Boss Fight Studio Bruiser the Betelgeusian Berserker Baboon (Bucky O’Hare)

The baddest baboon in the Aniverse has arrived!

2019 was not a plentiful year for Bucky O’Hare product. After receiving my two-pack of Toad Storm Troopers from Boss Fight Studio on Boxing Day 2018, I had not received a new Bucky sculpt until now. Not that 2019 was necessarily light on Bucky developments, it’s just the nature of the game when a small company invests in a niche property. Any company that makes Bucky toys, and there is currently only one such company, can’t just make a bunch of product and ship it to stores expecting a gradual sell-out. Rather a more cautious approach needs to be undertaken that involves basically doing one figure at a time and then putting it out there on pre-order for a bit to gauge interest before ultimately committing to a big factory order. It also doesn’t help when the figure is based on a licensed property and needs to go through an approval process with the license owner to make sure everything is all good. And when you add a global health crisis to the mix, well then nothing goes as planned.

Such is the reason why it has taken more than a year to make this figure of Bruiser, the Betelgeusian Berserker Baboon, a reality. He is the first in what toy company Boss Fight Studio is calling the Bucky O’Hare Deluxe line of figures. He’s much larger than any of the figures that have come before him, so much so that he had to forego the usual blister packaging in favor of a window box. And since he’s a lot bigger that also means he’s a lot more expensive which makes even commissioning the big guy a bit of a gamble on the part of Boss Fight Studio. Since he did indeed end up getting made, it would seem that gamble has paid off and it’s a good sign that the fanbase of both Bucky O’Hare and Boss Fight Studio were willing to sink approximately $55 into Bruiser to get him onto collector shelves where he rightfully belongs. And I can’t stress this enough, but he was worth the wait!

Bruiser represents a first for the Bucky line in that he’s the first figure released that is based on a character who originated in the cartoon series. The cartoon is where most people familiar with the product have the greatest affinity for, so it’s not really a surprise to see Boss Fight head in this direction. Bruiser is the younger brother of Bruce, the engineer on the Righteous Indignation who sadly didn’t make it out of issue #1 or episode #1. Perhaps seeing the potential in having a baboon on the crew in a permanent role, Bruiser was added for the cartoon in episode #2 as basically some hired muscle. Toads have a natural fear of baboons so for the writing staff he represented an easy way to end a conflict as he basically just needed to show up to scare away the bad guys. He also formed a bit of an odd couple with Blinky, the diminutive android on the crew, and their relationship was quite cute. He was popular enough that he was also a part of the Hasbro series of toys and he came with a rifle, even though he basically just uses his hands in the cartoon as weapons.

That’s one happy ape!

Even though he began as a cartoon character, he’s still a Larry Hama creation. All of the characters were and they all had artwork created by Continuity Comics to accompany them which I assume went into a series bible for the show. In moving from concept art to cartoon, some changes were made to make the character either easier to animate or to make them stand out better in terms of colors. As has been the case with all of the figures from Boss Fight Studio, Bruiser is based on that concept art as opposed to having a more toon accurate color scheme. This means black armor instead of blue with a red strap instead of pink. His gloved left hand is also colored correctly as opposed to the old Hasbro toy which didn’t bother adding any paint (and annoyed me to no end as a kid). His fur is also a touch more brown which just plain looks nicer than the old bright orange. Basically all of the yellow parts on his show costume are gold here making this Bruiser seem like the luxury model compared with the toon.

You can even remove his gauntlet if you wish to have your Bruiser cosplay as Cloud City Luke Skywalker.

The sculpting on Bruiser is something to behold. He’s a big, beefy, chunky, monkey and Boss Fight Studio making this for the adult collector means those spikes on his costume are quite the little hazards. The factory head has this lovely side-smirk going on that should remind folks of the Hasbro toy. He’s dense, and quite heavy, but not so heavy that he topples over. The belt and loincloth are a separate piece of plastic and so is the gauntlet on his left arm. When you pop off that left hand, you can even slide it off exposing the sleeve underneath. I love all of the textures on this guy be it the fur on his arms, the ridged portions of the armor, or the gear-like texture on his boots. He’s just a joy to hold and experience.

Like the other figures, Bruiser has pegs on his belt that allow him to holster his weapon for when he wants to munch on a banana or get his hands dirty.

The paint application for Bruiser is pretty simple, which applies to this line as a whole. There’s a lot of colored plastic, especially the fur, which does sometimes give the figure a shiny, plastic, appearance. It is a toy, after all, so it should look plastic, but a paint wash might have toned this down a bit. The paint on the portions that aren’t colored is clean and simple. Some of the spikes have a touch of paint chip at the point which is something that’s going to happen with that type of accent. I love the tan color of his glove and boots and it just mixes so well with the brown fur. The only areas that could stand to see some improvement is the right shoulder and the big fangs on his factory head. The shoulder has some gray plastic in the middle to blend it with the steel shoulder pad that is mostly unpainted on my figure. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it an eyesore, but it is noticeable. The fangs are a bit fuzzy at the edges and the part where the left tooth overlaps the nose chain is a little messy. This is pretty minor stuff though as it’s only noticeable upon close inspection.

Ever see a baboon chokeslam a toad?

Despite Bruiser’s size, he still comes with a fair amount of articulation. His head is on a ball joint, though his hunched stature means it doesn’t have a ton of play. He’s got ball-jointed shoulders and hinges at the elbows. There’s no bicep swivel, but I honestly can’t I say I miss it. The hands are on pegs with no hinge, which is par for the course with this line. He’s got a nice ab crunch, a first for this line owing to his size, that can help pivot his upper body and it’s basically completely hidden by the sculpt, which is incredible as ab crunches are often the bane of action figures because of what they do to the sculpt. He can turn at the waist and features ball-joints at the hips. He has hinges at the knee, but because of squat appearance there’s very little functional movement here. He makes up for that though with some impressive double-jointed ankle articulation. They sit on balls and also possess a hinge so you can really rock and roll ’em to adjust Bruiser’s positioning. The articulation as a whole possesses the perfect amount of tightness as Bruiser is really easy to move right out of the box, but when leaving him on a shelf everything stays in the position you left him in.

He works hard, so it’s important to take time out for a little snack.

So just what does $55 get you besides a big old monkey? Pretty much the same amount of accessories fans are accustomed to at this point. Bruiser comes with a gun that’s very similar to the Hasbro one, referred to as a Betelgeusian Lazer Bazooka, which makes sense since both were based on the same artwork. It has a ton of nice texture work and is painted in this chrome color that really helps stand out. This is a character that typically prefers to get his hands dirty, but good luck excluding that bazooka from your display. He has two pairs of hands to mix and match: a fist, an open hand, and a gripping hand for each arm. He’s got a banana to snack on (yellow peel, not one of those purple space bananas) and a secondary head with a big open mouth for munching on the banana or for yelling at toads. The yelling head has a hint of a smile to it as this is a baboon who likes his work. The banana is pretty great looking, I can honestly say I have never seen a finer plastic banana. The yelling head is also delightfully charismatic. He looks so happy! Position with mangling some toads and you basically have yourself a Bruiser in his happy place. I suppose if you’re keeping score with the other figures, he has one less of everything. Bucky, for example, has three sets of hands and three faceplates compared with Bruiser’s two of each. Though in his defense, he has a whole second head as opposed to a second faceplate. More importantly though, I don’t feel like we’re missing anything. I don’t think we need another expression nor do we really need an open right hand or thumb’s up, for example.

The neck joint can be a bit tricky to work with, but it also allows for weird monstrosities like this.

Swapping the extra pieces with the factory pieces is pretty straight-forward. His hands are just on pegs, so you will want to apply firm pressure pulling-out and resist the urge to bend as that could snap the peg. They’re seated pretty snug out of the box, but I was able to pull them off without the aid of heat. His head is a bit trickier because it sits on what is essentially a plastic dumbbell. It’s two balls connecting by a thick cylinder of plastic. One end snaps into the head and the other into the body. When I tried to pull the factory head off the ball seated in the body was the first to give-way. I had to heat the piece in the head socket under running, hot, water to get it out. Once I did that it worked fine, but don’t panic if the same thing happens to yours as it’s meant to come apart. And you may be switching frequently because it’s hard to pick a preferred head. I initially thought I’d be going with the factory head all the way, but that big old smile is just so charming! Maybe Boss Fight should just do a variant in the cartoon color scheme so I can have both on my shelf (hint hint)!

In terms of any shortcomings, there’s very few with this guy. Some might wish for more articulation, but I’m happy with where he’s at as the sculpt is fantastic. There really isn’t a pose I envisioned for him that I can’t replicate. He’s a big brawler and he looks the part. I suppose I would have liked an open right hand so he could do a big scary, monkey, pose with both open hands over his head. If anything though, I’d sacrifice both extra hands that he came with in favor of a toad head accessory of a terrified Storm Toad. It would be a lot of fun to have some screaming toads, but if he came with one such head then I’d be wishing he came with more! Maybe if he sells well enough to warrant that Aniverse variant, Boss Fight could consider such an accessory. They could even ditch the gun if it saves them money since I don’t think he ever used one in the cartoon. It’s probably more likely though that if such a head were made available it would be via an accessory pack or something.

The crew is looking a lot more formidable these days.

There may have been a pretty sizable gap in release between Bruiser and the toads, but that doesn’t appear like it’s going to repeat. Last summer, Boss Fight opened pre-orders for Mimi LaFloo, another character who first surfaced in the cartoon. Her figure was apparently the quickest to ever receive approval from Continuity and she went up pretty fast. At the time pre-orders opened, I had a brief interaction on Twitter with Boss Fight in which they left open the possibility she could see release in 2019. Obviously that didn’t happen, but I’m assuming she’s not too far off if 2019 was ever in play. Probably because of the delay in getting Bruiser out, Boss Fight has not placed a release window, let alone date, on that figure though I’m certainly hoping it makes it out before 2020 ends. Beyond that, Boss Fight did show off a new style of toys for Bucky that are basically mini figures with big heads that come packaged with small vehicles. They have at least made it to the prototype stage, but this is something that could arrive in 2020 though I haven’t seen any additional information on this series.

Just imagine his smile when his little buddy Blinky comes along!

Hopefully, Bruiser is a success for Boss Fight Studio as this would open the door for more Deluxe Bucky O’Hare figures. It’s hard to know just what characters are candidates for this style of release down the road. I think it’s safe to say Toadborg falls into this category and I have to assume he’d be the most likely figure to follow Bruiser at this size and price point. A character I am looking forward to seeing in Al Negator is a harder one to figure. He’s certainly taller than Bucky, but I don’t know that he’s necessarily that much bigger that he requires a release at this price point. He may end up somewhere in between as I suppose there’s no law requiring Boss Fight to release figures at either $35 MSRP or $55 and nothing in between. Regardless of what’s next, I just hope the line continues as my only real criticism with the line so far is that it’s heavy on good guys and very light on bad guys. My toads need someone to boss them around, be it Toadborg or the Air Marshall, especially now that Bucky has a berserker baboon on his side.