Tag Archives: teenage mutant ninja turtles

March 7, 2023

NECA Cartoon TMNT Grunt and Jersey Red

By Joe
We got ourselves a couple of bad apples, here.

Collectors my age who watched the original mini series for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles over and over likely all wondered the same thing at some point: what happened to the rest of Bebop and Rocksteady’s gang? When we first meet the dim-witted duo, they’re humans and part of a street gang harassing the people of New York. When they turn their attention towards a reporter by the name of April O’Neil, they run afoul of some local vigilantes who happen to be mutated ninjas. Shredder, identifying that his new foes are not human, decides to create some mutants of his own. We see the transformation of Bebop and Rocksteady to a mutant warthog and rhino respectively, while the rest of the gang gets mutated offscreen. We get one glimpse at them post mutation on a monitor in the Technodrome and then a very brief glimpse in the fifth and final episode of said mini series where they’re all in a cell. One lucky mutant, who we’ve come to know as Scrag, got to demonstrate Shredder’s reverse mutation ray which returned him to his human form and then he and the rest of the gang were never heard from again. Did Shredder, seeing how moronic Bebop and Rocksteady turned out, decide to just cut his losses and exterminate the rest? Maybe he returned them all to human form and set them free in New York? Or, perhaps wanting to have a little fun, did he and Krang tell them they were going home, but they actually dumped them in Dimension X where they almost certainly met their end?

There’s no canon explanation for what happened to the rest of the street punks. In reality, the mini series was commissioned by Playmates Toys to sell, well, toys. And it did its job so they were all set. Producer Fred Wolf saw more potential in the show and wanted to continue producing it and so they did leading to a second season and then several more. In going from the mini series to season two, it was likely decided that Shredder didn’t need a whole gang of mutants at his disposal. Bebop and Rocksteady would be enough as recurring characters and they could bring in other “villains of the day” to add variety. And since it was a kid’s show, there likely wasn’t any consideration given to telling the audience what happened with these other characters. Adults often underestimate kids and their capacity for knowledge and memory because I certainly wanted to know what happened with those other guys, but the show never brought them back. Now that I’m an adult and immersed in the collector community, I know my thoughts were not unique to me. Most kids wondered what happened to those punks, but aside from very brief appearances in supplemental media and ephemera, they’ve been forgotten. It’s only through those items that we even know them by name: Scrag, Grunt, Dopey, and Dumbo.

The gang’s all here.

When NECA and Loot Crate returned for another round of TMNT crates, the bonus figure for those who purchased all four crates ended up being the infamous Scrag. This basically signaled to the collector community that these long ignored characters were on NECA’s radar, and not being one to shy away from deep pulls, the prospect of completing Bebop and Rocksteady’s original gang suddenly seemed like a foregone conclusion. The only catch was that Scrag had a pretty significant barrier in front of him. If you only wanted that figure it was going to cost you $200 as you had to buy four $50 crates. NECA has insisted that any figure exclusive to Loot Crate would remain so which is why most of the first wave of crates were variants of popular characters. Wave 2 was more specialized and while a character like Danny Pennington from the first film, who was featured in the first crate of Wave 2, could get re-released at mass retail with a different look a character like Scrag only has one look. And his figure featured components to display him as a human or as his mutated bat form, so that possibility was out. Would NECA release the rest of the gang if there was no way for people who missed out on Scrag to get him? Well, we have our answer, and it’s “Yes!” For this round of Haulathon, NECA has unleashed the gang and for the first time ever we have them all in plastic form. And as a result, we essentially have all of the main characters from that inaugural mini series in plastic as well so that’s pretty cool. These guys have been more than 30 years in the making so now the question is, “Was it worth it?”

This guy has some interesting fashion sense. I feel like he tried out and was rejected be Demolition.

The other problem with NECA releasing Scrag solo is that it meant the four missing gang members were now reduced to three. NECA prefers to release these figures in packs of two so someone was going to have to be paired with a non-gang member. Or, there was the possibility of NECA doing another three-pack like it did with the Neutrinos, but it turns out that the company had a satisfactory replacement in mind: Jersey Red. Jersey Red is the canonical replacement for Bebop, or Rocksteady, in the gang they once ran with. She debuts in the episode “The Gang’s All Here” when Shredder orders the pair to reconnect with their old gang. If you’re wondering how that squares with my prior paragraphs talking about how we never heard from them again, it still does as the gang is composed of all new characters. Red, as far as we were shown, never actually ran with the likes of Grunt, Scrag, etc and instead was more like a replacement for those guys. She is joined by Lugnut and High-Five in her episodes so maybe they’re on NECA’s radar. For now, she’s a suitable inclusion as far as theming goes even if she wasn’t a figure I ever actively wanted.

It’s like getting two figures in one!

Grunt and Jersey Red come in the standard window box we’re accustomed to at this point. Purchasing the pair will set you back $60 now, but $30 each for a pair of figures of new tooling is pretty much the going rate these days. We’ll talk about Grunt first. He stands at around 6.25″ to the top of his head and 6.75″ to the top of his mohawk. He is pretty absurd looking. Maybe to avoid doing anything that could be too realistic for a gang member, the design of Grunt looks more like a Judas Priest roadie or pro wrestler. He has a blond mohawk and sunglasses, but has declined to wear a shirt. Instead, he basically wears a harness that’s strapped to his chest with a big, gold, buckle in the center of his chest and back. He has an oversized gray belt with some pouches on it to pair with tight, black, pants and boots. I guess because he values some personal protection, he’s also got gray kneepads and a pair of bracelets to complete the look. He’s lean, but pretty muscular, and I don’t know if a guy looking like this approached me on the street if I’d laugh or be intimidated. It’s certainly a look though and NECA captured it well. Since he’s mostly black and fleshtone, there isn’t a ton of paint on this guy. Every spot of him is still painted, it’s just not a paint job that requires a ton of detail. The toon shading is only applied to the harness and the kneepads, but there’s still plenty of linework on the muscles and finer details. And what is there is very clean, there’s little or no blemishes on my figure and there’s no plastic look to the figure. The only thing I don’t like is that his eyes were left without pupils. They’re just white, but since they’re behind sunglasses I’m guessing NECA decided it didn’t need to paint them.

Well that doesn’t look right.

For accessories, Grunt has 3 sets of hands: fists, gripping, and a second set of gripping hands. That second set of gripping hands features claws on the fingers because they’re likely intended for his mutated form. Unfortunately, they’re cast and painted in his normal flesh tone so they’re useless. The hands are also on long, skinny, pegs and are quite challenging to remove. More so than they should be and the long peg just means more room for breaking so do exercise caution. As for what he has to wield with the gripping hands, he gets a sword. It’s a curved blade with a wrapped handle and I think this is a new sculpt. It looks fine and he was seen with a sword in the show. His main accessory though is his mutant form. Grunt was mutated into a green, lizard, creature, and since he declines to wear a shirt NECA needed to include more than just a head and some hands like it did with Scrag. The lizard form is an entirely new torso. The default torso separates at the waist and it’s pretty easy to do. The lizard part then just plugs in, and again, fairly painlessly. If you wanted to get a really good seal you may need to heat the lizard torso up, but it’s not necessary. He looks great and the paint and linework is all very clean. He has open, clawing, hands which thankfully look great since they’re the only hands he’s got. He’s got a long, flicking, tongue which is a nice touch and it’s going to be hard to settle on a display for this guy because this lizard creature looks so cool.

This will not end well for you, punk.

When it comes to articulation, Grunt is fairly basic for the line. The head is likely on a double ball peg so you get some up and down plus full rotation and some tilt for nuance posing. The shoulders are just pegged in on hinges so you get full rotation and they can come out to the side almost to a horizontal position. It might go further if you force it, but it’s probably not necessary. No biceps swivel on this guy which is a surprise. Instead, he gets a single hinged joint at the elbow that just pegs into the bicep so you get a swivel there. The elbow bends to about 90 so it’s functional, but a biceps swivel would look better, in my opinion. I’m guessing they didn’t want to break up the sculpt or were trying to save some money by tooling fewer parts. The wrists swivel and hinge and after being pleasantly surprised with the vertical-hinged REX-1 wrists, Grunt is back to just all horizontal hinges despite his lone weapon being a sword. In the torso, we have a ball-joint in the diaphragm. It will give the figure rotation with a decent amount of side-to-side tilt and very little forward and back. At the waist is a twist where the upper body pegs into the lower body so while it works it does tend to come apart slightly when twisting on it. The hips are the standard ball and socket joints and they go out to the side for full splits, kick forward all the way, and back slightly. There’s a thigh twist up there as well as double-jointed knees which go past 90 degrees. At the top of the boot we do get a swivel and at the ankle we get hinges and rockers. The hinges offer very little going forward and back, but the ankle rocker is pretty solid.

Told ya!

Grunt’s articulation is probably enough. I don’t like the elbows, but NECA doesn’t like doing double-joints on bare armed characters so I at least understand the thinking. I just wish he got to keep a biceps swivel. As for the lizard-man, the articulation is basically the same. His arms can’t quite get out to horizontal either and he lacks a biceps swivel. His diaphragm joint has less range and it’s partly because the straps on his chest sit lower and are on the part that wants to rotate. His head, which sits forward on his body, is also different. I think it’s still a double ball peg, but the orientation means that ball is pointing straight out so you get a head that can’t look up, can look down a touch, and doesn’t get a lot of side-to-side. You get plenty of tilt, but otherwise is limited and swapping to the mutant form is a downgrade in articulation.

The rough and tough female of the gang.

Now let’s talk about Grunt’s box-mate: Jersey Red. Jersey Red is the rare female in this line, but I’m happy to say we actually have a couple more females to talk about from this wave of Haulathon releases. She was previously teased via a wanted poster included as a sticker in one of the Loot Crates and as a paper insert for the street diorama. She’s a heavy set woman in a halter top and jeans with a flock of red hair that reminds me of Guile from Street Fighter 2. She also has these red, cowboy, boots that will make her a challenge to stand in any pose that isn’t just straight up and down. The design is a bit understated compared with Grunt, but effective nonetheless. She’s not a character I ever needed in plastic, but what’s here looks good and true to the show. She does have the toon shading on her jeans and boots and the paint hits are all applied cleanly. As far as I can tell, nothing on this figure was reused from a previous one so she’s all new.

She’s got a gun and a bottle of…Maalox? She’s ready to party!

For accessories, Red has an assortment of hands: fists, clenching, a right trigger finger hand, and a left, wide, gripping hand. The wide gripping hand is included so she can hold one of her accessories. The first is a white bottle of some sort. In her debut episode, Shredder was trying to spread some new mutation serum so that might be what this bottle is for, but otherwise I don’t know. For the trigger hand, she has a gun. It’s a big, white, blaster of some kind that certainly looks like it came from the show. I don’t know if Jersey Red was ever seen wielding this gun, but it looks like something Shredder might have passed out to the gang when they brought them onboard in her debut episode. It’s not a lot of stuff, I’m guessing most of the accessory budget went to Grunt’s lizard half, but I don’t think she really needed anything else. She’s a brawler, but she’s got a gun too and if you want to outfit her with melee weapons you probably have a bunch laying around at this point. I know I do.

I believe the kids would refer to her now as “thick.”

As for articulation, Jersey Red is a bit limited. She has the standard setup at the head which allows her to look up, down, all around, and she has some tilt. The shoulders rotate all around and hinge out to the side to just about horizontal. She basically has the same arm setup as Grunt since her arms are bare so no biceps swivel and a single-jointed elbow. She basically hits 90 degrees at the elbow bend and the wrists swivel and hinge. All of the hinges are of the horizontal variety. In the torso, she has a diaphragm joint that lets her rotate just below her bust and that’s basically all it does. She has a waist twist below that which is just okay. Since it’s not a ball joint, twisting her too far breaks up the sculpt at the waist so it’s of limited use. At the hips, we have the standard setup, but she has a rather large “diaper” covering her crotch so she can’t do splits like Grunt can nor can she kick forward very far and she can’t kick back at all. She does have a thigh twist up there, but her knees are single-jointed. They swivel there as well, but the bend doesn’t quite hit 90 degrees. She does have a boot cut so those swivel and the hinge and rocker combo at the ankle work well enough, but because her boots are heeled it’s not nearly as useful. You’re not going to do a whole lot with her feet, but if you keep it simple, she actually stands pretty well. There are peg holes on her heels if you feel a simple stand is warranted, but she’s stable. I should add, nothing on either figure was too tight or too loose. I didn’t have to heat any of the joints and the only heat recommended is maybe for connecting Grunt’s mutant half to his lower body or getting his hands out, and if you’re real concerned about paint rub with the white blaster, heating the trigger hand first would help there though I had no issues without it.

“What the hell are you doing down there?”

Grunt and Jersey Red is not a two-pack that is going to set the world on fire, but it’s executed fairly well. The only real bummer is the gaffe with the mutant gripping hands for Grunt. Some companies would attempt to fix this by offering replacements somehow, but I don’t expect that to happen here. My guess is if they ever do a second production run it will be corrected there. NECA has done this in the past and indicated that customers could get on a list for replacement parts, but I’ve never seen anyone actually receive said replacement parts. The last time something like that happened was with the Rat King who had a faulty crotch piece that flaked paint. If that matters to you then you may want to sit this one out. I don’t think it’s a foregone conclusion that this set ever gets another run. These are obscure characters and if you don’t have Scrag all ready then you probably won’t even bother. Unless you’re the rare Jersey Red fan. The rise in price also doesn’t help. If I were grading these separately, I’d say Grunt is fine and a pretty fun figure to mess around with. Jersey Red looks good, but isn’t particularly fun to handle as she’s too limited. If I could have passed on her I probably would have, but I’m also not looking to offload her or anything. If you want to complete the original gang then sure, go for it. If you don’t care or don’t have any of those previous releases (including human Bebop and Rocksteady) then you can probably pass on this one.

NECA Cartoon TMNT Premonition of a Premutation SDCC 4-Pack

It was a little over a month ago that San Diego Comic Con occurred, in person, for the first time since 2019. This was cause for a celebration, even if for those of us who take in the convention from the comfort of our homes saw little change. Even without the event taking place the…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA Cartoon TMNT Accessory Set

We’re well into the cold of winter and spring feels like it’s just around the corner which means it must be time for another NECA Haulathon. Haulathon, if you don’t recall from last year, is basically a tandem promotion between NECA and Target which was just an excuse to get NECA some more visibility in…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in Television, toys

March 2, 2023

NECA Cartoon TMNT From the Files of Pizza Squad (Deluxe Rex-1)

By Joe
REX-1 is here to serve and protect. Maybe.

When you’re doing a syndicated cartoon expected to air basically every day, you need to pull story ideas from anywhere you can. I think that’s why parodies are so popular in the cartoons of the 80s to the point where it didn’t matter if the show was parodying something kids would actually know. Take REX-1, who premiered in the episode of the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon series “New York’s Shiniest.” Rex is basically a RoboCop parody, and RoboCop was one of those bizarre R-rated films that was marketed to kids for some reason. He got a toyline and a cartoon series which dropped the violence of the film as well as the social commentary just to make a show about a good cop who happens to be a robot. Rex, being from a cartoon series designed to sell toys and make kids laugh, is more of a doofus, but also a product of his time. The episode leans into a crime-ridden New York City, which was very much the opinion of the city in the mainstream at the time, in need of a hero and it turns to a robot cop. It turns out bad in a way and I’m guessing it was more of a way to inject comedy, but seeing a cop with the power of REX-1 basically apply the law indiscriminately feels like the kind of thing that would happen in reality. The turtles basically have to do the programming themselves to make Rex a more appropriate arbiter of justice, and since it was the TMNT cartoon, they have to take down Shredder.

It’s possible this robot doesn’t take its job too seriously.

REX-1’s premiere episode came in season two, which may have been the most watched season of the show. It was when there weren’t a lot of episodes available, but in my market, that didn’t stop them from airing the program every week day. I saw this guy a whole bunch as a result so this almost one-off character (I know he came back for at least one other episode) ended up being rather memorable. Despite the exposure, REX-1 never received an action figure in the original Playmates line, but that toyline rarely went too hard on cartoon-only characters. They still tended to favor the comics or original creations because it was mostly Mirage Studios that came up with the toy designs. A character like REX-1 was probably created by the show, almost certainly, and it was probably easier for legal reasons to just stick with what they were doing on the toy front.

“Mmmm…sweet crude.”

Because REX-1 was so well known, it felt like a foregone conclusion that NECA would eventually get to him. Especially once they started doing the “deluxe” releases that come in a VHS-styled box and are intended for solo characters instead of a multi-pack. It may have taken a little longer than some expected, but expectations have now been met and REX-1 is available in plastic form courtesy of NECA and Target’s Haulathon promotion. He comes in the expected VHS box which is quite massive this time around. I no longer have my Chrome Dome box, but it sure seems like it’s around the same size as that, and probably heavier. The artwork, once again provided by Daniel Elson and Aaron Hazouri, is fantastic and looks just like how I remember the old VHS tapes, style-wise. The only downside here is REX-1 comes at a new pricepoint of $50. As far as I can recall, the previous high for a deluxe release in this line was the previously mentioned Chrome Dome who came in at $40. That figure was released over 2 years ago so an increase of some kind was likely expected, but I was surprised to see NECA blow by the $45 price and go right to $50. We’ll get more into the value component of the review when I summarize everything at the end, but it definitely stung a bit to ring this one up at the register.

Probably not a sight you would want to see on the streets of New York.

REX-1 is quite a beefy figure for the line. He stands at a shade over 8.75″ to the top of his hat which I’m just going to consider part of his head. This doesn’t make him the tallest figure in the line, but he just might be the heaviest. I was not prepared for how heavy the box would feel when I picked it up and most of that weight is concentrated in the figure itself. Rex’s upper body is very chunky, though rounded-off, and there’s a noticeable heft when lifting this guy up. If I had a postage scale I’d weigh him, but I don’t, so my un-scientific approach of just holding and comparing figures has lead me to be believe that REX-1 is the heaviest figure in the line. And the only one that strikes me as heavier from outside the toon line is the recently released Zog. Rex’s heft is largely contained to the torso as the legs are much slimmer. His design from a color and texture standpoint is very on-model with the show, but the proportions are a little off. The show wasn’t known for its consistency so if you do a search for the character you will find some images where the upper body is this shape. The head size seems to vary, though I favor the slimmer look he seems to have most often. This one is a little chunkier and seems to sit a little lower on the neck as well. The big difference though is the size of the feet. NECA gave this figure some pretty large boots and I think that’s just for stability. REX-1 had one of those toon designs where his upper body is massive, but his legs pretty thin. If you want your toy to have a similar build to the upper body, it’s going to need more at the base to keep him standing. And I’m happy to say he stands fine, so at least the design change works. As for the aesthetics, it’s going to vary from person-to-person. I think he looks pretty good and I like the sizing so I’m fine with the tweeks, others may think he looks too off and I wouldn’t say they’re wrong.

If your robot never worked it’s likely because it was missing this stuff.

As is typical of a NECA release, REX-1 comes loaded with paint and the quality of that application is going to vary, but hopefully not too much. I had my choice of two in store and I selected what I felt was the one with the best paint, but it has some issues. There’s a little blue on one of the gray stripes on his shoulder and there are other small scuffs here and there. The only one that bothers me is there’s a little blob of dark gray at the base of his jaw on the figure’s lower right side. This wasn’t visible in the box because his head was tilted down and I think this is rub-off from inside the neck area as there’s a splotch of the same color in there. I think the jaw is gray plastic so I’m tempted to try to remove it (I was wrong, it’s blue plastic painted gray), but it’s also a delicate piece so I’m torn. There’s also paint rub at the knees which was the result of the gray pieces over his shins just being stuck to the thigh. It’s not visible when his legs are straight up and down and the plastic is at least navy blue so I could probably get this to come off without much risk (the base plastic may be navy, but it’s still painted over). Another spot likely to suffer from paint rub are the gray stripes in the hips. There’s actually a fair amount of clearance between the crotch piece and the hips likely to combat this issue, but push it too far and it will definitely happen. These are the types of flaws expected of a mass-produced item with this much paint. You basically take the good with the bad, and the good is that there is a ton of paint! A lot of companies skimp on that aspect of their figures so I will always prefer this approach to one that favors bare plastic. I like the shade of blues in use here and how it contrasts with the gray and white portions. The finish is quite matte and the cel-shading is effective. A lot of the more complex apps are also done very well like the name tag, the lines on the hands, or the black in the eyeglasses.

There are now too many robots in this line to comfortably fit in one shot. Missing: Metalhead, Krang’s android body, Roadkill Rodney, various Foot soldiers.
“Are you also a…pleasure…model?!” “DOES NOT COMPUTE!”

As a big figure, articulation is a bit of a wild card when it comes to REX-1. I wasn’t sure what to expect, and once I felt how heavy he was I only knew that it needed to be tight. Loose joints will kill a figure like this and I’m happy to say it’s not much of a concern. The head is likely on a ball joint and the figure looks up a little, down quite a bit, and can rotate some as well. The shape of the head prevents him from being able to spin all the way around, though a more determined person could pull it off. He gets some nice tilt for nuance posing and the jaw moves up and down a bit exposing his mouth. At the shoulders, we get the standard hinged peg and Rex can raise his arms out to the side almost to horizontal and rotate around. Again, a more determined individual could possibly get more, but you do have those gray stripes on the shoulder so I wouldn’t advise it. There’s a biceps swivel past that and then a single hinge at the elbow. It’s ratcheted so there’s no looseness and it gets to about a 90 degree bend. At the wrist, we have the customary swivel and hinge setup and I’m happy to say that the trigger hands have the preferred vertical hinge setup. Also, every wrist hinge in my set was stuck out of the box so you may need to heat them up to get them going. In the torso, there’s a diaphragm joint that basically just provides a bit of nuance posing. I’m not sure what they were going for or if the joint is just the result of how the figure was assembled, but it’s basically squared off inside. You can rotate there, but the figure fights you. Since it’s internal, I guess it doesn’t matter if the plastic is getting torn up, but I personally wouldn’t go too far there. There’s also two hinged pieces on the chest that lift up to reveal some of REX-1’s internal components. The hinges are tight enough to stay open without issue and the stuff inside is well-painted. It’s a nice touch.

“Oh, hey Rex, can you rewind this for me?”

Below the diaphragm joint is a waist twist that’s just a waist twist. The hips connect via ball and socket joints and this robot can basically do full splits and twist at the thigh. Kicking forward is not very good though. I don’t know if the joint is just super tight or if it’s ratcheted, but he really doesn’t want to go forward. I was able to force it two “clicks” which wasn’t enough to get either leg to horizontal. They don’t want to go back, and more often than not, when I try to kick the leg forward it feels like the peg is just bending and I’m not interested in breaking my new $50 toy to push it. I found more success going out to the side and then forward, but again, the figure feels like it doesn’t really want to kick forward and I feel like I’m playing with fire. The knee is a single hinge and doesn’t quite get to 90 degrees. Below that is a hinge and rocker combo at the ankle. Because of the big, gray, piece that goes over the foot and up the shin, it’s hard to really get at that hinge. It doesn’t seem to want to go forward much even though I can’t see anything stopping it and really only goes back for me. I have not heated anything, but at least the feet are tight so he isn’t falling over. The rocker works okay and I’m finding myself just adjusting his posing by widening his stance more often than not and using the rocker. He’s not the type of character that needs to do much, but the lower half is a bit disappointing.

“Why does this always happen?!”

These deluxe releases from NECA tend to come with a lot and REX-1 mostly lives up to that. He doesn’t have as much stuff as some of the past releases, or unique stuff, but he probably has enough. For hands, we get a whole bunch: fists, trigger finger hands, chop hands, wide open, and a right hand holding a hex nut. I think he was inspecting some evidence left behind in the show, but I can’t remember. I’m sure it’s scene specific. REX-1 also comes with his tongue. I wasn’t sure what the thing was when I pulled it out of the box and I’m thankful it was listed on the box. You can pivot his jaw down to reveal his “mouth” which is just a slot for the tongue. It’s cute, and likely something fun for toy photographers. Rex also has a pair of his sidearms. They’re a flat gray with some black linework and the trigger hands fit into them okay. They will leave behind white paint though, if you warm the hands up first that might help, but it’s just something you have to deal with. The guns can also peg into the gray circles on his hips for a holstered look and that works just fine. For when refreshment is needed, REX-1 also has a trusty can of oil to suck on. He has to use the same trigger hands for it, but they work fine. Again, be wary of paint rub. His last unique item is his controller which can be held by another character. It’s well-painted and looks just as good as the many other trinkets found in abundance with this line. Lastly, REX-1 has a trio of black VHS tapes for his reprogramming. They’re the same tapes we’ve seen with other releases so there’s nothing special here, but it’s a fun accessory and I’m happy to have more to pile up around the television set from the recently released accessory bundle.

“Hey! Sometimes a guy gets lonely!”

REX-1 was a release I think a lot of folks had been looking forward to and for them I think they’ll be pleased. The looks is what matters most with this line and NECA did a solid job in that regard. I do think some of the accuracy was sacrificed to make a more stable figure and I’m content with the trade-off, but others may not be. The paint has its issues, but overall does give the figure a more premium look. He has enough stuff, and the only real disappointment for me is the articulation. It’s never the strong suit of NECA, but I don’t like how scared I am of breaking this figure when I move the legs so that’s a bummer. And then of course there’s the price of $50. Compared to past NECA deluxe releases, it’s disappointing to see a rise in price without a rise in quality or components. Understanding that this is all unique tooling, but it’s always preferable to feel like you’re getting something extra when something suddenly costs more. That was true of Chrome Dome who really came loaded with stuff and I didn’t even blink at his price, but with REX-1 it’s not apparent. Does the figure need more? No, not really, but this is a line that likes to toss-in unrelated accessories just to flesh out some packaging and we don’t get any of that.

I guess he’s a baby sitter now?

At the same time, compare this release to other similarly priced figures and it doesn’t look so bad. NECA has been able to resist the price hikes we’ve seen with other toy producers so in a way they’re a victim of their own creation. Compare this to most of the Super7 Ultimates that come in at $55-$65 these days and the value appears tremendous. Unique tooling, lots of stuff, an abundance of paint apps – yeah, it’s no contest. And then compare it to Hasbro which recently announced a Spider-Man figure that’s 100% reuse for $35 and won’t have as much stuff as this figure and likely little paint and NECA looks even better. While I wish this guy came in at $40 or $45, I can’t really call it an outlier in the pricing department. I guess it is what it is and you’re either happy with it or you’re not. I am curious if NECA will try to reuse these molds for an “evil” REX-1 that was basically the same character model, but with a black and red look. Normally I’d say it’s a no-brainer, but does NECA think it can sell us the same figure twice at this price? Probably, but that remains to be seen. I don’t know if I’ll bother with that one if the time comes, but then again, I feel like I’ve said that a lot and here I am with a REX-1, Jersey Red, Grunt, and so on. If your collection needs REX-1 then you’ll probably want to get this. If you’re lukewarm on the character, then I’d understand passing especially considering how much stuff just got released. And if you’re having trouble finding this figure in-stores, you can try Target’s website tomorrow (as of this posting) at 9 AM EST when this figure is expected to be sold there. The obscure nature of the character and the price tag should make it a fairly easy release to get ahold of once the initial rush has subsided. Good luck and definitely don’t pay a scalper for this one.

More from NECA’s deluxe assortment of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:

NECA TMNT “The Colossal Chrome Dome” – Deluxe Chrome Dome

Many television shows have what is sometimes referred to as “event” episodes. These are often episodes that complete long-running arcs, have an extended runtime, and might even be featured in a more prominent timeslot. It’s usually something for shows that take themselves rather seriously do. A show that featured very little of this sort of…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Cartoon Metalhead

It took longer than anticipated, but at long last I now have a complete Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Wave 3 from NECA as I have in my hands the Deluxe Metalhead! Metalhead was released back in July alongside the Casey Jones and Slashed Foot Soldier set at Target stores in the US. While distribution numbers…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Cartoon “Another One Bites the Crust” Pizza Monster

When NECA launched its line of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures based on the classic cartoon series there was much rejoicing, followed by much consternation. The line was successful, some would say too successful. Product was hard to track down for collectors as only a handful of units were released to each store which…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Television, toys

February 28, 2023

NECA Cartoon TMNT Accessory Set

By Joe

We’re well into the cold of winter and spring feels like it’s just around the corner which means it must be time for another NECA Haulathon. Haulathon, if you don’t recall from last year, is basically a tandem promotion between NECA and Target which was just an excuse to get NECA some more visibility in store (and online) to sell a bunch of stuff to collectors. The tacky name certainly implies the two companies want a bit of a frenzy to be set-off that gets collectors storming into stores and ransacking the display leaving nothing but dust and empty shelves in their wake. Despite that feeling, it felt a bit more controlled in practice. Much of the stuff on sale had been made available via preorder months in advance so only a few items were actually brand new for TMNT collectors. That certainly helped, and when the promotion returned in the late summer it was done in pretty much the same fashion with only a handful of items being actually new to purchase.

That was the before times, this is now. NECA, for whatever reason, decided to do things differently for this latest Haulathon. Maybe there was pressure from Target to not offer pre-sales or maybe NECA just didn’t want to burden their own warehouse with individual orders? Or maybe there was such a backlog it made the logistics too cumbersome – I don’t know. What I do know is this latest incarnation of Haulathon cares not for your wallet. NECA has unleashed a vast assortment of product which is mostly concentrated to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles license. If you’re an all-in collector, prepared to get hurt. In the toon line alone, we’re getting five two-packs, one deluxe release, and an accessory set, which is the subject of today’s inaugural Haulathon 2023 post. I’ll skip the math, but it also comes with the unfortunate rise in prices that I think many were bracing for, but few may have expected to hit this hard. It would seem the standard price for a two-pack is now $60, up from $52 when the line launched. The movie two-packs already hit that price point so it wasn’t unexpected, but still disappointing. The lone deluxe figure shot way up though to $50, beating out the previous high of $40 set by Chrome Dome. As for the accessory set, it doesn’t really have a precedent since this is the first of its kind for the line. The movie series has had a pair of sets and I think the first was $50 and the second $60. Some other licenses that NECA dabbles in have come in lower, but this one is on the high end at $60. Expected? I suppose, but it would have been nice if it could have hit that $50 sweet spot. We’ll talk more about that later though, for now, all that matters is what’s in the box and is it worth getting?

“Finally, I gets some head protection.”

The toon accessory set has been a long time coming for collectors of this line. There are so many one-off items and smaller characters that made sense for such a thing. Plus we’ve seen the line already cram tons of little doodads into various releases because there is just so much. Every collector of this line likely has a container, drawer, whatever full of stuff with no where to put it all. The accessory set is going to add to that, but it’s also going to deliver some items meant to pair with the someday sewer lair. NECA showed off said lair last year at conventions and it was expected a portion of it would go up for sale in the fall, but that has yet to happen which almost leaves a pit in my stomach since NECA could come looking for more money any day now. That’s a problem for future me, and if NECA reads these, I beg of you to at least hold off a month or so before putting something like that up on your website! Some of us don’t expect to get tax refunds in April.

The accessory set comes housed in an oversized box with some toon-inspired artwork on the front showcasing a bunch of the items contained therein. On the reverse, we get some product shots and a partial list of the contents contained in the box. Unfortunately, there’s no window display so you won’t be able to inspect the contents before buying. It seems most stores are getting between 1 and 3 sets in this first wave of shipments and it’s been the early favorite of many as it’s flying off the shelves faster than anything else included with Haulathon. The store I found my set in only had the one, if others were there before I happened upon it I couldn’t tell. It was a packed endcap and this set had to be sort of wedged in on-top of other items just to fit. It’s possible there was only one sent to this store, and also possible the overflow was kept in the back to be put out later in the week -who knows? If you’re having trouble finding a set though, it’s expected to be made available this Friday (if you’re reading this the week this entry is posted) on Target’s website.

Who wants more Mousers and baby pizza monsters?

First thing we’ll talk about is the stuff that’s familiar. There’s a Mouser included and it’s just like the other Mousers we’ve received. Mine is stuck at the base of the neck, but is otherwise fine. There’s another pizza box of the hinged variety with a full pizza inside that’s removable. The deco this time around is Pizza Groove and it’s yet another box to add to the stack. There are two pizza monsters included in the set only this time it’s a new sculpt. That’s definitely welcomed as we have had multiple opportunities to get the other, standing, little, monster and I definitely didn’t need more of those. These ones are crawling and they look fine and should add a little variety to your display. Also returning is a VHS tape, this one with some yellow on the front where a label would be. The back of the box says there are two tapes included, but my set only had the one which seems to be the norm.

I do like this new Baxter portrait, though I’m surprised that the backpack doesn’t open.

That’s the new-old stuff, the rest is all new. We get a portrait of a wedge of cheese which I think is from Rat King’s lair? It’s something to be added to a diorama, I suppose, and by itself doesn’t really add much. There’s an oversized gem, the Star of Hoboken, which would make a nice centerpiece on a coffee table. There’s a little blow torch for when Donatello needs to “do machines,” but no flame effect included which is a bit of a bummer. We get a turtle-themed backpack which can fit on any of the heroes if you would like, though it can’t open. There’s also a ray gun, which is how the box labels it. I’m sure it’s pulled from a specific episode and possibly has a specific purpose, but I don’t recall it. At least it’s something to broaden the weaponry of turtle foes (even though it’s Michelangelo who is pictured on the box holding it). Lastly, we have a few accessories that definitely feel specific to previously released figures. The first is Rocksteady’s helmet which he wore during the original mini series and maybe a few times after. He was predominantly without it, but since the original Playmates figure had one, many still associate the character with the helmet. It’s just an olive drab dome with goggles molded onto it and it looks fine. I feel like it could have used some more linework or something to make it pop more like a lot of the accessories in this line, but NECA opted to keep it simple. We also get the Turtle Tracker, which is a handheld device used by Baxter. It looks pretty cool and it’s a rather involved sculpt which perhaps is what made it difficult to incorporate into another release. And then lastly, we have a new head for Baxter. I’m happy to say this one has his glasses (my previous Baxter came missing them and NECA has yet to replace it) and he’s also wearing Shredder’s helmet. This is from a season two episode (“The Curse of the Evil Eye”) where he briefly usurps Shredder with some magical device. I think his face looks better than the standard one and I’m left wishing the helmet and hair on that release were removable, but oh well. The helmet had a gem on the front of it in the episode which is not present for some reason.

Because the collection just wouldn’t be complete without Big MACC.
This brings new meaning to the phrase “Big MACC Attack.”

That stuff is the window dressing for this set. The filler, if you will. I suppose some really wanted that Rocksteady helmet and I know of a few who weren’t happy with how the Baxter figure turned out so they may welcome the new head. The real selling points for this set are the next few items we’re going to talk about. Up first is Big MACC. He’s a robot from an early episode that’s basically a foe, but by the end of the episode has been converted to an ally. He’s got a bit of a Short Circuit vibe to his design, but he’s essentially a set of treads with a body on top. As a figure, it’s very light and feels quite delicate. The base is hollow while the torso is connected to the apparatus below it with a double ball peg so it can twist and pivot. The arms are connected via double ball pegs so they rotate and have some pivot to them as well. There’s a hinge for an elbow joint on each and the head is joined to the neck via a double ball peg. There’s nothing at the hands and the big gun which is affixed to a tail of sorts has no articulation aside from a swivel. I’m a little surprised it’s not on a bendy wire, but I guess it’s fine. MACC is made of a hard plastic though so everything feels especially delicate. There’s a second gun plugged into his head which can be removed and replaced with a filler piece which is a nice touch. The main body is all white with black linework and it’s applied very clean. If you wanted a Big MACC figure, you have it, and it’s fine. I wish the hands could rotate and I’m surprised the base can’t, but he’s just a set and forget it kind of figure.

This might seem kind of silly to outsiders, but this TV is awesome. And here’s the cheese picture, since I forgot to include it in the shot of “new” stuff.

Our next item is one that will serve a greater purpose when the lair is available and it’s the television. This all plastic TV is an entirely new mold from the TV we’ve seen NECA release via other sets in the past. It’s a wood panel TV with dials and it has the missing front leg which has been replaced with a stack of books. On top of the TV we get a VCR and some rabbit ears for optimal reception. What’s neat is the VCR can actually accept one of the VHS tapes NECA has released and included in this set. It doesn’t have a little flap or anything, but it’s still a fun touch. The sculpt and paint are a bit plain, but it does have the added effect of featuring a removable top and a slot for the screen. NECA included 9 pieces of glossy cardstock to serve as the screens. They all feature different images so your turtles can watch a variety of programs. One is also clearly an old video game and NECA included a game console as well! It kind of resembles a Super Nintendo, but with a sleeker design. The controllers are more 2600 though and they’re connected to the console via a soft wire each. There’s a peg hole on the back of it which I’m not sure what that’s intended for, but it’s a neat little inclusion even though it doesn’t connect to the TV in any way. I’m betting the one in the show didn’t either.

They’re so cute!

The TV would be the star of the set if not for the inclusion of the baby turtles, or turtle toddlers. There was an episode where the turtles were transformed into child versions of themselves and NECA has included those characters in this set. All four are essentially the same mold, but with a different head and belt buckle. They’re quite dainty standing at around 2.38″ each. Donatello has a nervous expression, Mikey a big smile, Leo a more subdued smile, and Raph looks pissed. Each also comes with tiny versions of their signature weapons and Mikey’s even feature actual chains. They can’t store their weapons, but they couldn’t in the episode either. The figures are all well painted, but NECA decided not to attempt its form of cel-shading with these guys (they also didn’t with Big MACC). There’s still plenty of linework and the paint is applied rather well. There’s also a little articulation built into them. We have a ball joint at the head, hinged shoulders that rotate, ball-socketed hips, and hinged ankles with a rocker. The ankles feel pretty delicate and it’s hard to tell if the ankle is rocking or just stressing the peg. Definitely be careful. There’s also a lot of weight on the back of these guys due to the shell which makes standing them a challenge. Stepping poses help, or just lurching them forward can help too. I actually could get one-footed stances as well which surprised me. There’s no peg holes in the feet so I may end up using some sticky tack in the end to keep these little guys secure and I do wish they came with little stands to help. They can sit, but not very well, but well enough to stabilize them by holding into something. Ultimately though, they’re super cute and that’s what they’re meant to be. Chances are, if you’re interested in this set it’s due to the inclusion of the baby turtles. Now we just need the geriatric turtles to complete the set!

Just passing the time.

Accessory sets are a bit of an odd thing to review, but there you go. It’s definitely the type of item that the completist collector will get the most out of. There’s some deep pull accessories and definitely a bunch of this stuff will work better with the lair. I’m definitely happy to have the TV and I think NECA would be foolish to not make sure that everyone who wants that item can get it because it will help sell that aforementioned lair. I’m actually surprised it’s not included with that. The baby turtles are pretty wonderful and I’m happy to have them. Big MACC is okay, I didn’t need it, but I don’t hate having it. That’s likely why the character is in here. And I will get some use out of that alternate Baxter head. The rest is just stuff that I have no attachment to. It’s filler, some of which will go into my display and some won’t. Is it worth 60 bucks? Ehh, that’s a tough call. We probably could have got the baby turtles in a set similar to the Mouser one which was 30 or 35 bucks. These little guys sold that way with maybe a few of these items tossed in would have sold me. The only thing I “needed” other than them was the TV, which I think could have come with the lair, but maybe it couldn’t? Hopefully it not being sold there means that item will be a little easier on the wallet? That’s probably a pipe dream. I don’t want to speculate on the cost of that, but the street scene was $150 I think so it’s not going to come cheap. Let’s just hope NECA gives us a little breather before that thing goes up for sale.

NECA TMNT Cartoon The Wrath of Krang!

We’re back for 2021, and right now it looks like a lot like 2020 as we have a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figure to talk about – Android Krang! Hopefully, this doesn’t mean 2021 is a lot like 2020 going forward, but if it’s going to copy anything from 2020 then let it…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA Cartoon TMNT Premonition of a Premutation SDCC 4-Pack

It was a little over a month ago that San Diego Comic Con occurred, in person, for the first time since 2019. This was cause for a celebration, even if for those of us who take in the convention from the comfort of our homes saw little change. Even without the event taking place the…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Turtles in Disguise

When NECA started on this journey into the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon it first began with a video game. An adaptation of a video game, to be more precise. The 2016 San Diego Comic Con exclusive contained a four pack of the famous, green, pizza destroyers in a pixel deco. They were the first…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Television, toys

January 31, 2023

NECA The Last Ronin (Armored)

By Joe
The last of the TMNT has arrived!

When it comes to multimedia based on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, we find ourselves in a rare dry spell when it comes to television and movies. The final episode of Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles aired in 2020 with no new television series announced since. The show did receive a long-delayed finale in the form of a movie released on Netflix last year, but that hardly makes up for the otherwise lack of presence for TMNT on TV or on the big screen. The last transitions were much quicker when it came to the 2003 series to the 2012 series to Rise, but the dearth may soon be over as there is a new movie scheduled to arrive this summer. We’ll have to wait and see what that means for the franchise, but one aspect of TMNT has just continued plugging along and it’s the comics from IDW. There’s a main series that’s been running for years now, but much of the attention has been sucked up by the sidestory, The Last Ronin.

The Last Ronin is a flash-forward to a possible end for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles when the lone surviving turtle has long graduated from the term “teenage.” I covered every issue here and found it to be mostly entertaining, but what I really loved about it were the character designs. Upon reading that very first issue one of my takeaways was “Man, it would be really cool to get an action figure of this guy.” NECA’s Randy Falk agreed when he basically gushed over the series so it was not a surprise at all when the company unveiled their own take on The Last Ronin.

This guy is certainly a different style of turtle from what we’re accustomed to seeing.

The titular turtle arrives in the standard NECA Ultimates box with a fifth panel and artwork on the front. The art comes straight from IDW’s Ben Bishop and Luis Antonio Delgado. It’s mixed with product shots on the rear and inside panel and it’s the type of packaging that will likely catch the eye of someone who hasn’t been paying attention to TMNT and stumbles across it in Target. And how could it not? This figure depicts The Last Ronin, who I will just call Ronin from here on out since I remain committed to not spoiling anything, as he appears in issue number one. He’s sporting the black bandana, heavy hooded jacket, full pants, shoes, and gloves. Basically, he looks the opposite of how most envision a ninja turtle as he is covered from head to toe. Well, he has sandals on so I guess not head to toe literally, but the point remains. The turtles usually run around all but naked, but this guy does not. He’s also a hell of a lot taller than your standard turtle coming in at about 6.5″ to the top of his head, a little taller with the hood. This is in stark contrast to the old Mirage turtles or the cartoon ones, though a bit closer to the movie figures. In fairness, the Ultimates line from NECA is usually treated as a 7″ scale line whereas the cartoon line is closer to a 1:12 line. It’s not a huge difference, but worth mentioning. Despite that though, this turtle is supposed to be bigger than the rest. I think the reason given is because he continued to mutate the older he got. In the books, I want to say he’s taller than April or at least as tall, which is in contrast to the turtles normally being shorter than her. He’s also bulkier, wider, and less lean. At the same time, the head is smaller than usual and the limbs longer. He’s an altogether different sort of turtle than we’re used to seeing.

This comparison needed to happen.

The sculpt for this one was handled by Paul Harding and he continues to impress whenever he’s handed something TMNT related by NECA. There’s a lot of detail on this guy that might not jump out right from the start, but a closer examination reveals a truly impressive figure. The face looks great. He’s got his teeth gritting, there’s wrinkles in the flesh, and the eyes are focused and angry. This is an older turtle and that point is driven home when you pop the hood off to reveal the ages spots on the top of the head. The hood just clips into the back of the head so it doesn’t pose a problem when posing and there’s an optional bandana “tail” if you prefer, though no down hood accessory like we saw with Renet. There’s great texturing on the jacket and shoulder pads with almost a mesh texture on the sleeves and undershirt. The pads and forearm gauntlets have some nice aging done to them to make it look like this is a turtle who has been in a few scraps. There’s detailing with black line work, as has been customary with all of the comic styled turtles from NECA, and a healthy dose of shading. Because this character is so muted in contrast with more colorful portrayals, the paint doesn’t scream out for attention like it did with the Utrom, but it’s still very clean and very well applied. Because he has a coat, this is the rare TMNT figure without an exposed shell, but you can get a sense that it’s there due to the subtle nature in which the creases are sculpted into the body. The rear also features the hoop and rope that is famously depicted on the cover of the first issue. NECA chose to do it with a combination of a sculpted ring and brown thread. It works into the body and I’m guessing it’s tied off somewhere inside of the figure, but it is a bit fragile looking so beware. And since that ring contains two hoops for weapon storage, you have to be very careful when inserting and removing weapons. Or at least, I’m making the assumption that you should be careful when doing so.

Which turtle is he? Does it matter when he’s got the equipment to be all of them?

This turtle has a bit of an awkward look to him compared with the usual turtle, but he still has all of the articulation we’ve come to expect. And actually, with no visible shell he’s basically freed up to have a bit more than usual. The head sits on a double ball peg, but it sits right on top of the figure with barely any neck. I guess it’s due to the clothing? The look is right, but the lack of a neck means he has minimal range. He can rotate, but up and down is barely there and there’s not much nuance posing to speak of. The shoulders are ball-hinged and they’re a little tight. He can’t quite get to a horizontal pose, but can rotate around with the shoulder pads only impacting that part a little. The elbows are the controversial NECA double elbows with a hinge and swivel at the top and bottom. With a sleeved figure, it works fine and it isn’t the eyesore it is on a figure with bare arms. Still, I don’t know that it was the right call as we’ve seen the traditional double elbow work fine with the movie figures and the larger scaled figures and here we basically just get to a 90 degree bend. The forearm gauntlets really get the in the way of the bottom hinge being able to do much of anything. The swivel at both points works fine. At the wrists, we have the usual swivel and hinge and, I know I must sound like a broken record at this point, but NECA went with the wrong hinge once again for the gripping hands. This guy has a ton of weapons so it really sucks that he has horizontal hinges instead of vertical ones. This is a figure that should have both, but he lacks the ones he really needs most and it’s a shame. At the waist, we get a twist which is unusual for a turtle, but with no visible shell it’s not an issue here. It feels like a ball-peg, but you basically get nothing other than rotation at the spot. At the hips, the usual ball and socket are present and they get to almost a full split. There’s a little thigh rotation and double-jointed knees that bend past 90. At the ankles, we get a swivel plus hinges and an ankle rocker and they work okay. The ankle doesn’t go as far back as I’d like due to the shape of the shoe, but it goes forward pretty far. Usually it’s the opposite.

He can balance on one foot, so he’s got that going for him.

The end result is you get a figure that poses just alright. There’s not a ton of dynamic range here, but he is a bulkier turtle than we’re used to so not a ton was expected. He has these nice, big, feet so he can do some one-foot poses if you wish. The hips allow for some wide stances so he can look fairly menacing if you need him to. With this design, I am left wishing that NECA experimented with a butterfly joint so we could have a figure that can reach across its body, but I’m not aware of any NECA figure having that style of joint so that’s not something I could have expected. There’s just some two-handed poses I wish he could do with his weapons that he just can’t. I also feel like the heads needs to be better. Sit the head a little higher and that probably solves the issue. He’s a turtle, after all, he can have a neck.

Weapon storage for days!

The articulation, shortcomings and all, is probably still as expected. Where this figure is going to shine is with the overall presentation and the extras, and this guy has a lot of extras. Let’s start with the extra parts, shall we? Ronin has one extra head featuring a screaming or yelling expression. It’s every bit as good as the default one and it’s hard to pick a favorite. Popping one off for the other is also easy so changing things up is actually encouraged. There are two bandana tails, one is a swoop and the other goes straight back. They just peg in so they can be rotated. He also has his goggles which are sculpted plastic with an elastic band. To get them on, you will want to take the hood or bandana off first, slip the goggles over that, and then replace either the hood or bandana. This keeps the elastic under whatever is pegged in which will help to keep the goggles on as this guy’s head is basically a sphere so that elastic just wants to slide off right away. It’s definitely tricky to do with the hood, but pretty easy without. You could also just stick the goggles under the head which is how he carries them in the comic. For hands, we have fists, gripping, and open. The right gripping hand appears to be slightly more relaxed than the left with more spacing between the fingers which makes it good for the included sai if you want to put the center blade in between the fingers, which is always a popular look for TMNT even if it’s not exactly practical in a fight.

Given all of the stuff he comes with, hard to imagine going with a bo pose on the shelf.
You prefer your turtle with shades?
The little gizmos are fine, but probably destined for a drawer somewhere.
I’m having a hard time settling on a preferred head with this guy.

That lone sai is one of many weapons Ronin comes with. The idea is that this guy is like four turtles in one so he has the weapons of all. That means in addition to the sai he has one set of nunchaku, a katana, and a bo staff. The sai is a great sculpt. It’s a bit wider than usual and quite rigid and pointy. The “metal” has a nice luster and finish to it and it might be my favorite sai that NECA has done. The nunchaku feature two plastic handles connected via a real chain. The handles have a sculpted grip to them that looks nice and is different from the usual taped look we get. The bo staff is a bo staff. It has some tape and it’s well-sculpted and it looks fine. The katana is quite lovely. It’s long like a katana should be with a curved blade. The handle is lovingly sculpted and the paintjob is pristine as it has the same finish as the sai. The blade has some nicks carved into it making it look like a well-worn sword, but also one that has been lovingly cared for. It comes with an included black sheath which slots into one of the loops on the ring on the figure’s rear. There’s another slot there for the bo as well. The sai and nunchaku each have their own place on his belt and there’s a third loop on said belt for his tonfa. The tonfa is one of Ronin’s seemingly preferred weapons and it has a square design and it certainly looks like something you wouldn’t want to get struck with. It’s a little tough getting it into the belt loop, but it can be done and he can store all of his weapons. He also has a grappling hook which is a plastic claw type of instrument with more brown thread affixed to it. It can be wrapped around a stored weapon or bundled up and crammed through an unoccupied belt loop if you want. It’s kind of tough to pose since the rope is a literal string, but it’s cool to have. Lastly, we have a handful of throwables. Ronin has four shurikens which are really pointy. They’re presented in a gunmetal color and he can hold them between a thumb and finger. The last item is a grenade. It’s a tiny spherical object that can basically just be placed in one of the open hands or a gripping hand, though it more rests within them as opposed to being gripped. He has no storage for the shurikens or grenade so try not to lose them.

This dude, simply put, is bad ass.

All of these elements add up to one impressive release from NECA. This figure of The Last Ronin is one of the best figures released in 2022. It perfectly captures the look of the character from the comic which is a comic that I think is going to be highly regarded years from now as one of the best TMNT stories ever told. This figure isn’t perfect, but it is very good and it’s just the start. NECA released alongside it an unarmored variant which they rather cleverly bundled with the missing tonfa (Ronin had two) and broken katana featured in the story which encourages collectors to get both even if they prefer one look to the other. I’m tempted by that other one, but haven’t taken the plunge just yet. More are coming as NECA has decided to make The Last Ronin a full-fledged subline for TMNT. Flashback versions of the turtles and Splinter are coming as are two versions of the Foot Patrolbot. I think I’m all-in so if you’re curious about any of those releases check back as they start to make their way to stores. It sounds like Leonardo is up next, but we’ll have to wait and see. This line has the potential to be the best TMNT subline NECA has going, and given the quality of the cartoon, Mirage, and movie lines that’s saying something.

Check out more of our Last Ronin coverage:

Playmates TMNT The Last Ronin PX Previews Exclusive (Chase)

A few years ago, Mattel launched a new subline of action figures based on their most famous IP: Masters of the Universe. The subline was titled Origins and it basically took the vintage toys of the 80s and updated them with more modern articulation while still preserving that vintage aesthetic. And ever since then, collectors…

Keep reading
by Joe

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – The Last Ronin

I don’t read a lot of comics these days. Actually, I suppose I never truly read a lot of comics even when I was very much into X-Men and Spider-Man. Back in the 90s, I received most of my comic lore from trading cards. They were cheaper and fun to collect. When it came to…

Keep reading
by Joe

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – The Last Ronin #5

After lending Tuesday to the gargoyles for one week, the turtles are back on Turtle Tuesday and this time it’s for the latest (and final) issue in the The Last Ronin storyline. The Last Ronin is a concept for the final story of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles dating back to the days of Eastman…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Comics, toys

January 24, 2023

NECA Mirage Studios TMNT Casey Jones

By Joe

Casey has arrived to bust some skulls.

Where there be turtles, there be Casey Jones – the bad ass vigilante of New York City! Casey was an early addition to the comics and he’s basically been included with every iteration of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles since. And in all of them he tends to wear a hockey mask and bludgeons bad guys with sports equipment. It’s a pretty simple design, but it has stood the test of time. When NECA Toys started dipping its toe into TMNT back in 2008 it was probably assumed that Casey was on the short list of figures the company was likely to put out. Unfortunately, the line only extended one figure past the turtles (April) and fans never got their favorite vigilante in plastic. Things have changed since then and Casey Jones is no stranger to NECA or plastic. He’s been released as part of the toon line and received three separate releases in the movie line. And now, at long last, he finds himself released as part of NECA’s line of action figures based on the artwork of Mirage Studios.

How many Caseys is too many? And I even skipped one of the movie releases.

Casey Jones comes in the now standard single pack release. It’s a trapezoidal window box emblazoned with original artwork by TMNT co-creator Kevin Eastman. There’s product shots on the rear and a little cross-sell on the bottom. I’ll say upfront that this release from NECA is slightly controversial among some of the more hardcore members of the TMNT collector community. Like Renet before him, Casey comes in his reinterpreted IDW colors. That means a gray shirt instead of a red one and brown shoes in place of his black ones. I don’t know why NECA is doing things this way, but it looks like a red variant is coming too. Will it be stuck behind that Auto T bullshit the Mirage-accurate blue Renet was? Probably, but that hasn’t been confirmed. One would think the standard colors would be the standard release with the modern variant the slightly more expensive specialty option, but then that would make too much sense, now wouldn’t it? For all I know, this is the preferred look of the character by someone like Kevin Eastman. Personally, I don’t care that much because I’m used to seeing these books in black and white. Mirage Casey Jones is black and white in my head even though he had a red shirt on the cover of the Raphael one-shot. And unlike Renet, where I most definitely preferred the blue outfit to the red one, with Casey I’m less definitive. Red, gray, – it’s just a shirt. He at least stands out on my shelf a bit more considering the Foot all wear red and there’s Renet as well, but I certainly wouldn’t complain if he had a red shirt either. I guess if it’s that important to you then wait and find out how the red version is getting released. Or paint the damn thing yourself.

Casey seems to share some parts with the Foot.
He’s not exactly equipped to handle the Utrom, but then again, neither are the turtles.

With that out of the way, lets look at the figure for what it is. Casey Jones stands approximately 6.5″ tall which feels right for the line. He’s comprised largely of parts reused from Shredder and the Foot as he has the same upper arms, thighs, and probably torso as those releases. What’s new is the shirt overlay for the torso, the hands, calves, shoes, forearms, and namely the head. His default portrait is masked and I like that the mask is a separate piece that’s glued down to the face. It gives it some nice depth, even though the eye slits are painted and we don’t need to see his eyes underneath it. It’s very similar to the cartoon figure’s mask, but it is different and looks just as cool as it always does. There’s paint basically everywhere on this guy with a lot of black linework throughout which really helps it to pop on a shelf. He’s depicted in sweat pants and they have some sculpted wrinkles in them and the lower leg is a bit baggy which looks nice. This is a very lean Casey, which does match-up with how he was drawn in the comics. He’s not as bulky as the toon version, but he’s menacing enough in appearance. Despite that, I do wish he had a little extra bulk in the midsection as there’s a lot of plastic for the hips, especially on the rear of the figure, which is a little unsightly. Overall, he looks good, it’s just a character design that’s not made to impress so he’s a bit less exciting than someone like Renet or the Utrom.

You gotta have the hockey stick!

In terms of accessories, NECA outfitted Casey with a decent allotment. He’s basically known for having a bunch of weapons at his disposal, so NECA gave him his customary hockey stick, a pair of baseball bats, and a golf club. The stick and bats all feature sculpted tape around portions of them and are well-painted. The two bats are identical, which is a bit of a bummer, but I get why NECA wouldn’t want to sculpt two different ones for this release. At the same time, we’ve seen bats in other lines so it feels like they could have pulled from there. The club is a white wood style club and it looks fine, though it’s comically small. I’m not a big golfer or anything, but I have played the game and own a set of a clubs so I know how big they’re supposed to be. This club barely comes up past Casey’s knee so he must have found a youth model or something. It’s also very thin so he doesn’t grip it that well with two of his gripping hands. All of the weapons can be stored in his equipment bag. It has a square design to it so I’m not entirely sure what it’s supposed to be. It doesn’t look like a normal sports equipment bag or a golf bag, but it works. It’s easy to get onto the figure and looks fine. It’s brown and features the same black line work as the figure so it has a nice appearance.

I’m sure it wouldn’t feel too nice to get smashed over the head with this driver, but it sure is comically small.

Casey also has a few extra parts he can make use of. For one, he has a set of fists and a set of gripping hands. He wears fingerless gloves and those details are painted on. The gloves begin just past the hinge so that doesn’t get in the way and I can’t tell just which part of the hand is painted. Is it the gray glove portion or the fingers? Either way, the colors look fine and I’m not seeing any paint rub on the weapons so that’s a good thing. I do wish he had a different set of hands than the fists though. His gripping hands basically look like fists when he’s not holding anything so they feel redundant. Maybe some open hands, a finger pointing hand, or just different degrees of gripping hands would have been a better use of the budget. And this figure does commit the sin of not having the proper hinge on the gripping hands. Casey should have a vertical hinge, but instead he gets the mostly useless horizontal design. He has one extra, right, gripping hand as well and I think it’s meant for the golf club as it’s the only hand that gets a decent hold on that item. He does get an extra head and this one is unmasked. He’s a pretty ugly dude though so you might prefer to leave the mask on. He looks as he should, so that’s not a criticism of the figure, just the reality of the character design. Lastly, just like the movie version, he comes with a mask that can either be held or hung from the handle of one of his weapons stored in his bag. It looks quite nice and it’s a different mold from the mask on the default head as the eye slits are open. The straps are a soft plastic and, if you really want to, it can fit over the unmasked head, but you’re far better off just displaying him with the masked head than going this route unless you really like the look of the eyes from behind the mask.

A face only a mother could love.
It fits!

That takes us to articulation and if you have Shredder or the Foot from this line then you know what you’re in for. The head is on a double-ball peg and he can look down okay and rotate, but looking up is blocked some by the hair. He can look up, it’s just only a little. He does have some nuance posing there, so overall I like it. The shoulders are your typical ball hinges. He has a hard time getting his arms up to a horizontal position, but the shirt is cut back enough that rotation isn’t a problem. I do wish NECA would improve these shoulders though as it’s a consistent issue. There’s a biceps swivel and double-jointed elbows that bend past 90 degrees with ease. He is fully painted so you may need to heat some of the joints, but for me, my figure was fine out of the box. We already mentioned the wrists and in the torso he has some kind of diaphragm joint that isn’t usable because of the shirt overlay. It feels like a ball joint and you get the tiniest amount of range there, so little that it’s not worth counting. The waist twist is fine, but not the prettiest due to how slender his abdomen is in relation to the pants. A ball joint probably would have looked nice and might have also functioned better. At the hips we have the standard ball and socket. Even with the “diaper” piece, Casey can damn near hit a full split so that’s good. They’re also not loose which is even better. There is a thigh twist there that works quite well and the knees are double-jointed and go past 90. There is a boot swivel at the top of the shoe and at the ankle we have a hinge and rocker. The range on the hinge is pretty poor as it only goes back a little and barely any forward. The ankle rocker also isn’t the best as it’s pretty steep and limited, plus it also feels a bit gummy so I’m worried that I’m stressing the peg more than spinning it on the joint.

“Enough standing around, let’s kick some ass!”

The articulation is rather basic. It’s par for the course for this mold and this line in general as NECA definitely does not prioritize making super-articulated figures. They want it to look like the comic first and foremost and then add a suitable amount of articulation where it makes the most sense. As a result, we have a figure that doesn’t really feature any eyesores brought on by the articulation, but it also isn’t very dynamic. The wrist hinges and the ankles are my biggest areas for critique, and to a lesser extent, the waist and shoulders. The limited ankle articulation makes him harder to stand than expected, and it’s not helped by the added weight on the figure’s back brought on by the bag. He’s not as tipsy as the movie Casey, but I do feel like NECA could have done better at the ankles. The wrists are what they are and it’s something NECA has lately been overlooking, unfortunately. I would like them to make it a point of emphasis going forward. I also do think they could have done the shirt overlay a little differently to give us some added range in the diaphragm. It shouldn’t be that hard to at least give us some twist there and I don’t think much sacrifice in the sculpt would have been needed, if any. I think it’s something just brought on by the desire to reuse parts for the torso from figures that had a full shirt and were never going to move there anyway so there was no reason to engineer it differently. Considering they’re planning on two releases, at least, for this figure, maybe a little extra tooling could have been done?

“When you’re the best of friends…”

At the end of the day, if you want a Casey Jones for your Mirage Studios TMNT display you’re going to get this figure. Or you’re going to get the red one. Or you’re going to get both! And I think, for the most part, those who do pick this figure up will be content with the end product. He looks pretty nice, there’s a decent amount of articulation, and he has the weapons most expected. I have some nitpicks with the figure and those nitpicks combined with the character having a less than impressive design result in me viewing this one as the weakest in the Mirage line, but that doesn’t him bad or anything. He’s pretty average for a NECA release, and at least for NECA, that’s still a good product. The paint is clean, I had no stuck joints, and perhaps most importantly, the price isn’t too bad. You should be able to find this figure at specialty shops and even Walmart where he’ll range from $35-$38 and that’s not bad in today’s climate. If the red version does end up being an Auto T release, expect to have to shell out $40 for that one. For some, the character has to have a red shirt and I get that, but for me, I’ll pocket the five bucks and go gray.

More from NECA and Casey Jones!

NECA TMNT Mirage Studios Renet

Welcome to the first Turtle Tuesday of 2023! 2022 is the year that NECA returned to the Mirage Studios subline of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures it started way back in 2008. When the line was announced to return, it was essentially taking the place of the Turtles in Time figures that had been…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Movie Ultimate Casey Jones

I swear this blog is not just a NECA Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles blog, even though that’s what it has looked like lately. I’ve just been getting crushed with new releases lately, but it looks like a drought of some length will be incoming soon. Before that can happen though we need to talk about…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Cartoon Casey Jones and Slashed Foot Soldier

Something that is likely common to most of humanity is a desire to be successful. We all measure success differently, be it professional, financial, or something else, but we all strive for it. And sometimes success can feel like a burden. Take NECA’s line of action figures based on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles property.…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Comics, toys

January 17, 2023

NECA TMNT Mirage Studios Utrom

By Joe
Raise your hand if you knew who this was. Be honest!

We’ve become so accustomed to having the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in our lives that the name of the franchise has almost lost all meaning. Well, maybe not all, but I feel we mostly have lost sight of how ridiculous a concept this franchise is. And it extends to other characters in the franchise and I’m talking about Krang. Krang from the cartoon series is an oversized, talking, somewhat monstrous brain. In the context of the show, he’s perhaps not as outlandish a design as he would be in another show, but he’s still pretty out there. And then you add in his body. A large, bald, man in a red diaper and suspenders. Krang can’t go in his head like a normal brain would because then he’d no longer be visible so he has to go in the body’s stomach. I think it’s Vernon who draws attention to this factor in the fifth episode of the series when he sounds positively repulsed at the sight of a man with his brain in his stomach, and he’s right to be grossed out! Krang is one of the craziest designs from a popular franchise that I can think of.

These two make quite a couple.

And if you have a deep familiarity with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles then you know Krang is taken from the original comics, only there his race of beings were called the Utrom. There weren’t many (any?) that were actually named, they were just alien brains that got around in robotic bodies. Like Krang, they controlled those bodies from the stomach area, but unlike Krang their bodies were far more mechanical looking. Think the endoskeletons from Terminator, as that’s more in-line for how they appeared. They were foes to the turtles, but also tied in with their origin, and I’d elaborate more, but ever since the 2012 show came along the Utrom and the Kraang from that series kind of run together in my head. Needless to say, they play a significant enough role in the original comics that an action figure from NECA made sense.

The Utrom from NECA stands at right around 6.625″ in height. It comes in the standard window box packaging with new artwork from Kevin Eastman on the box depicting the character. On the rear are product shots and a cross-sell for more figures in the line. Let’s just get right to the big talking point with this guy: the paint job. This figure is gorgeously painted. If you thought the Fugitoid figure looked terrific, wait until you see this. It is fantastic! I am in love with how this figure turned out. It’s sculpted in a light blue plastic, like a periwinkle, with white accents painted onto parts of it to go along with the usual black linework this line is known for. There’s also a hit from an airbrush that contains some gray paint and the effect is just wonderful. This looks like it jumped off of the the page, colored version, and I just love how stylized this looks. This is what I want from action figures based on comics. You can’t sculpt it in chrome, and just making shiny plastic isn’t going to achieve the same end result. The eyes are also painted yellow with a hit of yellow from the airbrush to create the illusion that they’re glowing. The Utrom in the figure’s stomach is also well-painted. The eyes and teeth are clean and there’s a wash applied to really bring out the nasty with this little guy. And with this amount of paint on the figure, there’s virtually no slop. No stuck joints. It’s about as perfect a paint job as one could get in this price range. If I have any nits to pick with it, it’s that a couple hits of the white look a little thin. Maybe the neck area and some of the details on the arms could have used another hit of the airbrush, but that’s all minor and just me trying to poke holes in this thing because, otherwise, it’s awesome.

The sculpt and paint on this guy are just incredible.

The wonderful thing about this figure too is it has a sculpt to match. There are tons of little details in the arms, especially, that look like wires and little machinations. I love the contrast of the smooth plates on the figure’s thighs and the ribbed portions underneath. The rear of the figure is really loaded with sculpted details which is commendable since that’s a spot NECA could have cheaped out on, but obviously did not. It all speaks really well to NECA as a company because they’re clearly committed to delivering the best, most accurate, representation of the character possible. Who knows if much or any of this figure can even be reused for other figures. I’m sure we’ll get a variant at some point, but we have numerous examples of other companies just half-assing their sculpts to present a compromised vision of a character in the interest of saving money on tooling and NECA is just putting them to shame. And something I should praise NECA for more often than I do is that they credit the folks who design their figures so a major shout out and hearty congratulations to sculptors Brodie Perkins and Josh Sutton with paint credited to Geoff Trapp and Mike Puzzo. We should also probably give a shout out to director Trevor Zammit as I assume he’s the one pushing to make these look like the source material and he just does a fantastic job with all of the TMNT lines he oversees at NECA.

And if you thought they would cheap out on the figure’s rear you’d have been wrong.

We’ve gushed over the look of this one, now let’s talk about the stuff it comes with. The Utrom has three sets of hands: fists, gripping, and trigger finger. All of the hands feature the horizontal hinge, our first disappointment of the release, but I do like that the fingers are soft plastic and getting the accessories into the trigger hands is relatively easy and free of paint rub. He also has a gun and it has a really fun design as it has these panels over it. It has some linework on it and the muzzle is painted rather simply, but well. There’s two red tools for the figure to wield. One resembles a wrench and the other is a bit more nondescript. I’m guessing it’s pulled right from the comic, but I don’t know exactly what it is. He also has a little canister with a straw in it. I think this is a drink for that actual Utrom in the belly, the only problem is he doesn’t hold it very well. The fingers on the trigger hands are flexible enough that you can wedge it in there with some effort, but a more relaxed hand would have worked better. Lastly, we have a second portrait for the robot that features battle damage. It’s right eye is hanging out and there’s a big gouge taken out of the top of the head that looks really cool. It’s nice enough that the temptation is there to get another figure, I just wish he had more battle damaged parts to swap to or even a second Utrom with a different expression to create a bit more variety. The Utrom that came in the comic con 4-pack years ago is much too big to fit in this guy.

Bang!

The accessories are solid leaving just the articulation for us to talk about. Like most of the figures in this line, the articulation isn’t going to be the strongest aspect of the release, but I think it’s going to be enough. There’s a ball joint in the head that provides rotation and some nuance posing. It looks down well, but not up. The shoulders are ball-hinged and you get all of the rotation you need, but the boxy shape of the shoulder means the figure can’t raise its arms out to the side. You get maybe 45 degrees there. There is a biceps swivel and it’s integrated very well into the sculpt. The elbow hinge is only a single hinge, but the design allows it to go past 90 degrees so that’s fine. The wrists swivel and hinge and I already mentioned the direction of the hinges is unfortunate. In the diaphragm, we do have a ball joint above the opening for the Utrom. It’s actually more functional than I expected as you get a little forward and back, some tilt, and a fair amount of rotation. At the waist is another twist and the hips are the standard ball and socket joint. There’s a thigh pivot there that provides just a little something for adjustment poses as opposed to a full thigh twist. The legs kick forward to a full horizontal position, though they do drift out from the body a little the higher you go. There’s no range going back, and the single-jointed hinge will get you a 90 degree bend. At the ankles we have a hinge that allows for plenty of range backwards, but nothing forward. The ankle rocker works fine. It’s decent and I think it’s enough for this character. He can do plenty of one-handed gun poses. I do think NECA could have sacrificed a little bit in the sculpt at the shoulders for more range, and the lack of vertical hinges for the hands is an ongoing problem. The actual Utrom in the body is not articulated, but I don’t think it needs to be.

Hydration is importnt!
“I told you, Jerry, you can’t fit!”
He’s a sharing kind of alien brain.

The Utrom may not be a character that gets a lot of TMNT collectors excited, but the finished product is one of the best releases from NECA in a long time. I think this is easily my favorite from the Mirage line and I would put it up there with the best from the toon line as well. I can’t say enough good things about the paint job. This comic deco is fantastic and I love that NECA has the guts to try something like this with its figures. So many collectors dump on “cel-shading” when it comes to figure releases without realizing that most of the companies attempting that effect with their figures do a piss poor job. It takes effort and money to get it right as well as artistic vision. I’ve said it numerous times, but natural lighting cannot shade an action figure based on a comic book character the way that character is drawn in the book. It’s impossible. Comic book artists do their own thing that doesn’t work in reality and no one complains because it looks awesome. It’s stylized, but some of it is so prevalent that we don’t really think about it. I always use Venom as an example. We know his costume is black, but if you showed a panel from “Lethal Protector” to a kid he’d tell you the costume is blue because that’s how comic book artists shade black. And that’s what I want out of my figures. Major props to NECA on this one, they hit a homerun. I can’t wait to see what they do next.

More from NECA and their expansive selection of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures:

NECA TMNT Cartoon The Wrath of Krang!

We’re back for 2021, and right now it looks like a lot like 2020 as we have a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figure to talk about – Android Krang! Hopefully, this doesn’t mean 2021 is a lot like 2020 going forward, but if it’s going to copy anything from 2020 then let it…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Mirage Studios Fugitoid

I’m having a hard time coming up with an action figure line that has had retail releases separated by more than a decade. I don’t mean long-running lines of figures like G.I. Joe or Marvel Legends which have been around for decades, I mean a line that was started, ended, then re-started like NECA’s line…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA Mirage Shredder and Foot Clan NYCC Exclusive Set

The Shredder had a rough go at things for awhile when it came to plastic. He was featured rather prominently in the old Playmates line, though perhaps not as prominently as one would expect. Playmates never did do a movie version of him, aside from Super Shredder, and his figure was arguably the worst from…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | posted in Comics, toys

January 10, 2023

NECA TMNT Quarter Scale Toon Leonardo

By Joe
Leo is here and bigger than ever!

We’re not yet far enough removed from the holidays that Christmas has left my brain. And if you were to ask me what my favorite Christmas present was as a kid I wouldn’t hesitate to say my Super Nintendo. I had a real “Ralphie moment” in that I found it last having failed to notice it off to the side propped between the dining room table and the wall. It was an awesome gift and a memorable way to get it. My second favorite though was my Giant-Sized Leonardo. I got that gift from an aunt who must have talked to my mom and found out who my favorite turtle was. My dad is one of nine kids so Christmas with his family was always done as a pseudo Secret Santa, only it wasn’t a secret. All of the cousins (or the parents) drew names so that not every family was buying a gift for every niece and nephew. I think it was supposed to be a ten dollar limit too, but this particular aunt always loves giving gifts and is known to blow past such suggestions. I didn’t even know the giant sized line existed when I unwrapped that gift so I was blown away. My favorite toy turned into this massive figure? It was incredible! The only negative was he only came with one sword when we all know that Leonardo wields two.

It was my affection for that old toy (which I sadly no longer possess) that convinced me to collect NECA’s quarter scale line of figures based on the cartoon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I’ve already looked at Raphael and Donatello so with Leonardo there won’t be a ton to discuss. As is the case in the show, the turtles are all identical save for their weapons and colors so the figures follow the same style. They’re all the same save for the belts and paint, including the headsculpts. NECA used this line to unveil their new approach to turtle heads that come in two parts: eyes and mouth. This allows for the collector to change the expressions to suit their mood. You can have all of the turtles basically look the same, or make sure they’re all doing something different. It’s an idea so good that it’s been brought to the 1:12 line since.

Maybe someday there will be a quarter scale Shredder so the two can be on equal footing.

Leonardo comes in the same “Giant Sized” box as the previous two figures and stands a shade under 15″. He weighs over 3 pounds so he’s a big, weighty, toy. The sculpt is the same as before save for the L medallion on the front of the belt and the holsters for Leo’s swords on the rear of the belt. Like the smaller figures, NECA uses it’s two-tone shading with dark colors on the rear and bright colors on the front when it comes to paint. Most of the figure is painted, which is good and bad. Good because it gives the figure a real depth of color, but bad because there are spots of paint transfer. The rear of the my figure’s thighs have some brown from the shell and there’s some blue above the kneepad of the right knee as well. It’s not terrible, but it can stand out on a figure of such size. The black linework is largely sharp and helps make the figure “pop” when looking at it. It’s an impressive piece, as were the past two, and there’s almost a sense of disbelief to have such a giant turtle in-hand.

I prefer my Leo to be happy.

Leonardo’s expressions are both familiar and different. NECA intentionally mixes up the included mouth shapes with each release. Raph has just two, while Donnie had three, and Leo reflects the Donatello release. His included mouths are a smile, open mouth smile, and a neutral expression. The one mouth he doesn’t have is the yelling mouth which was included with both Donatello and Raph. Donatello had both the smile and neutral mouth so Leo doesn’t come with anything new, but I’m glad he has three options instead of two. Swapping them can be trying. I had to heat up some of them to get the eyes to snap in place while others I didn’t have to. He comes with the standard eyes on the smiling mouth and the standard eyes seem to work better as a result. The angry eyes required more effort, but I didn’t have any problem getting them on and off the neck peg and none are too loose like they are with Raph so that’s a plus. In terms of hands, Leo was given gripping hands, open hands, and thumb’s up hands. He doesn’t get the finger-pointing hands, but more importantly, his gripping hands are the same as Raph and Don. In the 1:12 line, NECA actually created three different sets of gripping hands: standard with horizontal hinge, standard with vertical hinge, and a wider gripping hand so that Raph can be posed with the middle tyne of his sai in between his fingers. For the quarter scale line, NECA apparently chose to only adopt the wide gripping hand. I expected this figure to come with new gripping hands with a vertical hinge because the 1:12 version has them and the quarter scale movie Leonardo has them as well (the 7″ movie Leo unfortunately does not). It sucks because NECA is obviously aware of which hand works best for a sword wielder like Leonardo (I’d argue the vertical hinge is also appropriate for Raph and Mikey with only Donatello benefitting from a horizontal hinge), but it’s frustratingly inconsistent in its approach. The recent Hudson figure from the Gargoyles line has it, but a character like Usagi Yojimbo does not. Make it make sense! And for $125 for a figure requiring minimal new tooling, it feels like something that we should have got here.

This aspect of the figure could stand to work better.

As for accessories beyond the optional parts, we have the customary swords. They’re the same shape as the 1:12 version, just upscaled. They appear to be sculpted in white with painted handles. The one benefit of Leo having Raph’s more specialized gripping hands is that the handles of the swords fit easily into them. It’s also helped by the fact that the hands are fairly pliable. This means there’s less chance for paint rub on the hands, which is not something that can be said of the sheaths on the rear of the figure. The fit for the swords is a tight one, especially the sheath on the bottom. And you will get some paint rub onto the nice, white, blades so maybe don’t even bother. I got the top sword through with minimal rub while the bottom one lead to a lot. I used a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser to get most of the brown off of the blade, but I don’t ever plan on sheathing these again. If it’s something you must do, then maybe heat the sheaths with a hair dryer first and see if that helps. Aside from the swords, Leo just has the same two slices of pizza which can key into the slices that came with the other figures. He also has a communicator which opens and closes just like Raph and Don and he has one paper good. It’s a newspaper or magazine titled Crimestoppers Weekly. It’s fine and obviously something that’s cheap to include.

The articulation for Leo is the exact same as the other two figures, so I don’t feel like I need to get into it. I just want to highlight that, unlike the 1:12 figures, these quarter scale figures have double-jointed elbows. The elbow pad pegs into the center part of the elbow and you actually get decent range there, a bit past 90 degrees. The joints are pretty tight overall though and I had issues with the biceps swivel and thigh twists. The biceps just required some additional effort as I just needed to make sure I got some leverage on the shoulder before twisting. The thigh swivel is much harder to get at since these figures have legs that pin into the crotch piece. That’s because they need to be ratcheted to support the figure’s weight, but it makes it quite difficult to get any leverage on that thigh twist. Both are stuck and attempting to twist them just stresses that peg in the hip and could easily lead to an unfortunate break. There’s some traces of lubrication at the joint, but it apparently wasn’t applied well enough. I had the same issue with Raph, bt Donatello had a lot of lubricating oil in there and I was able to twist his thighs without issue. I assumed it was all solved, but Leo is like Raph unfortunately. I haven’t been able to get them to move and I’m guessing I never will.

It’s nice to see them all together, but it also makes it plainly obvious who we’re missing.

Giant Sized Leonardo is a throwback sort of figure with modern engineering. If you have the other two, you basically know what to expect. Because of the lack of vertical hinges on his gripping hands, I might have to consider this figure the worst of the 3 given the issues with the thighs. It paints me to admit that since Leonardo is my favorite, so subjectively I like this figure more than the other two, but there are certainly some disappointments. If that is not an issue for you then you’ll probably be content. And if you have the other two then you basically already know if you want this or not. Had Leo been the first figure out in this line I might have been able to just go one and done with my favorite turtle in this scale, but since I started with Raph I pretty much have to have all four now. As for when that will happen, who knows? Michelangelo has yet to go up for solicitation, though a finished sample was present in a recent interview The Fwoosh conducted with NECA’s Trevor Zammit so I have to assume it’s either in production or in line to go into production. Which isn’t surprising since it’s the same figure as the other three. Leonardo started showing up last fall, the place I ordered it from seemed to get it in last, so maybe Mikey will show up on a similar timeline. I’m anxious to see how they do his nunchaku in this scale and to see if he comes with any extras. It will be nice to finally have all four together when that day comes.

Like your turtles big? Then check these out:

NECA Quarter Scale TMNT Toon Raph

My first NECA Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles product was the original release of the Mirage Studios quartet released in 2008. Nearly a decade went by before I bought another TMNT product from NECA, and that item ended up being the quarter scale movie Donatello. It was love at first sight for me and Donnie, and…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Quarter Scale Toon Donatello

2022 has been a year of catch-up so far for me. A lot of stuff I preordered a year or more ago is finally coming due, and often without the actual preorder! The NECA quarter scale toon Donatello from the classic cartoon series Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is yet another preorder that just didn’t get…

Keep reading
by Joe

Neca 1/4 Scale TMNT Movie Leonardo

NECA is now 3/4 of the way through the release schedule of their TMNT 1990 movie line with the release of Leonardo – the REAL leader of the group. And like Donatello and Raphael before him, he’s a pretty impressive specimen. The original 1990 movie impossibly never had dedicated action figures. Playmates half-assed a line…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Television, toys

January 3, 2023

NECA TMNT Mirage Studios Renet

By Joe
She’s traveled a long way to get here.

Welcome to the first Turtle Tuesday of 2023! 2022 is the year that NECA returned to the Mirage Studios subline of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures it started way back in 2008. When the line was announced to return, it was essentially taking the place of the Turtles in Time figures that had been sold through specialty shops over the past two years or so. These figures would be sold in a similar fashion as it was the small shops that would be able to place orders after being shutout of the more popular movie and cartoon sublines of TMNT. What NECA didn’t clarify at the time was that the Mirage figures (and Archie) would not be exclusive to those places, just available. When the company released Fugitoid earlier this year, it was via Target with the specialty shop places not getting the figure until months later. Since then, more has been revealed and for collectors it’s been a mixed bag as far as the experience goes. Specialty shops were given the figures Renet, Casey Jones, and the Utrom to solicit, but in the case of Renet and Jones, they were getting a variant based on the IDW re-colored issues. Renet is normally clothed in blue and Casey red, but the figures up for order featured a Renet in red and a Casey in gray. Is that a big deal? It depends on who you ask. A Blue Renet would eventually surface as a Walmart exclusive attached to some weird, NFT-like, distribution in which the consumer places an order either online (it has since sold out) or in-store that just gives them a code. They then go home and enter that code into a different website to take digital ownership of the figure at which point the collector can either “store” it or ship it. The turn-around on shipping was promised to be around two weeks, but turned into a month or more for those who participated. Oh, and the figures sold in this fashion (which also included black and white variants of the Mirage Foot Soldier and Shredder) retailed for 40 bucks, five more than the other versions.

Renet is no damsel in distress.

I personally wanted nothing to do with that arrangement. It sounds needlessly complicated, plus the toys are more expensive. Unfortunately, I did want the blue version of Renet, but I’m too stubborn to give in and jump through those hoops so when I eventually found the standard version at Target I just grabbed it. My experience with the character has mostly been in black and white anyway, so I’m not that attached to the blue color scheme, I just prefer it. It looks nicer. For others who grew up reading the colorized version of the old books they understandable have more attachment to the blue costume and I do not blame them one bit that the easy to order version of the character is essentially a variant with the true version locked behind an exclusive arrangement. That is, frankly speaking, bullshit and not the way I think NECA should be approaching this line. If part of the selling point of the Mirage line is to feature it at actual comic shops then it should be those places that get the standard version and send the IDW colors to Walmart. Instead it feels like NECA is admitting that variants of these characters aren’t going to be that popular so they’re making the more desirable version both exclusive and more expensive. It’s not a good look and given that NECA’s reputation has already taken a hit in 2022 thanks to the Loot Crate fiasco, it feels like another self-inflicted wound.

She can also go hoodless, if that’s your preference.

All that aside, Renet is pretty damn good figure. That’s the frustrating part as it would be nice to just voice with the wallet and skip the release all together, but the product is good and it’s not like sculptor Jon Matthews is responsible for how the thing is sold. Renet, if you’re unfamiliar with the character, debuted in issue number 8 or the Mirage Studios run. She is the Mistress of Time and carries the Sceptre of the Sands of Time which, as you probably could have guessed, affords her the ability to manipulate time. This leads to a time-hopping adventure with our heroes which would be adapted in both the 2003 cartoon series and the 2012 one (she kept her blue clothing in both, by the way). Given that there are so few female characters associated with the brand, it makes sense to turn to Renet fairly early in the relaunch to provide some variety out of the gate.

And if you want to go hoodless, she has this little piece to go over her neck that resembles the hood.

The figure arrives in the trapezoid styled box that Fugitoid came in complete with new artwork from Kevin Eastman. Renet stands approximately 6″ in height and feature the unfamiliar color combo or red and brown. Her default portrait features a red hood with a removable helmet that’s also red and accented with yellow. Her actual costume, which is essentially a one-pieced bathing suit, is brown and adorned with numerous clockfaces which are all sculpted details, and not decals. There’s some black linework to make the suit appear to be armored and she has gray shoulder pads, brown gloves, and brown boots. Every inch of this figure is painted and given the numerous clockfaces on the costume it’s really impressive that there’s little in the way of paint slop. If you go hunting for it you’ll probably find a clockface that isn’t perfect, but it’s rather remarkable how well the paint turned out. And I can say I saw three figures at Target and all three looked great. There’s the customary linework as well on the clothing and even some of the flesh portions like the knees and elbows. The only detail I don’t care for is the black line under her mouth which I just don’t think needs to be there. Otherwise, the paint is terrific.

The sculpt all around on this figure is exceptional for what is a mass produced item.

The sculpt for Renet is equally wonderful. The clocks I already mentioned and they’re a nice touch. The clock hands on each face are painted on so I guess if you have exceptionally high standards you can take NECA to task for not sculpting those, but I think they look good. Renet’s face and hair looks very true to the source material which was a bit rugged back in the day. Eastman will readily admit that he felt they had a hard time drawing females in the early days and it was something they worked hard to refine. I think she looks good though and her body certainly isn’t lacking for curves as she’s rather buxom. I like that her legs and arms have some shape to them though like she is strong and capable. This is in contrast to a lot of Marvel Legends where I feel their females tend to be too thin and lacking in muscle definition. Other sculpted details on the figure include wrinkles and creases in the gloves and boots which simulate the look of leather very well. The shoulder pads have sculpted indents in them too. Renet’s unusual helmet is also handled well with sculpted ridges and those weird ovals on the side.

And it’s not just the figure, the accessories are well-sculpted and well-painted too.
This scroll contains basically the only paint imperfections in the set. I can live with it.

Renet also comes packed with the standard assortment of articulation we’ve come to expect from NECA. The head is on a double-ball peg that allows her to look up, down, rotate, and tilt. Her shoulders are ball hinged and she can raise her arms out to the side to a horizontal position and rotate around. The shoulder pads flex so they don’t get in the way much, but I would recommend not rotating all the way around to not damage them. There is a biceps swivel plus double-jointed elbows which is great to see. NECA has, in the past, seemed resistance to double double-hinged elbows on characters without sleeves and I’m glad to see they’ve moved on from that fear. The wrists rotate and hinge horizontally. In the torso, there is a diaphragm joint, but it basically just affords some rotation with no forward and back. You will want to be mindful of doing much here too since the sculpted timepieces could get damaged. Because of that fear, I consider the joint functionally useless. At the hips are ball and socket joints that allow Renet to do splits. The crotch is a soft plastic so you do want to watch out for paint rub there, though mine seems okay. The thigh can rotate on that ball a bit and the knees are double-jointed. There is no boot swivel, and the ankles hinge and rock side-to-side. Lastly, we have the wired cape which is basically part of the articulation. It works very well and will allow you to position it as you see fit. My only issue with it is that it doesn’t always want to sit flush with her chest. The articulation here is serviceable. I wish she had some vertical hinges on her gripping hands and it would have been nice to get something out of the diaphragm joint. I like how the legs turned out though as they look terrific since the only visible joints are the knees. It’s a very clean looking figure so if the articulation isn’t going to amaze then at least it’s not contributing to some ugly cuts in the plastic.

This head looks awesome too, I just wish I had a place for it in my display.

Renet also comes with a pretty solid assortment of accessories. For hands, she has a set of open hands, fists, and gripping hands. For those gripping hands she has a scroll she can hold loosely. It’s brown and a yellow-gold on the parchment and is really the only instance of paint slop on my set as there’s a black blob on the yellow. She also has a dagger which is painted rather well and easily slips into her gripping hands as the fingers are fairly flexible on both. She also has her sceptre which looks terrific. The top of it is a monstrous, clawed, hand gripping an hourglass and it’s incredibly well-painted. The only thing that would make it look even better would be if it had an actual hourglass in it. The bottom of the staff also features another claw gripping a gold ball. Just a really cool accessory. Renet also have an alternate portrait with her hood down. There’s a piece of red plastic that serves as the hood which can be placed between her head and cape and the illusion is well conveyed. Her expression on the alternate head is one of concern which is contrast to the strong, stoic, default portrait. She’s also sporting a mullet, which is amusing. I don’t know if I’ll ever use this other head, but it looks good. Lastly, she has a third head which is actually not of her, but Lord Simultaneous. It’s done in transparent red plastic and is accentuated with some black linework and yellow eyes. It looks really cool as the face is screaming, I just don’t know what to do with it. I wish NECA had included a transparent stand for it, just a tall post, for display purposes. The head can be placed on the figure, but I can’t imagine many using this head for their display in such a fashion.

Never would I have imagined Renet serving as the centerpiece of Mirage shelf. Also, I need another shelf.

Renet the character is not one I have ever been particularly attached to, and the wrong color presentation initially lead me to believe I could pass on this release. Then I saw it in-store and found myself giving in, and that’s because this is a really well done figure. The sculpt is terrific and the paint somehow even better. I love the inclusion of the wired cape and she comes packed with plenty of accessories. And if you find her at retail, she should only cost you around $35. Some places tack on a few bucks, but if you shop around you can probably find a good deal on this one. Ignoring the garbage that is the release model for the blue version, this is worth your while if you want to add Renet to your Mirage Studios TMNT collection. The relative obscurity of the character means that Renet will likely be the favorite release in this line of few, but she might be the best overall figure that NECA has done so far in the Mirage line and that’s some pretty high praise.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in Comics, toys

December 31, 2022

TMNT Loot Crate Series 2 Vol. 2 – Pixelated Shark Boy

By Joe
Wow, it’s actually full this time.

2022 is nearly in the books. As we countdown the final hours and minutes until 2023, it feels good to say that the new year will begin with no further Loot Crate obligations. That’s because after a delay of more than a year, the second crate in Loot Crate’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series of crates is finally here. It may be the second crate, but it’s arriving fourth due to…who knows? Loot Crate basically went silent to start 2022 and stopped providing updates on where things were. This crate was supposedly ready to rock 10 months ago, but obviously that wasn’t the case. I ranted and raved a bit in the other crate reviews so if you want more background info I’d say go give those a peek, but let’s relax and be happy that it’s all over now.

If you’re new to the scam, each crate in a series of four is based on a different pillar of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles media empire: comics, movies, television, and video games. This final crate is the video game one, which in the first series was themed around Turtles in Time. The same could be said for NECA’s line of action figures released to comic shops, but this one is a mix of two different video games: Turtles in Time and Tournament Fighters. Like past crates, you get a bunch of junk and a t-shirt with the real selling point being an exclusive action figure from NECA. And in this one it’s Armaggon from Tournament Fighters, a character that I’m not particularly attached to, but I know a lot of other collectors out there who are really excited to get this one. And not because they’re huge fans of Tournament Fighters, but because Armaggon was a character in the Archie comics. He’s basically a mutant shark from the future and he’s quite the badass. The Armaggon from the video game was a mostly faithful adaptation of the comic character making this figure a pretty faithful adaptation of the same. Well, except for that pixel deco NECA uses for its video game line.

They call them “juice” glasses, but you can put whatever you want in them.
There’s more pixelation on the pin than the figure.

Before we get to the main event though, we should probably talk about the junk. As I mentioned in the prior paragraph, some of this is from Turtles in Time and some from Tournament Fighters. From Turtles in Time, we get a pair of socks. They have some graphics on them from the game (turtles on one sock, villains on the other) and…they’re socks. They’re fine. We also get a pin, as every crate has included a pin so far. This one features Leatherhead’s head and…it’s fine. We also get a boxed set of two glasses featuring Tokka and Rahzar from the game. When I picked the box up and saw the image of the glassware inside, I assumed they were shot glasses, but they’re actually bigger. I guess these are whiskey glasses? Bourbon glass? Loot Crate calls them juice glasses. Either way, the graphics are more like decals so if you decide to use these you will want to hand wash them because a dishwasher will likely obliterate the images. Some of the decals on mine are crooked, which is a shame. At least the images look, in a running theme for this crate so far, fine.

Well, there can’t be too many Tournament Fighters shirts out there.
Shredder! I am back and I’m huge!

Tournament Fighters, in case you forgot, was a TMNT fighting game released exclusively for consoles. It’s odd that it wasn’t released to arcades, but maybe that’s how late it was to arrive. It’s also a Konami fighter, and now that I think about it, Konami really didn’t tackle the genre much and I can’t think of a single Konami fighting game released in arcades (Martial Champion, anyone?). They mostly specialized in brawlers, but I guess they felt they could not ignore the hype generated by the likes of Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat. The game was released for the Super Nintendo, Genesis, and Nintendo Entertainment System. In what is an example of a bygone era for game development, each version of the game was completely different from the other. The Super Nintendo one is the version that featured Armaggon, so it’s from that game that the theme for the t-shirt is pulled. In what can only be described as a Christmas miracle (I got my crate before Christmas), Loot Crate actually sent me the proper sized shirt. The shirt itself is just black with the turtles fighting Shredder with some very 90s colors in the background. It’s…fine. Lastly, and it’s not really from any game, is a Krang stress ball. He has more of a toon look to him, but a licensing art toon look. It’s pretty fun though, I’ll give it that. We also get a summary card of the stuff in the crate, something the last one omitted.

They put a lot of effort into this packaging.

So yeah, the junk in this crate is all fine. Nothing is terrible, nothing is really a surprise, and nothing is really all that welcomed. I guess it’s nice to have another shirt, and I definitely prefer it to the apron from the last crate, and I’ll wear it and probably the socks because why not? I’ll find a home for the silly stress ball, and the rest will probably end up in a drawer or behind my bar. In comparison with the other crates, it’s way better simply by virtue of getting the shirt size correct, but it’s still a bunch of stuff I never would have purchased individually. The real attraction is and always has been the action figure. And in order to get the bonus figure of Scrag in the last crate, I had to get all of them. If I could have picked and choosed what crates I wanted and still got Scrag I may have passed on Armaggon. Nothing against him, I just have no affection for Tournament Fighters. It was a middling fighting game that was also brutally difficult and I wasted a rental on it as a kid. It wasn’t one of my worst rental decisions, but it was a game I never contemplated renting again or actually buying. And if I’m going to get an Armaggon, I’d prefer a true comic one. That said, I was still curious about this figure. I could tell from early solicitations that it was going to reuse some components from Bebop and Rocksteady, but it was also hard to tell just how much. And to a lesser extent, I was curious how the figure would be packaged and if NECA was intending to do more from the game.

And here’s good old shark boy, free from his box!

Armaggon comes bundled in a box that is essentially the same shape as the other Loot Crate figures. The graphics on it though are tailored to the Tournament Fighters SNES game and they did a really good job. Almost too good considering this isn’t a figure that will show up on shelves at a store near you. The box graphics are designed to mimic the packaging of a Super Nintendo game and NECA even put it’s own logo on there in the same style as the Nintendo logo of old. There’s shots of the arcade Donatello on it designed to emulate the same posings from the artwork of the Tournament Fighters game and they whited out the eyes on him and updated the figure to look a bit more like the Donatello from the game. He doesn’t look quite like the source though since those sprites were designed to resemble the 1990 movie suits. It would have been interesting to see NECA try to do the same just to see how that figure would have looked, but eh, it’s fine.

The tail has to be put on, but it’s not too bad.
I think I like it.

Once removed from his cardboard prison, Armaggon cuts a pretty intimidating pose on a shelf. He’s fairly tall coming in at a tick under 7″ (not counting his fin which puts him closer to 7.5″) or so which makes him one of the largest figures in the video game line. The first thing that jumps out though is the head. He looks pretty crazed with those red eyes and red gums to go with a lot of sharp teeth. It’s a nice sculpt and one that’s obviously all new. It sits on the torso of Bebop and I’m guessing the biceps and shoulders are recycled as well. The forearms needed to be re-tooled because Armaggon has some red fins there and they give his arms the added length they need. The hands are straight from the other release though as are the thighs which have the clothing wrinkles still sculpted in which is a bit annoying, but NECA did the same for the Triceratons so it’s hardly a surprise. The lower legs and the feet are all new since Armaggon has flippers. The other new part appears to be the crotch as his belt is part of the same piece. On the rear of the figure is a shark tail and that’s all new as well. To summarize, the only old parts are the torso, upper arm, hands, and thighs which is less than I expected.

He has the same gripping hands as Rocksteady, with one being a trigger finger. I’m not sure he needs them.

What stands out with the figure is the paint and his cybernetic bits. The pixel deco is one of NECA’s best applications of it. There are parts of the figure, like the right thigh and shoulders, that really blend like a sprite should when viewing it from the shelf. It’s a neat effect, and while some don’t like it, at least it’s done well. The cybernetic stuff is basically all of the yellow around the head area. It’s sort of like a harness, I don’t really know the function of it, but it’s very intricately done. He has lots of tubes and straps and while they look good, it does give the figure a fragile appearance. And considering it’s a limited edition figure that’s not supposed to ever be sold at retail, it makes it even scarier to handle. He also has his missiles sculpted into his traps and they’re colored gray like the game. They don’t do anything, but it’s obviously something the character needed. Overall, I’d call the sculpt and paint pretty damn good all things considered. The reuse present is appropriate and there’s plenty of new stuff to justify the cost. Well, if we’re applying a cost of 25 bucks or so to the figure since the crate costs $50.

Closed…
…open!

In terms of articulation, well, there isn’t a lot to talk about. As hinted at earlier, this guy is scary to pose. The head is locked down, but he does have a hinged jaw which is cool. The arms though are connected to those tubes and harness contraption and I hesitate to do much with them. They bend, but I can see them getting stressed and I personally will pose this guy in as unstressful a position as I can get. Which is probably straight up and down, but we’ll see. He does have hinged shoulders though and a biceps swivel. The elbows are double-jointed and the wrists swivel and hinge. There’s a torso joint that basically just provides a tiny bit of rotation and little else. If the waist does anything, I can’t tell. At the hips, we have ball and socket joints like the Triceratons which I am very happy about as I feared we’d get the old style Bebop and Rocksteady hips. There’s a slight thigh twist at the ball and the knees are double-jointed. The ankles hinge and have a rocker and move fine. The tail is on a ball peg, but it does very little. This guy is pretty stiff out of the box so be gentle. Maybe just be extra cautious and heat anything up that feels stuck. The lower half of the figure is the stronger part when it comes to articulation and it’s okay. I feel fine posing him down there. It’s the arms and upper torso that scare me the most, and really it’s the upper arm. The elbows and hands are fine. He’s not going to pose very well though, unfortunately.

These three all share some parts between them.

As has been the case with basically all of the Loot Crate figures, the accessories are rather weak. In fairness, I don’t know that Armaggon needs anything from the game. Maybe an effect? He just has extra hands though and they’re all recycled from Bebop and Rocksteady. He has a set of fists and open hands plus a trigger finger right hand and a gripping left. He has nothing to grasp, but if you want to give him a gun or something at least you can. I’ll probably just go with the open, style posed, hands and leave it that way.

Will NECA ever do proper Tournament Fighter turtles? I wouldn’t rule it out.

Well, that’s it! The second, and hopefully final, series of Loot Crates based on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are history and it feels good to be done. I’ve had plenty of preorders over the past two years that went long so it’s not the delays that bothered me. It’s the lack of communication and the outright lying that came out of The Loot Company that ticked me off. Plus, we’re not talking about a preorder that took two years to be delivered. This was paid for back in early 2021 and it was supposed to ship in September of the same year! That’s nuts! At the end of 2021 they were saying it was going to ship imminently – there’s no way that was ever true! And they screwed up a ton of the orders, went really light on the stuff in crate 3, and just all around delivered a bad consumer experience. Hopefully, Loot Crate is allowed to die for good this time and never return, because if another round of these things is announced I’m staying away. Unless they change their business model to not require payment upfront, because this stuff felt super shady. If I’m allowed to ignore the consumer experience and just judge the whole thing on what we got, it still was a subpar experience. The Danny figure stunk, and there was nothing of value in 2 of the remaining three crates outside of the figures. At least those figures were done well enough, but why do they need to be sold this way? Collectors will happily just buy these figures from NECA direct and there’s really no character too obscure for release at this point. Now, it’s just my opinion, but I don’t think NECA liked the experience of partnering with Loot Crate either so it’s my hope that they have enough pull with their owner, who owns Loot Crate, to put an end to the partnership because it really hurt their brand more than it helped. For now, let’s just be happy it’s over and try to enjoy the figures we got. Here’s to a new year free of Loot Crate!

TMNT Loot Crate Series 2 Vol. 1 – The “It’s Dan now” Crate

Loot Crate’s first series of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crates in 2020 were a massive success. The crates sold out and anyone who missed out found out acquiring them on the secondhand market would be most expensive, and that’s because each crate came bundled with a NECA exclusive action figure. NECA’s parent company rescued Loot…

Keep reading
by Joe

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in toys, Video Games

December 27, 2022

NECA TMNT Secret of the Ooze 4-Pack and Accessory Set

By Joe
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II – Let’s Get Silly!

It’s that time of year when a lot of folks are reflecting on the past year and all of the things that happened. This usually coincides with list-making for favorites and worst of the year in basically every category you can dream of. And for action figure enthusiasts, there’s definitely a lot of list making. And here to blow it all up is NECA who managed to sneak this set out before the end of the year even though it wasn’t expected until Q1 2023. When the set went up for preorder in April, I think most hoped that by Christmas we’d have it hand. And when a few months ago two-packs of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from The Secret of the Ooze started showing up at Walmart that seemed to encourage fans to dream of an early arrival. It also predictably annoyed some since the stuff that was prepaid for in the spring was still outstanding while Walmart was getting basically the same thing, but that’s a whole other thing.

NECA has eased into the second film in the TMNT franchise. After first indicating it wasn’t that interested in any of the films beyond the first, we started to see the villains. Tokka and Rahzar, multiple versions of Super Shredder, and a standard Shredder all arrived before the actual turtles. Those first film turtles are some of my all-time favorite action figures. They began life as quarter scale figures and the very first one I got was Donatello. It was a Christmas gift in 2016 so it’s fitting that I’m still talking movie turtles now six Christmases removed. Despite my love for those figures, I wasn’t really feeling that excited about these ones. I ordered the set largely out of convenience. I had no desire to stalk Walmart in search for them and my Secret of the Ooze collection had grown large enough that it needed the turtles. I don’t even particularly like the movie, but I did as a kid, and I’m still at least fond of the costumes from it. I also expected these figures to be very similar to the previous ones so there wasn’t a lot to be excited about. Then I got them in hand and I felt rather stupid for ever overlooking a NECA TMNT release.

There she is, in all her glory!

This set is the NECA store exclusive VHS four-pack. Just like NECA did with the first film, this set of four turtles comes housed in a pretty substantial box which is designed to resemble the original VHS release of the film. Only the turtles on the box have been substituted for images of the actual figures. It’s pretty cool, though this set made it a lot harder on photographer Stephen Mazurek. The front cover looks fantastic, but the image on the rear is pretty goofy looking because these figures really aren’t articulated enough to replicate the poses from the back of the VHS box. As a result, Mikey and Donnie both look like they’re riding an invisible horse or something. The box is huge though as it’s nearly 17″ in height and 10″ across. The lettering on it is raised, like a VHS, and it will look nice next to the same box from the first movie set. And like that, it’s a slipcover and the inner box features a tray with the figures and accessories inside secured behind a plastic cover with more photography all over the place. Considering that nothing in the box is exclusive to this set, you’re basically paying a premium for the fancy box and at least it delivers. Well, there is one thing that’s exclusive and it’s a backdrop. It’s a thick cardboard and it’s of the club from the film’s climax, the exterior wall. Could we one day see the interior stage setup? Only time will tell.

These may be the only turtles I choose not to display with their weapons.

I’m as charmed as anyone by a fancy box, but what I really care about are the figures inside. The turtles are all on the same body, but it does differ from the body of the first film turtles. They each stand at around 6.25″ in height, and considering it’s a 7″ scale line, that seems pretty good. The only thing that stinks about that is all four turtles are the same height when at least Michelangelo should be shorter, but that was something we had to overlook with the other figures too. The stuff that’s reused are the arms and legs and maybe whatever is inside the shell. The plastron, shell, pads, belts, and heads are all new. Even though the thighs appear to be the same between releases, these figures do have updated hips with the ball and socket joint. Like the previous figures, the biceps are actually a little different as Leo and Mikey share the same parts while Donnie and Raph share some as well. The shells are all the same, though Raph’s has some distress marks carved into his and Leo’s appears to allow for the scabbards of his swords to key-in. Each turtle does differ in that the pattern of their freckles are applied different from brother to brother.

The new figures all seem to have shineir feet for some reason.

In terms of changes from the past figures to these ones, they’re mostly subtle, but apparent. Obviously, the heads are all different as the costumes were overhauled to allow for a wider range of expressions. Donnie’s changed the most, while there’s a hint of the first film Leo and Raph in their designs. Mikey was practically unchanged, but his head seems a little smaller and more round. All of the turtles wear their bandanas over both shoulders and that’s reflected here. There are no optional display parts there. The colors are also a bit softer, especially Leo and Raph, and it’s captured here. The skin tone also appears to have more yellow incorporated into the green so they have a slightly different appearance. For some reason, there’s a powdery, green, residue on them this time around which tends to rub onto the accessories when placed in the gripping hands and can even find its way onto one’s hands after extensive play. I’m not sure why that is, but it’s so far been easy to clean off of the accessories. The plastron of each turtle is shaded more heavily than it was in the first film and I like how it contrasts with the otherwise brighter look. Michelangelo also has satchels for his nunchaku this time around which is cool and a nice addition to both the real world costume and the figure. Perhaps due to the flaky nature of the topcoat, there are a few spots on the figures where the plastic is shiny. On Leo especially, his right foot appears a lot glossier than the left which is a bit odd. Maybe they missed that piece with a final paint app or something. The powdery green also shows up in some of the grooves, especially on the hands, which is a little off-putting but not something that can be seen from a shelf. I would classify such issues as relatively minor, for otherwise these look like they jumped out of the movie. It’s almost eerie at times to look at them because they seem so lifelike.

It’s turtle time.

Since the bodies in use are very similar to the past turtles, it shouldn’t surprise anyone to learn the articulation is more or less the same. All of the turtles feature a double-ball peg for the head. The lower peg is recessed quite a bit so the range isn’t optimal. The turtles can basically rotate fine, but looking down varies from turtle to turtle with Michelangelo performing the best. None of them can look up and the ball peg is pretty snug and tight. At the shoulders we have ball-hinges and they can raise their arms out to just about horizontal and rotate all around. There’s no biceps swivel, which is something I would have welcomed, but we do have the NECA double-elbows which feature two hinges and a swivel above and below the joint. The elbow pads are smaller this time around and peg into the elbow like the quarter scale figures. This results in better range than we saw on the first film release as the turtles can now bend their elbows past 90 degrees. The wrists swivel and every hinge features a horizontal orientation, which is a bummer for Leonardo, especially. In the torso, there’s a ball joint or something, but it doesn’t do a whole lot. It basically just provides a tiny bit of rotation and tilt. The hips are the newer model hips and the turtles can just about do splits. They can’t quite kick forward all the way though as the thighs rub against the plastron. It’s also very creaky and unpleasant. There’s a bit of a thigh swivel at the ball-joint and the knees are double-jointed. They can just get past 90 degrees there while the ankles feature the usual hinge and rocker combo and works all right. They’ll move okay, but elaborate stuff is a bit out of the question. I do wish they had decided to sacrifice a tiny amount of the aesthetic to carve in a biceps swivel, but I understand why they didn’t. The lack of vertical hinges for the gripping hands is the one major oversight and NECA frustrates me in that area. They sometimes include such a hinge, and sometimes they don’t. Toon Leo and Raph, for example, have them and even the quarter scale movie Leonardo has them. The 7″ scale ones don’t though and that’s a real bummer.

Combat cole cuts!

This four-pack also comes packed with a fair assortment of accessories. Some are repeats, and some are new. For hands, all four turtles come with gripping hands. They then share the following sets: open, relaxed gripping, thumbs up, and pointing/sai grip. The gripping hands are really tight, but pliable. They’ll hold almost everything, but the green paint will transfer. There’s a full canister of ooze, which you probably have several of by now, and a second empty canister of ooze which is new. The fire extinguisher makes a return, but new this time is the foam bat from the opening of the film. It’s not actual foam though, but painted, hard, plastic. There’s also a new pizza box and it comes with a bunch of pizza “stubs” which is a nice addition. There’s also a full slice with a hole through the center so Raphael can catch his touchdown pass as he did in the film. There’s an extra left forearm and this is for Donnie as his default forearm features the wristwatch in the wrist strap as seen in one scene of the film. I have no idea how easy it is to swap forearms as I have no intention of removing the unique wristwatch arm. Mikey also comes with his “combat cole cuts,” two pairs of linked sausages which are in a nice, rubbery, plastic that almost makes them feel real. And lastly, each turtle has his standard weapons. For Leo, Raph, and Donnie, these are the same as the first film turtles with Donnie’s bo having a noticeably lighter paint app. For Mikey, his nunchaku have been updated so that instead of a pair of strings connecting the two he has something more like a bendy wire. It doesn’t seem to be strong enough for posing, but perhaps it will be more durable. They slot rather snugly into his new satchels too.

He’s real attached to that mop.
I could use a desk….
Aww, so cute!

That’s a fair amount of stuff. I think we could always use more hands, especially with vertical hinges, but I think they come with enough. Maybe another set of open hands should have been included so they could execute a proper Cowabunga pose, but at least we have the hands from the first set. If that’s not enough though then NECA has you covered as they also put up for sale an accessory set alongside this release. I passed on the same for the first film, but this time I decided to go all-in. And there’s a lot of stuff in here. It comes in a square box with an image of one of the film’s theatrical posters on the cover (the same image we saw on the Super Shredder release) with photography on the rear and spines. Inside the box is a big plastic tray with a cover over it and all of the accessories are visible. It’s not as flashy a package as the VHS box, but it’s durable and easy to reseal if you can’t find a home for all of this stuff.

Moving day!
This will be handy for storing some of the accessories.
“You think you could crunch any louder?!”
We just need an orange and a purple one.
You can hear this, right?

I guess we’ll just plow through it, but this thing has a lot of stuff pulled from the film. Up first, another ooze canister! This one though is basically the catalyst for the film as it’s the empty, broken, canister and it can separate just like the one in the film. It’s a nice little thing to have and kind of makes me wants another Splinter. To keep track of these things, there’s a computer and keyboard and, uh oh, one canister is still active! Also in here is Michelangelo’s chocolate bar so he can annoy Raph. And if he’s thirsty, there’s a red mug of what appears to be cola that features a straw and a blue mug without a straw. If salty is more your thing, there’s also a bowl of popcorn and two bags of potato chips (the bare essentials). When it’s time to clean up after another pizza party, there’s a pair of aprons: pink and purple. They’re soft goods and can tie onto any of the figures. There are also two cleaning brushes (wax on, wax off) and Donnie’s bo with a mop molded onto both ends – perfect for cleaning and romancing! These guys eat a lot of pizza, so there’s another box of pie! It’s the same box as the one featured in the four-pack, but this one has four, full, slices inside. They appear to be the same mold as the pizzas that came with the first film figures. When it’s time to move out of April’s apartment there’s a suitcase which can open and actually has a lot of room for stuff inside. Michelangelo’s hat is also included to protect him from the rain, and since you’ll be wanting to contact April once a new home is found there’s also a payphone. It has a slot on the back so that it can be hung on a nail or tack, if you wish. As for something cute, there’s a pre-mutated Rahzar which features articulation at the head. Less cute is the pre-mutated Tokka which has a hinged jaw. Rahzar looks fine, but Tokka is actually pretty impressive. There’s more paint on this little snapping turtle than is featured on most Hasbro figures. There’s also some included reading material, a little, paper, newspaper with “NINJA RAP IS BORN” as the cover story. They had to include that. And if reading’s not your thing, then you can also rock out with the included keytar. It easily slips over the head/shoulder of any turtle and is known to cause massive headaches in villains.

“…a little too Raph!”
“Touchdown! Yeah!”

That’s a lot of stuff, and I feel like I’m forgetting something, but I don’t think there’s any way to shake that feeling. Probably the main draw of this set is the five extra heads included for the figures. For Donatello, we get an open mouth expression which works for any of his talking poses. For Michelangelo, we get the opposite as his is more stoic compared with his default open mouth. Leonardo also gets a stoic face and it’s an expression I more associate with the character than his smiling portrait from the four-pack. Raphael’s is the least different as he has a half smile, I guess, by default and the new head is a full smile. He gets a third head though which features tape across the mouth so he can be “a little too Raph” should it please you. I wish they included a post to tie him to as well. Oddly, the Raph heads feature a darker shade of red on the bandana while the others are more uniform. I’m guessing this is an error, but it’s probably not something that will bother most. As for swapping the heads, it’s pretty painless. I was nervous about it at first, but I didn’t even need to heat them up or anything (same is true for the joints on the figures) and was able to just pop them off. Getting the secondary heads to really snap-in is tricky and may require heat. It does create a dilemma on what to display. I definitely prefer the alternate Leo head and I think I like the open mouth Donnie head more. Raph is the only one where I’m kind of lukewarm as far as preferring one over the other. Eventually, I probably will tie him up as it’s just too funny.

Never skip the pre-fight donut.
This will work.
Remember kids, the power of music was used to defeat Shredder.

These figures are pretty damn terrific. If you have any desire to add action figures of the turtles from Secret of the Ooze to your collection then you absolutely should track these down. The four pack is basically long gone, but two-packs should continue shipping all throughout 2023 to Walmart stores. Hopefully, NECA does a big restock at some point to help make it easier because they’re going to be in demand. The accessory set is unfortunately a NECA store exclusive and it too is long gone. They might reissue it at some point, but considering they’ve never done that for the first film accessory set it likely will be a long wait. If it’s something you have to have then you’re just going to have to bite the bullet and buy one on the secondary market. For 60 bucks, I think it’s worth it, but I don’t think I’d personally go much higher than that. The two-packs are a complete enough package that it’s hard to call the accessory set essential, but there is a lot of fun stuff in there. I particularly like the phone and the PC, though figuring out a way to display the PC is going to be tricky. I wish they had just included a little table for it and the office chair Donnie went surfing on. If the accessory set had included more hands, especially the coveted vertical hinged hands, it definitely would have been more of a slam dunk.

The collection basically doubled with this release (not pictured is the Shadow Master variant of Super Shredder nor the Euro variant, the latter of which I didn’t get).

This is another homerun from NECA and an A+ release. It’s also potentially the last release from the Secret of the Ooze for me. A figure of Keno with his moped is coming in 2023, but I’m on the fence there. Do I need a Keno? No, but the fact that he comes with his motorcycle is pretty cool. And if he’s sold on the NECA website that will go a long way. I’m definitely not going to run around Walmart looking for him. If this is the end though, then I’m pretty damn happy with the display I have and I think anyone else who invests in this line will be too.

More from The Secret of the Ooze…

NECA TMNT Secret of the Ooze Tokka and Rahzar

Merry Boxing Day every one! I hope you enjoyed the Christmas content this year, but it’s time to go back to our usual programming. Which in 2020 means toys. And I just could not wait any longer to talk about what was probably my most anticipated release of 2020: NECA’s Tokka and Rahzar based on…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Secret of the Ooze Ultimate Shredder

For the first time in a long time we went a week without a blog entry here. That’s because I took a much needed vacation and didn’t schedule anything. I’ll probably be backing off a little bit as we dig deeper into 2022 since there’s a certain holiday I need to get crackin’ on if…

Keep reading
by Joe

NECA TMNT Super Shredder

“The last vial of ooze!” “He must have drank all of it!” “It’s a Super Shredder!!!” It’s a simple, obvious, and corny introduction for a character, but as a 7-year old it felt rather impactful. The introduction of Super Shredder in the waning moments of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze…

Keep reading
by Joe

2 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , | posted in Film, toys