Tag Archives: 00s

#3718: Commander Bly

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , , ,

COMMANDER BLY

STAR WARS: REVENGE OF THE SITH (HASBRO)

“Equipped for battle on the exotic fungus planet of Felucia, Commander Bly fights alongside Jedi Knight Aayla Secura. When the secret Order 66 is issued, Commander Bly suddenly turns on Secura and the rest of the Jedi.”

We’ve arrived at another Friday review, and I’m once again doing a bit of clearing house on some of the hodge-podge of photographed Star Wars figures I haven’t yet reviewed.  Going into today’s review, I felt like I’d discussed the Revenge of the Sith tie-in line before, but a quick doublecheck showed that I have, in fact, reviewed nothing from this line.  Crazy.  Well, now’s as good a time as any to start, I suppose, so let’s kick things off with Commander Bly.  Everybody loves Bly!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Commander Bly was one of the last run Revenge of the Sith tie-in figures, hitting just before the holiday season in 2005, alongside fellow Clone Commander Gree.  Bly was actually intended to use the red color scheme used for the standard “Clone Commander” figure from the launch assortment for the line, but he was changed prior to the film’s release, so that figure had no direct counterpart on screen, and Hasbro had to follow-up with this update later.  There are also no less than three paint variations for Bly himself, as Hasbro kept tweaking him to be more accurate.  The figure stands about 3 3/4 inches tall and he has 22 points of articulation.  The clones were the best molds to come out of the RotS line, especially in terms of articulation.  This one’s a little restricted at the legs, largely due to the plastic kama, but he’s still quite posable, and also looks the part.  He’s the same mold as the not-Bly commander, which makes sense, since it was originally supposed to be him and all.  It’s got working holsters and a visor that goes up and down, which are both pretty standard for the character.  His paintwork, which was the subject of much adjustment, is the least adjusted version on mine, so he’s still got the white joints at the shoulders and lacks the brown detailing on the helmet and chest.  Still, it’s generally not bad, and the application’s all pretty clean, even if he does look a bit like mustard.  Bly was packed with the long blaster and two pistols, which the package dubbed “Battle Gear”.  He lost the grappling hook thing that the standard Commander had, which was kind of a bummer, but was also the least essential thing in the armament.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

When this guy and Gree dropped, I really wanted them.  Unfortunately, they suffered from that last assortment syndrome, which made them both very rare for a while.  By the time I actually found them, they were aftermarket pricing, and I could really only afford one, so I just got Gree.  I didn’t get a Bly for over a decade, since he was always *just* above what I wanted to pay.  I did finally get a loose one courtesy of All Time.  It was a while back, maybe in early 2020?  That’s when I took the photos seen here, right around the same time I got the Black Series version.  He’s cool.  Like I said, the clones are really the best figures from Revenge of the Sith, and Bly’s one of the best clones, so just generally solid.

Thanks to my sponsors over at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure to review.  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#3709: Cyclops

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

CYCLOPS

X-MEN: MOVIE SERIES (TOY BIZ)

“Scott Summers, Professor X’s first student and the X-Men’s field leader, possesses the uncanny mutant ability to fire beams of devastating energy from his eyes. He must wear a special visor made of ruby quartz to control these powerful otpic blasts or he would destroy everyone and everything around him with just a glance. The disciplined, serious minded student code-named Cyclops is often at odds with Logan because of his maverick attitude and their mutual attraction to Jean Grey.”

It’s been almost 25 years since the release of the first X-Men movie. It was a pretty big deal for comic book movies, being the first time we ever truly got to see the scope they could achieve, even if there were some growing pains along the way. It was, of course, Hugh Jackman’s first turn as Wolverine, a role he’s so defined in the two and a half decades since. Jackman got the opportunity to reprise his role earlier this year, in Deadpool & Wolverine, but the other main cast members weren’t quite as lucky. As much as I loved the film, I myself was a little bummed we didn’t get to see more of James Marsden’s Cyclops, especially since I’ve always felt that Marsden was woefully underserved by the writing for his character in the first three movies. I guess he’ll just have to make his grand return…in my mind! Or, you know, in a review of an old figure.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Cyclops was released in the first series of Toy Biz’s X-Men: The Movie tie-in line from 2000 (which, I always like to point out, was released simultaneously with series 2, so that the whole main cast could be on shelves at the same time).  The figure is about 6 inches tall and he has 14 points of articulation.  The X-Men: Movie line wasn’t Toy Biz’s first jump to the 6-inch scale for Marvel figures, but it was the first major move towards making it their standard scale.  It’s closer to a proper 1/12 scale than where they would go with Legends, for what it’s worth.  He’s still closer to the 5-inchers in terms of posing, and is in fact a little stiffer than some of the smaller guys.  He’s in sort of s mid-step kind of pose, which does result in some of the articulation being a little on the ineffective side, especially on the legs.  The ankles in particular are kind of pointless.  It is worth noting, however, that this was the first Cyclops to have both a light-up feature *and* neck articulation.  It doesn’t get a full rotation, but it’s still cool.  The actual sculpt proper’s actually pretty nice.  The larger size allows for more depth of detailing, which works especially well for the suit design, and its variety of textures.  His head’s got pretty passable likeness of Marsden as Cyclops.  The visor is designed to be removable, which is a cool feature, but makes the visor itself really fragile, and very prone to breaking.  But, it does look really cool when its properly in place, and it stays there pretty well.  Cyclops’s paint work is decent enough.  It’s pretty cleanly handled, and the color scheme is a solid match for the film.  The skin tone’s a little pasty, and perhaps a little thick, but it works reasonably well.  There were a few different takes on the exact details of the suit and its different piping, which got brighter and more obvious applications as the different production runs hit.  Cyclops was packed with both his visor and an alternate pair of sunglasses (which are even *more* fragile than the standard visor), as well as a figurine of Jean, clearly meant to be based on the scene in the movie where she gets hit by Toad’s slime and Scott has to blast it off her.  Of course, she’s not completely encased by the slime the way she is here; it’s actually just on her face in the movie, which is, amusingly, the one piece that mine’s missing.  She’s also based on the first Jean mold, so she’s got the wrong hair style, but beyond that, I guess it’s an okay extra, weird though it may be.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Cyclops was, unsurprisingly, the first of the X-Men: Movie figures that I got.  I got him as soon as they were released, before the film even came out.  I was very excited for the movie, and Cyclops was my favorite of the characters, so it was kind of a natural move for me.  He went everywhere with me for probably about 6 months or so, and his visor snapped in half probably about a month in, which was always a bummer.  I’ve been looking for a replacement for a little while and finally snagged one while on vacation two summers ago, which very much exited me.  The figure’s not perfect, but I really do love him, and still have very fond memories associated with him, which, honestly, is not unlike my feelings about the movie proper.

#3697: Alpha Ranger

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

ALPHA RANGER

XEVOZ (HASBRO)

Do you ever have one of those moments where you see something and, like, a whole branch of memories you’ve largely forgotten just all click into place?  I mean, I guess I sort of do that a bit.  Sort of a theme of this site, isn’t it?  Am I being weird?  Probably.  But, you know, like the good sort of quirky weird, right?  Right.  So, the aforementioned “core memory unlocker” in this case is Xevoz.  If you’re not familiar (by which I mean if you weren’t a ten-to-twelve-year-old in the early ’00s who caught their two year run), Xevoz was a line of constructible action figures made by Hasbro, who licensed out the general style from Stikfas, another early ’00s line, albeit one aimed at a slightly older audience.  They were rather customizable, and each built around a core concept or idea, with a “standard” look open to variations.  They launched with minimal fanfare in early 2004, and ran four waves up through mid-2005, at which point the line ended with less fanfare than it started.  They never really had the same cultural impact of other lines, and they exist now only in my memory.  Like Leonardo DiCaprio.  Or Torengos.  Anyway, here’s a review of a Xevoz guy!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

The Alpha Ranger was one of the three “Basics” in Wave 1 of Xevoz.  They were the lowest price-point figures, and generally kept the parts count a little lower and the designs a little less involved.  In addition to dividing the figures into different price points, there were also different factions within the fictitious world of Xevoz.  Alpha Ranger is one of the “Neo-Sapiens”, which is what happens when you mix Keanu Reeves with Doug Jones.  Okay, not really.  Abe did wear a lot of black, though.  I’m getting sidetracked.  In actuality, they were the standard sci-fi humans of the set-up.  The Alpha Ranger’s main body set-up is made up of 15 parts, and results in a figure that stands about 6 inches tall and has 14 points of articulation.  The core, stripped-down body has him in a rather basic jump-suit, with minimal additional detailing.  In general, the line was pretty stylized and blocky, which aided with the customizing approach.  This represents a pretty standard “human” in the style, which is a neat view.  The standard build as shown in the instructions that accompany the figure uses the helmeted head, and puts on his shoulder and knee pads, as well as his chest plate and back pack.  It results in a design that’s not terribly far-removed from a Colonial Marine, which is cool by me.  Certainly fits my vibe in collecting.  I also quite enjoy the visor on the helmet, because it’s got this sort of Cyclops meets Deadshot feel, which also works for me.  There’s a handful of additional parts (though less than others, since he’s a “Basic”), including two different heads (one a basic unhelmeted look, the other one that looks a bit like a shrunken head; the second one is supposed to be this set’s “gag” piece, which was one sort of humorous piece included with each set), a smart-gun-style Pulse Cannon (complete with arm attachment), a rifle, a knife, and a pistol.  You can reconfigure stuff and swap out parts to get a number of different looks, which is especially cool if you’re looking to get an army of these guys set-up.  The paint on Xevoz was generally minimal, but what’s there works out alight.  Any additional detailing was addressed by stickers, which there were a good number of, in case you wanted extra customization.  Personally, I’m not much of a stickers guy, but it’s still cool.  There was also, like, a game that they tried with them?  You assembled this little hex-thingy, and there were stats based on the different pieces included.  I never got much into it.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I had a small handful of these as a kid.  I remember the KB Toys my grandmother frequently took me and my brother to had a bunch of them, and they were on clearance, so this was probably at the tail end of the run?  The Alpha Ranger was one of the ones I had.  I lost parts to most of them, and so they kind of just faded out of my memory.  It’s okay, though, because All Time came through with the save.  A collection of Xevoz got traded in, and did the previously mentioned core-memory-unlocking.  There was an Alpha Ranger, missing exactly one piece, and after a quick dig, I found that piece from my original.  It was destiny!  I’m quite happy to have him back, but now I just need to avoid jumping back in.

Thanks to my sponsors over at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure to review.  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#3694: Elongated Man

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

ELONGATED MAN

IDENTITY CRISIS (DC DIRECT)

“Ralph Dibny was the original stretching sleuth of the JLA. His loss became the focal point of the events that unraveled in Identity Crisis.”

If we’re having a discussion about “worst comic stories ever,” you know I gotta bring up “Identity Crisis.”  Look, I’m a die-hard Elongated Man fanboy.  On the outside, a Justice League event with Ralph at the center is something I should love, right?  Except it’s actually something I loathe, and I legitimately think it broke DC.  I know, bold words.  But they did some really awful stuff there, and it meant that two of my favorite DC characters got broken and sidelined for well over a decade.  As a consolation prize, I suppose it did at least give me another Elongated Man figure.  So, there’s that.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Elongated Man was released in Series 2 of DC Direct’s Identity Crisis tie-in line, which was released in March of 2006, almost two years after the story was published.  As a central piece of the story, it’s sort of odd that Ralph wasn’t released until Series 2, but of course, he’s not really a heavy hitter, I guess, and he’s ultimately pretty well side-lined within the story proper.  He’d also just recently gotten his first figure from DC Direct’s JLA line not too long before.  The figure stands just shy of 6 1/2 inches tall and he has 17 points of articulation, as well as an extending neck feature.  Elongated Man’s articulation scheme was tricky.  DCD was still really experimenting with things, and there’s a fair number of joints, but range of motion remains rather restricted.  All of the Identity Crisis figures were based on Michael Turner’s cover illustrations for the series (as opposed to Raggs Morales’ interiors).  Turner’s work had a rather distinctive flair, and works well in two dimensions, but it three dimensions…well, it was a real mess.  Just, across the board.  None of the sculpts were fantastic for this line.  There were a lot of really odd proportions and dimensions to everything, and everybody wound up looking kind of misshapen.  That said, Ralph turned out generally alright.  Still weird, but he’s a stretchy guy, so it’s a little more forgivable.  His expression’s rather dour, but I guess that makes a degree of sense given the subject matter.  I do kind of feel he looks a touch young and pretty for Ralph, but Turner’s art treated Ralph that way, so it’s accurate.  Ralph’s paint work is decent enough.  I like that they kept the shiny black for the gloves and boots.  The application on the yellow is a little messy, though.  Ralph was packed with a display stand (not pictured) as well as a pair of alternate stretched arms.  The stretched arms are unique to this guy (technically, the Mattel Ralph had the outstretched hand, but it’s not quite the same sort of thing), but they’re kind of weird.  They’re technically meant to be bendy, but they’re very stiff, so they don’t really bend.  They’re also oddly flat.  Still, it’s a nice option.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I didn’t like Identity Crisis, and I didn’t like how Turner’s art translated to figures, so I largely avoided this line.  I already had the JLA figure, and we weren’t deep enough on Elongated Man figures for me to even contemplate owning all of them, so I didn’t jump on this one.  I wound up getting him from KB Toys of all places, which was odd since they didn’t tend to carry DCD figures, which were typically a comics shop exclusive thing.  But, I was on a weekend beach trip with my family, and this guy was there at the KB outlet, marked way down, so I bought it.  It was pretty early on in my appreciation of the character, and kind of helped turn the tide in a way.  Honestly, he’s not terrible.  I hate the story, but I don’t hate the figure, even if he does sort of have a weird quality about him.

#3689: Martial Arts Batman

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , , ,

MARTIAL ARTS BATMAN

BATMAN (MATTEL)

Back in 2003, there was a huge change-up in the world of super hero toys, as the DC license passed from Hasbro (who had inherited it when they had fully absorbed Kenner at the end of the ’90s) to Mattel.  While Mattel had focused decidedly less on the action figure market for a lot of the ’90s, in the early ’00s, they’d relaunched their in-house brand Masters of the Universe, with former McFarlane sculptors the Four Horsemen doing the sculpts.  Having netted the DC license, they launched a line of Batman figures, also primarily sculpted by the Four Horsemen.  McFarlane sculptors on DC figures?  It’ll never work….

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Martial Arts Batman was one of a whole plethora of Batman variants present for the launch of Mattel’s Batman line in 2003.  While the standard Batman (dubbed “Zipline”), Robin, and Joker all flew off shelves, the Bat-variants were less speedy.  The figure stands 6 inches tall and he has 12 points of articulation.  While the articulation scheme’s nothing to write home about these days (or even when the figures were new, considering they were contemporaries of Spider-Man Classics and Marvel Legends), it was actually a pretty nice step up from what we were typically seeing from Hasbro before the license transferred.  All of the Bat-variants were sculpted by the Four Horsemen, centered around the core sculpt done for Zipline Batman.  It’s a solid starting point, being a clean and rather “generic” take on the then current Batman design.  The iconography definitely holds up.  Each of the variant figures got their own little selection of unique parts, which, in the case of Martial Arts Batman, was the hands, feet, and belt.  The belt and hands would also see re-use for the Batman packed in with the Nightwing figure later the same year.  Generally speaking, the parts aren’t bad.  They match well with the core body pieces, and the general “martial arts” vibe is captured decently enough.  The wrappings on the hands, in particular, are pretty cool.  Also, in keeping with a theme that the Four Horsemen were very insistent on early in the line, he’s got the little bat-symbol on the bottom of his feet, which is a pretty nifty little bit.  His paint work is…odd.  They saddled him with a lot of maroon, as it’s the base color of his suit for some reason.  There’s some black, of course, but he’s also quite reliant on gold for the accents.  It’s a weird set-up.  I’m also not entirely sure how I feel about the bare hands under the wraps.  The application is at least pretty clean, so he’s got that going for him.  He’s packed with a bladed staff thing which can split into two, as well as a wrist mounted bladed thing.  Look, it’s all very technical, but there are a number of things, and they’re all rather martial arts-y, I guess?  I mean, I guess they’re at least kind of nifty.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Hasbro’s last few years on the DC license were rough.  Mattel gaining the license was a breath of fresh air….until the product actually hit.  This line is a great example of that, being a perfectly fine line, while also being more or less indistinguishable from what Hasbro was doing a year before.  I didn’t get a ton of these figures when they were new, and this one in particular is a rather recent addition to my collection…relatively speaking.  He came into All Time a few years ago, and his package was such that he was going to wind up in the loose figure bin anyway, so I snagged him, because why not.  He’s fine.  Nothing amazing or anything, but fine.  He’s got a good sculpt at the very least.

Thanks to my sponsors over at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure to review.  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#3656: Casey Jones

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

CASEY JONES

TMNT (PLAYMATES)

I sort of started month (well, sort of, anyway; it was like a preview to the month) with a review of a Chris Evans figure, and you know what? I’m gonna end it that way too. However, in a shocking turn of events, it’s *not* a Captain America. Heck, it’s not even a Human Torch. No, it’s from one of the two comic-adaptation roles he played in between, when he voiced Casey Jones for 2007’s TMNT. Oh yeah, let’s look at some more Ninja Turtles, with a guy who’s neither a ninja nor a turtle!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Casey Jones was released in the main product launch for Playmates’ TMNT tie-in line, shortly before the film’s release in early 2007. He fell into the line’s “The Good” subset, along with April and Splinter.  The figure stands just over 6 1/4 inches tall and he has 10 points of articulation.  Movement is pretty basic, and kind of restricted, especially when compared to the Turtles from the same line.  There’s a distinct lack of movement for the elbows, and the knees are jointed oddly high up on the leg, so there’s not a *ton* of posing to be done with him.  It was pretty typical of non-Turtles figures at this point, so it’s not a shock.  Still a bit of a bummer, though.  The sculpt aims to adapt Casey’s animation model from the film, specifically he’s fully geared up look from the movie’s climax, which is definitely his best look of the options available.  The sculpt does a solid job of recreating the look.  In particular, the head really gets his “likeness” down.   The body’s a little more basic and soft in some spots, but it gets all the main layout down as it should.  The gashes on the shoulder plates are a nice tough, though.  Casey’s color work is basic, but hits all the main marks for the design.  The paint application is pretty clean, and all the basic colors are there.  I do especially like that they remembered to give him the slight bit of visible red from his shirt under the armor.  Casey is packed with a removable mask, two baseball bats, a cricket bat, a golfclub, his bag, and a separate harness for just the bats.  The mask is surprisingly on model, and sits well on the face.  The only slight drag on it is that it’s an off-white, indicating it’s just a standard mask, rather than the metal one April gives him just before the final battle.  It’s a small thing, and this makes him more generally on-brand for the character, I suppose, but it’s such a nice plot point in the movie that I’m admittedly a little bummed it’s off.  The sports equipment is fun, though, and I appreciate the options for the bag or the harness.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

TMNT is the first piece of Turtles media that *really* clicked with me.  I’d enjoyed other elements of the franchise, but this one actually excited me.  It was also the film that really cemented my love of not only Donatello, but also Casey.  I liked Evans’ performance a lot, and the new design just really worked.  I wanted this figure when they were new, but I was never able to snag one.  Over the years, I’ve seen a few, but he was always incomplete.  I was actually talking with Max about it being one of my grails, and then, like, a week later, I came across a sealed one at a toy show, sitting on a table for 50% off.  He’s a product of his time, and certainly lacks in the articulation department, but he looks really cool, and I’m very glad to have finally gotten one.

#3590: Abe Sapien

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

ABE SAPIEN

HELLBOY (MEZCO)

Fun FiQ Fact #0069:  In the 2004 Hellboy movie, Abe Sapien is voiced by an uncredited David Hyde-Pierce, who after seeing Doug Jones’ on-set performance of the character refused to be credited.

20 years ago this week, Hellboy hit theaters.  It was a big deal for the franchise, and it was a big deal for me, because it was my first introduction to the characters.  I found myself instantly enamored, and I was particularly a fan of Hellboy’s fellow “freak” from the BPRD, Abe Sapien.  Abe’s remained my favorite part of the franchise since, and I do love to collect him in toy form when I can.  Let’s check out one of those today!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Abe Sapien was released in the first series of Mezco’s Hellboy movie tie-in line.  This one is the standard release, but there was also a shirted PX-exclusive, which I reviewed back in 2018.  The figure stands 7 3/4 inches tall and he has 25 points of articulation.  As I’ve discussed before, the articulation on these figures is an interesting mix.  This is a line that ran concurrent with Toy Biz’s Marvel Legends, which was setting some pretty major standards for articulation.  Compared to that, this has some restrictive spots.  But, it’s certainly serviceable.  Abe’s sculpt is the same one used by the exclusive.  It’s a pretty solid one, and it does a nice job of capturing Abe’s movie design.  It’s a little stylized, as is Mezco’s way, but I feel like it works well for Abe’s design.  Abe’s paint work is decent enough.  The patterning on his skin is pretty impressive, and I do like the shiny finish.  It’s a bit less murky in its coloring than the PX version, which I think helps.  Abe includes an extra head with goggles, plus the collar and rebreather device, his belt, and a small Samael (not pictured).  The alternate head doesn’t really work, since he’s always wearing the shirt with the rebreather set-up, but the thought is there, and it did at least give them the tooling in advance for the repaint.

THE ME REMAINDER OF THE EQUATION

I really wanted this figure when the movie came out, but the tie-in figures were tricky to find at best.  I saw this guy maybe one time, and didn’t get him, and that was that.  I did eventually get the exclusive, which was a perfectly fine stand-in, but I still wanted this one.  Thankfully, I had one land in front of me a month or so back.  Sure, he’s not drastically different than the repaint, but I do really love this figure, no matter how he’s painted.

Thanks to my sponsors over at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure to review.  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#3562: Freestyle Skate Batman

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , , , ,

FREESTYLE SKATE BATMAN

BATMAN: MISSION MASTERS (HASBRO)

Fun FiQ Fact #0041: Terry McGuinness is never seen skateboard in or out of the Batman costume in Batman Beyond, but that didn’t stop Hasbro from making a figure based on that very concept.

My relationship with Hasbro’s run with the DC license was a particularly good one.  While Kenner had managed an alright balance of accurate to the source figures and goofy variants during their run with the DC license, Hasbro honed in on the wackiness, especially narrowing in on Batman, and ignoring most of the DCU for…well, a bunch of rather silly Bat-variants.  The end of the animated Batman tie-ins was an all-encompassing line, Mission Masters, where the express purpose was just doing nothing but baseless variants.  As the line progressed, even Batman Beyond, whose own line was never super to begin with, got in on the action.  One time they made him a skater, because it was 2000, and that was what they decided the kids like.  Full disclosue: I wasn’t one of those kids.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Freestyle Skate Batman was part of the third round of Mission Masters, dubbed Mission Masters 3, and he was a deluxe-sized release.  The figure stands about 5 inches tall and he has 7 points of articulation.  He was noteworthy for getting a disc and peg set-up on the shoulders, in contrast to the simple cut joint that almost every Hasbro/Kenner DC figure got.  Why did he get the extra movement?  No clue.  It’s cool, though.  His sculpt was all-new, and it’s…well, it’s a Batman variant.  The head sculpt is very much consistent with Hasbro’s other BB head sculpts, which is to say it’s not exactly an accurate recreation of the animation model, but it’s not terribly far off.  The rest of the sculpt is definitely on the goofier side.  He’s quite pre-posed, and his design maintains elements from his standard look, but adds a bunch of extra ones, because I guess that’s what you do when you’re skating?  His color work is again pretty close to the standard, though he’s a metallic blue, rather than black.  He’s accented with some slightly bronzed silver.  I particularly dig the tech detailing on the wings.  Batman wouldn’t be much of a “Freestyle Skate” guy without some form of skateboard, so he gets just that.  It’s big, silly, strange, and it launches a big missile.  So, there it is.

THE ME REMAINDER OF THE EQUATION

I didn’t buy this new.  I saw it a good many times, as I did most of the Mission Masters figures.  I generally disliked Mission Masters when it was at retail, because it never really felt authentic.  I wanted other characters, and I didn’t dig the switch to purely odd Batmen.  But, I’ve mellowed over the years a bit, so when I got the opportunity to pick up a loose one a few years back, I jumped on it.  He’s pretty fun.  Silly, but fun.

Thanks to my sponsors over at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure to review.  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#3542: Prince Adam

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

PRINCE ADAM

MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE (MATTEL)

(Not So) Fun FiQ Fact #0021:  I’m coming into this MotU review with an unfortunately re-ignited frustration towards the Classics era of the line…or at least some of it’s management.  Thankfully, I’m not focusing on that era!  Yay!

My introduction to Masters of the Universe was the 2002 re-launch of the brand, specifically the pilot movie to the cartoon, which aired during Cartoon Network’s Cartoon Theatre.  I really loved it, and got a basic He-Man from the tie-in line almost immediately.  The line was notoriously hard to find, though, so follow-ups to He-Man were on the trickier side.  But, even during the original run, I did manage to snag He-Man’s alter ego Prince Adam, who in this incarnation was actually convincingly a different guy.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Prince Adam was released in the third main assortment of the rebooted Masters of the Universe line from 2002.  The figure stands a little under 6 inches tall and he has 12 points of articulation.  He was notably smaller than the rest of the Heroic Warriors, accurately depicting the smaller stature Adam had in the cartoon.  His articulation matched the rest of the line; it’s hardly super-posable, but it was an improvement on the vintage line, which was cool at the time.  Adam’s sculpt was, like the rest of the line, handled by Four Horsemen Studios.  Honestly, it’s one of my favorites from the line, just because it was different from everything else.  It takes the core elements of the vintage Adam design, and translates them into something more in-line with the updated aesthetics of the line.  There’s plenty of detail work, and it’s a pretty nice example of subtlety from the line.  Adam’s paint work is decently handled.  It’s largely on the basic side, but the application is clean.  He could definitely benefit from some additional accenting, but that was really true of this whole line.  Adam was packed with the “powered-down” version of the Power Sword, as well as a scepter thing, which originally included a missile launcher-style case, but I’ve lost that.

THE ME REMAINDER OF THE EQUATION

My dad had driven me around to a few stores when I was looking for a basic He-Man, and from that point on, he kept a pretty close eye on the line’s other releases.  This one in particular he kept an eye out for, because it had all the markings of a particularly tricky to get release, and he wound up finding me one in a much shorter fashion than I think either of us expected.  He’s basic, and kind of just a statue, but still definitely my favorite version of Adam.

#3531: Jean Grey

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

JEAN GREY

X-MEN CLASSICS (TOY BIZ)

Fun FiQ Fact #0010: Jean Grey’s Jim Lee costume has received 11 action figures since its debut.

As a kid, my introduction to the X-Men was the animated series, which drove my desire for the whole cast of characters in action figure form.  The toyline running concurrently with the show was actually comics-based, but still generally managed to get a lot of looks that were close enough to work.  There were, however, some omissions, as well as some…odd ways of doing figures.  Despite being a main character on the show, Jean’s only figure in the line proper for most of its run was a single Phoenix figure, which wasn’t her main get-up on the series.  That look got some action figure love, sure, but Toy Biz’s takes always felt a bit monkey’s paw-like; you’d get her, but at some sort of trade off.  My search for a good one ran for a good number of years.  The closest I got was in 2000, and it was a figure that I was honestly pretty thrilled to get, even though she’s maybe not the most thrilling figure at the end of it all.  Still, here she is!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Jean Grey is part of Toy Biz’s X-Men Classics line, which they launched in 2000 to run some old molds in new packaging between the toys for X-Men: The Movie and X-Men: Evolution.  While most of the figures were minor tweaks to existing releases, the Battle Blasters figures all got more substantial tweaks, in order to make them less Age of Apocalypse-inspired and more standard.  The figure stands 5 inches tall and has 5 points of articulation.  Her mold is almost identical to the original “Secret Weapon Force” release, which was just the Jean mold that Toy Biz had on hand at the time, I guess.  It does at the very least fill in the etched lines for the boots and gloves from the mold’s original use as Mystique.  For all of the re-uses the body saw during Toy Biz’s run, I do believe this is the only time they got rid of those.  It definitely helps with the overall look.  The mold’s not bad; the body is basic, and the head, while definitely more dialed into the AoA version of the character, isn’t horrible.  The main change-up, obviously, is the paint, which now puts her in her Jim Lee costume…or at least something close to it.  There are some sculpted details that don’t line up; the hair’s too short, and she lacks the shoulder pads and leg pouches.  That’s kind of expected, and it’s certainly closer than the other repaint they did for this costume.  The only thing that really stands out to me as “off” is the hands being yellow, but even that was a back and forth thing, with it only more recently being decided that she didn’t wear gloves with the costume.  This Jean release got the exact same accessory as her original “Secret Weapon” release: the Catapult Tank Blaster.  It’s a big green and black thing, and it’s hella goofy.  But, hey, at least I got two of them, right?

THE ME REMAINDER OF THE EQUATION

I vividly recall finding this figure in a Toys R Us, early December, still in post-X-Men: The Movie bliss, and being absolutely thrilled.  Then less so, because it was early December, which was typically a time of no toy purchases, what with the inevitable onslaught of figures I’d be getting as Christmas gifts.  My parents, however, recognized the significance of the figure, and allowed me to break their usual rule, so that I could finally have the Jean Grey I’d been waiting so long for.  She’s not much to write home about; she’s just the Secret Weapon Force Jean with a new deco, and that one wasn’t anything special either.  But, I was always very happy with her, and she’s still pretty nifty, even if there are better Jim Lee style Jeans these days.