Doc Thomas Reviews > Left 4 Dead Boomer by NECA (w/ Sculptor’s Commentary!)

October 16, 2012 | Doc Thomas

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…)

Sponsored Review > Engineer (Chair Suit) (Prometheus, NECA)

October 12, 2012 | Poe

Let’s get one thing out of the way first: Prometheus is not a good movie. It’s a bloated, pretentious, incoherent mess of a film. However, I thought the aesthetic aspects of the movie were great, and that’s where this figure comes in.

I had high hopes for Prometheus. I’ve been a fan of the Alien franchise since I was eight or nine years old, and one of my favorite mysteries of that universe was the story behind the so-called “Space Jockey” (Prometheus calls them “Engineers”) in the chair on the derelict spaceship.

This unexplained and yet crucially important part of the Alien universe was so compelling to me. What was that thing? Was that long nose the trunk of an elephantine alien, or simply a breathing mask of some sort? Why was its bio-mechanical body, particularly its ribs, so similar to those of the xenomorph? What was that giant cannon-like structure it was sitting in, and why did he seem to be organically fused to it? Prometheus promised to answer some of these questions. And it did, I guess, but in an at best incomplete and at worst completely unsatisfactory way. And it was really poorly written, too.

But no matter – I’m not here to review the film. The fact is, regardless of how it got here, I now have an action figure of the Space Jockey – something I’ve always wanted but never imagined I’d have. Now that I’ve got him, I can imagine he’s whatever I want him to be.

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Sponsored Review > Hero Ash and Henrietta (Evil Dead 2, NECA)

August 14, 2012 | Poe

NOTE: The toys in this review were provided free of charge by NECA Toys (though I also bought a second set). –PG

This has been an interesting year for me. It has seen the advent of two things that young Poe wanted more than anything: super-articulated Godzilla action figures, and Evil Dead 2 action figures.

As you may or may not be aware, my “Poe Ghostal” handle was born when I joined the Spawn message board back in 1999. And why did I join? To urge McFarlane Toys to add Ash to their Movie Maniacs line. They did, and it sucked, and also it was from Army of Darkness and not my favorite of the trilogy, Evil Dead 2, but I’ve covered this before so let’s move on.

While Army of Darkness is the film most casual fans know, my favorite has always been and always will be Evil Dead 2. I’ve seen it dozens of times on video and at least twice in special Halloween theater showings. I do somewhat miss the time when the film was still a true cult favorite; for Christmas one year, my parents had to contact a store in Canada to track down a copy of ED2 on VHS as a gift. Nowadays the Evil Dead trilogy is big business, with tons of comics, videogames, DVDs, and toys, but as with Lord of the Rings, part of me misses the time before the Internet boom when Evil Dead fandom was still the provenance of in-the-know geeks and horror hounds.

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NECA Bets They Can Get You To Buy Another Robocop…

July 25, 2012 | Poe

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMm8bxvpoT8&feature=youtu.be&h=375&w=500]

…and they’re totally right.

Just thought it’d be nice to take a break from Subpocalypse for a moment.

SDCC Preview Night Post

July 11, 2012 | Poe

It’s preview night at SDCC and the news is already starting to roll in!

UPDATE 11:49pm: Even more awesome Predator from NECA, including an unmuddied Dutch!

And – the game is officially over!

10pm: Our man inside, Rustin Parr, took a few great photos:

Here’s MOTUC Granamyr, due out later this year. Still forming my opinion on this – the sculpt is great, but I’m concerned he might be a bit too pre-posed in the sitting posture. Oh, and he’ll be $80.

There will also be a Great Unrest Weapons Pack which will include Keldor’s swords, Man-At-Arms big gun, and Draego-Man’s second sword, shield and whip (pic at ToyArk).

Rustin also sent in this pic from NECA:

Dutch from Predator! Fully articulated! Evidently we’ll have to wait for the non-muddy version, but whatever, I’m in for every figure from the original movie.

No, this is not a MOTUC Castle Grayskull – it’s a statue from Icon Heroes. I haven’t heard how large it is, but I don’t think it’s MOTUC-scaled.

In weirder but still awesome news, the toy company Super 7 somehow got the original molds to Kenner’s unproduced 1979 Alien 3 ¾” line and will be producing them. Amazing.