Oh, Bane, you cinematic enigma.
Are you from the Caribbean? Is your
mask keeping you alive? Will you use Venom at all? What’s up with
that jacket that makes you look like Tom Selleck from Quincy Down
Under? Or do I mean Steven Segal from On Deadly Ground?
Holy shit – a Michael Caine connection! Is there something in his
contract where his costars have to wear sheepskin sometimes? Why the
shit aren’t you wearing a luchador mask?
I like Bane and I always have. I know
that sounds awfully convenient given the proximity of his big-screen
debut, but “Knightfall” is one of my favorite story arcs of all
time and one of the only crossovers that I had no problem buying
every single tie-in of (at the time). Bane is more than a match for
Batman. If not for a very convenient series of ridiculous events, he
would have broken Bruce Wayne. I’ve reread “Knightfall”
and “Vengeance of Bane” an awful lot, and that’s something I
can’t say about most comics.
Admittedly, I didn’t pick Bane for my initial pool of ideas for Nolan’s third entry in his Batman series,
but he was in the second round if I had ever gotten around to writing
it.
I didn’t read any of Gail Simone’s
Secret Six until last year, when I devoured the entire run in
a few days. Now I like Bane even more.
The guy has been poorly represented in
media so far. Possibly the best portrayal was on Batman: The
Animated Series. But in The Batman, Batman & Robin,
Batman: Brave & The Bold, and even the amazing Arkham
video games he is portrayed as little more than a hired thug. His
most positive media adaptation comes from Young Justice, where
he is actually a brilliant crime lord.
And now Tom Hardy will step into the
role (if not the mask) in The Dark Knight Rises, out July
20th. When he was first announced I didn’t know anything
about Hardy other than he was on a lot of Hot Lists (or whatever). I
was glad a relative unknown was cast in the role, but I didn’t even
know what the guy looked like; let alone whether or not he had the
chops to pull off one of the Dark Knight’s most complex – and
perhaps difficult to adapt - villains.
Then I saw Bronson.
If you haven’t seen it, you should be
ashamed of yourself. Okay, not really, but you need to check it out.
It will give you a burning desire to see Hardy in The Dark Knight
Rises. He pulls off a brutal, brilliant, lunatic very well. Not
that Bane is a lunatic, but the character Hardy plays in Bronson
is so layered and convoluted I have no doubt he will be able to pull
off the role.
Okay, so back to toys – I found Bane
and Batman at a Target the other night. I had gone there with the
intention of looking for the new Movie Masters. Well, that and trying
to find a little something for Lil’ Troublemaker. He was bummed
because we had just had to leave a really fun time with a bunch of
our friends. I was bummed, too, so we both needed toys.
First Glance: I wish he
didn’t have the jacket, but I get why he has the jacket.
It’s in the images we’ve seen the most of. Otherwise Bane is a
big, bulky figure and I like him.
Sculpt: Bane is a 100%
new sculpt.
I think his neck is basically
ball-jointed, but it really only swivels. He has ball-jointed
shoulders and the swivel/pivot hips that Mattel likes so much. There
are pivots at the elbows, abdomen, knees, and ankles. His wrists,
waist, and thighs have swivels. He does not have the standard
swivels at his biceps.
The articulation issues are a little
annoying. His head doesn’t have the expected range of movement, his
arms can’t do as much due to the lack of bicep movement, and his
low-hanging belt interferes with his hips.
As far as the actual sculpt, though,
Bane looks good. The head is fantastic. What you can see of the Hardy
likeness is great and the mask is full of detail, down to the straps
having textures.
The torso is thick and detailed.
Whatever kind of body armor that is has layers and straps and looks
mostly good. I like the separate piece used for the lower part, even
though it does limit the leg movement significantly. The only real
problem I have with the torso is that the joint kind of looks like
shit. The parts of the upper and lower abdomen do not match up
regardless of how you have Bane posed. I really think they could have
done better.
The jacket looks great. It has a lining
and buttons inside and a lot of texture on the outside. The holes
where the arms go through are fairly snug – you can only see a
little of his torso through them. The arms themselves look fine, but
the lack of swivel bugs me. They also can’t hang down by his body.
The thickness of the jacket and the roundness of the arms keeps them
sort of sticking out; like a kid in a snow suit. The hands are cool
and have different wrappings on each side. They are sculpted nicely
and while I would have appreciated two sets – open and closed –
these do look fine. On second thought, they should have included a
whole second set of arms so we could take that jacket off.
The legs look very good, with a lot of
detail on the cargo pants to keep them from looking too plain. I like
the pockets and indentions and whatnot. The knee joints are lined up
so that they don’t break up the design. Bane’s boots are really
cool. Like the pants and vest they have a lot of details to make them
not look as dull as, well, boots.
Design: Bane does look a
little dull paint-wise on initial inspection, but there is actually a
lot of detail and variety.
The head features painted-on stubble
and the eyes are accurate and well-placed. The mask has some light
detail and manages to look a bit more vicious than the one we’ve
seen from trailers and such.
The jacket, again, looks great. The
interior is painted – lining and buttons – which makes a huge
difference in the seeming quality of the figure. The vest also sports
some nice layers so that it isn’t just an afterthought, with the
upper and lower portions matching up nicely.
The pants aren’t quite as detailed,
but they do still look good. The boots are great, with a couple of
different shades and painted laces. I know painted laces should be a
given, but they aren’t always.
Overall this guy has a very good paint
job that could have been not-so-good.
Accessories: Bane comes
with the support piece for the Bat Signal. It has some nice deco and
looks appropriately worn. One side of the fork has a button that
depresses and the other side has a sort of latch. You can tell how
the signal portion will fit in and it’s a pretty neat setup. I like
that Bane came with this piece because it allows for some neat
posing.
Because Mattel sucks and likes to make
us think it costs even more than it really does to make these
figures, Bane comes with no real accessories. I really do feel he
should have come with bare alternate arms.
Packaging: The packaging
is very nice. The blister is in the shape of Batman’s forearm and
is eye-catching and cool. The art looks good and is more mature than
the other Batman product out there. This package would almost be too
subdued if it weren’t for the shape of the blister. The back
features the other figures from the first wave as well as a picture
of the fully assembled Bat Signal.
There is also a sticker on the blister
with a code to get Movie Cash for your ticket to see The Dark
Knight Rises. I thought this was pretty awesome, so I pulled out
the laptop and logged onto the site as soon as I could. Unfortunately
the promotion doesn’t go into effect until 7/1/2012, so I’ve got
to hang onto these stupid blisters until then. I know what you’re
thinking – why don’t I just write the codes down? Because I’d
lose them. I know I would. I guess I could make a note in my phone’s
calendar, but that seems like so much work.
Overall: I think Bane
looks really good and accurately reflects what we’ve seen so far
from The Dark Knight Rises. However, he is kind of a crappy
figure. Well, crappy might be too strong a word, but I am
disappointed in the limitations on the articulation.
3 out of 5
Bane might not be quite as plentiful as
Batman, but he shouldn’t be hard to find. Walmart is usually the
cheapest for Mattel products, though Target has surprised me from
time to time. Do your research before you buy this guy. I think I
paid $16.79 for mine and while that was definitely too much, at least
these are good figures with some kind of big accessory. More than I
can say for the Jay Garrick I just paid $23.70 for. But we’ll get
to him soon.
-Phantom
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