|
Well, I see someone is fulfilling the Purple Promise!
We've had Batman, we've had Robin, and since Nightwing wasn't in Batman vs. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, our third set includes Batgirl. That's the natural progression, right? Cartoon animals go mouse > cat > dog, Gotham City heroes go man > unlikable child > cool smart lady? Makes sense to us!
Lucky for all involved, this crossover came out at just the right time to see Babs wearing her distinctive "Batgirl of Burnside" costume, which has been made into an action figure before (by both DCD and Mattel), but not in the cartoony style this one gets. Everything still matches the comics' style sheet, just... smoother. She's wearing her purple leather jacket with the cape snapped to the shoulders and the yellow batsymbol on the chest, plus the leggings with the black stripes down the outsides and the yellow combat boots with the black laces. This is the comicbook costume, just translated to the cartoon style.
One change that's been made? Her mask has white lenses rather than exposed eyes, because that's the style the cartoon went for. Her (human) ears poke out of the sides of the mask quite a distance, which is another feature taken from the comics, and the (bat) ears on top of the mask are startlingly sharp - watch your fingers! We do get to see her unmasked in the movie, and amusingly, she looks like April O'Neil.
The figure moves at the ankles, knees, hips, torso, wrists, elbows, shoulders, and head. There's a bit of a gap between the hands
and the cuffs on her gloves, but it's not too bad. Her belt, the pouch on her right hip, and the strap around her thigh are all glued together into a single piece, but since it doesn't physically attach to her body anywhere, it doesn't impede her movement.
Her accessories include a batarang, her grapnel launcher with open and closed hooks, her cellphone, a small tube of anti-ooze retromutagen, a dart filled with the same, a slice of pizza, and four alternate hands so she can use all the various things. She does ride her motorcycle in the movie, but there was no way that was going to fit in this box.
So far all these sets have paired characters
in a logical way: the team leaders, the team losers, and now the team thinkers. [Also all their colors match! --ed.]
Donnie continues the pattern of all the Turtles having unique designs and thus unique molds. He's taller than Leonardo but shorter than Raphael, and thinner than them both. The green of his skin is a very bluish shade, and his belt includes a strap that goes over his right shoulder. In addition to the individualized safety pads - Donatello's look smooth and rounded, and have a purple tint to them - each of the brothers has their initial worked into the design of their belts: look at the buckle on the belt here, and notice that it's shaped like a capital D. Then go back and look at the other figures, and see how the little straps of cloth wrapped around the belt form an L or an M or an R. The design work on these characters really is quite skilled, isn't it?
The other turtles' heads have been short and squat, but Donatello's is tall and narrow. His eyes are also sculpt wide instead of squinty, which
gives him a more inquisitive look. Like Raph, he gets an alternate head, taken from the base assault in the third act: his is a blue baseball helmet with a red stripe and an aftermarket targeting lens over the left eye. Since this is him in the middle of a fight, he's also gritting his teeth. Unfortunately, when you go to swap the heads, the peg pulls out of the neck, instead of popping out of the head like it should, so that's tough to work with.
The figure has balljointed ankles, double-hinged knees, balljointed hips, a balljointed chest, Revoltech wrists, swivel/hinge elbows, swivel/hinge shoulders, and a balljointed head. The waist is wobbly - not to the point where he can't stand, but definitely to the point
where the legs will wiggle back and forth if you lift him by the torso and shake him. Plus, the hands end up sitting too far away from the forearms, leaving big blatant gaps at the wrists. That's not good.
Like all the other characters, he includes a slice of pizza, and you know he's going to have his bo staff (which splits in half so you can get it into the loop on his back). You get your choice of hands in fist, holding, or chopping poses, a large canister of TCRI mutagen ooze, and his T-phone communicator, so he can keep in touch with Batgirl (her handle online is @Oracle; his is @BoStaffsAreCool). Just as Babs' phone was sculpted and painted fully, the T-phone is hinged to open and fully detailed inside.
Best Batfamily character + best Turtle Boi? What's not to like here!
-- 11/13/19
|
