Short Round
Indiana Jones - Adventure Series (Hasbro) - Basic Series
Rated 3.75 stars by Wes68
Temple of Doom is underrepresented in the Adventure Series. So many key characters were outright ignored. Willie Scott, Lao Che, a Thugee Guard, and of course, Mola Ram are entirely absent. There is a whole discussion to be had about the 'controversies' surrounding the Temple of Doom, but that's for another time. So while it is disappointing we didn't get those iconic characters? We thankfully did get Shortround. It should be noted that Shortround costs the same as the other 6" figures. Shortround is as you would expect, much shorter than 6". To Hasbro's credit, it does feel like they realized it would be a tough sell to ask the same price for Shortround as a full 6" figure without offering more. Shortound as a result does come with a decent number of accessories (as well as a...[See More]

Walter Donovan
Indiana Jones - Adventure Series (Hasbro) - Basic Series
Rated 3.50 stars by Wes68
Walter Donovan is not the most exciting addition to the Adventure series line, but he is a welcome addition in a line that has too few baddies. The figure itself is fine, though he is a bit light on accessories. He also reuses some parts as the legs appear to be reused from older starwars figures like Grand Moff Tarkin. His face sculpt is generally pretty good and captures the likeness of Julian Glover pretty well. I said he is light on accessories, but thankfully those he does come with are fitting for the character. He comes with a part of the grail tablet which as I saw someone post, you can create a rubbing with. It's a nice bit of set dressing, though Donovan is wearing the wrong outfit here. However you could use a Club Obi Wan Indy and do a repaint and head swap if you want...[See More]

Kang
Simpsons (Super7) - Ultimates
Rated 4.30 stars by RMaster007
Although Super7 chose a good starting lineup for their Simpsons line, with a mix of major and minor characters, the third wave was when things steered into an unusual direction. Mr. Burns and Ralph were expected, but not Kang and Kodos, with no figures of the family themselves. Sure, Playmates went a few waves of their line with none of the family, but Super7 doing such a thing this early was quite a gamble. The Rigelians are some of my favorite characters in the show, so I was happy to get them sooner than later, or not at all given the early death of the line. One thing to note about the pair is that they come in huge boxes, and I mean huge. They aren't as big as Grimlock, but still rather tall and deep, though bear the same graphics as the rest of the line. There's a lot more stuff...[See More]

Mr. Satan (Hercule)
Dragon Ball Z - S.H. Figuarts (Bandai) - Basic Series
Rated 5.00 stars by Karl T. Face
I've always been drawn to the underpowered (or non-combatant) side characters that nevertheless have very important roles to play. In the DBZ universe, even the awesomely-named Hercule Satan, the World Martial Arts Champion, is primarily comic relief. But he's still, unironically, one of my favorite characters in the series. Does that justify what I spent here? Probably. For starters, this is Figuarts. It's already coming with a hell of a pedigree, and doesn't disappoint. For the uninitiated, this generally means articulation out the wazoo, plenty of extra hands and heads/faces, and a few accessories to boot. Trying to list all the joints would be tedious, but it's a couple notches above Marvel Legends. The legs are slightly restricted by the poofy pants, but otherwise everything has...[See More]

Prince Adam
He-Man - Masters of the Universe (Mattel) - Series 3
Rated 4.25 stars by Karl T. Face
Superman may get some flak for his insufficient disguise, but this guy makes him look like The Chameleon. 3 waves in, the MOTU line started dropping "story" characters like Orko and Prince Adam. It was nice to see, although Adam (and later,most of Randor) was just He-Man with clothes. But hey, the show pretty much did the same. And the lavender pants and white shirt may just be painted on, but with the softgoods vest covering a lot of the chest detail, it actually looks pretty damn good. An elastic belt holds the thing closed, with a tiny yellow buckle. Articulation is the usual Big Five plus spring-loaded waist. You all know what to expect. The downside is that you can't really holster his sword on his back. At least you could fake that with the original harness. And you'd probably want...[See More]

Chakahachi and Lotus
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Classic Cartoon (Neca) - Multi-Packs
Rated 4.70 stars by RMaster007
Thought the only ninjas in New York were human-sized mutant turtles? Well, think again. Lotus Blossom was a character who only appeared in two episodes, but she left quite an impact, because you can't go wrong with ninja babes. However, the NECA two-pack featuring her proved hard for me to find, and I was finally able to find it hiding amongst some of the more recent releases, yet had to go out of town for it. I really wish NECA would give more specific sculpting credits, because there's three people credited here (Tony Cipriano, Tim Miller, and Kushwara Studios), and I'm not sure which one of them did Lotus. Whoever's responsible, the head sculpt is fine, though the eyes seem to be a bit too far apart. They designed her hair to flow back so it won't get in the way of the sheath, and the...[See More]

Crawler
Convertors (Select) - Insectors
Rated 3.50 stars by Karl T. Face
We have Deluxe Insecticons at home. Nah, I kid. These things were actually out a year before the Deluxe Insecticons, licensing the same Beetras molds- which, interestingly, came from the same design studio as Bubblegum Crisis. This makes two lines that brought the toys into more hands than the original, often in better colors. Starting in beast mode, it's about what you'd expect- a blocky, angular robo-beetle with metallic stickers and improved greebles. I particularly like the cooling fins on the elytra. And of course, folded robot legs underneath, but only really visible from the sides and rear. The metallic blue and dull silver are slick as hell. Articulation is limited to the head and horn, and the turret-eyes. Robot mode is fairly solid-looking apart from a noticeable gap in the...[See More]

Wreck-Gar
Transformers (Super7) - Ultimate
Rated 4.15 stars by RMaster007
1986 was an important year for Transformers, as not only did the franchise receive its first feature film, but introduced some new characters, albeit at the cost of characters like Optimus Prime and Megatron getting scrapped or reformatted. Everyone knows the likes of Hot Rod and Galvatron, but who can forget Wreck-Gar, the Junkion whose vocabulary is sourced entirely from television? Not Super7, hence why he's the only movie-introduced character to get an Ultimate. Wreck-Gar may be one of the few Transformers to have facial hair, sporting a thin mustache and beard, along with the antennae on top of his head. It's a pretty good likeness of his cartoon design, with all the proper details and clean paint, but his face is a bit more yellow than it should he. I like how his face isn't just...[See More]

Alfred Pennyworth
Batman - Animated Series (McFarlane) - Basic Series
Rated 4.15 stars by RMaster007
The city of Gotham isn't just masked vigilantes and an overabundance of villains and corrupt businessmen, there's normal citizens as well, such as Alfred Pennyworth, the faithful butler of both Batman and his secret identity Bruce Wayne. He doesn't get a lot of figures, but DC Collectibles did make one, coming from the animated series. Only catch was that he only came with a big Batcave playset, and as you can guess, it goes for a lot nowadays. Thankfully, McFarlane came along and reissued Alfred on his own for a very reasonable price. Most of the Animated figures were done by Irene Matar, but Alfred was done by Tony Cipriano (McFarlane doesn't credit their sculptors, but DCC did). The head sculpt is certainly nice, with the raised eyebrow expression. It befits Alfred perfectly, since he...[See More]

Major Arnold Toht
Indiana Jones - Adventure Series (Hasbro) - Basic Series
Rated 4.00 stars by Wes68
The Adventure Series line lacks a lot of iconic baddies. There is a whole discussion that could be had about how do you market toys of baddies that were aligned with a certain fascist political party from 1930-40's Germany. I suspect this is probably a reason we didn't get characters like the German mechanic or Col. Dietrich from Raiders or Vogel from Last Crusade. Still their omission feels a bit glaring. We didn't even get any German soldiers or a Indy in a German uniform/disguise. Fortunately, we did get Arnold Toht, one of the most iconic baddies of Raiders if not cinema history thanks in large part due to his grisly demise. Toht doesn't come with a whole lot of accessories, but what he does come with makes for one of the better figures in the line. Toht comes with a pair of...[See More]