Review of Hawkeye - Civil War
Sixth Scale Action Figure

Introduction

There's an old saying - "Every time a collector re-buys the same MCU character, another Hot Toys employee gets their wings". Or something like that. I've been trying to not give them too many wings lately, skipping many of the latest remakes of characters like Iron Man, Black Widow, and Captain America. A couple years ago, they were still making tremendous strides in sculpt and paint from release to release - now, not so much. And the actual look of the characters hasn't altered enough to drive me to enter my credit card number when a new one pops up.

But I made an exception for the Civil War Hawkeye, who has just started shipping in the U.S. I only have the original version, skipping the Age of Ultron, so it seemed like I was due. And this guy came with an accessory I couldn't ignore - an arrow tip with Ant Man hanging on for dear life.

This figure retails for around $220, depending on the retailer.

Packaging - ***
This is the usual slip over a window box - nothing special, but the graphics on the outer slip cover are decent.  The entire thing is collector friendly of course, but it's pretty standard stuff. I'm also not positive about the huge white expanse in the lower half of the cover. It's a tad plain for my tastes, and needs a little more visual punch.

Note - a reader pointed out how the design is a great call out to the comic book cover style, and I have to agree.  I didn't read the comics, so the reference was lost on me, but yea, it's a great idea.

Sculpting - ***1/2
This is our third Jeremy Renner as Hawkeye portrait, and while it's very, very good, I can't say that it's really that much better than the original from Avengers. The hair style is different of course, and I do love the amount of detailing in the strands and layers. But as I mentioned earlier, to buy a successive version of a character, the new release really needs something to set it apart.  I can't say the portrait is the selling point here over the previous versions.

There's all the usual realism, from the skin texture to the wrinkles to the eyebrows and lips. While the nose is a bit too 'generic white guy', the jawline, lips, and chin are dead on Renner. They've avoided a mannequin appearance by going with a slight squint and a tight set to the jaw and mouth.  He's determined, not crazy.

The various hands are more in scale than usual, and the assorted sculpted poses work great with the accessories. The sculpting on the accessories themselves is top notch as well, and the various weapons look stupendous.  I do wish the sculpt on the tiny Ant-Man was just a bit sharper, but more on that in the Accessories section. And if you're new to the concept of 'sixth scale', he stands just a hair over 12" tall.

Paint - ***1/2
Hawkeye suffers from the tanning bed accident that seems to plague most Hot Toys figures, but the paint work is very clean and very realistic. The glassy eyes are straight with very little bleed, and the five o'clock shadow along the upper lip and jaw looks fantastic. The skin tone might be a little dark, but it's certainly realistic and life-like.

The hair line doesn't work for me quite as well as usual, however.  They've tried blending the skin tone and hair color in gradually, but with this particular spiky hair style it looks a little weird, like he's using some scalp paint to hide a receding hair line.

Still, it's another example of the quality and realism of the production paint work from Hot Toys. Again, I can't say it's a huge improvement over their work on the first Hawkeye, but it's not a step back either.

Articulation - ***
This is Hawkeye. Hawkeye shoots arrows. That's pretty much all Hawkeye does. That means the underlying body needs to be able to take a reasonable drawn bow stance.  This is harder than you think with sixth scale bodies, but it is possible. Bard the Bowman from Asmus is able to do it, Tauriel (also from Asmus) is able to do it...but Hawkeye is not.

Oh, you can get close. And if you look at it from the right angle, you won't see how far away the hand is from the face, or the odd angle of the bow and arrow itself compared to the body. The issue here is a combination of the shoulder and elbow.

Let's start at the neck first, to keep from getting too far off track. There's a double ball joint, and the head and neck are separate pieces. That means lots of tilt and lean action in every direction, although sculpt purists may not like the seam along the jawline.

Back to the shoulders. The shoulder needs to come up pretty high for him to fire the bow, and it makes it *almost* all the way.  It's close enough that the shoulder is NOT the main issue, but only a minor inconvenience. The went with a fairly hidden rotating hinge elbow joint, and a well developed bicep. This means the forearm can not tighten up close to the upper arm, forcing the hand outward from the chest. You want to get it up close to the face? That's not going to happen.

The rotating hinge wrists can help a bit, and like I said - from the right angle it will look reasonable. But it's not at the level of the better designed bodies, and was a disappointment.

The rest of the body has all the usual TrueType articulation. The torso and waist joints work well, as do the hips, knees, and ankles.  The two piece boots allow the ankles a ton of mobility, and while the tight suit looks like it could be restrictive, it actually allows a lot more movement than you might anticipate.  The ankles were a little loose on mine, but not so bad that I couldn't keep him standing in deeper poses.

Accessories - ****
There's a really nice assortment of useful extras here, including hands, arrows, and arrow tips.

There are seven hands in total, designed to work with the various accessories, especially the bow and arrows. They swap pretty easily, and there's some extra wrist pegs just in case.

There's a ton of arrow shafts, 16 altogether. You can fill the quiver with them, and you can use any one with the 12 different tips supplied. These range from deadly tiny points to the aforementioned Ant-Man, hurtling to his target. Swapping the tips was simple enough, but don't apply too much pressure.

The arrows fit inside the futuristic looking quiver, which then attaches to his back. More on that attachment in the Outfit section.

These arrows go with his expanded bow, complete with string.  There's also a collapsed bow, which can be held in either hand.

That's not it for weapons, as he has both a small dagger (which slips into a sheath you attach around his right boot) and his handgun, with moving slide action and hammer. The gun can be carried in the holster on his left hip as well.

He has some very cool shades too, and these are properly scaled and fit cleanly on his face. As you'd expect, there's also a display base with the appropriate logo.

My big reason for picking this figure up was the Ant-Man arrow tip. I have to say that it's a bit disappointing, with a softer sculpt and weaker paint operations than I had hoped for.  It's not a deal breaker, but it's also not the big advantage I'd anticipated.

Outfit - ***
I had a couple logistical problems with the outfit, but overall the quality and tailoring is what you'd expect from Hot Toys.

The body suit fits tightly, but the stretchy material allows for deep stances and dynamic poses.  The torso can turn and hold a twist, and the knees and hips are only slightly restricted.

One of the bigger hurdles for this outfit - it's damn close to the original Avengers look.  There's a few minor updates, but overall the style and design are awfully close to the first release. At least the AoU version had the funky jacket.

My first issue was with attaching the quiver. The quiver back has a thinner section near the bottom, which widens up and is then blocked by two small protrusions.  You snap the thinner section into a plastic clasp on his back and slide it downward until the protrusions block any further descent.  While the concept seems workable, one of the edges of the back clasp broke, and had to be repaired with super glue before I could finally get the quiver properly in place.  We just saw Deadpool use a creatively designed magnetic attachment for his scabbards on his back, and something similar here would have been a much better option. This isn't terrible, but it is somewhat clumsy.

The other issue involved the breast plate on the right front of the chest. As I was attaching the quiver, I squeezed this plate and one of the buckles, which is glued to the back of the plate, broke free. Again, nothing a dab of super glue couldn't fix, but a basic figure like this shouldn't be quite this fragile.

On the plus side, the two piece boots look great and allow for some terrific ankle mobility.  One area to take care with is the soft rubber sides of the upper boot. The edges that hang over either side of the foot can get caught up and smashed when popping the foot on, which you'll have to do, since there's a piece of plastic you need to remove. Only way to get rid of the plastic is to remove the foot, and when you're replacing it, you want to make sure the bottom half of the upper is out of the way.

As a reference, the photo below shows the breast plate with the one buckle popped loose, before I re-glued it.

Fun Factor - ***
While this figure would be a tad more fun if you could get a perfect bow stance, it's good enough to allow for plenty of posing and reposing, and finding new ways to display him with your other Civil War characters.

Value - **1/2
At $220, the price point fits in with the average for high end sixth scale figures, even for companies like Star Ace and Asmus right now. Of course, when they charge $220, there's even more extras, light and sound features, etc. but Hawkeye has a nice assortment of accessories to compensate. Regular readers know that at **1/2 here is an average score, and does not increase or decrease my final Overall score.

Things to Watch Out For -
As I mentioned, I had some breakage with both the quiver connector and the breast plate. Both were easy to fix with some super glue, but take care.  When attaching the quiver, the thinner section toward the bottom is not all that thin - it still requires snapping it in. It will then slide down into place with the small notches holding it from dropping lower.

And don't squeeze the torso with your fingers on the plate. It's hard not to do - when swapping hands, putting the quiver in place, or adjusting the arms, you'll want to squeeze - but don't.

Take your time with the quiver and arrows as well. Mine came apart when I was working with it - the top popped right off. It didn't look like it had been glued. That allowed the interior pieces (the long rods with the wheels, the faux tips at the bottom) to come out.  It also meant I could put the arrows together easier, snapping them into place along the discs. Once I had them in place, I put it back together...and glued it shut.

Overall - ***1/2
Taken all by itself, this is a solid release.  The head sculpt and paint are what you'd expect from Hot Toys, and the costume and accessories are well worth the price. Speaking of the price, they have kept it reasonable, particularly when you consider the first release of Hawkeye was 4 years ago, and just $20 cheaper.

But therein lies this figures biggest problem - the earlier releases. If you own the Avengers Hawkeye, it's going to be very hard to make the case that this one is really an upgrade.  Considering that some retailers still have the second AoU version available for sale, I don't see this one flying off the shelf.

The one advantage it does have is the source material, Captain America: Civil War. This was one of the best films in the entire MCU, and if putting together the complete, outfit correct, team is your goal, this guy is a must have.

Score Recap (out of ****):
Packaging - ***1/2
Sculpting - ***1/2
Paint - ***1/2
Articulation - ***
Accessories - ****
Outfit - ***
Fun Factor - ***
Value - **1/2
Overall - ***1/2

Where to Buy 
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Related Links -
Of course, you'll want to check out the first Hawkeye from Hot Toys, based on his look in Avengers.

You should also hit the Search Reviews page, in case any other applicable reviews were done after this one was published.

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