NECA recently shared the sad news that they won’t be making new DC Comics-based figures for some time. But they’ve certainly gone out with a bang this year, releasing amazing, exclusive DC/Alien/Predator crossover packs at San Diego Comic-Con and, more recently, New York Comic Con. NECA was good enough to send Batman News a set of the NYCC exclusives, so I have a few brief thoughts, and a lot of pictures, to share with you.
A few brief thoughts
I am not, historically, an action figure junkie. I love (maybe too much) collecting Mezco’s One:12 collective 6-inch figures, but that’s primarily because they do such a good job of covering up joints and making things look a bit more slick and realistic.
That’s not what NECA is about, though. Granted, they use fabric and some more convincing materials in some of their 1/4-scale stuff, but their figures—especially at the 7-inch size of these swan-song DC crossovers—tend to be more of an “enhanced classic”—pretty much a very kicked up version of what you might have played with as a child.
So what are the enhancements? There’s lots more articulation available, with double-joints at knees and elbows, abdomen, ankles, and wrists. There are more accessories and interchangeable body parts. If you dig a traditional action figure, it’s hard not to love these on the face of them.
As you dig deeper, however, the increased articulation is a mixed bag. On both the SDCC and NYCC exclusives, posing legs independently from each other is quite a challenge, and getting the NYCC Batman to stand up in a natural-looking pose was frustratingly difficult. Everything looks cool, but it’s awfully hard to take advantage of the key benefits offered by all of those ugly, visible joints.
The paint on these is very nice, but as with every single NECA figure I’ve ever reviewed, at this scale or larger, the paint on interchangeable parts is eager to flake at the contact points when you are swapping things out. It’s not a huge deal, and in almost every instance, the missing paint isn’t detectable once the part is installed, but it’s a consistent production defect just the same.
At the end of the day, these figures are more about the concept than about execution. The execution isn’t terrible, but it’s not top-of-the-line. These are still a great value for the price and what’s included, but if you’ve never had NECA figures before, understand what they are and what they aren’t, and make an informed decision before buying.
DISCLAIMER: Batman News received these figures from the manufacturer for review.
