Monthly Archives: December 2017

Dec 4 2017

Marvel Legends (Gladiator Hulk Wave): Thor Odinson by Hasbro

Welcome back to my trek through the Gladiator Hulk Wave of Marvel Legends! I’m nearing the home stretch, with just two more comic based figures to look at until I can build the Incredible Champion of Sakaar! Today I’m checking out Thor, or as the package calls him, Marvel’s Odinson. Call him Odinson, call him Unworthy Thor, but he’s still Thor. Because my friends, Thor is still Thor even if unworthy to wield Mjolnir. But that’s a subject on which I will vent a little more next week when I look at Jane Foster Thor. Or maybe I’ll just let it go. We’ll see. I actually loved the idea of an unworthy Thor storyline, but I didn’t feel like Marvel did anything interesting with it. Will new Editor-in-Chief C.B. Cebulski haul Marvel Comics out of the dumpster fire it’s in? I guess we’ll find out. Can it get any worse? I genuinely don’t believe so.

Odinson shares the same slot with Ares as the two “Nine Realms Warriors,” and like Ares, there’s a lot of plastic in this box. Thor himself ain’t no lightweight and when you add in his accessory, Jarnbjorn, and the massive Gladiator Hulk torso, you get a pretty full tray crammed in there. I should note that I might have skipped this figure if it weren’t for the BAF parts, because a variant is included in the SDCC “Battle for Asgarde” set, which I still have sitting unopened in the corner waiting for me to do another Marvel Week. There are, however, some pretty big differences between the two figures, so in this case having to double-dip isn’t too bad.

And the figure isn’t too shabby either! While a good chunk of this costume is just painted buck, Odinson features enough unique sculpting to satisfy me. The black sleeveless shirt is just painted onto his chest with a little cutout up top. See, dudes can wear boob windows too! Eat your heart out, Power Girl! I love how the tops of the trousers are sculpted and tied off with a piece of rope, because down-on-his-luck Thor can’t afford proper pants that fit, nor a belt to hold them up! I jest, but it’s a really nice touch. The boots feature sculpted flares at the knees, and sculpted brown straps tying them in place at the tops and down near the ankles. He also has a pedestrian pair of wrist bracers, which are sculpted as separate pieces.

The cape is really nice! It’s cast in bright red plastic with a silver painted fastener off-set near his left shoulder. The back shows it all tattered with a rough bottom edge and various holes. Still, it’s very thick which eschews realism and gives it a decidedly comic book look. Of course, if you’d rather go without it, you can just pop the head and remove it.

Speaking of heads, this one is a bit of a poser. It genuinely looks fine to me with the figure in hand, but then I take pictures up close and this happens. YIKES! It looks like someone pinched the middle of his face and his eyes are popping out. You ain’t unworthy, you just too ugly! It’s a shame, because the face is very chiseled and angular with some beautiful definition in the sculpt. It looks a little more gaunt than normal Thor, which is a nice touch for hard-luck Thor. The hair is sculpted so that it’s blowing off to the side, which is admittedly a rather singular look, but it works well enough for me. Bottom line is that if you keep a safe distance, it’ll look fine. You’re just going to have to trust me on this one.

The articulation holds no surprises, but we’ll run through it anyway. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, double hinges in the elbows, and swivels in the biceps. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have swivels in the thighs, double hinges in the knees, and the ankles have both hinges and lateral rockers. The torso features both an ab crunch and a waist swivel, and the neck is both ball jointed and hinged. The hinges are all solid, and he’s an all around fun figure to play with.

Odinson comes with one accessory and that’s his trusty axe, Jarnbjorn. For a substitute weapon, this thing is beautiful! Hasbro decorated out the axe head’s socket with some lovely scrollwork and an ornate, spiked tip. The curved handle has sculpted wood texture running through it, and grip is ribbed with silver rings at each end. This is one of the most beautiful weapons Marvel Legends has given us in quite a while!

Whatever my feeling about the particulars of the comics, and they’re not all bad, Unworthy Thor is a great idea for a storyline and I’m glad they did this figure. There was a little while where I thought it was going to be totally exclusive to the SDCC set, and while I did wind up getting it very easily, that’s not always the case. It’s probably a good thing that the figure made it to regular retail too, making it available to the collectors who were unable to get the exclusive set, or maybe just didn’t want all of those figures. Next week, I’m going to put this wave to a bed with a look at the last boxed figure, Jane Foster Thor, and the Build-A-Figure, Gladiator Hulk!

Dec 2 2017

Figma: “Kantai Collection” Destroyer Fubuki (Anime Version) by Max Factory

It’s been a couple of months since I’ve done an Anime Saturday feature and I feel bad about it. Not least of all because I’ve got a lot of stuff piling up and waiting to be reviewed. What can I say, other than this is a crazy time of year for me, I don’t have as many weekends off, and time is more than a little tight. Nonetheless, I’m off today and had some time to enjoy a leisurely morning with a pot of coffee and time to open up a Figma. And wouldn’t you just know it… it’s another one of the Fleet Girls from Kantai Collection!

And it’s Fubuki! It’s crazy to think that with five or six of the Fleet Girls already on my Figma shelf, it took this long to get to the main protaganist of the anime. In this case, however, she hasn’t been sitting around waiting to be reviewed, but rather she’s a fairly recent release. I’ll also point out that this is the Animation Version, with a regular version releasing very shortly. I’ve looked at pictures of both figures and I can’t for the life of me see any difference. But seeing as how I’ve never actually played the game, I’m content with the version tied to my beloved anime series.

Starting out with the base figure, Fubuki features here school uniform, including her sailor-style white top with a blue collar and blue sleeve cuffs, and a perfectly sculpted neckerchief tied below her neck. The top is just short enough to show a little midriff, and below that she has a pleated blue skirt. The outfit is topped off with a pair of blue socks, each with a tiny white stripe around the top, and crisp white anchors printed on the sides. While you can strip most of Fubuki’s armaments from her, the leg straps for her torpedo mounts, and her rudder boots are permanent fixtures. This could be disappointing to some collectors who would have preferred the ability to display her completely off duty, but it’s not such a big deal for me. The boots do feature some really nice detail.

Of course, this is a Figma, so you can expect all sorts of extra facial expressions and hands. Fubuki includes three expressions, one normal, one extremely happy with eyes closed, and one serious battle face. Swapping them out involves the usual easy step of popping off the front of the hair. My little gripe here is that the normal face and the battle face are a little too close in my opinion. I think the fault lies with the normal face, which looks more surprised to me. I would have liked something a little more neutral there.

The collection of hands offers no real surprises. If you own any Figmas, then you should know the drill. Fubuki comes with fists, accessory holding hands, splayed finger hands, relaxed hands, and one pointing right hand. OK, let’s get our Fleet Girl all geared up…

For starters, Fubuki comes with her two 61cm triple torpedo mounts (oxygen powered, of course!) attached to her thighs with somewhat restricted ball joints and some sculpted faux straps on her legs to simulate holding them on. You can easily swivel each torpedo mount from pointing up when they’re not in use to facing forward for firing. There’s a little bit of motion left and right, but not a lot. As already demonstrated, these are easy to pop off the figure if you want to display her in her down time.

Next up are her 12.7cm twin gun mount and her backpack. The backpack attaches with a ball jointed peg, which keeps some space between it and her back to allow it to not interfere too much with her posing. Subsequently, there’s another peg hole on the back of the smokestack to plug in the Figma stand. It certainly helps, but I’m surprised to see that even with the backpack, Fubuki is balanced enough to stand on her own. The backpack itself is a nice piece of work with all the detail I’ve come to expect out of a Figma sculpt, right down to the twin anchors and antenna. The piece is cast in battleship gray plastic and there’s a little black and red paint added. I’ll note here that the peg for the stand is a tight fit going into the backpack. Normally, Max Factory includes an adapter piece with a narrower peg, but that wasn’t the case here. It does work, but not as well as if they had included the extra piece.

The twin gun mount is designed to hang on a shoulder strap at her right hip for easy access to it. The strap itself is a little bulky, but not too bad considering the scale. The gun mount attaches to it with an open ended clip, so it’s really easy to take it off the strap so she can hold it and then put it back on again. As mentioned, she does have a pair of accessory holding hands, but she only fires this thing from her right hand in the anime, so one would have been fine for me. The grip on it is a little loose, but for the most part I didn’t have much trouble getting her to hold it straight.

Fubuki isn’t the most complex Figma around, but she sure does hit all the right points and she’s a lot of fun to play with. But that doesn’t come as any surprise to me. The base figure is just about perfect and by now Max Factory has become experts in fashioning Fleet Girl armaments. The only kicker here is that with an original retail of around $60, these figures are approaching that ceiling where I’m beginning to think twice before buying. When it comes to the KanColle figures, I’m probably always going to crumble, but as for those franchises that I’m a little less enthusiastic about? I might have to start getting pickier. As for now… I can’t help but notice the two empty spaces on each side of her and wonder if Figma is planning on getting her fellow Destroyers, Mutsuki and Yuudachi out eventually.

Dec 1 2017

DC Multiverse (Ares Wave): Collect & Connect Ares by Mattel

It’s Friday evening and I’m ready to collapse after a long work week. But before I dive head first into a bottle of Jameson, let’s wrap up DC Friday with one more review for today. If you hadn’t noticed, I’ve peppered my other reviews of this assortment of Wonder Woman movie figures with my general feelings about the film, but to sum it up here: I loved the first half, didn’t care so much for the second half, and felt that the final act really let the whole film down. It started with such lofty goals and excellent character presentation only to fizzle out with a disappointing and shitty CGI mess and it deserved so much better. By the time the final battle with Ares came, I was pretty drunk, very sleepy, and barely even paying attention. And so I give you the star of that disappointing denouement: Ares.

Ares is the first Collect & Connect figure from the DC Multiverse line that I’ve actually completed. Oh, I’ve done plenty from DC Universe Classics, and as such this one felt very abbreviated. Only four figures? Really??? That’s easy enough. Yes, despite still consisting of seven parts and a sword, Mattel doubled up on a lot of them to give us the whole figure in just four installments, with extra accessories coming bundled with the two Toys R Us Exclusive figures, which I’ll review next week. Putting this guy together is pretty simple, and the pieces fit tightly enough that I wouldn’t want to have to take him apart again.

As for the design, well… it’s certainly interesting. He looks like an armored terror that stepped right out of the pages of an AD&D manual, and that’s cool. But he’s also a far cry from how I’m used to seeing DC’s Ares depicted. This guy is a mix of human, demon, and armor, all blended together. He’s got regular looking hands and feet, as well as normal musculature running through the bare parts of his arms, but all cast in dark plastic. The chiseled chest features a bit more of metallic blue sheen to it, making me uncertain as to whether that’s supposed to be him or just armor, or maybe the armor is part of him. He has a similar finish on his grieves, arm bracers, and shoulder plates, as well as a sculpted black pelt thrown over his shoulder and secured with a strap. It looks as if there are sculpted keys hanging on the cross strap. Overall, the painted blue metal effect is cool, and there’s some nice pitted texturing on some of the armor, but I don’t find the design to be terribly compelling. The proportions are also a little wonky, like his legs seem a little weak and atrophied for his upper body.

The head is nearly featureless and hidden under the large demonic skull. Again, this is a pretty cool effect and I dig how at first glance it looks like the skull is actually his head and not just a helmet. The skull itself features a chalky blue paint job with white teeth and a pretty intricate sculpt showing all sorts of crags and bumps. It certainly makes for an intimidating look.

The articulation has all the right points. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, as well as swivels in the biceps and wrists. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, hinged at the knees and ankles, and have swivels at the thighs. The torso features a swivel at the waist, a ball joint in the chest, and a ball joint in the neck. It’s all pretty good, except for a super loose swivel in my figure’s right thigh. It’s bad enough that it will sometimes give way, especially in wide stances.

Ares includes one accessory (so far), and that’s his sword and I really dig it a lot. It isn’t ornate or gaudy, nor does it look ceremonial. Instead it looks like a utilitarian rank-and-file tool for butchering enemies, just like I would expect the God of War to wield. The hilt looks like it’s meant to be forged out of simple iron, with a turned grip and a down sweeping cross guard. The blade features a fairly sharp taper and most of it is washed in red paint. I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be blood, or maybe it’s glowing with heat, but either way it looks pretty bad ass. Of course, there are some more accessories to give him, but we’ll have to wait until I open up this wave’s two TRU Exclusive figures next week to look at those.

Despite my feelings for the DCEU version of Ares and that final battle in Wonder Woman, I have to say that I still dig this figure. Of course, individual mileage may vary based on personal opinions about the character design they went with. It’s also only fair to note that the DC Universe Classics Ares figure is one of my all time favorite releases in that line and was a very tough act for this Ares to follow. I can’t say that he would have been worth chasing in order to build on his own, but luckily I was pretty happy with the figures in this assortment, so Ares was just a cool extra.

Dec 1 2017

DC Multiverse (Ares Wave): Steve Trevor by Mattel

I was originally going to save the second half of my DC Friday content for later in the day, but I decided to just unload it all at once this morning before heading off to work. So, if you happen to be checking in today, don’t forget to scroll down and read the review for the Wonder Woman figure as well. This way I’ll be freed up to come back later tonight and have a look at the Collect & Connect Ares figure as well! But for now… let’s check out Steve Trevor.

There’s nothing new to say about the packaging, so let me just go on record by saying, I like Chris Pine a lot. He’s a damn charismatic fellow and based on some of the behind-the-scenes stuff I’ve seen, he seems like he’s fun to work with. I’d even dare say that some of the interviews I’ve seen with Gal Gadot and Pine promoting Wonder Woman have shown more chemistry between the two than between their characters on screen. But maybe that’s just me. With that having been said, Pine didn’t always work for me as Steve Trevor. Maybe it was the way he was written, but I just didn’t see it. Nonetheless, he wasn’t necessarily bad in the role and I was happy that Mattel gave him a figure.

And it’s a damn nice looking figure as well! Steve features his WWI-era garb, which consists of boots, sculpted wraps for his lower legs (socks?), some baggy trousers, a belted tunic-like vest, and a heavy knit shirt with a turtleneck. It’s a strange attire, and that’s coming from someone who has made reading the history of the period a hobby for a while now. I’m not saying it isn’t authentic, but it’s far more of a swashbuckling adventure garb than a straight on uniform. Then again, in the DCEU Trevor is an American Pilot who attaches himself to a British Army Unit as an Intelligence Agent, so it makes sense that he wore whatever was on hand and suitable. In any event, the sculpting here features some decent texturing on the wool socks and the the vest, as well as the knitted pattern on the shirt. I think the vest is supposed to be leather, which is why they went with a glossy paint for it, but I think it would have looked better in matte. Still, the recreation of the underlying costume is not bad at all!

Steve also wears a coat over his duds, one which I would say is like a cross between an aviator’s jacket and a trench coat. Yes… after all the figures I have wearing trench coats, I finally have one wearing an actual TRENCH coat. How exciting! The coat consists of the usual soft plastic vest with arms sculpted to look like sleeves. The arm holes are a little bigger than they needed to be, which sort of dispels the illusion that it’s all supposed to be one garment, but it still works pretty well. The jacket features sculpted stitching and buttons, wide lapels, a sculpted fur collar, and even the buttons on the sleeves are sculpted and painted gold. Again, nice attention to detail!

The head sculpts in this assortment haven’t been the best, but Mattel sure hit all the right notes when they did this one. It’s an excellent likeness to Pine, and I’m guessing that’s not an easy thing to do, because Playmates sure as hell couldn’t make it work when they were releasing the Kirk figures from the 2009 Star Trek film, and they sure tried in every major scale. The paint here is a little basic, especially the wash on the hair, but I’m confident that I could recognize who this was supposed to be, even if the figure was taken completely out of context. It’s not quite up to snuff with some of Hasbro’s best MCU portraits, but it’s still good work.

Despite being the first male character in the assortment, Steve features close to the same articulation we saw with the ladies, but in an ironic twist, there’s actually a few points less here. His arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, and swivels in the wrists, but not in the biceps. The legs have rotating hinges in the hips, swivels in the thighs, and hinges in both the knees and ankles. After years of complaining that Hasbro omits the bicep swivels from their Marvel Legends ladies, it’s kind of funny to see this mostly female assortment from Mattel go the other way around. He does make up for it, however, by adding a ball joint at the chest, in addition to the swivel waist and ball jointed neck.

Trevor comes with one accessory and that’s a shotgun. It’s a fairly bland sculpt and the trigger and guard are both one piece of solid plastic, but at least the forestock is ribbed. The weapon has a blued finish with brown paint for the stock. I was able to get some decent poses of him holding it, but since the trigger guard is a solid piece, and he doesn’t have a trigger finger, you can’t really have him firing it.

All in all I think Mattel did a really nice job on this figure. Yes, he’s relatively simple and the colors are bland, but both fit the source material pretty well, there’s some nice attention to detail on the costume, and the likeness is exceptionally well done for a DC Multiverse figure. He also looks great next to Wonder Woman, and that’s really what counts. Not to mention, he comes with the final pieces I need to cobble together my Collect & Connect Ares figure. So, come on back tonight and I’ll wrap up an ultra-rare DC Friday Triple-Play by checking out Ares.

Dec 1 2017

DC Multiverse (Ares Wave): Wonder Woman by Mattel

Welcome to another Double Feature for DC Friday! And after some spotty weeks without new DC content, it feels good to be doing these again! Last week, I knocked out the first half of the DC Multiverse Ares Wave with a look at Diana and Hippolyta. Today I’m going to finish up the four figures needed to build the C&C figure by opening up both Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor!

And here’s Wonder Woman in the box, and I’ll go ahead and point out the obvious by saying this is Diana wearing her black cloak over her costume. It’s a look that she adopted for some very specific sequences in the film and it’s probably not the iconic look that most fans and collectors are looking for. There is a more traditional version (sans coat), but oddly enough that one is a Toys R Us Exclusive and is not necessary to build Ares, but does come with some optional extras. And yes, I will be looking at that figure, as well the other TRU Exclusive of the wave, Menalippe, next week. For now, let’s get Diana out of her box and check her out.

While I don’t own the Multiverse Batman V Superman Wonder Woman, this one looks like this is a re-sculpt of that previous release. She’s been fitted with a soft plastic sleeveless coat, and her arms have been sculpted with sleeves on them to resemble part of the jacket. It looks good, I like the sculpted fur fringe, although it does cover up a lot of the beautiful work they did on her rather iconic outfit underneath. And damn, it is a beautiful outfit, with plenty of detail, and some snappy red, blue and gold paint. I’ll actually save some of that gushing for when I review the TRU Exclusive version.

Diana also sports the shoulder strap, which is sculpted from a separate piece of soft brown plastic and features a loop for her sword and her lasso. The lasso loop works well and pegs into place securely, although the sword loop pits the sword against the cloak, making it a difficult fit. And while I appreciate the ability to store her equipment, I do wish this rig was removable. Alas, it’s permanently attached to the back of the figure. Some deft work with a razor could probably get it off of there, but I think I’ll keep it.

The head sculpt is also unique to this figure, as it features an integrated and non-removable hood. It looks good and allows her to still have working neck articulation, while still convincing me that it’s supposed to be part of the cloak. The overall portrait is OK, but it’s certainly not a great likeness for Gal Gadot. I can see a little of her in there, but it’s fleeting. Also, they seem to have missed the white paint on my figure’s right eye. I’d argue that such lofty goals as good likenesses are too much to expect from a 6-inch mass market line these days, but then I look at some of Hasbro’s MCU figures in Marvel Legends and realize that solid likenesses can be done at this scale and price point. You just have to work harder at it, Mattel.

As for articulation, this wave has been really consistent with the different points, meaning that it’s all the same points we saw last time with Diana and Hippolyta. The arms feature rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, with swivels in the wrists. The legs have rotating hinges in the hips, swivels in the thighs, and hinges in both the knees and ankles. There’s a swivel in the waist and a ball joint in the neck. On the downside, the sculpted jacket sleeves restrict the range of motion in those shoulders just a bit. I was sort of able to get the Diana figure to cross her bracers, but that ain’t happening here.

As already mentioned, Wonder Woman comes with her sword, The Godkiller, and her Lasso of Truth. The lasso is more or less the same accessory we got with Diana. The sword is similar a similar sculpt to the one bundled with Diana, but features several notable distinctions, including the pommel crossguard and blade. She can hold either accessory in either hand.

And so this wave continues to give me hope for the DC Multiverse line, where previously I had none. As I’m sure I said before, there’s still room for improvement, but compared to some of the garbage this line has churned out in past waves, figures like this one are definitely steps in the right direction. Mattel obviously invested some effort into the sculpt and paintwork, and if you want a figure of Diana that is very specific to her first solo movie, than this cloaked version definitely fits that bill. Coming up next… Steve Trevor!