Review > April O’Neil (TMNT, NECA)

August 6, 2009 | Poe

Most casual fans of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles will remember April O’Neil as the buxom reporter who somehow retained her high-profile TV news job despite never changing out of her yellow jumpsuit (perhaps her inability to button it up all the way had something to do with it, I don’t know). But in the original 1980s comics by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, April was quite different.

The original April was a computer programmer and research assistant working for mad scientist Baxter Stockman. She got mixed up with the Turtles when she discovered Stockman was using his “Mouser” robots to rob banks.

It’s been more than a year since I reviewed NECA’s Ninja Turtles back in April ’08. Since then, the line has been declared dead several times. But April popped up at SDCC, and soon she’ll be available in specialty stores in green or yellow outfits (the yellow outfit hopefully drawing in casual fans who only know the cartoon). (more…)

NECA nabs Heroclix, Diamond gets Battle Beasts

August 4, 2009 | Poe

I thought I’d draw your attention to two fairly significant corporate acquisitions that may have been buried amongst the SDCC news.

heroclix-logo

After months of rumors, it’s been pretty much confirmed (there hasn’t been an official announcement yet) that NECA has bought Wizkids from Topps. Wizkids’ biggest property, as I’m sure you know, is the tabletop miniatures game Heroclix, which features characters from DC, Marvel and Dark Horse, among others. There’s also the spinoff game Horrorclix, which features Jason, Freddy, and even Cthulhu himself.

I don’t have any sense of how well the Clix property has fared over the last couple of years. I imagine that once they’d gotten down to the third- and fourth-stringers in the DC and Marvel universes, there might have been a problem keeping up interest in the game. I also thought it was a mistake not to make Heroclix and Horrorclix fully compatible. In any event, it seems NECA will be taking the reigns, and we’ll have to see what they do with it.

In other news, Diamond Select now has Battle Beasts, the 1980s toy line featuring little manimals with weapons and stickers you rubbed to find out if their strength was wood, water, or fire. (more…)

Poe’s Point > SDCC Wrap

July 28, 2009 | Poe

sdcc_wrap

I’m not going to discuss what happened with the various exclusives and so forth–Rustin has promised a rant later in the week, and I’m sure that will cover it all and more.

Instead, I’m just going to list the things that interested me the most. (more…)

Odds ‘n’ Ends > Pre-SDCC Edition

July 22, 2009 | Poe

odds_n_ends_09

  • The Fwoosh has a first look review of Egon. The glasses don’t look as bad as they did in the packaging shots. Looks like he is indeed in the same scale as Movie Masters, so you can have Egon duke it out with the Joker. I will say that while the new Slimer is nice, I’m glad I have the NECA one.
  • Early images of the Hasbro SDCC booth, including some Marvel Universe figures. (Apparently you have to register to see the bigger pics.)
  • Too soon? But I kid the toy industry. Frankly, it’s MJ’s own fault for making such a famous zombie video. And I think he’d be amused by the whole thing, honestly.
  • Dr. Mrs. Ghostal and I watched the pilot and first two eps of Warehouse 13 last night. It’s not as quirky as Eureka and the two main characters aren’t (yet) as appealing as Scully and Mulder, but I like Saul Rubinek’s nutty professor, and the “haunted objects” are an interesting hook–sort of like a reverse Reaper. They need to drop the whole Secret Service angle, though–it’s just too hard to explain what the hell they’re doing at crime scenes. In any event, I’m willing to give it a try–so many of my favorite shows (like X-Files and Star Trek: The Next Generation) started with fairly weak first seasons, particularly when viewed in retrospect.