Patty Tolan

Leslie Jones has a line in Ghostbusters that perfectly sums up the shit she had to go through this summer: "Okay, I don't know if it was a race thing or a lady thing, but I'm mad as hell!" Ghostbusters was attacked from the beginning by the limp-dicked loser-bros of the internet for daring to be a female reboot of a kind of mediocre (if we're being completely honest and taking off the rose-colored Nostalgia Bifocals™ [they're bifocals because you're old]) movie from the '80s. They made the trailer the most disliked video in YouTube history, and they tried so hard to ruin the movie's ratings that Rotten Tomatoes turned off user reviews because dimwits were down-voting the movie before it opened. Look, it's fine to dislike the new Ghostbusters: once you see it. I thought it was great, but if you watched it and didn't like it, that's just a difference of opinion. But these impotent wonders were complaining about it as soon as it was announced, for no reason other than the new cast kept their sexual organs on the inside of their bodies. And surprise surprise, it turns out that people who are bigoted against one group tend not to stop there, so Leslie Jones became their prime target because of course she did. Patty Tolan. Ghost tracker, municipal historian, metaphysical commando, not at all the racial stereotype some of the trailers made her seem. Jones was great in the role (it was originally written with Melissa McCarthy in mind), and the likeness on this toy is just as average as the other three figures in this line. They did do a nice job sculpting her braids, though the paint leaves a bit to be desired. In the movie, Patty is the one who gets the Ghostbusters their uniforms, thanks to her MTA connections. While Venkman, Ray, Egon and Winston apparently all had the exact same physique (according to Mattel logic), the women each get their own unique sculpts. "Unique-ish." Just like Erin and Holtzmann seemed to share one digital sculpt that had been stretched to different sizes, Patty may stand a full head taller than Abby, but her jumpsuit has all the same wrinkles. Same pockets, too: she gets the pants that have the pockets on the front of the legs, not just the sides. Her upper arms seem too short for her body - your elbows are more or less even with your waist, and your wrists are even with your crotch, and neither of those are true on this toy. Patty either has a balljoined neck or a swivel that's incredibly loose, so maybe I need to revisit the Abby and Erin reviews to double-check their articulation. Definitely sure about the wrists only being swivels though, that hasn't changed. Her stumpy little arms have swivel/hinge joints in the shoulders and elbows, the waist is a swivel that conflicts with her belt, the H-hips don't raise to a full 90° thanks to the design of the pants, the swivel thighs cut right through her pockets, the knees are situated just above the boots, and the ankles are just hinged, with no extra rock to them. When Mattel started making Ghostbusters toys in 2009, they had their proton packs permanently attached to their backs. That eventually changed (because how else do you get fans to double-dip?), but the new Ghostbusters get the removable packs from the start. The sculpt looks just like the real movie props, but there's almost no paint on it. The gun part can plug onto the side or be held in the figure's hands, but this still feels like a missed opportunity. Why do we not get proton streams that fit on the barrel? Why does Patty not come with the ghost shredder Holtzmann built her? Getting a proton pack is a must, but there could have been more. The set includes more. The Ghostbusters figures each come with a Build-A-Figure piece (which Mattel is still calling "Collect and Connect," because screw you if you like names that don't suck). The BAF is Rowan, and Patty has his head. We've reviewed all four Ghostbusters now, and have yet to mention the packaging at all. They come in a box that's similar to the boxes Mattel uses for all their DC figures, which is nice: it's cool that Mattel has a specific style that carries over between all their product. It would be like if Marvel Legends and Star Wars Black Series figures came in packaging that was the same shape. The box is black, with green slime dripping down from the top and the Gb logo in the upper left corner. An orange and gray safey stripe goes along the bottom in front of black-and-yellow hazard tape. It's a nice presentation and looks pretty spiffy on the shelf. When the sad little racists of the internet did their best to crap on Leslie Jones, the rest of the world rallied around her, and she made it clear that she DGAF. She's been working as a comedian since the late '80s, but didn't get her big break until SNL brought her on as a writer in reaction to complaints that the show hadn't had any black women since Maya Rudolph left (Chris Rock personally pitched her to Lorne Michaels). That was in 2013, when Jones was 46 years old. Her first week on the show, she told a joke (about being popular as a slave) that managed to piss off a lot of people despite being stone cold funny. Her second appearance was four months later, and Ghostbusters director Paul Feig was watching; before her segment was over, he'd already mentally cast her for the film. Leslie Jones is a 49-year-old woman who now has an action figure of her character in a sci-fi movie and has made enemies of the internet's biggest assholes. She busted her ass for 25 years before hitting it big, so any time you feel like you're losing at life, just keep that in mind and keep powering through. We believe in you. -- 11/24/16

Tweet