Sharing the same body as the green creatures from the rest of this Gremlins line, the Bandit Gremlin
brings you a different figure - by most modern standards, anyway. My
sample had joints that moved without too much fussing, which means at
least mine was pretty great. The body is the same as the Cinema
Gremlin and Stripe, but the head and gun are unique to this release.
Despite the frozen joints on the Cinema Gremlin,
I wanted to make it work - and thankfully, it's doable. Some figures'
limbs will not budge, so it's a gamble - this one paid off. The figure
shares the same basic body as Stripe and the Bandit Gremlin, but sports
a popcorn bucket and one of those most hilarious comedy props in the
1980s, 3-D Glasses. (See also: Swedish Chef in The Muppets Take Manhattan, Billy Zane in Back to the Future.) Add glasses to anything and it's automatically better.
I wanted to wait to open the Gremlins
figures for Christmas reviews... maybe that was a mistake. The quality
of this line has been up and down, which resulted in my initial reaction
(oh wow! I'll buy every last one of these!) to apprehension to
disappointment. I had three Doc Browns break out of the package. A
Predator seemed OK, but it turns out the joint in the arm wasn't
actually turning - it was twisting and broke off. Boiling water helped
loosen some stuck joints, but the night I opened Christmas Gizmo,
I found he had a stuck right arm. I figured, well, let's try the
Cinema Gremlin - all five joints were stuck and couldn't move. Stripe
with Chainsaw had one stuck arm, but the legs were warped so he can't
stand. Since the Mogwai Stripe and Billy Peltzer
figures I looked at earlier were both good, this was really
heartbreaking. I'm going to see if I can boil or freeze the joints into
working order, but generally it just means something is going to break.
With that in mind, let me preemptively advise caution - Funko makes a
lot of neat stuff, but their return policies and CS on broken toys is
basically "take it back to the store." With that in mind, I advise
strongly on buying these figures to leave in the packaging if you plan
to buy them at all. This isn't meant to sound like sour grapes, but
when 3 of the 5 figures have assembly problems we've got real issues.
Rarely do I have much to say about smell, but this The Nightmare Before Christmas Mayor
has a whiff very similar to the Onell Design Glyos figures. It's hard
to miss. The figure itself is neat, but it doesn't ring true to the
ReAction aesthetic - that is, a shameless replication of the Star Wars
form factor of 1978-1985. His foot pegs holes are even a different
size - the end result is a better figure that, while not totally out of
place in the line, really just shows that there's a sliding scale as far
as authenticity goes on this line.
As one of the people lucky enough to be aware of The Nightmare Before Christmas
months before anyone saw it thanks to Tomart's Action Figure Digest I
was also lucky enough to scope out the toys as they were new. I didn't
buy many - I still regret that, but I was also pretty young and unable
to find work. So this Behemoth is the first one I've ever owned -
and it's pretty great. He feels like a bulky, beefy Kenner figure of
old (not unlike a Sise Fromm or a Rancor Keeper) with sculpting and
detailing pretty much on the mark. Given the use of puppets, there's
really no reason to get it "wrong" as there is a disgustingly large
quantity of photos.
Taking a page from modern toys, Kane (with Facehugger)
gives us a reason to buy two of the same guy instead of one guy with
variant heads or features. The arms and legs are the same as the
Chestburster version, but this one isn't "dead" when you remove the
alien mask accessory. He's just preggers.
Even though it's only September, I feel it's always time for my favorite Christmas movie Gremlins, because it's a good time. Funko and Super 7 teamed up with the forces of justice to bring me Billy Peltzer,
a Kenner-style 1980s figure which, admittedly, would have been pretty
retro were it released in 1984 along with the movie - the final days of Star Wars
were in 1985, and the influence of a 3 3/4-inch 5-jointed simple figure
would be gone shortly thereafter. As the only human in the entire
wave, Billy doesn't have to bring much to the table - and thanks to his
size, he's the only one that feels worth the ten bucks. A Mogwai is a
bit pricey at that price.
After two pretty cool waves, it seems that the ReAction Alien
line is in a holding pattern. At least, we haven't seen the other
space suit figures and have yet to get a Harry Dean Stanton. Now we've
got three versions of this character, as Kane (with Chestburster)
is arguably the entire reason this movie happens. As is typical for
modern horror movies, he's not careful and gets pregnant. No wait,
that's not it. Well, yes it is - and this figure is sort of a beautiful
spoiler become flesh.
While characters in this movie have some lavish costumes, fancy jackets, and unique battle-damage, only Leeloo (Straps Costume)
gets plastic twice. A regular version came out at the same time, but
when your lead actress shows up, is killed, is rebuilt naked, and goes
on a crazy chase in the sky it generally warrants another toy. She's
pretty good.
As one of the more memorable and fun film villains of the late 1990s, Zorg
is a must-have figure mostly for the novelty of having him. Sure, a
Pop! Vinyl figure is coming and the ReAction isn't perfect - but it's
good for ReAction standards. The basic format of the other lines is
followed closely with 5 joints and a nice accessory, one of the largest
for ReAction.
Increasing most action figure collections' Chris Tucker quotient by one, Ruby Rhod
is something of an oddball on numerous levels. He's got Q*Bert's
snout on his head, he talked amazingly fast, and was basically what an
E! host would be like in the distant future. Post-post-glam in
appearance and mannerisms, the character stopped the movie cold and
earned a Razzie for worst new performer. As he was neither worst nor
new, it was an odd choice - there haven't been a lot of characters like
him in sci-fi movies and as an action figure he turned out quite nicely. 
As one of the most identifiable races in The Fifth Element, a non-specific Mangalore
ReAction figure just makes sense. It's not explicitly Aknot, but it's
cool and it looks like it fell out of the 1980s. The paint is a little
weak, as it should be - they nailed it here.
I saw custom figures of this one back in the 1990s, and they look a lot like this final Korben Dallas
ReAction figure in the sense that it's sort of a Dagobah Training Luke
Skywalker meets Aquaman kind of thing. Korben comes from a sci-fi
future in which the hairstyles of the band The Police are in vogue along
with blisteringly bright orange shirts with military pants and boots.
It's a decent replica of his movie costume, plus it has a surprise in
the back - there's a gun holster in what is more or less the back of his
pants' waistband.
I dug The Fifth Element
when I saw it at a crappy theater near my house in 1997. It didn't
dawn on me at the time, but it turned out that it was packed with a
bunch of great action figure designs which had a lot of false starts
before the likes of Diva Plavalaguna came out as a ReAction
Figure in 1997. I saw custom figures at the former Empire of Toys, I
saw prototypes in ToyFare, but no actual product hit until now! We got 7
figures, which is pretty amazing - and it also highlighted how many other
figures like Cornelius, or any of dozens of awesome, gorgeous, or
arguably sexist extras and background characters. (See: McDonald's,
Fhloston Paradise plane.)
There aren't many catchphrases to survive The Fifth Element , but Leeloo
did have one word that really struck a chord and is also no doubt a
question you have right now. "Multipass?" Yes. Leeloo has a
Multipass! It's unpainted and tiny, so you're probably going to lose it
because if it gets in your carpet you will never see it again.
It's not the smallest 3 3/4-inch accessory ever, but it's definitely
close. Molded in her skin color plastic, Leeloo has a lot of paint to
get her up to spec while also being somewhat convincing as a retro
figure. The only problem is that the paint isn't glossy, and old Kenner
toys were shiny little dears.
I didn't even think to ask for a Predator (Thermal Vision)
ReAction Figure. I was just in Toys R Us one day, and blammo, there it
was for ten bucks. I took a few days to mull it over. "Do I need another
Predator figure?" The answer was yes, and I scooped it up even though
it's the same masked mold I've bought at least four times by now. Paint
makes up for a lot in these toys, and something this weird - and
technically something we never really saw in the movie - is a must-buy
for fans of this junk.
The ReAction Alien line is a little weird. We've got three Kanes, two monsters, and our heroine has only two releases. The second is this Ripley (Spacesuit) figure, which is basically the first Kane in new colors and Ripley's head - now molded in flesh color. Her helmet is new, missing the flashlight on top.
I arguably didn't need the Predator (Invisible)
ReAction Figure. There are numerous versions of the mold - at this
point, at least seven - one of which is a clear figure with some green
splatter on it. They're all neat for different reasons, and of them all
this one is probably the least fancy. Being molded in one color tends
to suck out some of the detail, but it does play up the whole "stealth"
angle and calls back to the Ambush Predator mail-away figure in the
1990s.