#I have a Figma Tracer figure on my desk still :) I like her

[deathbydarkelves]

I hate all forms of PvP 99% of the time but this new mode is silly enough that I wanna try it. I'll let y'all know how I do. I have next to no experience in battle royales.

[bwprowl]

It’s east vs west, Marvel vs DC, and expensive vs cheap tonight, as I roll up lowdowns on red-hot new video game figma, ridiculous new movie toys, and more unexpected entries into our aisles. I’ve also got a quick run-through of some of the newer-wave Titan Transformers I finally managed to find. Hope you enjoy these Tuesday Night Toys!

New Stuff: Red Son

Those DC movies are still happening, and for obvious reasons just don’t carry with them the same anticipatory excitement as the Marvel movies they’re trying to emulate. I mean of course I know everyone’s saying Wonder Woman is good and I do need to see it, but that’s one win out of, like, the last four? Look, I know this is a toy blog not a movie blog, but I don’t think I’m out of line in saying that I’m not really looking forward to a Justice League movie carrying on from the setup from friggin’ Batman v Superman.

Fortunately Mattel’s toys for these things at least look pretty cool, as always! Ol’ Matty’s really stepped up their game with the varied Multiverse line in recent years, and these will be falling under that banner, as usual for the movies. That great Wonder Woman design is in there again, of course, and we get looks at the new Cyborg and Flash. Looks like this will be a decently affordable, easy way to build your League, if you feel so compelled.

But the big shot of adrenaline for me is the new Batmobile they’ll be releasing here as well! This is a huge, ambitious, electronic statement of a thing. It’s basically a big remote control car you control with an app on your phone, and it’s got lights and sound effects and *actual damn smoke* that comes out of the exhaust (do you have to…refill it somehow?) and basically AR effects that you watch through the cockpit on your phone while you’re playing with it. It truly feels like an absurd next-generation play pattern for toys like this, and as someone who’s watched others worry that toys were losing so much ground to electronics and smartphones, seeing them blended together for an ultra-modern take like this is incredibly exciting. This Batmobile is bound to be ridiculously expensive, but I’ll be tempted to go in on it purely for next-level novelty. This is like a new, super-powerful videogame console to someone like me.

Also in the DC corner of things, statue-maker Tweeterhead will be offering a properly tiny displayable version of the Bottled City of Kandor as an SDCC exclusive. This mainstay minipolis from the Superman lore is a great idea for a piece like this. It's even got an actual glass dome! Kinda disappointing it'll only be an exclusive, but at least they're offering people an option to order it non-attendee after the con.

We also found out through pre-order listings that McFarlane Toys will be doing toys based off Stranger Things. There's just mock-ups for now, but at least Eleven and Chief Hopper are due out in November, so if you, like about a zillion people (including myself) are a fan of that show, this'll be worth keeping an eye on.

For the more traditional type of new-stuff hype, figma Red was formally revealed and just put up for pre-order! The original Pokemon trainer (specifically in his FireRed/LeafGreen design) has topped figma wishlists for quite some time now, so seeing Good Smile finally deliver is welcome. Less welcome is the usual odd restrictions with import Pokemon products: Getting Red direct from Good Smile (with the bonus Pikachu) is impossible outside of Asia. The good news is that more universal exporters like AmiAmi seem all too happy to take pre-orders to ship Red anywhere, and he’s discounted decently there besides. Yeah, you miss out on the Pikachu, but at least the option is there.

Now we start demanding Green and Blue

Wishlist: More Heroes

Yes, figma Tracer was revealed last week and yes, she looks great, and yes, you were going to buy her regardless of if I mentioned her or not. Look guys, I’m in the same boat. The day she was put up for pre-order I went in for three: one for me, and one each for a couple of my friends to split shipping with because we all knew we had to have her. Overwatch is a rightfully stupidly popular game, and Tracer is the exceedingly likable, delightfully well-designed face of that game, and Max Factory’s team has brought her to life as well as you expect from the figma line at this point. I don’t even *play* Tracer, but I like her and I want to let MF and GSC know that I’ll go in for more figma of these characters. Guys, I will drop $150+ on a D.va figma with her MEKA.

Also start placing your bets for which alternate skin she gets recolored into first. I’m hoping for Posh, myself

On the complete opposite end of things, I spotted this in Target the other day: A Titan Heroes Scarlet Spider. And not the most recent, genuinely awesome, I-wish-he-was-voiced-by-Crispin-Freeman Kaine version of Scarlet Spider, but the original, 90’s as hell, wearing-a-hoodie-over-a-red-leotard Scarlet Spider! It is frankly ridiculous to see something buried in as much, at this point, niche comic history as OG Scarlet Spider getting an entry in the cheapo directly-kid-targeted toyline like this, and that’s already plenty of amusement value to me (oh my god and I just realized he’s sharing shelf space with the Marvel Legends toy of the god-danged Jackal). As someone with a special place in his heart for Scarlet (and 90’s Spider-nonsense in general), at less than ten bucks I might just grab this dumb thing for myself.

Show this toy to your parents and watch their eyes glaze over with a knowing weariness

Oh, and if you’ve been needing an officially-produced role/cos-play version of Joker’s mask from that popular little Persona game, you can pre-order one now…for way too damn much.

On Desk: Titans Return returns

Stupid Walgreens wave. These newest Titans Return Transformers first, for whatever reason, dropped at the drug-store chain rather than the usual retail spots like Target and Wal-Mart, where they cost even more and were pretty hard to find. I never even saw a trace of them in my local area, and the one I did find at a Walgreens, Krok, I did while I was out of town. So I was pretty glad to find the other two I was looking forward to at Target finally last week.

I was happy to pay too much while I was on vacation for Krok, though. I liked the Skullsmasher mold quite a bit originally, and this version renders it in gorgeous colors, and he’s got a sweet new headsculpt, and he’s a remade Action Master! Oh and he’s a popular guy in those popular current comics so I guess people will like him cause of that too. Really though, it’s just his looks that do it for me. Krok’s original bio was that he was a former cyber-football player, and these colors rather do look like they’d be at home on some sort of sports uniform. Going with the footballer theme, Krok’s old Action Master partner was named Gatoraider (geddit? geddit?), but Hasbro *for some reason* decided that name wouldn’t pass legal now, so his new Titan Master pal is given the even more stupidly awesome moniker of ‘Gatorface’. I love him.

I also love Topspin. Here’s a guy I at least knew I was going to get regardless just to fill out my Wreckers team, but Hasbro sprung a surprise on everyone and made new Topspin a really cool toy! He’s solid and chunky, fitting his root look well while still being dynamic and posable, and his transformation is in-goddamned-sane, especially given that his old version was just a ‘fold in half’ deal. There is so much clever unfolding and compressing going on in this toy. It actually took me a second to figure out how to fold the arms in on their elbows because that is a trick I have legit never seen on a Transformer before! Getting a toy of this level of a guy like *Topspin* in this day and age is, frankly, unbelievable! He’s an outstanding addition to the lineup and I cannot wait for him to be remolded into Twin Twist.

And then there’s Perceptor. Look, Perceptor would have a hard enough time measuring up to the strong starts of Krok and Topspin already, but he’s just kind of an okay toy on his own. I mean, he’s probably better as a toy and as a Perceptor than the *last* Perceptor from Reveal the Shield, but again, not a hard bar to clear. This guy’s just kinda small and gangly and his knee swivels are too loose and the joint his scope slides on is too tight. It is cool that we get the ol’ dumb microscope mode back, as well as the half-assed tank mode (more full-assed here with dedicated parts to transform into it and everything), plus a sniper rifle for good All Hail Megatron homage action. But there’s just too many little niggles that make him not feel as cool as the other guys I got from this wave. Neat, but I really wish he could have been better.

Nerd

So thanks for indulging me in all that everyone! Now you go and have fun, and I’ll see you next time!