There was plenty to look forward to, but it’s back to business as usual after our exciting Toy Fair weekend. I’m kicking off this week’s reviews with a figure I just got in the mail, Revoltech Yamaguchi’s Alucard from Hellsing. ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX
Hellsing is a secret organization founded to protect Britain from paranormal threats. The institute was begun by Abraham Van Helsing, but is now run by his daughter Integra. To vanquish the forces of evil, Integra uses a mix of specially trained military personnel and beings with supernatural powers. The most powerful member of the Hellsing staff is Alucard, the first vampire.
There’s a manga and a couple of different anime series, all of which have similar themes but divergent plots. But what remains mostly constant in each series is Alucard and his abilities. To say he’s overpowered is almost an understatement. He’s been “killed” in multiple ways, but it never seems to take. This is unfortunate for him because he seems bored with life and actually wants to die.
It’s an interesting story, and personally I really enjoyed the original anime, which focused mainly on a young girl named Seras Victoria and her newly bestowed vampire abilities. But Alucard is still in it quite a bit, making his quippy observations and killing enemies with giant dog heads made of shadow and eyeballs that he pulls out of the darkness of his body.
The Revoltech figure seems to be based more on the Hellsing manga. Although Alucard’s design is mostly the same in each of the different media projects, his clothes are very dark and lack the bright reds of the animes. The figure itself also has a lot of design elements that we saw with Revoltech’s Vash and Wolfwood figures. There are a lot of sharply sculpted edges in the design of his clothing. The tails of his coat in particular are very angular and dynamic.
These stylistic lines are a double edged sword though. On one hand you have a sculpt full of kinetic energy, which makes for some really fantastic action poses. The down side to this is that these angles can make the figure too stylized, giving him a very awkward appearance from some angles. Alucard suffers from this, especially from the back, because you can see a lot of open spaces around the joints and just how odd his posture really is.
If you can get over his stylized look, you’ll discover Alucard has some really extensive articulation. His head, neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, torso, hips, and ankles are all Revolver joints. I’m not really sure why, but they went with hinge joints for the knees. Alucard also has two Revolver joints in each tail of his coat. This was something we also saw of Vash’s coat, and I really enjoy the movement effect it can create on the figure. Continue to page 2…
Eyeball dog attachment would have been great or a Vlad the Impaler variant head. I would love a Seras, too, but after reading the manga in its entirety, my opinion of it as a whole is tarnished. :p I can still pretend that the anime is better than it was. 🙂
(manga donated by friend site: http://betweenfailures.com/ Visit and pay your respects!)
I received this figure two weeks ago, and I love it. I’m going to be on the lookout for the Himura Kenshin figure, as well as the two Trigun figures. I love posing Alucard, and it made me start watching the OVA’s they’ve released. I think they’re pretty cool.
Does yours have a loose neck joint? (the inner chest cavity one)
It kind of is loose, but it doesn’t flop down or anything like that. Actually, when I first opened the figure, I tried to take his head off on the upper part of the neck. When I did, the joint came out in half, with the other half staying inside the neck. Apparently when he was assembled they put that joint together wrong so the peg was smashed in. I was able to straighting it out, but I wouldn’t be able to turn the figure. I went ahead and swithced that joint out with the one in the chest cavity. Now it’s fine, but the lower neck is a little loose.
If you find him, then be very careful with the Kenshin figure. The hands use that Revoltech swivel wrist instead of the 3mm Revoltech joint. Those wrist pins/pegs are delicate. He only comes with one right hand sword hand, and mine broke the first time I tried swapping hands. I’m used to how delicate some Revoltech figures are, but those wrist swivel joints are scary soft.
Right now Kenshi is stuck in poses as he is about to draw his blade. Someday I’ll fix his hand and he’ll be able to properly hold his sword.
man, i’ve said it before, and i’ll say it again… were it not for the scale, i’d be a die hard revoltechnician. they do make some damned cool looking figs, and they certainly don’t skimp on accessories. get these up to the 6 to 7 inch range, and there’s a plethora of properties i’d love to see them dip into, in addition to buying wholesale into the properties they’ve already covered. but the first couple i snagged were just too damned small. when i relapsed and bought in on the fist of the north star prison guard, who is huge compared to say dante, he’s still just too petite to really fit into my universe w/ the sense of awe i want him to have. too many motuc and legends lurking around who absolutely dwarf him. but man, next to my few gi joes, he looks the part he’s intended to.
that said, man, revoltech makes the MU and DCIH offerings look like fresh hemorroids.
I would frakkin hope so.
Revoltech should be a much better looking toy than MU or DCIH. I’d feel completely ripped off if a $50 imported toy from Japan looked like a $9 toy from Walmart. Not too mention they are in completely different scales.
With that said, every Revoltech and Figma figure I buy makes me ten times more appreciative of American toys from Hasbro, Mattel, and everybody else. Unlike a certain Saber Alter figure from Figma, I’ve never had a shoulder joint on a MOTUC figure sheer off. Even if I did, I could rob another MOTUC figure of his or her shoulder, and make a fix of it. That’s something I can’t do with certain Saber Alter figure from Figma, because they decided to use 2-3 different sized shoulder joints in their line.
If Superman, Captain America, and Snake Eyes decide to leap off the top shelf…. No big deal. I can put the right back up there. If Geno-Breaker or Black Rock Shooter jump from the same shelf…. I’ll have a bunch of parts for future customs. 🙁