Every so often, I like to break the seriousness of the figures I look at with something wacky. Today, that breath of fresh air comes in the form of the Hot Toys Arkham Knight Harley Quinn figure.
Who doesn't love Harley? Ever since she was introduced in Batman: The Animated Series, Harley Quinn has become a major character on her own, and naturally appeared in the various Arkham video games. This is obviously her look from the third and final game, and naturally she's sported a few different looks over the years.
When you compare the Video Game Masterpiece figures from Hot Toys, what you get within that simple cardboard box is usually much, MUCH more interesting than what you'd get with the latest Marvel/DC/Star Wars entry. Case in point, here's Harley's loadout:
- 1 x Main Figure
- 6 x Posing/Gripping Hands
- 1 x Assault Rifle
- 1 x Pistol
- 1 x Paint Can/Brush
- 1 x Mallet
- 1 x Baseball Bat
- 1 x Jack-in-the-Box
- 1 x Jack-in-the-Box Effect
- 1 x Clip (for mounting bat on back)
- 1 x Base/Stand
Before we get started, I just want to mention the biggest, most horrifying fact about this figure - it's built on the Hot Toys seamless body. The problem with this body is two fold. First off, the skin isn't silicon (at least, not until WW '84) and is incredibly stiff, placing tremendous amount of strain on the joints of the skeleton and generally making articulation kind of blah. The second problem is that the skeleton is incredibly frail, and is nowhere as robust as that on a TBLeague - the right forearm on my figure snapped, and I'm not sure if it was just bad luck or it was something I did.
Being a Hot Toys body, the curves of the body are incredibly average across the board. Harley has the benefit of a large frilly dress to hide her lack of booty and general chicken legs, whereas her corset gives the impression of impressive bust, when in reality it's a Hot Toy and I've seen enough Black Widow's to know that it's tolerable. Overall, it is safe to say that the proportions of the on screen Harley are not matched by this figure, but it could be worse.
Keep posted for the follow up on that last point.
The art direction of the Arkham games has been nothing but superb, and it's a treat to get those designs reproduced in the real world, albeit at a tiny size. Harley is dressed in an awesome mixture of tight leggings and a frilly dress, masterfully recreated using fabric, vinyl, and hard plastic parts. I can't say for certain that Hot Toys nail every aspect of the costume, but they're the ones that generally try the hardest to actually accomplish that. While the little laces and buckles are nice, my favourite frill of her outfit has to be the raised studs on her leggings and boots, followed by the actual use of fabric for her lace cuffs.
Having said all that, articulation, already challenging due to the body used, is taxed even further due to the use of tight vinyl for the legs. So basically it's going to be museum poses for the vast majority of her arsenal, and in my case, because of her single right handed gun holding prowess, at this time I'm REALLY limited on what I can do. Having said that, nice looking museum poses are basically what most of the Hot Toys catalogue is capable of - its the ones that can pose that are the exception.
The excellent execution isn't limited to the costume, but also the sculpt and, equally important, the various pieces of weaponry that Harley has at her disposal.
Sculpts for the Arkham based figures are, in my opinion, closer to the mark than most of the live action stuff. I don't care what anyone says when they say that the latest Marvel figure is bang on - I can blindly point at a figure and it'll most likely be the eyes or the brow line. Harley is definitely pretty good. Expression is bang on (actually having one is.. not really something I can say for any of my figures other than Captain America) and it's really hard to screw up white face paint. In general, my criticism on this point would be directed towards the lack of mascara, as the onscreen Harley (or even the one on the box) takes "smokey eyes" to a whole new level. The shape of her face is a bit on the long side, and should be more squat. The hair colouring is nice.. it's not dirty blonde, but rather, gold, which is a popular substitute, with the ends of the pig tails appropriately coloured. The hair is sculpted, which I have to live with, but at the same time being short hair doesn't really make me cringe as much. Plus the pigtails are articulated.
As mentioned above, broadly speaking articulation isn't that great, with most of your posing will be of the upper body variety, provided you don't have a broken arm or something. Not much else to discuss here, but I thought I would draw our attention to this particular photo, where the rubber suit alone is enough to hold up the internal (at this point disconnected) skeleton, a joint, her hand, AND the pistol. The skeleton doesn't exist to move the body into position - it exists to stop the thing from imploding.
Paint Applications are phenomenal. Again, I can't say for certain every single detail is on the figure, but they certainly did their best to cram it all in. One of the nice things about a figure like this is that video game character generally have a larger colour pallet to draw upon, or at least more applications of colour. Considerable effort is needed to make sure fine details are applied correctly, and masking is sharp to prevent any bleeding. Add to that the actual skill need to apply the paint, and you'll understand why I say Harley here is a work of visual beauty.
My figure broke.. not much else to say about Build Quality. It is worth noting that this phenomenon isn't exact rare for figures using this body. In fact, I have an old RE4 Ada Wong that uses one of their earlier seamless bodies, and I got that one for cheap because the wrist snapped off that one.
So in the end, buyer beware - Harley Quinn is a beautiful figure that, while can't pose particularly well, just flat out looks awesome even if relatively vanilla poses. This is due to the attention to detail, fantastic production values, and having a face that isn't a zombie. HOWEVER, if you do get one that is intact, cherish it and handle with care, because that body can't be fixed.
For Full Gallery, please visit:
Bình luận