It’s Figure Friday. It’s too warm for September, and this is just a filler column until I can really pop off for 31 Days of Horror in October. I haven’t purchased much in the way of new stuff since my last column. Megatron was kind of pricey, and nothing on the shelves is really doing it for me right now.
That said, there’s some good stuff to look forward to, and I think that’s all something we could use right now.
Since I’m trying to pad this column out as much as possible and I can’t futz with the font size, spacing, or margins like one of my college papers…I decided to bring in a ringer.
Without further ado, I’d like to toss things over to our chief youth correspondent and resident Scott Pilgrim expert…Anya!
Hello everyone! Didn’t expect to see me here, did you? Not my normal column. Everything will make sense when you hear I’m here to tell you that the new Scott Pilgrim figures from Bottleneck Gallery are HERE! They were officially announced on September 16th, and include so many new figures of characters that have never gotten Bottleneck stuff before.
New figures include:
- 3 different variations of Kim Pine, the drummer for Sex-Bob-Omb
- 3 different variations of Knives Chau, the self-proclaimed “Scottaholic”
A limited edition set of Sex-Bob-Omb, which comes with a new Scott Pilgrim variant, Stephen Stills’ first bottleneck figure, and a seated Kim Pine, as well as all of their instruments.
I’m so excited to see these characters getting more recognition, and it only brings me more hope for an eventual Wallace Wells figure.
And now back to E.A. Henson!
Daredevil: Born Again Marvel Legends Daredevil Premium Roleplay Mask and Billy Clubs
This item is simultaneously very cool and very, very silly.
I like props. I’ve been assembling my own lightsabers for somewhere north of 25 years now. I’ve glued together poured resin Farscape pulse-pistol kits long before 3D printing was even a twinkle in Josh Wallen’s eye. There’s something extremely cool about having a tangible piece of movie magic that you can pick up and it has real weight to it.
I’m compelled to mention that I’ve never (as an adult) done the “pew-pew” with a phaser or a “vmmmmm” with a lightsaber. There are some lines I just can’t cross.
The most recent season of Daredevil was really cool and was a nice indicator that the Marvel pendulum was swinging from “Ehh” to “Pretty good” once again. Now that we’re months past its release, we’re finally getting some Daredevil merchandise in the form of the action figure I wrote about previously, and this DD mask and Billy Club set.
These would look absolutely awesome on your shelf if you’re a DD-fanatic, and that’s about as far as I’d go with it. As you can see in the photos, the mask was designed with a “one-size fits most” approach over a true 1:1 scale replica. Or, you know, Charlie Cox could just have a really large head.
I don’t know if this would work for cosplay, especially if you consider the $140 price tag. Citation very much needed, but you could likely 3D print your own that’s been designed to fit your noggin perfectly for a substantially lower cost.
Transformers Studio Series Leader Class The Transformers: The Movie Soundwave
There’s really not much more in the way of praise I can heap upon the Transformers Studio Series line of toys. They’re consistently cranking out screen-accurate depictions of all your favourite robots from the 1984 series. Even from a longevity standpoint, it’s impressive that a toyline has managed to survive for forty-plus years just by rehashing the same characters with the same gimmicks and making iterative improvements every decade or so.
It’s amazing that every time my interest seems to slightly start flagging in Transformers, they’ll roll up with something that gets me hook, line, and sinker. “Yeah, there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism…but this Soundwave looks just like he did in the cartoon!” Me, probably.
This figure turns into a (non-working) cassette tape player, which in 1984 was truly mind-blowing because it looked like the REAL thing. It’s also equally mind-blowing in 2025 that they’re making this toy exclusively to court the adult collector market and that making this for kids didn’t factor into the equation at all.
On a final note, the back of the box art from this figure uses a still from the cartoon that was VERY CLEARLY lifted from YouTube. You can see the “Play” button in the lower left corner of the cartoon still, and I sincerely hope that they don’t correct this before I’m able to get my hands on one.
