That’s right, we’re back baby! There’s still a lot of renovations to do around here, but for now PGPoA is up and running and may even be occasionally updated.
It’s SDCC season, and we appear to be living in the worst of times (politically) and the best of times in terms of action figures. While many of the larger companies are delivering great products (admittedly at higher prices), we are seeing some significant new smaller companies enter the market with some impressive products and licenses.
For example, Fresh Monkey Fiction recently combined with BigBadToyStore to create the BigBadWorkshop toy company. Reading between the lines, it seems like BBTS is now underwriting select FMF ventures, such as Operation: Monster Force and the Naughty or Nice Collection. And one of the cooler things I’ve seen so far is they are apparently developing a line of 1/12 scale NPC figures (credit to Luke Thompson – check out his blog, it’s cool). I love this idea, and I suspect many collectors of various 6″ lines will too. As Luke notes, the price will be key, though I’d probably spend more on these than a lot of people might. I just wish there were 1/10 scale options as well – my McFarlane Batman Year One figure needs crooks (and crooked cops) to whale on.
Boss Fight spent last week teasing a new line of Hellboy action figures, only to stop abruptly with a sign-up page and leave us hanging. I went nuts for Hellboy from about 2004-2006, and Mezco’s Comic Hellboy line was one of my favorites from that era. I’ve got BF’s Red Sonja and I like it, so here’s hoping their Hellboy line is as good or even better.
And on a related note, that new Hellboy line got me thinking about 1000Toys’s Hellboy figures, and then on to the competing 6″ Street Fighter action figure lines by Jada Toys and Storm Collectibles. The Jada Toys figures are similar to Marvel Legends figures in sculpt, articulation and accessories, whereas the Storm Collectibles figures are more on par with what you see from Bandai’s S.H. Figuarts line. Now, Marvel Legends and S.H. Figuarts have been battling it out for over a decade now, mostly with Marvel movie figures, but it’s always been an interesting question to me how you decide which to get. For example, you can get the Jada Toys Blanka for $35, or the Storm Collectibles Blanka for $110. By the same token, the 1000Toys Hellboy costs $150, whereas I expect the Boss Fight figure will probably be between $50-$70 (based on their other licensed 1/12 figures like Red Sonja, though it’s obviously possible they won’t go the 1/12 route). So the question is, if the cheaper figure gives you ninety percent of what you’re looking for from a figure, is it worth $70-$100 to get that last ten percent? Obviously this is going to be based on a lot of factors – one’s budget, how much of a fan you are of the property, and so forth. But it remains an interesting question to me, whether these tiered action figure lines represent the future of the hobby.
