Samurai and Union Officer

This is not a set. It's two figures I recently picked up from the playmobil website. The Samurai has the upturned, squinty Asian eyes, but I can't get mad because of how much I love the details on the samurai armor.

Meanwhile the Union Officer has a funny mustache. Historical facial hair is always great.

There's just something about the way Playmobil does figures from history that tickles me in the right place. Now if they'd just do some figures from less violent professions, I'd be super thrilled.

Vindicator and Box

Since I'm trying to collect a good Alpha Flight minimate team I decided to go out and get the Toys R Us exclusive set of Vindicator and Box. Vindicator is the female version of Guardian, which makes sense since she's his wife. Heather Hudson took over the role when everyone thought James Hudson died. She became the leader of alpha Flight and got engaged to another Canadian hero, Madison Jeffries.

Jeffries was a support character to Alpha Flight until a bunch of weird crap happened (Madison's insane brother who had the power to manipulate flesh the way Jeffries could manipulate metal, plastic, glass, etc, manipulated then merged with the original operator of the Box armor) and Jeffries was forced to take over the Box armor. Considering his powers, Jeffries was able to reshape the armor into anything he wanted, and helped him move from the third tier Gamma Flight to the first tier Alpha Flight team. During that period he got engaged to Heather Hudson until it was revealed that her husband was actually alive. After that he got married, was brainwashed into helping various villains commit genocide against mutants, and then was rescued and became a member of X-Club, the X-men's super-science team. Damn that was a lot to type out.

Both figures come with a few accessories, including hair and an alternate visor for Vindicator and an alternate hand for Box. Box also has a head underneath his armor, showing the form Madison has when he's merged with the armor.

AMP Ep. 56: Shire Sausage

Episode 56 if the Articulated Monster is up. My friend Aya joins us as we talk about the Denny's Hobbit Menu.

Kung-fu guy

Hai-ya!

Continuing my ongoing quest to get action figures of Asian people, I ended up getting the Series 3 Playmobil figure of this Asian dude. Playmobil figures don't really have names, so I'm calling this dude Asian Kung-Fu Guy.

I know I like to ironically collect unintentionally racist action figures of Asian people, (I'm Asian, I'm sensitive to this kind of thing, especially when the toy manufacturer is from Europe) but this guy is even more racist than I usually expect. He's not just a martial artist. He doesn't just have the slanted eyes that all Playmobil figures of Asian people have. He's got a fu-manchu mustache. Oh, and angry eyebrows so you know his fu-manchu-stache means he's evil.

Which is funny, because if the television show "Kung-Fu" with David Carradine taught me anything, it's that the practitioners of Kung-Fu are supposed to be peaceful people. Oh wait, I didn't see the dragon on his clothes. He's clearly evil.

I don't really think this guy is all that racist. But then I look at the mustache and I don't know. I just don't know.

Crankstart and Galvatron

I decided to give the Kre-O transformer minifigs another chance, mostly because there was a two for one sale and Galvatron sort of impressed me when I read other people's look at the figure. I had hopes that Crankstart, who turns into a four wheeled vehicle, would look a lot better than the other minifigures.

Sadly I was wrong. He looks exactly as I feared, a figure tipped on its side. Just one that has wheels attached to his feet.

Meanwhile Galvatron was actually pretty good. And best of all, his transformation was more than just disassembling him and reassembling him in a different way. He actually sort of transformed without removing that many parts. And best of all, he doesn't look like someone just tipped him on his side.

And they did a damn good job with his robot mode. A friend happened to see it and could recognize him immediately.

Kyle Rayner & Kilowog (SDCC 2012 exclusive)

Having never been to a comic convention, I've long missed out on the con exclusive game. But luckily since college I've made friends who do attend such gatherings, and so for the last two years my friend Kelly has been able to pick up exclusive toys being offered at San Diego Comic Con for me. Last year she grabbed the Hasbro Indiana Jones six-figure set (I'm still rightfully apologizing for her having to carry a three foot-long box through the packed con floor), and this July she was able to snag the first DC Collectibles (formerly DC Direct) Green Lantern 3 3/4"-scale two-pack.

Well, the snagging was a little more difficult than it should've been. See, the deal behind this series of non-retail two-packs is that DC intends them to be exclusive to certain big-time conventions (the second set containing John Stewart and Atrocitus was exclusive to the recent New York Comic Con, for instance). The company further stated that the line wouldn't progress beyond the first two-pack if it didn't sell out at SDCC. Apparently DC anticipated astronomical demand, as it instituted a complicated voucher system to ensure people didn't buy too many, as they had done with DC Direct's multi-colored Hal Jordan figures a while ago. How complicated, you ask? So complicated that Kelly wasn't able to buy a set for me until the last day. And so complicated that when she went to the booth to see if she could finally give them money for something they want to sell, there were still huge piles of the set left over. Unsurprisingly, at that point scoring one wasn't all that difficult.

Despite the logistical foul-up that resulted in heaps of unpurchased Kyle Rayner/Kilowog sets, it seems sales were decent enough to warrant continuing the line. Anyway, I wasn't able to pick up my set from Kelly and pay her back until last month, and I haven't been able to write up my review until now, but I gots things to say about this pair of Lanterns and I hope you don't mind hearing about them.

AMP Episode 55: Castle Graysuck

After last week's technical problems, episode 55 is now here. AJ and Mario have technical problems of their own but they join in about halfway through.



Obviously we spend some time talking about Mattel's Castle Grayskull preorder, since it allows us to mock Mattel a little more.

Laser Bird with Space Egg

So I picked up one of the K'Nex angry bird single figure blind packs. I like the Mario Kart K'nex figures, so I figured, why not? Aside from the fact that I don't play the games.

Since it's K'Nex that mean you can just look at the codes to figure out what's inside. (Thanks internet!)

So since I don't like the game, I just went for aesthetics. Like something crazy, like a space bird. I guess its called a Laserbird. I just like the 1950's scifi serial look it has. Back when aliens wore capes and funky eyewear.

Nothing on the bird looks like it fits with building bricks, but the space egg does, but that's K'Nex for you. I guess the birds are only meant to be chucked at building bricks. Because destruction!

Please make better quality versions

I saw the Star Wars Angry Birds at Toys R Us today. There were some blind packed "figures," including the only available in blind pack version of Han Solo Yellow Bird trapped in carbonite. I considered getting it (very easy to use the feel method) but decided against it because looking at the figures in the boxsets made ke realize how small they are, how poor quality (looking like tiny, poorly painted erasers) they are and how they're made of weak, bendible plastic. They really seem like glorified erasers. I've gotten better quality figures from gumball machines.

Which is a shame since it costs $4 for two blind packed figures.

Aunt May, Shield Agents, JJJ

My order for the Marvel Minimates series 43 came in. I bought the whole wave because I wanted the variant figure, and it's pretty much the only way to get the variant at a reasonable price. Who's the variant figure?

Aunt May. They made an action figure of Spider-man's elderly aunt who has no powers or does anything even close to interesting. It's an action figure of a normal old woman. And that is amazing. (CRAP, That was not intentional.)

 She comes with a Shield Agent, who is the army builder in this wave. To make it seem like there isn't an army of clones, he comes with a second set of hair. It's a good solution. Works really well.

The other figure, the one that Aunt May replaces, is J. Johnah Jameson, editor of the Daily Bugle and anti-Spider-man fantatic. He comes with some great Daily Bugle accessories, a rolled up paper and one bearing one of the "Spider-Man a Menace" headline variations that always adorns his paper. It's pretty great. More than makes up for me feeling bad that my old school and extremely rare JJJ minimate is now worth less.

I would like to point out that even though this wave is supposed to be dedicated to the Jean DeWolf Saga, the back of the card has absolutely nothing about that story. We just get regular bios. Aunt May is old. JJJ hates Spider-man, Shield agents are generic. 

(Oh wait, I forgot, Spider-man made a deal with the devil to save his aunt's life, because what the hell Joe Quesada?)

Collectobot

I love Playmobil. Today I went to an Educational toy store and in their Playmobil section I finally found the Olympic sets. Unfortunatley they didn't have the ones I wanted, so instead I had to "Settle" for a Playmobil mech suit.

Playmobil made a mech suit. Also a flying car, but whatever, a mech suit! Sure they call it Collectobot but it's a fricking mech suit. And also:

ELVIS HAS DEMOLISHED THE BUILDING!

Thankyaverymuch.

Black Bean

I wrote about these a long time ago, but I just got my hands on the Black Bean. Mameshiba's insanely popular, they've spawned anime shows, a manga. They've even decided each type of bean has its own personality.

Black Bean here is described as "Has a tendency to to stare and likes to hide." So he's like the creepy stalker of the Mameshiba world, if the pure innocence of that world could have a stalker. What's the adorably cute version of a stalker? Black Bean would be that. Also, pink hippo sweat.

 

AMP Episode 54: Birthday Suit He-Man

So Episode 54 of the Articulated Monster Podcast is up. We talk about the Hobbit and voice chips and stuff.

Street Fighter vs. Tekken

I never really got into Tekken, so I've never been into Tekken figures. But when they did a Street Fighter crossover, and then made figures of that combined property, suddenly I had a reason to get some figures.

Since every Tekken figure is combined with a Street Fighter figure, this is a good way to fill out the ole' Street Fighter minimate collection. The Marvel vs. Capcom figures can only use the characters that appeared in the original Marvel vs. Capcom 3 game (the Ultimate edition characters are out, so no Rocket Racoon or Phoenix Wright, sad face).That means the only way I'm getting Cammy is to get the Cammy vs. Nina Williams pack.

Cammy! My second favorite Street Fighter character, as a minimate. I have just enough knowledge of Tekken to know that Nina Williams is an assassin, so, here's a picture of Cammy kicking an assassin.

Who else is there? Sagat and some guy wearing a Jaguar mask!

Ken and a guy wearing boxing gloves!

Poison and some creepy little blonde girl and what the hell they made a minimate of Poison?!

Poison first appeared in Final Fight as one of the bad guys that repeatedly gets beaten up by the good guys. During the Street Fighter Alpha games the Final Fight characters were integrated into the Street Fighter universe. This included Poison. Now the thing about Poison was that when Final Fight was first appearing in North America there were some people that had issue with a bunch of men beating up women. To allay these fears, Capcom claimed that Poison was a transvestite. Then later they just said Poison was a woman. But the internet and other things still conspire to claim that Poison is a transvestite, or a transsexual.

Given this ridiculous back story, I'm astonished that they made a minimate of the character. And also whoever the the hell the blonde girl is. The back of the box says her name is Lili and she's the daughter of a world famous oil czar who loves to street fight. Because that's what the children of rich people do. You know, that's why Paris Hilton is always street fighting.

Now I just need to wait for the Toys R Us figures to come out so I can get the TRU exclusive Guile and Zangief figures. I'm sure they'll also come with Tekken figures I won't know.

The Spirit

I'm told the Spirit is a horrible movie. I haven't seen it. But regardless of quality, it was a box office bomb. And that means the toys are cheap!

Or in this case, the minimates! And I love to buy cheap minimates! It's so great that they're so small, it's easier to store them without looking insane.

Here's the Silken Floss and Octopus figures. I don't know anything about them except that they're played by the Black Widow and Nick Fury!

And here's the Spirit and Eve Mendes! I forget what her character is called, all I know is that she was played by Eve Mendes and I guess she wore a skin tight catsuit. Since I never saw the movie, I can't project any negative feelings I have for the movie on these figures. That's probably a good thing since that means I can just think that these figures look awesome!

AMP Episode 53: The Thing

New episode of Articulated Monster is up