Finally The Daryl has come back to the blog!

Well, there's no review... yet. But there is a fancy new logo made for me by my friend, Martyn. And there will also be a new-look wrestling ring with logo designed by him too which I'll be doing figure reviews from. Hopefully I can have a review once a week like I originally planned, so keep checking back as there will be a new review ASAP.

3 and 3/4 Inch Marvel Universe/Iron Man Movie figures

I thought I'd do a different review because I've only reviewed wrestling and MMA figures. The images were took with my phone so appologies if the quality is bad. Also, I took them while at university so didn't have a "background" so most of the pics are up close. I'll be reviewing these together due to the lack of pictures and lack of things to say.
(Click Images to open them in new window)

Packaging
The packaging for both figures is similar in design. by this I mean the plastic bubble is partly glued to the card and the other part is taped to the back of the card.



Iron Man- The figure can be seen clearly in the package which is good for MOC collectors. The artwork on the card is also nice (it is the same throughout the line) with Iron Man flashing his repulsor blast.



Wolverine- I really like the packaging on the Marvel Universe figures. The drawing of the character on the side looks really good and shows what the figure is meant to represent. The whole of the figure is clearly displayed and not hidden by anything on the front of the bubble. You can also clearly see the display base and "Top Secret" envelope.

Head Scan/Part Sculpt



Iron Man- The helmet sculpt looks identical to the first film and the armor looks bulky, but not too bulky.



Wolverine- I'm not a fan of the head sculpt. The image on the carding makes him look like a real bad ass but the figure looks child-like. The rest of the figure looks really cool and I can't fault it.


Articulation
Iron Man- Ball joint neck, ball joint shoulders, swivel hinged elbows, swivel wrists, ball joint hips, double hinged knees, ball jointed torso. While this figure sounds good, the articulation is terrible. All the joints are really stiff and I still haven't been able to move the legs at the crotch/hip area after having the figure for a few days.

Wolverine- Ball joint neck, ball joint torso, ball joint shoulders, swivel wrists, T crotch, double jointed knees, swivel-hinged feet. Everything is good about the articulation, absolutley no complaints.

Paint
Iron Man- The paint is applied very well and looke exactly like the film. There were no problems with mine and I couldn't see any more in the shop to compare them to see if there were any with bad paint apps.

Wolverine- The yellow on the suit seems to have a red/orange tinge. I don't know if that's true to the comic, but on the prototype image it is solid yellow, so it's a bit annoying to me that mine seems to be off a little.

Accessories



Iron Man- He comes with some extra "Flip Up Armor". This is purely for kids. I can't see why a collector would want this as it's not in the film at all and I'm not really sure what it's for. It goes over Iron Man's head and just looks like a bulkier version of the armor he already has. It also comes with a display base and armor cards. The Armor cards stack one on top of each other which then display the full armor. This is in a similar vein to the film when he draws plans for the Mark I suit and places them on top of each other to create the full suit design. Built onto the side of the display base is a place to stack the cards which will look good displayed with other Iron Man figures as an armor display.









Wolverine- He comes with a display base and some "Top Secret" files. There's nothing really much to say about these. I'll just let the images do the talking as there's nothing really interesting or unique about them.





Other points of interest
Marvel Universe Wave 6 Wolverine- £9.99
Iron Man II Movie Series 1 Iron Man Mark III- £8.99
While I like the figures I can't help but feel they're over priced. For around £10 I can buy a 6 inch WWE figure so these 3 and 3/4 Inch figures, while good quality and detailed don't seem as worth it to me. Saying that, I'm not a huge comic book fan, I'm a fan of the films and cartoons but for someone who has been reading comics for a long time I can see how they could justify paying this price.

Spring Toy Fair 2010 thoughts. Mattel.

There will be no pics in this particular blog. I like to only include my own pics, but I'll link to the figures I'm referring to so you can get a look.

Mattel (WWE)
Part_1
Part_2

The big news from the Toy Fair is that Mattel are introducing a new line called "WWE Legends". The packaging uses the WWE Legends logo (similar to the old block style WWF logo). The figures will be in elite style.

The first series consists of; Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat, Sgt. Slaughter, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes, "Road Warrior" Animal & "Road Warrior Hawk.

The second series; Terry Funk, Iron Sheik, "Ravishing" Rick Rude, "Superfly" Jimmy Snuka & Jake "The Snake" Roberts. It's also safe to assume that one more figure will be in this set that hasn't been announced yet (as the vast majority of figure series, including the first series of Legends, contains six figures.)

I think it's a smart move for Mattel to produce a line like this. It was clearly the line that "made" Jakks. Mattel now has a wide range of body molds (even though they're still making new ones for people like Dusty Rhodes and Sgt. Slaughter) so it shouldn't be too difficult to re-create certain wrestlers' likeness.

The only critisism I have is that they didn't get a Bret Hart figure on show. Just think of the possibilites they could have done;

Elite Series- Current style, with either short or regular length jeans, sculpted t-shirt (not cloth), and a removeable leather jacket.
Basic Series- Similar to the elite but obviously with less articulation and no jacket.
Entrance Greats- Choose from a vast array of attires with entrance jacket and removeable shades. Maybe base it off one of the times he took the Canadian flag to the ring so there's another accessory in the box.
Legends- Any era of Bret for this.

Obviously they still have time to make a Bret figure, but how cool would it have been to see something (even if it was an unpainted prototype) just so we know we're getting something.

Check back soon for thoughts on the product that Jakks showed.

Didn't do the reviews.... meh.

Basically, I've got all the reviews written out and have a few images on my digital camera but am not home (which is where my camera is). So there's no way of me uploading them and putting them with the review.

The look back on ECW with some of the Mattel figures should be up on Thursday, it's literally a case of uploading the images.

My indepth review of Basic Series 2 Jack Swagger will follow shortly after the look-back on ECW. It just needs a final read-through (and images uploading.)

Check back here in an hour or two when I'll have some thoughts on the 2010 Spring Toy Fair.

New reviews coming soon

I think from now on I'm going to do "themed" reviews (unless I get something super cool). By this, I mean I'm going to do reviews based on the goings on in wrestling/MMA. Or a possible future review may be the 5 worst figures I own. I think reviews like that are more interesting than just a random review of one figure.

So the first themed review is going to be titled "RIP WWECW". The review will either be a series of separate reviews of the following figures, or all of them in one blog post. I like to get the reviews done on a Thursday (Friday at the latest) so I have the weekend to do other things. But I'm expecting Series 2 of Mattel's basic figures (minus Rey Mysterio and Vladimir Kozlov) to arrive any day now. And that series contains some figures I'd like to include in my tribute to WWECW.
The following figures will be included in the review:
Basic Series 1 Kofi Kingston
Basic Series 1 Evan Bourne
Basic Series 1 The Big Show
Basic Series 2 CM Punk
Basic Series 2 Jack Swagger (This one may get a review to itself as he's one of my favourite wrestlers)
Basic Series 2 Mark Henry
Basic Series 2 Kane
Elite Series 2 Matt Hardy
2-Packs Series 2 Miz & Morrisson
2-Packs Series 2 Finlay & Hornswoggle

I realise that is quite a lot of figures to review so it may not be as in depth as my previous reviews, but I'll take a fair amount of images to make up for it. The images for these reviews will be better than my last two. As I'm going to use my digital camera to get some good shots.

Other future reviews will be include; "Triple H vs Randy Orton", "Entrance Greats: Shawn Michaels", "My top 10 Jakks WWE figures", "UFC Octagon Playset". Also look out for random figure reviews of figures that I have received but haven't had time to review like, Elite Series 2 Batista and Elite Series 2 R-Truth.

UFC Series 1 Mike "Quick" Swick Review

UFC 109 is right around the corner, Mike Swick is the only fighter on the card that I have a figure of. So I've decided to do a review on him. I'm expecting to be receiving the full set of six WWE Elite series 2 figures and an Entrance Greats Shawn Michaels. I'll deffinatley be doing a review of HBK once I get him. But I won't have time to fully review all six (Randy Orton, Ted DiBiase, Triple H, Matt Hardy, Batista and R-Truth.) So I'll do reviews eventually on Elite series 2 Orton and Matt Hardy deffinatley, but these reviews will probably come in a week when I have no new figures. So, the review... Let's get it on!


Packaging
I bought this figure loose, but the figure is packaged in a standard Jakks UFC figure box. It has the UFC event logo the figure is based from (UFC Fight For The Troops.) And it also says it is from the UFC collection (the Jakks UFC line also includes Legends, Pride and WEC.)

Printed on the carding behind the figure is a chainlink fence with UFC protective pads, to show that this is from the UFC line. The Pride figures have ring ropes to show that the fighter was a Pride fighter.

Head Scan/Part Sculpt

The head scan has a great likeness to him. The part scuplt is what lets this figure down. At the Fight for the Troops card, Swick was fighting at Welterweight which is the 170lb division. But he shares the exact same torso as Miguel "Angel" Torres (from the WEC part of Jakks UFC line.) Torres' figure is based from the time he was Bantamweight champion which is the 135lb division. Even though there is a 35lb weight difference, both figures have the same torso.

This is a problem with the UFC line, in three series (Series 0, 1 and 2) Jakks has only used three different torsos. All the heavyweights (Lesnar, Mir, Nogueira etc) share the same torso, then there is the torso mainly used for the Lightheavyweights, and finally the torso that has been used for anyone smaller than Lightheavyweight.

Articulation

The figure has Jakks Deluxe articulation which means; Ball-joint neck, ball-joint shoulders, single-hinged elbows, swivel and up and down wrist movement, swivel-waist, ball-joint wait, double-hinged knee and swivel and up and down ankle movement.

The figures also have additional articulation in the shoulder area, it allows the arms to move across the chest for more accurate submission and grappling.

Paint

I couldn't find an image of his attire from Fight for the Troops so I can only go on how the logos are applied. Everything looks to be in place and applied straight with no half-applied logos. The red tape around the glove is a nice touch as the earlier series didn't have this.

Accessories
Swick comes with no accessories. It would have been nice to get a water bottle or possibly walk on t-shirt.


Comparison/Scale

The Champ is Here!!!!

I think I'm going to be posting one review a week. With Uni work, I just couldn't find time to take pictures, upload them and write a review. So when I come home on a Thursday I'll get my review on and bring some awesome images to you. My next review which I'll try and do over the weekend, but may have to wait until next Thursday will be of some of the Jakks Pacific UFC figure line. Here's a sneak peek at the UFC figures I'll be reviewing:




So this review is going to be of the Toys R Us exclusive John Cena and Edge with toy title belt and DVD. This set is based on the 2006 feud between Cena and Edge. I haven't had chance to view the DVD yet, but it is region 0 so should be good to view worldwide. It does say NTSC on the disc which I'm sure is some kind of US encoding, but I'll let you know if I have any problems when viewing it.

NOTE: I'm still working on resizing these images so they look good on the page. If there is a problem, just click them to see them full-screen. Also, appologies if the quality of the photos suck, I'm taking them on my iphone and uploading them directly to photobucket as I'm rushin

Packaging





The packaging is in line with every WWE Mattel product on the market, it will look in place if you are a collector that keeps your things boxed up. The box allows you to touch the title belt which could be a bit annoying if someone messes with it before you buy it. The figures are hidden inside the packaging so are untouched by the great unwashed.



Everything is attached with these really annoying tie things. It's not a major problem as it keeps things in place, but it's just a bit annoying as it takes time to cut everything free.



Both figures are in a plastic see-through bag with the display base and card name tag inside the bag (The bag is then attatched to the card with the annoying plastic tie.) I noticed that the John Cena name tag was creased because the figure had bent it while in the box. So if you like to display the figures on the stand, don't expect the name tags to be in perfect condition as they could be damaged inside the box without you knowing.

Head Scan/Part Sculpt
John Cena- Cena is the exact same figure as his Basic series 1 (but painted differently). Cena hasn't changed that much in this time so it doesn't bother me that the same torso and head scan has been used.



Edge- The head scan on this figure is the same as the Elite series 1 figure. The part choices look to be the same as the WrestleMania Heritage figure (but I don't have that so can't be 100% sure.) I have a slight problem with the head scan being the same and that is Edge has changed heair style slightly from 2006 to 2009. The figure has a hard time in standing up. Because of the part choice, the knees seem to cave in bringing the ankles really close together. I don't know if its just a problem with my figure, but standing him in the wrestling ring is a bit of a pain. Standing him on the base is fine.



Articulation
John Cena- Cena's articulation is slightly different than most basic style figures because of his cut-off jeans. Instead of having a swivel just below the knee at the top of the shin, it is at the bottom of the shin above his sneakers.

Edge- Edge features the same articulation as all the other basic figures, I won't go into them here as I've mentioned them in a previous review.

Paint



John Cena- Cena has loads of detail. He has logos on his shorts and detail on his sneakers. Even his sweatbands have the catchphrases and logos he was using at some point throughout the 2006 era.



Edge- Edge only has his "sun" tattoo on his shoulder but that is accurate to the time frame so I have no problem with this. He has his gauntlets painted on each wrist with the drawstring ties painted on the inside which is a nice touch. The "Rated R" logos on each thigh look awesome, they're painted nice and big and not cramped up like the old Jakks version of this figure.





Accessories (not including display bases)
John Cena doesn't have any accessories.

Edge has one elbow pad. Without looking up some of their previous encounters I can't say whether this is accurate or not, but it seems odd that they'd only include one elbow pad with the figure when the two previous Edge figures both had two elbow pads.

This set also comes with a toy WWE title belt which I'm going to include in this section. The belt is a step up from Jakks versions of the toy belts. The strap feels like faux leather, whereas the Jakks Pacific title belts had foam straps.



The plates are made of plastic but painted exceptionally well. My only complaint is that there aren't enough plates on it. There should be two plates either side of the main spinning one. The plates that are on the strap look good and I have no complaints with them, but the ones that are missing detract slightly from the belt. The title belt fastens with velcro at the back which can be adjusted to fit a childs waist.

Comparison/Scale



Other Images

Elite Series 1 Rey Mysterio

The other day, I received Elite Series 1 MVP, 2-Pack Series 1 Glamarella and the figure I'm reviewing right now; Elite Series 1 Rey Mysterio. In the time it took me to complete this review, I have received other figures too. They are; One full set of 2-Packs Series 2 (Finlay/Hornswoggle, Miz/Morrisson, Primo/Carlito), WrestleMania Heritage Randy Orton and the Basic Series 1 box set of 6 (loose). I am also expecting in the post an American store exclusive Edge and John Cena with toy belt and DVD. While I don't expect to be able to review every figure I get, I'll review my favourites so don't be suprised if you see an image of a figure I haven't reviewed yet popping up in another review. I'll also take requests via the comment box, I've set it up so that non-members of Blogspot can leave comments.

Packaging

I didn't take a picture of the packaging because I was too excited to open it and I had already posted photos of the Elite CM Punk's box. Rey comes in the same style box. The figure is fixed in the package with clear rubber bands. The bubble allows for the figure to be visible so is good for MOC collectors. But I opened mine up, so less of the boring stuff...

Head Scan/ Part Sculpt



Since he wears a mask, it's quite difficult to judge if the figure actually has a good likeness. The details on the mask is fine- the straps on the back are raised up and some of the detail on the mask is also raised. The head shape makes him look a bit weird because it's perfectly round. They haven't quite captured Rey's jaw line properly which makes something seem off about the figure.

The part sculpt on the figure is very good. The torso choice is perfect to a certain extent, Rey isn't that skinny but his muscle definition is very similar to this. I've got a feeling it could be unique to Rey as nobody else in WWE at the moment would suit it. His pants mould is also very well done and will be unique to him (because of the size of the figure).



I don't know if this is a sculpting problem or a lack of paint, but I've put it in the sculpting section as it could have been easily rectified with a tiny bit of paint, but would look a bit odd. The gloves on both hands have a part sculpted to the arm ( a kind of wrist strap). The left hand is fitted perfectly but the right hand there is a gap between the hand and the arm. It is painted with Rey's skin tone, so i think it was meant to have been a little further down on the arm (so there is no visible skin tone).

The shoes/boots are also specifically made for Rey. They are very sinilar to what he wears and aren't just generic lace-up boots like we've seen on previous attempts at his figures.

Articulation



Rey has Elite articulation which means he has added points of articulation such as double jointed knees and torso cut. There is also some articulation at the ankle. It seems like the foot is connected to the ankle with a ball joint to allow accurate movement for the foot.

Paint

The paint application on the figure is top notch. I was a little apprehensive before buying the figure because I wanted to be sure the tattoos were accuratley placed but I couldn't wait for them to hit shops over here (the UK). So I ordered it online. I'm very happy with the tattoos and where they're placed.



The logos on each leg are nice and big, exactly how they should be (unlike some previous Jakks figures which had small logos on the thigh only.)



Accessories

The elite figures all come with accessories. Rey comes with a black t-shirt and the hood thing he gives to a fan during his entrance. The shirt just goes over his head, the sides are cut out to accuratley represent the way he sometimes wears t-shirts. The hood fits snug on his head. I tried to fit it onto Chris Jericho's head but it wouldn't go, so I think it was specifically made for Rey. It's not a cloth hood like it would be in real life, it's made of plastic.



I'm going to include his elbow pads in this section. I wouldn't really talk about elbow pads as they aren't really an accesory but an expected part of the attire. The elbow pads slightly restrict the elbow articulation. They aren't too bad, but I hope in the future that Mattel makes pads out of slightly softer material.

Comparison/Scale


This image shows and Elite Series 1 Edge and 2-Packs Series 1 Jericho with Rey. Rey is shorter than the two of these in real life and seems to be in scale in figure form too.


This is a shot of Elite Rey and a Ruthless Aggression (Jakks Pacific) Rey. I took image to give you an idea of how short the Elite Rey actually is.


Other Images

Update plus a Thank you

If you read my previous post, you would have seen that I was waiting for six figures. They haven't arrived yet. But a different order I made has arrived today. It included; Elite Series 1 Rey Mysterio and MVP and Beth Phoenix/Santino Marella 2 pack. Expect a few reviews of these in the next few days.

Just want to say a big than you to Martyn at Dropkick Radio for plugging my blog. For the people that aren't aware of what this is; it's an online wrestling radio show and podcast. Check out www.dropkickradio.com for more information.

2 Blogs in one day--Shock Horror!!!

After looking at my last blog, I've just realised that I'll have to be careful when I edit the images. I'm taking them from my Photobucket account and then resizing them on this website when I write my blog. I thought it'd expand the page to fit the larger images on, but that's not the case. If you want to see the images, all you have to do is click on them and they'll open in a new tab or window. Sorry for any inconvenience.

I'm expecting this in the post any day now, hopefully the image doesn't stretch the page;



It's a Toys R Us exclusive set of 6 (The first series of Mattel's Basic figures). I ordered it from a seller in the US (on eBay). I'm getting them loose (to save a little on shipping). I think I'm going to review one figure at a time instead of doing them in a group like I did in my last post. After re-reading it, I think it came across a little mumbled. The reviews will be a work in progress until I find a format that I'm happy with. I'll also try and take more images. I took all my pictures before I wrote it then realised I ran out too soon.

I'm also waiting on a Jakks John Cena figure that comes with a cloth "Hustle Loyalty Respect" T-shirt from the exclusive triple pack (with Edge and Big Show). I'm going to wait on reviewing the Cena from the 6-pack until this one comes so I can either do some comparison shots or put the cloth shirt on the Mattel Cena.

I've also just ordered some more Mattel product. I've ordered the final two Elite figures from Series 1 (MVP and Rey Mysterio) and I've also ordered Beth Phoenix/Santino Marella 2-pack. That's all I want from the first batch of figures they've released. I'm waiting for the Elite series 2 Orton (with full sleeve tattoos) to be released, if I can pick up the WrestleMania heritage Orton for cheap then I may get that too.