Review of Black Widow - Iron Man 2
Sixth Scale Action Figure

Introduction

Ah, Scarlett Johansson. One of the most beautiful women in Hollywood today, and I can sit through any film she's in. In the interests of full disclosure, I've never tried to sit through The Spirit, but  I'm sure if I was drunk enough to watch the movie, I'd love her in it.

While Iron Man 2 had plenty of good (but not quite great) moments, Ms. Johansson's Black Widow stole the show for me. I enjoyed Rourke's Whiplash, but if I never see the character on screen again I can still die satisfied. But Black Widow? I would love to see more of her...uh, on screen of course. Yea, that's what I meant.

And if rumors hold out, it looks like I'll get my wish, as she's supposed to reprise her role as the Russian ass whooper in both the upcoming Nick Fury and Avengers movies.

Hot Toys have just released their Black Widow figure, the second Johansson character to get the high end sixth scale treatment. The first was Silken Floss from The Spirit, a figure I still need to pick up some day.

When I say she's started shipping, I mean through international dealers. I buy mine through a shop in Canada, and they tend to get theirs in prior to the distributors on American soil. Everyone should start seeing them soon, however.

Packaging - ***1/2
There's nothing unique here, but like other Hot Toys packaging, it's completely collector friendly. The outer sleeve has a reflective coating, while the inner box is sturdy enough to keep the figure safe.

Sculpting - ***
I'm including both the actual portrait and the rooted hair here, making this score a bit lower than if I were only considering the likeness.

In person, the portrait is extremely good, capturing the look of Ms. Johansson extremely well. As you'd expect, it's also an extremely realistic sculpt, with soft texturing to the lips, life-like eyes, and finely detailed eyebrows. From the right angle, it's a dead on likeness. From some angles, she's a bit more generic, but no less beautiful.

They went with rooted curly red hair, rather than trying to sculpt the long do. It's a tough call - sculpt this much hair and it tends to be heavy, but rooted hair tends to fly away and be difficult to maintain.

They used quite a bit of hair spray, or something like that, to keep the curls in place, but I still had plenty of trouble keeping the hair neat. I suspect that over time, it's going to start looking less like Black Widow and more like Carrot Top.

Because of this, the overall portrait takes a hit. I applaud Hot Toys for working with rooted hair, because I think that it has potential. But it's going to take a few more iterations before they can produce something that matches their exceptional facial portraits and paint work.

Paint - ****
The majority of the paint work is on the face, where the lips, eyes and eyelashes look amazing. The eyebrows are perfectly shaded, and the lip color is gorgeous. The eyes are straight and clean, with a bright sheen that allows for natural catch lights. They even perfected the eyelashes and eyeliner, with very fine, thin strands.

The skin tone is light and even, giving her the same porcelain look that Scarlett herself has. The skin color between the hands, neck and face matches well, and the edges on the gloves are clean and neat.

Articulation - ***1/2
Hot Toys female body is about as good as it gets. The double jointed ball neck works great, as does every joint below. Shoulders, biceps, hips, waist, abs, hips, thighs, knees and ankles all are solid with an excellent range of movement.

The soft boots allow for the ankles and rocker foot joints to work well too, giving you more options and deeper stances.

I had some problems with weak joints on Whiplash, but there were no such issues here. She stands great on her own, and can take very natural poses.

There are two issues that I'd like to see improved, however. The elbows can't close quite far enough to allow for the hands to come as near to the head as I'd like, but it's a minor nit. And my other nit is a tad weird - while she has very large breasts, they are set so low on the torso that you can't really show off her cleavage without taking the zipper down to almost her belly button. Yea, it's a weird nit to pick, but I never claimed I was normal.

Accessories - ***
We are getting accustomed to a ton of extras with the usual Hot Toys figure, making us a bit spoiled.

So when they only give us two hand guns and three hands, we're likely to complain. At least I am - I don't know about you.

The guns are excellent, of course, and both have removable clips and moving slides. Both the sculpt and paint is very realistic, and both guns fit nicely in her sculpted gun hands. The larger one also fits in her holster.

There are three extra hands - one left and two right. The one left and one of the rights are gun hands, while the second right has two fingers extended. Combined with the relaxed pose hands that she comes wearing, you can find a combination that works with just about any pose.

There's also one of the standard Hot Toys display stands, but it isn't necessary to use it if you don't lean that way. There's also a few extra wrist pegs, just in case you get a little wild with the pressure when swapping the hands.

Outfit - ***1/2
The outfit is fairly basic, but well done. The skin tight body suit is perfectly tailored, with a properly scaled zipper in front. 

There's a small belt around the actual waist, and there's a sturdy plastic belt with pouches and holster than hangs lower on the hips.

She has her bracelets too, and these look great and don't get in the way of the hands. You can still swap them easily, and they remain in place even with some pretty extreme posing.

The boots look great, and the softer material  allows the articulation to still work well.

Fun Factor - ***1/2
I've talked about this plenty of times before, but while these figures aren't intended for kids, they haven't lost the DNA of their toy forefathers. The outfit and accessories are very sturdy, and the only aspect that may wear badly is the rooted hair. Then again, that's pretty much the same for any Barbie.

Value - **
Black Widow is on the lower side of the usual Hot Toys price range, coming in around $135 or so at most stores. Still, with only a couple accessories and a relatively simple outfit, she's not as good a value as some other figures they've put out in this very same price range.

Things to Watch Out For -
I found that swapping the hands by popping the entire wrist peg out worked better than simply taking the hand off.

Overall - ***
The highlights here are the Scarlett likeness, paint work, and great looking outfit. However, with only a few accessories, a fairly high price, and the difficult to manage rooted hair, she's not one of my top picks. 

That's not to say she won't look great next to the rest of the Iron Man series, especially since all those metal outfits tend to start blending together, and her femininity adds a nice change of pace.

I suspect that Hot Toys is going to eventually do some pretty amazing things with rooted hair, but it's going to take a few more tries before they get it perfected.

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

Where to Buy 
Online options include these site sponsors:

- Sideshow doesn't have an exclusive this time, but they have the regular for $150.

- or you can search ebay for a deal.

Related Links -
Black Widow joins the growing Hot Toys Iron Man series - 

- the previous release was just a few weeks ago: Whiplash.

- prior to that, I looked at the Mark III figure, Mark II figure, Mark I figure, and additional Tony Stark men's suit. There are also guest reviews of the Battle Damaged Iron Man and Mech Suit Tony Stark.

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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