I
honestly don’t know a whole heck of a lot about Roy Harper.
I
feel like I say that an awful lot for a guy who claims to be such a
big fan of comic books. But whatever. My ignorance is more out of a
resistance to trying new things than it is anything else. I like
Batman and the X-Men, so I tend to stick with Batman and the X-Men.
The
sum total of my knowledge of Speedy/Red Arrow/Arsenal comes from the
Teen
Titans
cartoon, the Young
Justice
cartoon, and whatever Chris Sims
wrote about him back when that awful dead cat story was going on.
Well, and the first several issues of Red
Hood and the Outlaws,
which I enjoyed, but not enough to keep buying it.
When
we were out shopping at the discount stores the other night I found a
Young
Justice
Red Arrow for ten bucks less than the outrageous $24.99 retail price.
He was a really cool-looking figure and since I already had Artemis
and Aqualad thanks to other discount stores I thought I might as well
buy him.
I
know that has nothing to do with the DCUC Red Arrow, but hang on –
I want to mention something else first.
I
loathe Mattel for many reasons. They have inexcusably poor quality
control. They make terrible, terrible
decisions about how to market movie-based properties. Their
assortments are baffling and their distribution is worse. They killed
the Green
Lantern
toy line. And yes – the movie was mind-wrenchingly bad, but toy
lines have survived shitty movies before. Mattel also killed the
Young
Justice
line by charging outrageous prices for toys that included things
nobody was asking for and a character selection that betrayed a total
lack of understanding of kids or
collectors.
It
seems like Mattel’s defense is always about how costly it is to
make toys, but few other toys companies are doing things as cheaply
as Mattel; yet those other companies are not charging near Mattel’s
prices for comparable yet superior products.
Just
so I don’t sound like too big an idiot for bitching about Mattel
and yet still spending a large portion of my toy budget on them,
there are good things about the company. They definitely have a knack
for picking up the most exciting, cool licenses. They have the Four
Horsemen to make the most of their supposedly limited budget. And
while this does not negate any of what I complained about above, they
do produce an awful lot of awesome toys.
Anyway,
as we continued on our discount store shopping, we hit Big Lots and
found a whole shelf of DC Universe Classics Wave 20. The only
characters they didn’t have were Hawk and Dove. I passed on the
rest, but I happened to need a new Green Arrow and decided I might as
well get the accompanying Red Arrow so that he’d match the rest of
my DCUC stuff. I told Lil’ Troublemaker he could have the Young
Justice
one. Artemis and Aqualad work on my shelf only because there aren’t
DCUC versions.
First
Glance:
Well, this is a repaint of the old DCUC Green Arrow with an angry
head. The Young
Justice
one is a million times better, but is just a bit too cartoony when I
have an alternative. But honestly, I’m not all that excited about
this guy.
Sculpt:
Man, they could have at least given him Cyborg’s arm or something.
Anything to not make him such an obvious repaint.
Red
Arrow has ball joints at the neck and shoulders, swivels at the
biceps, waist, and thighs. The elbows, abdomen, knees, and ankles
have single joint pivots. The hips are the funky Mattel
swivel/pivots. Finally, the wrists are also swivel/pivot ball joint
analogs.
There
are a couple of new parts here. The head and belt are new sculpts.
The head is angry. It looks really good and has a great facial
expression. I continue to be impressed that the Four Horsemen can
sculpt so many different heads that all look unique. There really is
an awful lot of detail in Roy’s face and it is certainly
distinctive. I do, however, prefer neural expressions on my action
figures, but that’s personal taste. I still can’t stand to look
at the head on the Deadman that Mattel made. The belt is basically
the same as Green Arrow’s, but with an “R” on the buckle rather
than a “G”.
Visually,
the costume is fine. This is a very well done figure and the details
that are there are nice. The ties across the chest, the shoulder
pieces, the belts and the quiver. It all looks very good. I think I
do prefer this larger quiver to the one on the new Green Arrow. I
just feel like Mattel pulled a fast one on us. I would have preferred
a smaller Roy Harper and I think most people probably would have. One
made from the teen-sized buck would have made a lot more sense.
Design:
Roy does have a solid, if boring, paint job. The head looks great
and the hair and eyes and mask are all tight with good detailing and
accurate application. There’s great shading on the body –
particularly the skin – and the armbands on mine are actually a bit
cleaner than on my old Green Arrow. I like the shades of red that
they used, but I have to say I’d prefer it if they had taken some
license and thrown in some blacks or grays. The Young
Justice
Red Arrow is so much more visually interesting.
Accessories:
Red Arrow comes with his bow and three arrows, as well as Nekron’s
left arm.
The
bow is the same crappy one that came with both Green Arrows. Both
Artemis
and Red Arrow from Young
Justice
came with far superior bows. Artemis has a cool compound bow, and Red
Arrow has one with a loop at either end rather than molded string so
you can string it yourself and not have an ugly piece of crap. They
learned this lesson from Bow.
The
arrows are actually really cool but useless, as they cannot interact
with the bow or be stored in the quiver. I’m torn here, as I was
disappointed that the new Green Arrow did not include arrows. At the
same time, there’s no reason for these figures to come with arrows.
Packaging:
Your standard DCUC blister.
Overall:
This is a very good figure that is completely boring and too big. But
not at all unacceptable. There aren’t any errors, just design
choices I don’t agree with. The bow does totally suck though, and
when you blow it with the one accessory the character is named after
you kind of blow it big time. I wouldn’t judge so harshly if we
hadn’t bought a better version with a better bow the very same
night. Granted, that version retailed for almost twice as much
originally, but that’s Mattel’s problem, not mine.
3
out of 5
Red
Arrow isn’t a fail, but I can’t say I recommend him. I feel like
Mattel could have done so much more to make this a worthwhile figure,
even within their own cheap-o production guidelines. If you see one
on clearance, he’s probably worth ten bucks or less.
-Phantom
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