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Packaging - ***
These use a very similar design to series 1, with a very attractive color
scheme right from the film. The clamshells work great of course, and
rather than use twisties or rubber bands to hold the small accessories in
their hands, they've gone with a shrink wrap type plastic. This plastic
covers the hand and accessory, keeping it in place but not hurting the overall
look of the figure inside the package.
I knocked these down slightly because there isn't much personalization from
one to the other. There's a little - the front bears a sticker with the
character name, and the right side of the insert bears the name and photo of
the character as well. But there's nothing on the back, and no
explanatory text about the character or the accessories included.
Sculpting - Plum ****; Victor, Bonejangles ***1/2
If you loved the first series, be in for another great run. All six
figures are terrific, although there's a couple that are real stand outs.
Of this half, Mrs. Plum is the winner. With tons of great detail, including
some amazing differences in texture between various pieces of clothing, the
bones and her remaining skin, she's a fantastic edition to the overall
set. Mind you, there's something truly disturbing about the whole shape
of her hat, but I try my best to ignore that.
She has actual hair rooted to the back of her hair, and since it was wild
and wicked in the film, it works well here. No need to come or groom -
just let it all hang out!
Bonejangles suffers from the same issue most skeleton action figures do. He's
likely to wilt over time, even with a slightly stiffer plastic.
Thankfully, they did go with something more sturdy and less rubbery than, say,
the POTC skeletons from NECA, but I'm still betting that in certain poses,
he's bound to wilt.
I wasn't too thrilled with Bonejangles at first, but the more I played with
it, the more I realized how well the sculpt and limited articulation work
together to allow you to create some pretty great poses. This is a
combination effort between the articulation and the design of the sculpt, and
both areas get extra credit.
Finally, there's Victor. It looks to me like this is the same head
sculpt as the previous two - I couldn't find any differences. However,
the body sculpt is new, with more disarray. There's a tear in his pant
leg, one suit shoulder is separated, and his tie is less neat, and more pulled
out from his vest.
The included package is permenantly attached to his hands, so I count it as
part of the sculpt. It's empty at this point of course, but it works
quite nicely with the basic pose.
Paint - ****
Try as I might, I couldn't find a complaint about the paint ops on any of
these three figures.
Mrs. Plum is again my favorite, with a wonderful use of color and
gradiation. There's blue highlighting on the white areas of the outfit,
and the effect of shadowing works quite well. Small details are very
clean and neat, and there's zero slop.
Bonejangles has far less color, since he's basically bone white. But
the white has a realistic appearance, and the eyes and hat are clean and neat.
Finally, there's Victor again. The series 1 Victor had issues with
the lines on his pant legs, bringing down his paint score. I'm happy to
report that none of those issues exist here, and everything is spot on.
The paint is used to emphasis the beat up, destitute appearance of Victor,
including the dark circles around the eyes.
Articulation - Bonejangles ***1/2; Plum, Victor **1/2
These are difficult figures to articulate, but they've given it there best
shot.
Vicgtor has cut shoulders, double pin knees, a T crotch (with very limit
room to move, due to the coat), cut thighs, and the all important ball jointed
neck. Because of the permanence of the box, the wrist, bicep, and elbow
articulation is no longer present. This means he went from the most
articulated in series 1, to the least articulated in series 2.
Plum has a cut waist, ball jointed shoulders, and cut wrists (at the glove
tops). There's no ball jointed neck due to the character design, and of course
there's no articulation below the waist.
However, the arm articulation works quite well for her, especially the ball
jointed shoulders, giving her more poses than you'd think.
Bonejangles has some terrific articulation, although it doesn't seem like
there's much at first. as ball jointed shoulders, a very small ball
jointed neck, a pin elbow and wrist only on the left arm, ball jointed hips,
and a unique ball joint where the spine enters the pelvic bone.
His curved spine doesn't allow for him to stand up completely straight, and
I do wish that his neck wasn't bent quite so far forward, making some poses
difficult. But the more I played around with him, the more poses I found
that he could hold, and hold well. He can also stand fine on his own, without
the base, something poor Victor can't manage.
Accessories - Plum ***; Victor **1/2; Bonejangles **
Just like the first series, each figure comes with an accessory, and one or
two other items.
Well, that's not quite true. Bonejangles comes with a base, which looks like
a chunk of wood from either the bar (my guess) or the mansion. There's
also a paper back drop, but it's a rather dull color (much more like the Land
of the Living than the Land of the Dead), and doesn't fit all the way across
the base for some reason. I believe that's because the base was
originally supposed to be angled, with a slightly V shape, so that the
background would have fit across the one side of the 'V'. The final base
came out straight though, making the backdrop too small.
There's also a peg hole in the base for a metal rod to hold the right foot
in the air, but for the life of me I couldn't find it in the package.
I'm going to give it another shot before I toss out the packaging, but it's
possible that it was skipped.
Victor has his oval base, which has pegs for his tiny feet, and the
permanently attached box top. There's also four holes for the pegs on
Scrap's feet, his other accessory, to attach to the base. That works
better in theory than practice, and I never could quite get it to work.
I finally called Uncle.
Scraps is pretty cool though, with an articulated neck and joints on both
back legs to help with attaching him to the base. I'm pretty sure this
is also the identical sculpt to the Scraps that came with the DVD set, but
it's a critical addition for those that skipped that pair.
Last but not least is Plum. She has the most accessories, including
her interesting base (with nasty dishes piled high, small pot, and a fish
carcass), a rolling pin, and a big spoon. She can hold her accessories
quite well, and they look terrific.
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