monsters.” You might say one of these turned up again later in another episode, but that was actually just a projection playing on Jo Grant’s fears and not a real Drashig so i doesn’t count. Ahem, sorry, nerdgasm.

Holy smokes, the box is huge. It obviously had to be big to hold that Drashig, but at the same time, there’s a lot of room in there for the other figures. As with “The Chase” set, there’s no backdrop insert, but that’s to be expected here since the figures all come from different episodes. Instead the tray is designed to mirror the diamond deco of the box and the overall effect is gorgeous. The figures are held in place with the string, which is easily clipped away to get at the goods.
Starting off with the Auton. You didn’t think you were going to get away with buying a CO figure set and not get some reuse, did you? HA! The Auton is a heavy reuse of the original Captain Jack Harkness figure, and I don’t care one bit because the end result looks fabulous. Basically the entire body is the same, save for some minor resculpting of buttons and a beltbuckle. Some have complained that the new scarf makes the neck look unnaturally elongated, but I think it adds to the figure’s creepiness. It is afterall an animated maniquin so it doesn’t have to be proportionally correct. I’m particularly happy with the paintwork on this figure. The deep blue of his outfit looks great and the silver detailwork on the buttons and belt buckle are immaculate. Whoever painted this figure should start doing the Dalek figures. Snap!
Thanks to the reuse of parts, the Auton’s articulation is a throwback to the older figures. The head rotates, the arms rotate at the shoulders, swivel at the wrists and have hinged elbows. The legs have universal movement at the hips and hinged knees. It’s not a hell of a lot, but in fairness, he is a friggin animated plastic mannquin so we don’t need a lot of poseability for him to lumber along and shoot people.
The modern Auton figures were a little disappointing as you merely pulled off their fingers to reveal a hole that was supposed to be their gun. It wasn’t really screen accurate. Here, you get an actual replacement hand with the fingers flipped down and the gun clearly sculpted. This is how it should have been done in the first place, CO! I don’t want to take away from the modern Autons, but to me this guy is much scarier, much cooler looking, and overall a better figure even with all the reuse of parts. I love him and I really wish CO would do a two-pack of these guys. I would definitely buy a couple more.
Next up, let’s check out Omega. I’ll admit I was a little leary about CO going with softgoods on this figure. Sure, we saw softgoods on the Sea Devils, but I thought the use of it here might look out of place in the line. I mean, why do softgoods on Omega’s robes and not the decayed Master figures? Well, I’m prepared to eat those words now, because this figure turned out to be visually stunning, mostly thanks to the shimmering whispy cloth robes. Even more surprising is that the glitter doesn’t come off in my hands when I play around with him. The sculpted parts of the figure look equally amazing. I’ve always loved the design of Omega’s mask and it looks outstanding here and the chunky sculpt and bronze finish make it look weighty and antiqued and oh, so cool.
Omega features all the new articulation seen in CO’s recent releases, including those wonderful new ball jointed shoulders. The only main difference here is that the swivel in the forearm is located higher up, rather than at the wrist. One cool little extra is that Omega’s head is removable. It’s a nice nod to the scene where Omega removed his helmet and there was nothing underneath. The head is attached with a heavy socket joint that lets the head rotate without pulling off too easly. CO, I adore this figure!
And then there’s the Drashig. It’s not exactly a figure, and yet it’s not the static piece that the Fendahleen was. It’s a hand puppet! Hell, I guess you could say its a prop replica since the original one in the series was some kind of puppet. This one looks as good as the one used in the series, too, although that’s not saying much since the Drashig were not the most convincing of Doctor Who monsters. In any event, this thing is sculpted in soft rubbery plastic with some very nice paintwork. It’s completely hollow, so you can just slip your hand right into it to work its toothy mouth. It’s big enough that it can scoop up other Doctor Who figures in its mouth. I was pretty sure that this thing was going to be designed for a kids hand and that I wasn’t going to be able to use it, but even my meaty paw can get in there to operate it without a problem.
As with “The Chase” set, this one retails at just under fifty bucks. Yes, its a premium, but these are action figures based off of a science fiction series in the 70’s from another country, so I’m willing to pay that premium. The Auton and Omega turned out great, and while I was a little leary about the Dreshig, I think it turned out to be a pretty cool item. I applaud CO for taking risks like this and producing unconventional things like the Drashig. Especially since the Drashig isn’t exactly a high profile Doctor Who monster. I just hope it pays off for them. Keep cranking them out, CO, and I’ll keep buying them. I do like this format, but I do hope you get back to doing some new companion bundles too. I just know you guys have that Jamie & Yeti set hiding back there somewhere.