Poe Ghostal here. We’re trying something new for this review – what I’m calling “Sculptor’s Commentary” (though I reserve the right to change it to, say, “Designer’s Commentary” depending on who’s doing the commenting). The Boomer was sculpted by Jason Frailey, who also sculpted the Evil Dead II Henrietta as well as the super-popular new Glyos-compatible Armorvor. Jason was kind enough to do an interview in which he discussed some aspects of sculpting the Boomer. You can find this commentary in quotes throughout the review. I’m working on more of these for the future, so if you’re a sculptor who’s sculpted toys I’ve reviewed, or a reader who’s in contact with such a sculptor and think they might be interested, please shoot me an email at poe@poeghostal.com. –PG

NECA have done me proud. Way back in 2010, when I wrote my two articles about how the Left 4 Dead action figures should be made, fate was listening in and ensured that the Valve licence would end up with those who could best bring my plastic fantasies to life. Soon we’ll be seeing a plethora of excellent action figures based on Valve’s sensational award-winning video games done by those amazing people over at NECA. The first release was the original Left 4 Dead Boomer, probably the most well-known of the L4D zombies and the perfect test case for NECA to show off their chops at converting these characters into action figures. How did they do, particularly in regard to my planned version in my article? Read on to find out! (more…)