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So, for the uninitiated just who
is the Spirit?
In a nutshell Denny
Clot, a rookie cop is gunned down dead on the streets of Central City,
he is mysteriously resurrected and takes on the guise of the
supernatural Spirit. He’s given the blessing of police commissioner
Dolan, his erstwhile father figure, to fight crime from the shadows,
and become Central Cities guardian angel. To do so he must take on the
forces of his arch nemesis The Octopus, a corrupt fascist, criminal
mastermind intent on destroying Central City and it’s entire population
in his quest for eternal life. See, it even sounds like it oughta’been
good!
Packaging
- ***1/2
By now it should be apparent to most, that Hot Toys really know
packaging.
In the last year they have given
us some of the most outstanding boxes ever to grace a 1/6th figure.
Now, these aren’t quite up there with the IRONMAN or Godfather boxes,
but they still manage to capture the spirit of the movie… ha, d’ya see
what I did there… try the veal, I’m here all week!
So we have strong, high contrast
black and white images of the relevant characters on the front of the
matt finished sleeves, these have spot gloss laminated features like
logos and details whilst the back has full colour images of the
figures. These slide off to reveal the usual 5 panel flap fronted
boxes, the palette is primarily black and white again with flashes of
bright red. Within the boxes lie the figures in vac formed trays, held
secure by 5 twisters each.
Sculpting - The Spirit *** The
Octopus ****
I freely admit I’m not that familiar with Gabriel
Macht, and sadly, after the performance of this movie I
probably never will be. Obviously this isn’t his fault, but they always
say you’re only as good as your last job. Samuel L Jackson on the other
hand is every body’s favourite badass, even when he’s in a bad film
(and lets face it, he often is), you can always say ‘hey, at least Sam
Jackson's in the movie!’
And it’s testament to Yulli’s
amazing sculpt of Jackson, that the masses want this figure to bash
into everyone from Mace Windu and Shaft, to Jules Winnfield and Nick
Fury, you name it, basically any character he’s played… other than The
Octopus!
It really is a beautiful piece
of work. It captures that stare he has, that lets you know not to mess
with him unless you want a whole can of it opened up. The shape of his
mouth and nose are spot on, these seem to have been the parts that have
so eluded everyone else who’s had a crack at him. That’s not to say the
eyes aren’t expertly done, because they are and the skin texture is
once again applied with just the right amount of emphasis for this
scale. Which is lucky as the Octopus is a bald as the proverbial coot,
so there’s a lot of skin texture to look at! The only problem I can see
is that although this has an expertly sculpted goatee beard, only Shaft
ever sported a beard, so if you want to make a Mace Windu out of this
you’re gonna need some impressive skills to take it off (unless you
decide to do ‘Mace- The Wilderness years’), and whoever you decide to
make him into, you have those eyebrows and facial
tattoos to contend with!
He only comes with one pair of
gloved hands in a gun grip position, but they are a very specific
design. In the original comic strips the Octopus never exposed his
face, it was always in shadow, all that you ever saw were those
sinister gauntlets with their distinctive three
stripes so at least the Octopus keeps his original glove
design, even if he is less shy about showing his face in the movie!
Jung Mi Kim sculpts the Spirit’s head here, she may already be familiar
to you for her work on the cowled Batman heads from TDK and the up
coming Albert Wesker from Resident Evil 5, so it’s evident that she is
quite a talent. Macht as a subject appears to be quite the ‘pretty
boy’, meaning that although he may be easy on the eye for the laydeez
he doesn’t exactly have any strong facial characteristics. Sure, he’s
chiselled and handsome but that don’t always add up to an interesting
sculpt. However, this is still a very convincing piece of work, and I
can see the
resemblance is close to spot on, there’s almost something of
a young Tony
Curtis in there as well. He’s been given a distinctive pout
that is evident in the central pictures I used in my link. So as far as
likeness goes then Jung has done a fine job, though it does look like
the actor has a slightly squarer jaw-line, but it’s hard to tell as the
movie is shot with such extremes of light and dark.
Even the hair looks convincing
in its simple brushed back style, considering it had to be done in such
a way that it could fit under the hat it works well.
I was hoping the domino mask
might be magnetic so it could be removed, but alas it’s permanently
attached, however the crisp edges it has are so well cast and then
painted you’ll be hard pressed to realise that at first, his ears show
a good shape, but could do with just a little more depth and crispness
to the detail. He also comes with two alternate fisted hands in his
distinctive black gloves. So although this character doesn’t have the
impact or WOW factor of the Octopus, it’s still a very solid piece of
work.
Now I just want to get my mitts
on that Silken
Floss figure and I can’t think why?
Paint - The Spirit *** The
Octopus ****
By recent standards these figures are a veritable cakewalk for Hot Toys!
The standout of the two is once
again The Octopus, JC Hong exercises his expertise to show just how
good production paint apps can be. I find myself wondering if this
might be considered something of a calling card with the Lucas
licensing people, it certainly shows that if the Star Wars licence was
to come up in the Asian markets they could do an amazing job of
bringing the characters from his universe to very lifelike life!
Everything about this paint app
works. The base plastic used for the head has just the right degree of
translucence to look flesh like, and the subtle airbrushed paint work
on darker tones around his eyes and chin are just perfect. Then the
fine details on the eyes, eyebrows, facial
tattoos and beard are all sharp, distinct and totally
faithful to the character as seen on screen, I can find absolutely
nothing to fault!
The Spirit sadly doesn’t come
off quite so well. There is actually nothing essentially wrong with the
paint work per se. All the division lines are clean, the colours are
subtle and it looks good on the whole. The problem seems to lie in base
plastic used on the head. Whereas the translucence worked on the
Octopus head, here it ends up looking a little flat in some lights, and
the flesh tones a little basic. The strange thing is I still find
myself really liking this figure far more than I thought I would, I
think it’s his simplicity that has me hooked, and even though the
classic comic character wore a blue outfit, there’s no denying this
figure still looks very chic and iconic on the shelf. So, as I sad a
solid paint job, but it just lacks a certain ‘Je ne sais pas!”
Articulation - The
Spirit **** The Octopus ***1/2
There really is very little to say here that hasn’t been said or
written a hundred times before, both come on the True Type body, and as
they are both wearing outfits that are primarily cloth you will get
just about any pose to want.
Both wear gloves that overlap
the wrists, plus The Octopus is wearing a wide belt and some heavy duty
boots that are available to wear in the real
world should should you choose. It’d be my guess they might
render your ankle about as positionable as the 1/6th sculpted ones
here. So all in all this is about as good as it gets till someone can
give us a better-articulated body that also happens to be mighty
durable!
Outfit - ****
I’ve said before, never mistake a simple outfit in the real world for
one that will be simple to duplicate in 1/6th. It’s often things like
civilian wear, that we are used to seeing each and every day that are
the hardest to translate into scaled miniatures!
Here the Spirit wears black
converse hi-tops, black slacks with a silver buckled black belt, a
black shirt, a black trench coat, a black fedora and lastly a bright
red tie. All these garments fit perfectly and the pockets on the slacks
and shirt are working, but it’s the detail on that coat that makes this
really stand out. The pockets aren’t working as they are buttoned
closed, so as not to spoil the line of its flow, they went for less
bulk. But every other detail from the double yoke over the back and
right chest, right down to the metallic D-rings hanging from his belt,
are all fully realised. It even has wire running through its edges, as
does the red tie for those ‘flapping in the wind’ poses. His hat is
like the ones that came with the recent Godfather and Michael Jackson
figures so it’s very thin plastic material that is then flocked, it
works well and the scale looks pretty convincing. I’m hot sure how well
the flocked look works for this character, the proto shots showed it as
being painted, which might have worked slightly better here. This is
definitely a case where a relatively simple outfit HAS been done
exceptionally well. I’d say the tailoring is the strongest part of this
figure.
The Octopus’ idea of sartorial
elegance is far more eccentric, but just as impressively carried out.
He comes wearing a hefty pair of New-Rock boots, leather trousers with
pleat details on the knees and working pockets, a wide cummerbund style
belt that it covered in gizmo’s, a red polo necked shirt with a mauve
cravat worn over the top, this also has an ornate tie pin to hold it in
place. Then there’s the coat, unlike the Spirits, this is not
understated, in fact it is totally pimped to the max! What we have is a
mauve and silver brocade style frock coat with fur trim and large
ornate silver ‘working’ clasps, the large collar can me turned up, and
there is a matching Russian style fur hat as well.
Needless to say Sam Jackson…
sorry, the Octopus looks totally at home in this outfit, and even if
you’re not a big fan of the movie (but hey, who is?) this makes
onehellova a cool display figure!
Accessories - The Spirit **1/2
The Octopus ****
These guys are like chalk and cheese when it comes to accessories, in
fact the one impressive accessory the Spirit comes with is actually for
the Octopus!
You can find out everything, and
I mean EVERYTHING you could need to know about the Octopus’ arsenal here
but it’s pretty obvious this guy likes his guns, and being the Octopus
he likes everything in eights. He has eight tentacled tears tattooed
under his eyes, eight assault rifles strapped together and even his
matching shotguns have a combined eight
barrels.
His full haul is-
- A Hat (part of the outfit really, but packed loose in the box)
- A combination of assault rifle/shotgun with removable shells and
magazines (the other one comes with The Spirit figure)
- Two, four-barreled shotguns
- Two Customized Revolvers
- 12-inch figure stand with The Octopus nameplate
The combination assault weapon
is so gloriously over the top it’s amazing. It is quite literally a
cluster of firearms welded and strapped together with suppressors,
sights and shotgun cartridges stuck all over the place. He then has the
two four barreled shotguns, as pictured in the last link, both of these
can flip open, and lastly he has a brace of customized Smith &
Wesson revolvers, and it has to be said, as impressive as all those big
weapons are, it’s the two revolvers that look the coolest, to me at
least!
The Spirit on the other hand
comes with one combination assault weapon, but as I said he’s packing
it for the Octopus. All he has for his own personal use is the hat
(I’ve already gone over this) the figure-stand (I never use these) and
a tiny pair of hand cuffs, these are nicely observed and can open and
shut with a small real chain holding them together.
So I guess at the end of the day
you have to respect a guy who can pack light, but not when you’re
giving marks for accessories.
Fun Factor - ***
As a movie it’s hard to get excited about The Spirit, it came, it sat
there for a while, it fizzled away without much ceremony and then it
disappeared. However, the Hot Toys figures on the other hand are really
quite impressive, hell they could do figures of The
Golden Girls and I’d probably want them. As it is I’m
chomping at the bit to get hold of their Goemon
figures, and I know virtually nothing about the movie or the folk
tale.
As far as fun goes, I like these
a lot and they’re great to pose and play around with, so had the movie
been a quality blockbuster you just know you wouldn’t be able to get
these for love nor money… as it is, it wasn’t and you can get them
relatively easily… ain’t life a double edged sword!
Value - The Spirit **1/2 The
Octopus ***1/2
You should have been able to pick both of these up for around $130 each
on pre-order, so that what I’ve based my price on.
I’ve noticed the Octopus is
already creeping up in value thanks mostly to his ‘bash’ potential,
whilst in the wake of the films poor performance the Spirit figure
seems to be getting a little cheaper.
So for $130, when buying the
Octopus, you’re getting a cracking sculpt of a much-loved actor in a
very groovy outfit with some very cool and unique accessories. But when
you buy the Spirit for the same price you’re getting a solid sculpt of
a virtually unknown actor with someone else’s weapon and a tiny pair of
handcuffs for an accessory. That is a little unfair though, because as
I said the Spirits outfit is beautifully crafted, but is an outfit
enough for the price of admission, I’ll let you decide!
Overall
- The Spirit *** The Octopus ****
I’m really happy with both
of these figures, but the Octopus definitely has edge, he’s packing
that cool outfit, an impressive bunch of unique guns and a spookily
good likeness (dare I say, this might be my sculpt of the year, even
though we’ve had the battle of the Godfathers). The Spirit, as I’ve
already gone over suffers from being a virtually unknown actor with a
very light accessory haul (especially when you consider one of his
accessories is for another figure). However, they both look very cool
when posed side by side… though I have to admit I have my Spirit in a
crouching pose on top of a mirror in my dining room, coat and tie
flapping in the wind looking down… kind of like a Batman-lite!
Scoring
Recap:
Packaging - ***1/2
Sculpting - The Spirit *** The Octopus ****
Paint - The Spirit *** The Octopus ****
Articulation - The Spirit **** The Octopus ***1/2
Accessories - The Spirit **1/2 The Octopus ****
Outfit - ****
Fun Factor - ***
Value - The Spirit **1/2 The Octopus ***1/2
Overall - The Spirit *** The Octopus ****
Where
to Buy -
OK, I know the film tanked, but it still surprised me that I can hardly
find these in stock anywhere!
Which leads me to believe these may have been manufactured in numbers
to match pre-orders, so I’d also guess these might be pretty thin on
the ground. If… just if this movie does ever garner a cult status,
expect to pay a lot more further down the line, and if it doesn’t,
expect people to be giving them away.
On eBay The Octopus seems to be demanding from $135 to $190 while The
Spirit is $115 to $135. The only one available from Michaels sponsor
was Forbidden
Planet, The Octopus- £129.99 pre-order
So other than that, it’s time to hit
eBay.
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