The voting is closed in the People's Choice Awards for Best and Worst of 2003, but there's still some tallying to do.  And don't worry, I'll get those prize packs out to the lucky winners asap.  But now it's time to post my personal picks for the best and worst.

I always pick three winners - gold, silver and bronze medalists.  This year was another great year for companies, figures and lines.  Most of the truly awful companies have gone bye bye, but there's still a few mistakes that slip out.  Check out my picks and see how they match up with yours!

The Best Overall Company
We had another great year, with many companies stepping up with some amazing work.  Last year I picked NECA as a company to watch this year, and I don't mind gloating when I say I was right.  Other standby companies like Mattel, Playmates and even Hasbro continued to produce lines of great quality, and small companies like Sideshow, Mezco and Art Asylum continued to impress with their exceptional quality and design.  New comers like Mirage and Play Along made a major splash as well.  It was tough just picking three, but it's a job that has to be done...

The bronze medal goes to Sideshow.  I bought more sixth scale product from them than anyone else this year, and they did a great job overall.  Some of the individual figures could have been better, but they're producing several impressive lines, including Bond, Modern Horror, and Monty Python.  They're Simpsons and Muppets busts are fantastic, and they have a terrific line up for next year including Hellboy, Buffy and Live by the Sword.

The silver goes to Mcfarlane.  You simply can't argue with the overall quality of the paint and sculpt on every line.  Sure, they screw up occasionally, and if you think no one else can do as well, then you've lost all sense of reality.  But they still produce some of the best figures over and over, and you can't argue with repeated success.

A drum roll please...the gold goes to Palisades.  The Muppets line continues to impress on every level - sculpting, paint, accessories, articulation - they've got it all.  Their mini-busts rival or surpass anyone else's, and they've picked up several new cool licenses that will make for a terrific 2004.

I consider these companies my top three for another very simple reason - if any of these three pick up a favorite license of mine, I know without a doubt I'll be buying it.

Best Overall Line
Boy, it's just going to be one tough category after the other.  There were actually quite a few good lines based on films this year, which has been a sore spot for companies in the past.  The Matrix figures were solid, and even the T3 stuff ended up better than I had expected.  The Mattel Batman line might be my most frustrating, but it has already produced at least three fantastic figures, and Hasbro managed to improve on the Star Wars line again.  And lines like DC Direct and Marvel Legends have been dreams come true for many super hero collectors.  But for me, there are three that stand out.

The bronze medal goes around the neck of Movie Maniacs 6, the Predator and Alien series.  Every one of these figures was great, and some of them were easy nominees for best figure of the year.  Even the deluxe queen set stood out from the pack, and this was my favorite overall MM series to date.  

Silver is awarded to the Original Star Trek figures from Art Asylum.  I really hope we get to see the second series of these figures, because the first series was a work of art.  And for us STOS fans, it was a breathe of fresh air.  Digger has the ability to make toys into art, and I'm looking forward to what they offer in 2004.

But the gold was an easy choice.  The Muppets line from Palisades continues to amaze me.  Just look at the two play sets this year, the Swedish Chef's Kitchen and the Swinetrek, and you'll be astounded.  The figures quality and detail seem to improve from series to series if that's even possible.

Best Male Figure
Every major line has at least one impressive male figure this year.  And considering how many major lines there were, you can see how tough it is to narrow down the best male figure.  Here's my three...

The bronze goes to Pinhead from the first Hellraiser line.  This figure is indicative of the overall quality and sculpting that NECA is capable of, and filled a void on many horror collectors shelves.  This line makes me look forward to the Kill Bill series, and other lines we'll see from NECA in 2004.

Silver is snagged by Koozebane Kermit.  If I had done a best exclusive of the year, he would have won gold.  He looks great, and is easily my favorite of all the Kermits so far.  There's going to be two more Kermits in 2004 that might knock him off his pedestal, but only time will tell.

And the shiny gold goes to Zipline Batman.  Okay, he's not the perfect Batman, and I'm hoping we get an even better looking version with the Hush line.  But he's the best we've had in years, and I'm happy to have him on the shelf.

Best Female Figure
There are always fewer female figures each year, but I think this year was particularly barren.  Of course, that makes picking three even easier!  There were some tough choices though - the Marvel Select Black Cat might not have much articulation, but she did have a certain something, and McToys did pretty well with both Niobe and the T-X.  But I still managed to find three that stood out over the rest.

Bronze is awarded to Princess Kashimir from Playmates World of Springfield line. While the line has been in it's 'cruise mode' this year, there have been a few stand out figures and sets, and Kashimir is one of those.

I'll toss a silver over to Eowyn in her Armor.  Return of the King was a great film, and Toybiz continued to do a fine job bringing the license to plastic.  Eowyn in Armor not only looked great, she's well articulated with good accessories.  You can never go wrong with a beautiful woman that has the courage to stand up to the Witch King.

All women love gold, and the woman I give it to is Aurora from bbi.  This Cy Girl has a terrific looking retro/modern astronaut suit, with plenty of firepower as well.  She's my favorite sixth scale girl this year, and has a place of honor on the shelf.

Best Articulation
In past years, the sixth scale companies tended to dominate this category.  Not so this year, where super articulation has become a main stay in lines in the 6 and 7 inch scale.  Sure, bbi, Dragon, and Sideshow continue to do a great job, but Toybiz, Art Asylum, SOTA and even McToys are giving them a run for their money.

The bronze is proudly worn by Sideshow.  They have my favorite sixth scale body, mostly due to the ultra cool wrists.  I've had little to no trouble with floppy joints this year, and their body works well for most licenses.

Silver is taken by SOTA.  They practically came out of no where, and really impressed me with the articulation on the Tomb Raider Lara Croft figures.

Gold goes to the very deserving Toybiz.  In all their main lines - LOTR, Marvel Legends, Spider-Man - they've upped the ante on articulation.  And they've proven that you can have great articulation AND great sculpting in smaller figures.

Best Sculpting
This is another really tough category.  Every company is trying to reach the standards originally set by Mcfarlane.  Even Mcfarlane is having to stretch to just maintain with the new kids.  Companies like Mezco, Sideshow, and Palisades have been pushing the envelope for awhile, and newcomers like SOTA and Majestic are coming on mighty strong.  Even the big boys like Mattel and Hasbro have stepped up their game.  My choices are:

The bronze is given to NECA.  They've been a nice surprise this year, producing some great sculpts in both Hellraiser releases, the Gremlins line, and even the dad for Christmas Story.  They've also done some cool items like the 18" Jason, and the Simpsons lava lamp.  Diversity is definitely their strong suit!

I'm slipping the silver to Sideshow.  Some folks aren't as happy with their sculpts as I am, but they do the best head sculpts in the sixth scale market.  Is everyone perfect?  No, but a great majority are dead on with the source material.  They've done an amazing job on the Python, Bond and Platoon licenses, and even the generic heads for their military lines are better than other sixth scale manufacturers..

Gold is awarded to Mcfarlane.  Yes, I know - how predictable.  But they consistently provide some of the best sculpting on the market.  Movie Maniacs V, Terminator and Matrix all had some outstanding work, especially in the deluxe sets.

Best Packaging
Lots of folks think packaging is meaningless, but it sells a whole lot more product than most realize. Great looking packaging can do more than just sell a few more toys though - it can transcend the commercial and become art in its own right.  A few companies manage to make this happen.

The bronze goes to newcomer Majestic.  They've used clam shells out of the gate, and I loved the design of both the Davey and Goliath line and the Quisp set.

Silver is awarded to Sideshow.  Their sixth scale packages are often collector friendly, allowing you to remove the figure and replace it later with no damage if you so wish.  And the graphics and text on some of their licensed lines is simply amazing.  The Monty Python boxes alone get them this medal.

Finally, this year gold goes to Mezco.  Their package designs for lines like Dark Carnival and Gangsters Inc. were some of the very best I've seen in a long time, and they took the clamshell packaging idea to a new level of cool.  This is packaging as art.

Best vehicle/play set
This category normally has fewer nominees than most others.  There just aren't that many vehicles and play sets produced...most years.  But this year we got quite a few, and on top of that, we got some of the finest I've ever seen.

The bronze is awarded to the deluxe Alien Queen set from Mcfarlane Toys.  They did several nice sets this year for T3 and Matrix, but this set for the Movie Maniacs series was my favorite of the bunch.  A great diorama with an amazing figure - you can't ask for much more.

Silver is tossed into the hands of Playmates for the Treehouse of Horror 4 set - The Collector's Lair.  Okay, so maybe it's the complete geek in me, but I love this set.  I always show it off to new visitors to the toy room, and give them the whole back story.  Playmates did an excellent job with the set, and the included figures were perfect.

The shiny gold is given to Palisades for the outstanding, amazing, and eye popping Swedish Chef's Kitchen.  A large set, it has over 40 accessories, tons of moving doors and drawers, great sculpting, amazing paint, and all for a great price.  This is the best play set I've ever seen, and Palisades can be proud of the amazing work that went into it.

Best New Idea
It seems like there were fewer truly new ideas this year, but maybe my memory is just getting foggy.  Even picking three, I still had two - rotocast figures, and clamshell packages - that I thought were a great idea but didn't get a medal.  The ones I liked:

The bronze goes to a line that isn't really new.  The Mezco Mez-itz really turned a corner this year with the Predator, Alien, Dick Tracey and Monster sets.  These little buggers are really cool, and you should take the time to give them a look if you haven't.

Silver goes to Playing Mantis for increasing the articulation on the Peanuts line in a very creative and great looking way.  They added plenty of articulation to the Christmas Carol line as well, so it looks like a trend we'll continue to see from them.

And gold is awarded to Play Along for the very cool Armies of Middle Earth line of mini-figures and play sets.  This license was perfect for this scale, and they've done a great job executing.

Best Accessories
I added this category to my selections last year, and like an idiot, I forgot to add it to the regular voting this year.  Ah, well, there's always next year.

The bronze is given to Playmates for their work with the World of Springfield line.  I bet 90% of the accessories were new this year, and they have four or five with every figure.  They strive to have them make sense, fit in their hands, and still manage to get some really cool ones in there like the Loch Ness Monster doll with Kilt Willie.

Silver goes to Palisades.  Just look at the ultra-nifty accessories that the Muppets line has and you'll see what a company can do with a little imagination and a love for the license.

And the deserving winner of the gold is Ignite.  With their real die cast metal weapons on figures like the Gladiator, Crusader and Viking, they've moved sixth scale accessories to a whole new level.  It doesn't come cheap, but they are worth every penny.

Best Outfit
I screwed up with this category too - I forgot to add it in to the regular voting.  Sorry about that one, but I'll remember next year!  This is clearly a sixth scale category, although occasionally we get outfits on smaller figures.

The bronze is given to Hot Toys.  They've been coming on strong this year with their sixth scale offerings, and they have done some really amazing work.  They are also very expensive at times, but that tends to happen when you raise the quality higher.

I'm giving the silver to Drastic Plastic.  They haven't done much in the second half of the year, but they did some fantastic work with their Custer early in the year.

The gold goes to Ignite.  Perhaps a surprise for some - where's bbi and Dragon? - but for me, the historical figures being put out by Ignite allow for them to do some really unique things with the outfits.  All the material is the best quality, with great tailoring and hemming, and there are LOTS of layers and pieces of clothing on every figure.

Now on to the Worst of 2003. No one likes to talk about worst, but in past years they've been pretty easy to pick. I'm happy to say that this seems to be getting harder with each passing year though, as companies that do truly inferior work disappear, and those remaining strive for greater quality.

But even if everyone was getting A's, some of those would be A-'s. And in a few of the worst categories, it was far too easy to come up with my picks. So let's get down and dirty!

Worst Overall Company
This was a tough category this year. Gone are the N2's and Exclusive Premieres that were so damn easy to pick on. Oh, I could beat up on Stan Winston (figuratively of course - even at his age he could still kick my ass), but he went and dropped his prices. I could pick on those perennial fan favorites for this award, Hasbro and Mcfarlane, but both companies had a great year. And all the little guys seem to be doing everything they can to reach the high bar set by the best of the best.

This year, the award's are going to companies that managed to either a) seriously disappointment or b) piss me off with their goofy, backward ideas. Without further ado...

The tarnished bronze is awarded to Jakk's. When I heard they were doing Universal Monsters, I knew they'd be bad. When a company continues to produce weak figures, time after time, their rep precedes them.

The blackened silver goes to Toycom. They can break off a little piece and hand it to Mirage, since the two of them seem pretty inseparable these days. Two words for why they get this award - South Park. Here's a line I was really looking forward to, but between poor sculpts and high prices, it was a big disappointment. The King of the Hill line only had high prices, and it made it to a second series. I'll be very surprised if we see the South Park line make it that far.

And the ultimate fool's gold goes to Mattel. Yep, Mattel. I wasn't a big He-man fan, but even I can see how badly they mishandled that line. And as a big Batman collector, I know they've done nothing but frustrate me. Oh, sure - I love Zipline Batman, and I can even tolerate the Batman variations they've been producing. Some of the sculpts are fantastic, but the extreme short packing of villains, along with the &$#*(%_@ short packed no-goggles Mr. Freeze has me climbing the walls. And if I can't find him, I know others are having even more trouble.

Worst Line
Think there weren't enough to chose from? Oh, I say nay nay! There were plenty, but fortunately not as many as in past years.

The bronze medal was slapped, then given to Clerks. Come on, Kevin - they're just big PVC's. Yes, the sculpt and paint were good, but so are Homies. You can say "hey, they're just for collectors anyway, who needs articulation, accessories, or anything cool?", but don't gouge your fans just because you can.

After a quick judo chop to the neck, silver was awarded to goes to Witchblade. Palisades won the best company of the year, and I think they do amazing work, but here's a line where they really dropped the ball. A weak concept ended up an even weaker action figure line due to poor sculpting, paint, articulation and design.

A whole gang of other medals got together and stomped on the gold, before giving it to Alias. Ugh. Non-existent articulation and awful sculpting turned one of the most attractive women on television today into the Hunchback of Notre Dame. And not the cute Disney version, but the Charles Laughton Quasimodo. All she needed was a hump to make the look complete. And by hump, I mean on her back. Uh, never mind.

Worst Male Figure
This was actually one of the toughest categories for me this year. There just weren't as many awful male figures as I'm accustomed to. But that's a good thing!

The slimy bronze is handed over to the Marvel Studios 12" Blade II. At a 'collector' price point, we got kiddie quality. That's a combination that just doesn't work. Some of the other figures in the line were slightly better, but Blade was a particular disappointment with his bendy guns and floppy weapons.

Silver was dropped in the mud, then given to Database from the World of Springfield. Done in a completely wrong scale, he's the runt of the entire series. He looks so far out of place with the other kids, that he's likely to be the all time most disliked Simpsons figure, and that's saying a lot considering there's over 150.

And, after gold was trampled by mules, it was awarded to Fly Fishing Spider-man. Yep, these large scale Spider-man figures, clearly aimed at kids, are easy to pick on. But I can understand the appeal of Firefighter Spidey, or Police Spidey, or even Soccor Spidey to your basic 7 year old kid. But fly fishing? Who is that concept for? Someone was doing some serious drugs the day they approved that concept.

Worst Female
Here's a category that's never hard to choose. Let's face it - screwing up the female form in action figure style is almost an art form in itself. This year's awards...

The scratched bronze goes to Miss Hoover from World of Springfield. Easily my least favorite female figure in the entire series, she has the hunchback that Alias' Sydney was missing.

The dented silver the Mom from Christmas story. The only figure in the set that got cartooned up, she simply didn't fit in. I'm betting it wasn't NECA's fault, but rather the fault of the licensor. Damn companies.

And the old gold is awarded to Marion Ravenwood. Not since monkey-face Leia have we seen such a truly atrocious looking sculpt on a female figure. You've heard of a two bagger? They don't make bags thick enough.

Worst Articulation
Some of these categories I like to think of in terms of company. Why? Because if you open up something like best articulation at a lower level like line, there are dozens of possible choices. Instead, most of the time a company either believes in articulation or they don't. Some companies do a good job sometimes, and a terrible job others *coughmcfarlanecough*. But for the most part, if a company gives you good articulation on one series, you can expect it on the next. My awards are...

DC Direct gets the bent bronze. Occasionally, they break out the articulation genie, but more often than not they give us extremely expensive plastic statues.

The mangled silver goes to Graphitti Designs. Hey, if I complained about the articulation on the Clerks figures, did you really think you'd skate by here?

Finally, the gold that turns your wrist green goes to a newcomer, Dusty Trails. They aren't going for articulation, but rather cheap statues. I had a reporter over looking at my collection last fall, and when she saw one of the Dusty Trail figures, her comment summed it up - "Not much of a toy, is it? More of a knick knack."

Worst Sculpting
Now here was a tough category. The bar was set by McToys on sculpting, and companies like Palisades, Mezco and Art Asylum have continued to push it up. Every company is rising to the challenge, even the slower big boys like Mattel and Hasbro. It was tough to choose, but someone has to do it...

Bruised bronze is awarded to 21st Century.  What happened?  Their head sculpts went from acceptable - they were never great - to down right awful.  Their stuff looks worse than anything Formative International ever did, and they still cost far too much.  Their smaller scale stuff stayed pretty good, but it's never been of the quality of bbi or Dragon either. 

Pitted silver is awarded to Toycom.  After bungling both South Park and Alias, it's pretty obvious that this is still a big problem for them.  I had high hopes after seeing King of the Hill, but alas, it didn't last.

The gold from the front tooth of Mike Tyson is given to Jakk's.  I'm trying to judge this only on their work from this year, but I'm having a tough time getting the vision of the new Universal Monsters out of my head.  Whenever a licensed is announced with Jakk's, I know we're in for 1980's sculpting.

Worst Packaging
While great packaging can convince you to buy something you might not have, poor packaging is less likely to turn you off completely.  Still, you always need to put your best clamshell forward.  My picks for worst:

Busted bronze is given to Mattel.  The packaging hasn't been God awful, but in general it's about as basic as you can get.  Lines like He-man, JLA, and even Batman have been pretty uninspired.

Silver might be a mostly black, but it still goes to NECA.  While their scultping and design have been great on several lines, their packaging has been less exciting.  The Hellraiser line isn't bad, but the Gremlins, Christmas Story and others were very plain, boring and basic.

And the gooey gold is given to Toybiz for Lord of the Rings.  The oversized, curved packages always bugged me.  You can't store them, and you still have to tear them apart to get to the figure.  They take up too much room, and although they look good on the peg, are generally a pain in the neck for collectors.

Worst Vehicle/Playset
We saw a lot of really great playsets and vehicles this year, but there were still a few stinkers in the group.  My picks:

Booger bronze goes to the ProZone Baseball sets from Playmates.  Kids didn't want to hear an announcer talk about player stats, and neither did collectors.

Pissy silver is given to the 12" Leia on a Speederbike.  Really, was this a figure that was worth $50?  Apparently not, since you could find them on clearance at most Targets for $12.  It's the same speeder bike, with the usual goofy looking Leia.  At least it fills out the set, and if you bought some single boxed Biker Scout's, now you can pick up extra speeder bikes for them cheap.

And goober gold is awarded to  Mattel.  They picked up the Batman line, and gave us the exact same initial vehicles and bat cave as Hasbro for the animated figures.  That's pretty much unforgivable, even when I realize that they are cheap bastards.

Worst Idea
I think that the top winner in this category had to be my easiest pick out of every category.  It was such a bad idea, it was that easy.

But first, blackened bronze goes to rising prices.  Seems that the cost of action figures keeps rising, while inflation remains fairly non-existent in most areas.  Figures that cost $6 two years ago were $8 last year, and are $10 now.  There have been some improvements in quality to offset it, but not enough.

Sloppy silver is awarded to the boom in convention exclusives.  I don't mind every figure and it's cousin twice removed getting a convention exclusive, but the distribution on these is fraught with issues and problems.  Gentle Giant and Mattel both took serious abuse from the fans for their handling of convention exclusives, and companies have to learn that you can't use a critical figure or key sculpt/paint style for a convention exclusive.

And the worst idea?  Gross gold is given to the ridiculous lunchbox exclusives from Toyfare.  Have a few extra Fozzies?  Pack 'em in a Muppet lunchbox, number them 1 - 99, and sell them for ridiculously over inflated prices.  And because of suckers like me, they ended up producing three of these things last year in the Muppets line.

Worst Outfit
It was almost impossible to come up with three choices here - most of the sixth scale market has really upped the ante on the clothes.  Still, I found a way to pick three:

Broken bronze goes to goes to Link Innovations for the Construction Jack line.  While they are clearly intended for kids, the costumes are certainly the least appealing factor of the line.

Rusty silver is given to Toybiz for the Marvel Select line of 12" figures.  A line intended for 'collectors' had little in the way of quality.  They had collector pricing though!  The costumes lacked the kind of quality and tailoring necessary in today's market.

And dilapidated gold is awarded to Hasbro.  I still collect the 12" line of Star Wars figures, but I have no idea why.  The clothes continue to be some of the weakest around, and the only saving grace is that the price point for the figures has dropped down to twenty bucks.

Worst Accessories
I wish I had remembered to include this in this year's voting - I bet I would have gotten some interesting responses.  Ah well, here's my thoughts:

I can't come up with another term bronze goes to Disney for the Indy line.  There were enough accessories, but they looked awful - was that a monkey with Marion, or a clump of dirt? - and almost none of the figures could hold them!

My mind is fried silver is awarded to DC Direct.  While their sculpting was good, and there articulation improved, they rarely include accessories.  When they do, it's one or two at best, often fairly useless.  Considering the superheroes they are working with, and the price points they are charging, they could be doing a lot more.

Finally, the I wish I could think of something else gold goes to Mattel.  Okay, we're getting accessories with the Batman and Justice League figures - but they are as goofy as ever.  And they seem even worse than Hasbro (if that's possible) about giving us the exact same figure with a new goofy set of accessories and calling it 'new' figure.

Most looking forward to in 2004
There are plenty of interesting things coming up in 2004, and I'm sure we're going to see quite a few surprises at Toy Fair next month.  But even now it's easy to pick three for me.

I like the Marvel mini-mates, and have the whole run so far, although I'm not a huge Marvel fan.  When they announced the DC versions, my heart went pitter patter.  The doctor says there's nothing wrong, so it must be because I'll get to see all my favorites in mini-mate form.

Kill Bill was a fun movie, and NECA has been doing solid work this year.  Combine the two, and you have another series I'm looking forward to next year.  Some of the initial photos have been great, while others have looked less than perfect.  It's still early though, and I have my hopes up that this will be a great cult line.

And for my last one, I'm picking something near and dear to my heart - Sideshow's new Buffy/Angel figures.  I've been waiting a long time for this line to continue, and the photos look terrific. 

Companies to watch
There are lots of interesting lines, figures and ideas coming up in the new year.  These three companies are ones to watch.

NECA has done a great job last year, but this was their grace period.  This year they have two lines that collectors are really looking forward to - Ghostbusters and Kill Bill - and if they can deliver, they'll have shown they aren't a flash in the pan.

Majestic hasn't snagged a really big license yet, but they have done wonders with what they've had.  Great sculpts, articulation and accessories were common on the Davey and Goliath, Quisp, Jeepers Creepers and Fly figures.  This year they'll be doing Sea Monkeys and 12" Munsters, and I'll be very interested in seeing what they have to show at Toy Fair.

SOTA started with porn figures, and they were told it was the kiss of death.  Looks like they've proved folks wrong, and did a nice job with the Tomb Raider figures.  Okay, the movie bombed, but these figures were far better than any of those produced for the previous film.  I'll be interested in seeing what SOTA has to announce next month.

The Final Tally!
So who's the big winner this year?  Here's the final medal standings.  Each 'best of' gold is worth three points, each silver two, each bronze one.  Each 'worst of' gold is worth -3, each silver -2 and each bronze -1.  I also gave each company in the 'looking forward to' and 'companies to watch' a point under the Bronze label.  Add them all up and you get Palisades clearly at the top.  Interestingly enough, the top three this year are exactly the same as last year - Palisades, Mcfarlane and Sideshow - although their order has switch around.  Ignite has come up out of nowhere, and companies like Art Asylum, Play Along and Mezco made decent showings.