Ok-dokey, folks, it’s the last day of my look at the new Nick TV styled Turtles, and I’ve saved the runt of the litter for last. It’s Michelangelo!!!
I was about to say this is the last time we’ll see this packaging, but who am I kidding? I’ll be picking up more of these figures in the future. Suffice it to say, the packaging is awesome and brimming with personality. The bubble insert declares Micky as the “Jokester & Hard-Hitting Nunchuck Hero.” Indeed he is. The back of the card has a nice File Card that you can clip out and save with a terribly goofy shot of Mickey as he appears in the new Nick show. Once again, the bottom of the card has pictures of the rest of the figures that are currently available in the line.
The first thing I noticed when getting Micky out of the package is he’s actually notably shorter than the other figure, which just continues the cool trend of Playmates making each figure so unique. The back of his belt has two loops to store his nunchucks, but we’ll get to more on that in a minute. He has the same basic style of arms and legs, complete with the nicely detailed hand and foot wraps and the cool leathery texture to the skin. His shell has some distinctive scrapes and nicks, although he looks to be slightly less battle scarred than some of the others. I like Mikey’s head sculpt a lot. Beyond the fact that Playmates didn’t go all goofy on us like his screen counterpart, he still has a lighthearted, toothy smirk and just looks very much appropriate to the character as I remember him.
As with the other Turtles, Mikey’s coloring comes more from the plastic than paint apps. The paintwork that is here is very good. I’m not a big fan of the coloring Playmates used on his skin. It’s kind of a puke, pea-soup green and it looks slightly jarring when posed with the other turtles.
Mikey comes with his nunchucks, and here’s where my first big complaint about any of these figures comes into play. The chucks are each molded in one piece of plastic, one with them close together and the other with them a little bit apart. If you flex the molded chain on either in the slightest, you get nasty stress marks that look like they’re going to break apart any second. Unfortunately, to store them right, you need to squeeze them together and tuck them into the loops on the belt. The alternative is to just stick one end of each into each loop. It works, but it looks terrible. I wish Playmates had taken a page from Bandai’s book and given us an extra set of closed chucks on the sprue tree. Yes, Mikey comes with a nice assortment of gear in his Ninja Arsenal, just like the other figures.
And that wraps up my look at the Nickelodeon turtles. Hopefully I’ve properly conveyed just how awesome these figures are. In fact, they’re so well done, I think I actually dig them a bit more than the Classics, and that’s saying quite a bit. If nothing else, this line (as well as the Classics figures) proves that even a company with a track record as spotty as Playmates can go above and beyond and it’s particularly gratifying to see them do it with one of their oldest and greatest licenses. While it’s always tricky to compare different figure lines, I think you’d be hard pressed to find a better made set of figures hanging on the pegs at this price point. What’s even cooler is that Playmates is trying to give the whole vehicle and playset thing a go, and I hope it works for them. I’ll definitely be picking up more of these figures, and some of the vehicles. I’m still on the fence over the mammoth sewer playset. I want to support their decision to release it by buying the thing, but I seriously have absolutely nowhere to put something that big, and it doesn’t look like something that would go back into the box all that easily. We’ll see…