I'm not one of the weird guys who still play with their figures, nor am I a psycho who collects every figure produced and keeps them in their packaging. I'm the kind of guy who collects only the few figures that I really want. I don't want to get all the minor characters, just the ones that are really important to me. There's something about having an action figure--not a mini-maquette or something--that's just so cool. Even if I'm not going to play with them, and they're really only going to sit on my shelf and look shiny, I'm somehow happy with the basic idea that they're poseable--like they're some kind of mini-versions of the real characters.
I'm currently interested in three figure lines at the moment: DC Universe, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, and Marvel Universe.
The DCU figures are great. They're like 6 inches of plastic magic. Their sculpts are amazing, and their poseability is outstanding. My only gripe is that they don't release enough of the main characters, preferring to have mostly 2nd-tier characters along with one or two upper-tier characters in each figure wave. That annoys me, as we still haven't gotten a great Superman or Batman figure yet. (But we did get Nightwing!!! :D )
Actually, there are a couple of other gripes. Firstly, the scale. I love figures being in that 6-inch scale, but they simply take up too much room on my shelf. The 3 & 3/4'' scale is what I can handle. Mattel also has a smaller-scale DC line, but the quality of those figures is downright terrible. I believe that Mattel makes great 6-inch figures, while Hasbro makes good 3-3/4-inch ones. Secondly, I have a problem with the price. $10.99 was the last price I saw for the DCU figures, and that's just a little too much for figures that aren't my absolute favorites.
The Clone Wars figures are really nice. The "animated CG" style of the series is near-perfectly translated to toy form, and the overall quality of the figures is very impressive.
So far, I've collected Anakin, Ahsoka, Cody, Rex, Ventress, Obi-Wan, and Plo Koon. Next I'm looking to get Kit Fisto, Mace Windu, and any other Jedi or clone commanders they release.
At $6.99, they're just barely within my acceptable price range.
My latest obsession, the Marvel Universe figures, are quite remarkable. Their sculpts aren't perfect, but they definitely seem to be great little figures that are chosen straight from the current comics (which I am definitely happy about).
I just picked up Iron Man tonight, and he's pretty good. Not perfect, mind you, but good. He's got an absolutely perfect metallic sheen to his armor that is essential to the character.
I can't wait to pick up more of these, including:
- Captain America
- Spider-man
- Iron Fist
- Ms. Marvel
- Thor
Another cool thing is that the new line of figures for X-Men Origins: Wolverine is basically an extension of the MU line. The vast majority of the figures are actually based on the X-men comics, and it's a great way to collect figures like Cyclops, Iceman, Gambit, and classic yellow/blue Wolverine.
But the best part about the MU line has to be the three-pack coming later this year:
Spider-man, Iceman, and Firestar!!!! The Spectacular Spider-Friends!!!! *geek squeal*
By the way, if you've never seen Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends, you are missing out on life.
Sadly, however, the MU line has one major fault: its price. $7.99 is way too much. If the figures had an absolutely perfect sculpt or were in a bigger scale I could forgive the price, but eight dollars for something that small and (not to be insulting, but) imperfect is just ridiculous. I may have to hold off on getting some of these figures for a long while; hopefully I won't miss out on them entirely.
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