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The Tick (Live Action)

When I heard they were doing a live action Tick, I had high hopes.  Those hopes were even higher when I heard that Patrick Warburton??? as going to be playing the lead.  He's perfect for the vocal intonations of the Tick.

I've enjoyed the show, although I even admit it's had its highs and lows.  But the show is ending on January 24th, so we got this set of four figures just in time.  Maybe we'll get lucky and Comedy Central or one of the other cable channels will pick the show up.

This set of figures includes the Tick and Arthur of course, plus Captain Liberty and Bat Manuel.  I picked these up on-line, but I hear there are some stores that are carrying them as well. 


Packaging - *1/2
Dull is the best way to describe the packaging.  They are fairly sturdy, but the artwork is the same on all four, and doesn't do much to sell the line.

Sculpting - **
This was a very tough category this time.  The problem is that the sculpting is all over the place, depending on the figure.

None of the head sculpts can be called good.  Of the four, the Tick looks the most like the actor, but it's still a pretty generic sculpt.  The other three figures are very weak, and tremendously generic.

The sculpts on the bodies are superior to the head sculpts though, except for Captain Liberty.  Bat Manuel has great detail in his costume, and the Tick is well done.  Arthur's belly could be a little more paunchy, but overall these three have good body sculpts.  Even the posed nature of the figures isn't too bad, and the scale of the figures is well done, with the Tick slightly taller than the others.

Too bad Captain Liberty wasn't given the same treatment.  The arm pose is awkward, and whe wasn't given the same ball jointed shoulders to make up for it.  And what exactly happened to her chest?  I'll be the first to admit that most super hero figures these days are far too well endowed, but part of the humor of her costume is the excessive bust line, and here she's got no cleavage at all.

Paint - ***
The paint ops on these are the best feature of the line.  In particular, Bat Manuel has great paint features on his very detailed uniform.  All the figures have decent lines, and fairly decent colors (although the Tick looks to dark to me), but Captain Liberty is the poorest of the set again.

Articulation - **1/2
I have to admit, I didn't open this set up, so my judgement of the articulation is based on what I can see.

And what I can see isn't particularly good.  Not surprising for N2, since none of their lines have been well articulated.

The males all have ball jointed shoulders, plus neck and thigh articulation.  The Tick has wrist articulation, and Arthur has a cut joint at the left elbow.

Captain Liberty has neck, cut joint shoulders, cut elbows and hips.  Again, due to her pre-posed arms, she's the one hurt most by the poor articulation.

Accessories - **
All four figures come with a Superhero License.  If you've been watching the show, you'll understand, including why Tick's says I. P. Daily is his real name.

The Tick also comes with an extra set of hands, but I'm not a big fan of extra hands if there isn't much point.

Captain Liberty has a torch, but Bat Manuel has nothing.  Perhaps due to the extra detail in the costume and cape.

Arthur has the most in terms of accessories, with his wings, backpack (which is wear his wings normally are) and goggles.  Both the goggles and backpack look good. However, the wings are extremely flimsy looking, and I suspect they won't hold their position well over time.

Value - **
Everywhere I've seen these they've been about ten bucks a pop.  With few to no accessories, limited articulation, and weak head sculpts, these certainly aren't ten dollar figures.  $7-$8 would have made much more sense.

Overall - **
I really like the show, and I really wanted to like this line, although I have no faith in N2's ability to produce an action figure.  Unfortunately, N2 didn't let us down, at least not those of us with such low expectations.

I bet we see these on clearance some where eventually, so you might want to wait a little while and see if you can get a better price.

Where to Buy
I hear that some stores like Software Etc. or Electronics Boutique are getting these in, but I haven't seen them anywhere like that yet.  I picked up mine on-line:

- I bought my set at Action Figure Express for $40 for the set plus shipping.  They arrived in perfect shape.  (MROTW Affiliate)

- Entertainment Earth has them by the case for $115 plus shipping, which is about $9.50 a figure each before shipping.  (MROTW Affiliate)

- Comics Infinity also has them for about $40 for the set of four.  I've always gotten great service from them.  Search for 'tick' in the toys section.

- Aisle Sniper has them for about $40 too, but it looks like they aren't in stock yet.


Figure from the collection of Michael Crawford.

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