Tag Archives: gold label

Aug 21 2024

DC Multiverse (Gold Label): Metallo by McFarlane

A handful of McFarlane Gold Label releases have trickled in over the past few weeks, so I thought I’d get a jump on opening some of them. Today’s release was an Exclusive to Target and gives us a rather unusual take on the Superman villain, Metallo. I wasn’t sure about this figure when I dropped the preorder, but I really wanted to get a Metallo onto the DC Multiverse shelves, so let’s see what he’s all about!

He comes in the usual DC Multiverse packaging giving you a great look at the figure inside. The foil Gold Label medal is in the upper left corner, signifying this was a retailer exclusive. You also get the usual stand and collector card sealed to the blue backer tray. The back panel of the box recreates the collector card art. If I had the space, I’d keep all these figures boxed, as they look amazing and the bold character name on the side panel makes them easy to spot on the shelf, even if they’re lined up spine-out like books. But, I don’t have that kind of real estate for plastic and I think they look better displayed loose, so out he comes and into the bin goes the packaging.

I haven’t seen any specifics on the source material for this version of Metallo. I can see a few influences in the card art, but it’s not really that close. There’s some bronze age inspiration here, but mostly I think they were going for the Superman: Secret Origin look and even that’s a stretch. A lot of that has to do with him being partly kitbashed from the Blue and Green Power Suit Lex Luthor figures, but it doesn’t explain other bizarre choices, like painting the atom symbol on his chest shield when it would have been just as easy to paint it up like Secret Origin design. Recycling includes the legs, arms, and pelvis from those Luthor figures. I don’t recognize the torso, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find out they were borrowed too.

The choice of colors works for the source art, but the application is way off. There’s too much red in the legs, leaving just the knees and ankle joints green. What’s more, the lack of paint on the legs makes the figure look kind of cheap and all that great sculpted detail is lost in the bright red plastic. I do, however, really like the metallic green used for the arms and chest armor. I think more of the lighter green here and there would have helped with accuracy and made Metallo here look a little bit less like some kind of weird Christmas-themed exclusive.

The head sculpt is decent enough, and I think it’s the one aspect that works for the figure. There’s a wonderful depth to the sculpt as you can see the teeth and eyes deep inside the slits in the face plate. It’s pretty damn creepy and matches up with Metallo’s appearance on the cover of Superman: Secret Origin #5 quite well.

Articulation holds no surprises, so I won’t run through it here. For the most part, the joints work well and he’s fun to play with. The ankles could have used a little more finesse, but he’s fairly well balanced so that’s not a big issue. Metallo has a fist on his left arm and a grasping hand on his right and doesn’t come with any extra hands.

You do get one accessory, and that’s a cluster of Kryptonite. I’m pretty sure that this is the same accessory that McFarlane packed in with Superman in their Retro 66 Batman line. I haven’t checked out that figure here yet, but I will get to him eventually. It’s a cool accessory, but it just adds more recycling to an already heavily recycled package.

In the end, this Metallo is really just a placeholder for me, as it’s a reach to match it up with any existing appearance of the character. I have no issues with recycling parts, when it makes sense. But Metallo here clearly felt like a case of Todd’s design team rummaging through the parts drawer to see how close they could get. It kind of adds insult to injury when you realize that Todd already got his money’s worth on a lot of these parts with two previous releases. The end result is a somewhat original take on the character, and that’s not what most collectors are here for. Normally, I would have happily waited for discount on Amazon, but being a Gold Label I went for the preorder. In retrospect, I guess I could have gambled and tried to get it cheaper, because I don’t think this one is going to sell very well.

Feb 16 2024

DC Multiverse (Rebirth): Supergirl by McFarlane

Holy shit has Todd been busy this year! It seems like every other day we’re getting more reveals of DC Multiverse figures as well as some amazing Super Powers stuff. For the most part, I tend to play the waiting game on this line, as many of the figures do wind up on deep discount, but there have been quite a few releases that I’ve been pre-ordering as of late and Supergirl here was one of them!

This is at least the third version of Supergirl released by McFarlane in this format. We also got an Injustice 2 version based on the video game and a version from The Flash film. Neither of those interested me at all, but I’m definitely down for anything they do from the Rebirth comics. Kara Zor El comes in the standard DC Multiverse window box. She’s a Gold Label release, which I originally thought made her a Target Exclusive, but I’m sure I’ve seen her pop up at some other online retailers since. As usual, the box displays the figure really well and the side panel calls her out as the Rebirth version. And, it’s sort of collector friendly packaging. You can get the figure out, but if you want the stands and the collector card, you’re going to have to rip them off the cardboard backer.

And here she is out of the box and there’s a lot to like here, but I do have some quibbles. The biggest one is the decision to go with what look like boots going up all the way to her skirt. The Supergirl that I remember from Rebirth had boots that went up past her knees and then you got a little flash of bare thigh before the skirt. Maybe she adopted this look later on? I don’t know, but I’d prefer the look that I associate with the character more than what we got here. With that having been said, I think she looks pretty good for what she is and the rest of the figure looks pretty close to the Rebirth character design. I like the shade of blue they used for her top, the S-Shield is printed very sharply, and the red looks great. The sculpted belt is painted gold and the cape is actually softgoods, which is a welcome treat.

The portrait looks good, although I don’t really think it depicts any specific artists’ style from the book. The hair is sculpted really well and I like the way it curls down at her shoulders. Obviously, it impacts the neck articulation, but not as bad as I expected. The facial printing is sharp, she’s got pretty blue eyes and a cute little smirk. McFarlane can be really hit and miss on their comic based portraits, but I think this one is pretty solid.

The articulation follows the standard DC Multiverse formula, which is mostly excellent, but is held back here by the skirt. There are no slits in the sides, so it really hinders her hip articulation and keeps her from achieving any wide stances. And as always I will bemoan the lack of thigh swivels and those bulbous ankle joints, which tend to look really bad on the ladies. As you might expect, her hair gets in the way of looking up for those flying poses. Everything else is fine and her double hinged elbows and knees can get some really tight bends. Kara only comes with one set of hands and those are fists, which is fine by me as they work for flying or for punching.

In addition to the standard black disk stand, you also get the clear flight stand that turns up every now and then. These have an adjustable grabber to wrap around the figure’s waist. A lot of people seem to like to rag on these, but I’m always happy to find it included. It is a little flimsy, but still a decent bonus for a $20 figure, and it works just fine to display the flyers in nice hovering pose. You can also remove the grabber and just use the base as it has a peg hole to stand the figure.

If I had to level one major nitpick against McFarlane’s comic figures is they tend to take liberties when translating the artwork into action figure. And granted, Kara here gets the look about 80% right, if I’m using my highly precise, and not at all arbitrary, scientific scale of deducting 10% off for each thigh that should have been bare. Again, maybe this was the leg look she adopted at some point during the Rebirth run, but it wasn’t in any of the books I read. No, seeing a flash of plastic skin isn’t that important to me, but why not stay accurate to the costume, eh? Either way, I dig this figure a lot and I’m glad I picked her up. Even if she is a far cry from the absolutely fantastic DC Icons Rebirth Supergirl figure, which I should never have let leave my collection. Yeah, always going to regret letting that one go…