I mentioned in
Tuesday’s Batmobile review that I was totally stoked about
that Batmobile toy coming out and might have understated my level of
excitement about the actual figures.
I was very
excited about the figures.
As much as the appearances of the characters from Batman ’66 may be the most iconic and oft-used for licensed materials; this is the first time the likenesses of the actors have been used. And to me that is a fairly important distinction. There have been many toys that utilized the design and color scheme of Adam West’s Batman, but this is the first that actually is Adam West as Batman. And Burt Ward as Robin, and on and on.
Another
potentially exciting thing about this line was that Mattel would be
relatively unable to farm parts. Each figure was using a specific
depiction of the character as portrayed by the appropriate actor. And
you can’t really fudge the physical differences between, say, Adam
West and Frank Gorshin. Of course, this also meant the line might be
grossly more expensive than Mattel’s other DC offerings. With
prices for a single 6” scale figure with some shared parts and no
accessories ranging from sixteen to twenty dollars, this TV Masters
line could have ended up pricing itself out of existence from the
get-go.
Fortunately,
cooler heads prevailed at Mattel and the average price for these
seems to be in the $15-16 range. Excepting Toys R Us, where the
single figures are $19.99.
I’m not here
today to talk about the single figures, though. I’m here to talk
about the Toys R Us Exclusive Batman and Robin two pack, which is
currently the only way to obtain a Robin figure. You can get it from
more places than just Toys R Us, though. That’s just the only
brick-and-mortar store carrying the set.
First
Glance: I wasn’t expecting this set to be in such a big box
for some reason. I knew it came with the wall piece and that the
figures were posed, but I was still expecting a blister card. The
figures are immediately impressive. The proportions are what jump out
the most – these are much more human physiques than the DCUC lines.
Head – ball
joint
Shoulders –
swivel/pivot
Biceps - swivel
Elbows –pivot
Wrists –
swivel
Abdomen –
pivot
Waist - swivel
Hips –
swivel/hinge
Thighs - swivel
Knees – pivot
Ankles - pivot
Batman and
Robin’s legs both have a significantly wider range of motion than
other DC figures. The legs can be positioned almost ninety degrees to
the body and the knees have a deeper bend than that. Batman’s
ankles pivot a good bit more deeply than Robin’s but Robin can
still achieve a pretty decent climbing stance. This is due to the
fact that the whole gimmick with this set is that they can be posed
climbing the included wall.
Batman’s neck
joint is great, as it is mostly concealed by the way his cape and
cowl meet but it still has a very good range of motion. Robin’s
head movement isn’t so great, as it is the traditional single ball
joint. He can sort of look up a little bit. His right-to-left motion
is okay though.
All of the other
joints are quite functional. The abdominal pivots work nicely and
look pretty good, especially considering these are much more
realistic sculpts than the usual DC figures. The arms are great, too.
It’s been a
long time since I bought any Mattel figures that had stuck joints,
but the dreaded affliction has returned with this Robin. His right
thigh swivel won’t budge. I’m sure I need to do the old hot water
trick, but I just haven’t yet.
The head
features Adam West’s likeness and is spot-on, right down to the
mask being slightly crooked over the eyes. I love the tiny, little
ears.
The body has
great proportions and the joints are worked into the sculpt quite
well. That’s not to say they don’t look a little funny when the
figure is posed, but for this scale and this price point everything
is great. The only real improvement would be if Mattel had
implemented NECA’s rubber underpants method to conceal the hip
joints. I still dislike Mattel’s (and Underground Toys’) method
of articulating hips.
The boots,
gloves, and the part of the cape that is bunched up around Batman’s
neck are all sculpted. The gloves in particular look great because
the three pointy tips are uneven and look very natural. The hands are
sculpted with open fists that are definitely intended to look as
though they are climbing. The trunks are not sculpted, which I
thought was a bit odd. But maybe there’s another use in the line
for Adam West legs.
The utility belt
sits appropriately high on the figure’s waist and looks awesome.
It’s all big and bulky and even has the little fasteners sculpted
onto the bottoms of the pouches.
Side Note: When
Mattel showed their “Prop Replica” Batman ’66 Utility Belt (and
Mattel’s definition of the term “Prop Replica” is a whole other
post) at San Diego Comic Con, me and Evil had a whole discussion
about the design. In the end we realized that Adam West’s belt
pouches did, indeed open upside-down. I decided this was because with
the Bat-Gloves on it would have been extremely difficult to root
around in pouches. It was much easier to just open the catch and have
whatever Bat-Item was needed just drop into his satiny hand. So any
time you see a comic book Batman with pouches that open on top, just
think about how ridiculous that is. And don’t even get me started
on the utility belts with the stupid little capsules on them.
Also, despite my
misgivings about the likely overall quality of Mattel’s Utility
Belt, I still really want one.
Robin has a good
bit more sculpting than Batman. The facial features are a bit soft,
but this is still unmistakably Burt Ward. I love the size and
thickness of the mask. It is sculpted on and not just painted, so if
Mattel produces a Dick Grayson (hopefully the line will be successful
enough to get that far – I see Secret Identity figures as 4th
or 5th series at the earliest) they will need a new
sculpt. My only gripe is that for figures this realistic I would have
preferred more detailed hair along the lines of what NECA does rather
than the blobby hair with only suggestions of detail that we have
here. This would be fine for a comic book figure, but for this line
more detail is needed.
The rest of
Robin looks awesome, though. His tunic has some great folds and
rumples. The laces across the front are very well defined and you can
even see the eyelets. The bottom of the tunic is a separate piece
that hangs under the utility belt and over the trunks. The sleeves
and trunks are sculpted and look very good.
The gloves and
boots have a nice amount of detail and feel very substantial somehow.
Like they have a weight to them. Like Batman, Robin has hands that
are posed to grip a rope. They aren’t quite suited for
punching. Knowing Mattel, we’ll get “BAM KAPOW” variants of the
Dynamic Duo with new closed fists. Maybe they’ll have
different face sculpts. With Angry Eyes.
Robin’s
utility belt looks great and the way that it is situated on the
figure gives it a certain weight. The tunic underneath is sculpted to
look like the belt is tight on it. I am not using my words very well
here, but you know what I mean.
It’s worth
noting that this is the first Robin figure that feels proportionally
correct when compared to the corresponding Batman.
If you look at
Robin’s legs you can see that they are a slightly darker shade than
his arms and face. This is to suggest the tights that Burt Ward wore.
I think they should have actually been a bit lighter, but it doesn’t
really matter. I like that they put the effort in.
The shades of
the colors are all spot-on and the paint is applied accurately.
There’s no splotching or bleeding and the colors are all very
solid. Even the “R” symbol is super clean and centered.
Batman also
sports a mostly fantastic paint job. The bodysuit is grey with a
darker wash to give it some texture. The only issue is that on my
figure the legs have a slightly darker wash than the torso. This
makes sense for Robin, not so much for Batman. Also, some of the wash
on the top of the right thigh is smudged off.
The blur
portions look awesome. They are a nice, dark hue with a metallic
effect to resemble satin. It looks great and is a nice touch to make
this figure seem a bit more special.
The yellow of
the Utility Belt and chest Bat Symbol is bright and contrasts the
darker colors quite well. The gold belt buckle with the painted-on
Bat Symbol is also nice and bright. None of Mattel’s previous
problems with yellows are present on these figures. The colors are
thick and bright. The chest Bat Symbol is centered and well-defined.
The best painted
part of this figure is by far the head. The facial features are
precise and the lips even have a slightly different hue. The cowl has
the black face portion with the eyebrows and nose painted on. It
looks amazing.
Flair:
Both figures have fabric capes to facilitate being seated in the
Batmobile. There
were these ridiculously huge tags sewn into the seams on the capes:
I had to cut those out.
I had to cut those out.
The fabric is
shiny but cheap. I think Mattel could have done a little better, but
the capes don’t look terrible. Well, the fabric doesn’t. The
wires kind of do. Both capes have wires sewn into the edges. The idea
is that when you pose the figures on the included wall horizontally,
you can use the wires to make the capes stand out.
This does not work. At all. Not even a little bit. The wires aren’t attached to anything, so they simply hang there like an unsupported cape would. Except they look ugly and make the capes hang poorly.
This does not work. At all. Not even a little bit. The wires aren’t attached to anything, so they simply hang there like an unsupported cape would. Except they look ugly and make the capes hang poorly.
Accessories:
Included with this set are a climbing wall, a Batarang, and a piece
of packing material that I don’t want to dignify with the
designation “rope”.
This is the
“rope”:
It is a piece of
shit. This is the sort of thing used to secure toys in packaging, not
an accessory.
The Batarang is
made out of rubber, which I don’t like because it was warped right
out of the package. Interestingly, it has a hole in it for a much
more slender lien than what is included. I do like the metallic paint
on this, though if asked I wouldn’t have said that the Batman ’66
Batarangs were blue.
The wall is
pretty neat. The windows open and close so you could conceivably have
your Charles Nelson Reilly figure (I wish) lean out and question your
Caped Crusaders. There are pegs for Batman and Robin’s feet and
they do fit securely enough that you can pose this thing vertically
or horizontally. There is a loop at the top to secure a rope and
there’s a hole on the back so you can mount this on a wall. It
would have been nice is this thing were a bit bigger, but for the
price of the set I think this is better than we had any right to
expect from Mattel.
Packaging:
I like that this is in a window box rather than a blister card. I get
that the figures needed to be posed for this, even if I don’t like
it (though my figures seem to have minimal package-induced warping).
But I still don’t like the overall design of the graphics for this
line. They’re just so bland and the fonts are awful.
The bio on the
back is fine and I do particularly like the TV screen theme for the
list of additional figures.
Value:
I paid $32.99 + shipping for this set from BigBadToyStore. The
shipping was diffused among some other stuff, so it was probably a
couple of bucks or less. I’m okay with that price given the special
nature of the set. Granted, the cape thing didn’t work out, but
it’s still a nice two-pack with a gimmicky thing going on.
Overall:
The cape thing is a totally fail and messes up the figures’ profile
a bit, but this is still a really neat set that fires on all
nostalgia cylinders. Aside from the capes and a few minor quibbles
Batman and Robin look as good as I could have wanted. The sculpts are
fantastic and Mattel really put their best paint jobs on these. If
you’re patient, you’re probably better off buying the
single-carded Batman (he doesn’t have the cape wire) and waiting
for a Robin. But you won’t be disappointed if you go ahead and buy
this set now.
4
out of 5
BigBad and
Entertainment Earth both have the set in stock now. I have seen it in
Toys R Us stores as well, though I can’t remember what their price
was.
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