So now we’re up the third series of
Scary Little Ugly Guys. From what I’ve seen they seem to be doing
well at retail. There are a lot of toy lines that sort of stagnate a
bit. The same pegs at stores have the same figures arranged in the
same way every time you go in. But the SLUG Zombies always seem to
have moved. Whether it’s the 3-packs on the pegs or the 12-pack
coffins on the shelves, these little toys appear to be doing all
right.
That’s a good thing because they’re
pretty awesome.
Another neat thing is the fact that we
are three series in and the figures still feel fresh. The mixture of
original zombies with parody and/or homage characters works well and
I think JAKKS can get a whole lot of mileage out of this line as long
as it continues to be successful. I suppose the next major step might
be some sort of playsets or even vehicles. I could picture a little
city playset with a few moving parts or some Road Warrior-style
vehicles.
First Glance: The first
two series of SLUG Zombies were somewhat familiar to me, as JAKKS
showed all or most of them at Toy Fair earlier this year. But the
third series was all-new stuff. And still all very fun.
Sculpt: Obviously this is
a different format from my regular toy reviews, as there’s no paint
or articulation to discuss. But I am going to run down each figure
briefly.
Extra Crispy
To me this zombie Colonel
Sanders with his bucket of – presumably – rotten fried chicken is
one of the top offerings of the line so far. This guy is so
immediately recognizable and iconic. And for reasons I can’t quite
explain he just seems like a natural fit as a zombie.
Johnny Two-Guns
I feel like this is
supposed to be a recognizable character, but I just can’t figure
out who. I guess he could just be an amalgamation of Blaxploitation
archetypes. Of course, I’m not even positive he’s supposed to be
black. I mean, he is pink. But he kind of looks black. His
favorite quote is, “I can shoot down zombies just by yelling BANG!”
which is pretty hilarious but also makes me wish he looked like
Diamond Dallas Page.
The Towering Terror
Another one that treads
the line of being offensive. Andre the Giant is one of the most
beloved professional wrestlers of all time and I’m not sure a
zombie Andre is okay. But I’m going to try and look at it more as a
tribute to one of the greats. And I do like that they establish a
feud with Macho Mangler from the last series in his bio.
Tragic Magic
This is another case where
I feel like they missed the mark with the name. “David Slain”,
“Chris Mangled”, or “David Rotterfield” would have been
better; just off the top of my head. But the figure looks good and
that’s what really matters because honestly I’m not going to
remember any of these guys’ names anyway.
Double-Barrel Carol
She’s notable for being
the first female survivor. Carol looks like a sort of punky hipster
girl. One of the “Dislikes” listed in her bio is mini-golf. That
seems awfully specific and kind of odd and makes me feel like it’s
a reference I should get. If anybody picks up on a character that
Carol might be, let me know.
Singer Mortis
This is obviously Elvis. I
suppose some might consider this even more offensive than the Andre
one above, but not me. The King is certainly one of the greatest
entertainers of all time, but I don’t have any particular
attachment to him because I’m not seventy years old or a greaser. I
do love that he is holding his disembodied hand which is, in turn,
holding his microphone. Oh, and his name is kind of terrible. I’m
sure there’s an Elvis song that could have been altered. “Jailhouse
Rot”, maybe?
Squeamy Sashimi
I almost wish this guy was
a survivor. I like the idea of a sushi chef slicing up zombies and
flipping the little pieces all over the place like at Benihana’s.
The Deadlifter
This guy is all-around
pretty funny. From the punny name to the visual gag he works very
well. I could see this concept working in the background of any of
your finer horror comedies.
Basehit Bones
Meh. I hate baseball. I
guess it’s funny enough that he’s using his leg as a bat, but I
just don’t care. The name falls kind of flat, as well.
Zero Hero
I'm glad to have Black Lantern Superman, here. But that name sucks kryptonite.
Louie Fingers
I guess a Mafia guy was a given. The name isn't as horrible as some. I'm assuming he smashes peoples hands with that big hammer. And then eats them, of course.
Jeet Kun Dead
I guess the fact that this Bruce Lee knockoff's name made me laugh means I'm an idiot. And fairly insensitive.
The four that do not come in the
12-pack are (ones). I bought one 3-pack so I could get Riled-Up
Riley, who is Shaun from Shaun of the Dead. He’s pretty
great and is a dead-on Simon Pegg (for this scale and style of
figure, anyway).
Color: The zombies are a
sickly green hue and the humans are almost the same pink as the old
MUSCLE figures that this line is so reminiscent of. The colors work
well and I’m curious to see if JAKKS expands on them. Not only
could we get the color-coded werewolves and vampires I mentioned last
time, they could also throw in some glow-in-the-dark “irradiated”
zombies or maybe some clear ghosts. Because translucence and glowing
are the two very best features any toy could have.
Side Note: I am a genius. An all-new checklist poster I just found on the website shows what look like three more series of SLUGs, including some glow-in-the-dark variants. Woo-hoo! Check it out below.
Packaging: There are two
types of SLUG Zombie packaging so far – coffins and blister cards.
The coffins each have twelve specific figures in them and the blister
cards have three random figures. I originally thought buying the
coffin got you all of the figures, but it doesn’t. There are
sixteen figures in each series, so you’re going to have to buy a
few blister packs if you want them. This is where I get a little
irritated, as it means collecting a whole set is going to require you
to buy not only doubles but to pay the extra that blister packs cost.
The coffin of twelve is $9.99 and the three packs are $3.99, so it’s
less than a dollar a figure for the big one and $1.33 apiece for the
smaller packs.
The coffin itself is cardboard with a
window in the front to show one of the figures so you know what
you’re getting. I have to give JAKKS credit for that one. Some
other toy companies might have had some nice, full-color depictions
on the front and just let you assume you were getting fully decoed
figures.
Once you get the coffin open, there is
a plastic tray inside with the various figures arranged on it:
This kind of amuses me for some reason.
I like the way they just kind of stacked the guys up to make the
space work. They’re not just jumbled in there, but they aren’t
exactly organized and separated either.
Overall: I’m still
thrilled to be getting these little figures. I have thirty-nine of
them now and fatigue hasn’t set in. I’m going to be more than
happy to fork over more money as long as JAKKS keeps cranking them
out.
4
out of 5
These are available at Target and Toys
R Us now. I haven’t seen them at Walmart, so I’m going to assume
they took a pass on them. I don’t quite get why, as they seem to
have no problem carrying the Creepy Crawlers and Doctor Dreadful
sets; which are far more gross than the SLUGs in my opinion. It could
simply be a result of their constantly-shrinking action figure aisle.
Phantom
Troublemaker vs. 31 Days of Halloween
If you’re new here or haven’t been
keeping up, this is where I give my thoughts on SyFy’s “31 days
of Halloween” programming. Obviously I haven’t seen everything
I’ll be talking about, but that’s kind of what the internet is
all about – talking out of your ass.
Each day I will cover the schedule from
the time my post goes live (usually 11 AM) through the following 24
hours. On Fridays I will cover the whole weekend, which is a huge
pain in the ass but also kind of fun.
Enjoy!
11:00 AM – 1:00 PM – Furnace
– Danny Trejo, Michael Pare, Tom Sizemore… Ja Rule… and… Paul
Wall? 2006 was Ja Rule’s big year, clearly. This is a movie about a
bunch of prisoners who are supposed to reopen an abandoned wing of a
prison, but get killed by a ghost instead. Or maybe they get
buttsexed. I’m not sure.
Halloween score – 4
Quality score – 2
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM – Bone Eater
– I could make some lame joke here about the title “Bone Eater”,
but I won’t. Because Native American burial grounds are no laughing
matter, and neither are the giant killer bone monsters that come out
of them. That can only be defeated with a magic tomahawk.
Halloween score – 3
Quality score – 2
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM – House of Bones
– I am a dude. I am genetically predisposed to chuckle and think of
Paul Rudd’s character’s video “Boner Jams ‘99” from The
40-Year-Old Virgin any time I hear or see the word “bone”.
And this is a whole entire house of bones.
Holy cow, I just realized I watched this one last year and it was
okay. It stars Corin Nemec and the delicious Charisma Carpenter as
paranormal investigators who get more than they bargained for (or
whatever).
Halloween score – 5
Quality score – 3
5:00 PM – 7:00 PM – Jeepers Creepers
2 – I originally found this sequel to be as good as
the first one. I suppose I still do, but they’re both tainted by
the circumstances surrounding the director.
Halloween score – 5
Quality score – 3
7:00 PM – 9:00 PM – One Missed Call
– I’m assuming this is the American remake. I wrote about this
the other day, but now I can’t remember which one was better. I
promise I’m not trying to be all snobby here – believe me, I hate
foreign films and subtitles and stuff – but I think me and the
missus generally prefer the Japanese versions of movies. This might
be the one case where we liked the American one more, which is doubly
surprising given that it’s a Takashi Miike movie. Hey, they can’t
all be Gozu.
Halloween score – 4
Quality score – 3 (?)
9:00 PM – 11:00 PM – Thir13en Ghosts
– Silly fucking title aside, I like this movie a whole lot. I like
all of the Ghost House movies that I’ve seen. Tony Shaloub, Mathew
Lillard, and Shannon Elizabeth combined with beautiful sets and
snazzy effects make for a fun hour and a half.
Halloween score – 5
Quality score – 4
11:00 PM – 1:30 AM – SAW III
– Man, these all run together so much. I think this is one of the
ones I don’t like. I know I liked the first one and the second one
is my favorite. I think this might be the one where they stumbled.
Oh, and these movies may be gory as shit and released around
Halloween, but I don’t find them particularly Halloweeny.
Halloween score – 3
Quality score – 3
FRIDAY
1:30 AM – 3:30 AM – SAW IV
– I find it weird that part three needs 2.5 hours and this one only
needs 2. If this is the one where they have to stand on blocks of ice
I think I liked it. I’m not sure. I’ve got a box set of the first
four or five movies and I think I need to watch them again.
Halloween score – 3
Quality score – 3
3:30 AM – 5:30 AM – SAW V
– I don’t remember what happened in this one, but I know the last
one I watched was pretty good. I think it was SAW 3D (not that
I saw it in 3D) and it was the one where Carey Elwes came back.
Halloween score – 3
Quality score – 3
5:30 AM – 6:00 AM – Scare Tactics
– I’M BRIAN FELOWS.
Halloween score – 5
Quality score – 2
6:00 AM – 8:00 AM – Paid Programming
– I wonder if I could get somebody to sponsor me doing a series of
posts about one of the infomercial products. Not the Pos-T-Vac, but
the total Gym or the Hoveround or something.
Halloween score – 1
Quality score – 5
8:00 AM – 10:00 AM – Jack Brooks:
Monster Slayer – Finally! A movie I can heartily
endorse! This is a rad flick with a great cast, an awesome story, and
tons of heart. Watch it. Fuck that - go buy it. Now.
Halloween score – 5
Quality score – 4
10:00 AM – 12:00 AM – Jeepers
Creepers 2 – SyFy – c’mon you guys – you just
showed this yesterday. Stop it. Really.
Halloween score – 4
Quality score – 3
Come back tomorrow for a list of my
favorite vampire movies. It’ll be great!
-Phantom
I'm pretty sure Johnny Two-Guns is based off of Chuck Norris:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.top10thingsblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/chucknorrisjokes.jpg
These guys look pretty cool though, and the value for price is a lot better than a single Marvel Legend or DC Classic figure.
Wow. That's pretty obvious. I just felt like that hair looked like an afro. But yeah - that's Chuck.
Delete