Saturday, June 20, 2009

Show & Tell #4 - DC Universe Action Figures

This is a big special return to the Show & Tell portion of my blog. About a week ago, I dropped my wife off at her parent’s house, approximately 160 miles north of our home in Milwaukee. While driving along the highways, we pass lots of Targets and Wal-Marts that just happen to carry the DC Universe Classics line of action figures.

On the way up, my understanding and loving wife offered to stop at the first Target we saw to hunt down some figures and by the time we were driving home, she was right along with me in full-fledged quest mode stopping at every Target and Wal-Mart (and occasionally ShopKo). All in all, I got 7 action figures, plus the remaining pieces I needed for one of my Collect & Connect figures. Click below for details :

Have I mentioned before that my wife rules? Because seriously, she does. We had a blast together hunting down the elusive figures while heading home from “up north”. While I was driving, she was navigating and spotting for stores that might carry the figures. Here are pics of the haul before tearing open the boxes :


In the first picture, we have the JLU Booster Gold figure and DC Universe Classics Firestorm (action posed by Archie Cunningham), Killer Moth and long-hair 1990s Superman.


In the second picture, we have JLU Dr. Fate, and DC Universe Classics Captain Marvel and Mister Miracle.

And since most of these were Collect & Connect figures…put the pieces all together and you have :


Kalibak! Son of Darkseid and Chief of Security on the USS Enterprise. OK, just really the first one, the second is more of an inside joke for DC Animated Universe fans.

The Booster Gold and Doctor Fate figures are fairly decent. Most of the JLU figures are fairly consistent, they aren’t the most well put together and painted figures out there but the size works well for limited display area and the designs are pretty close to the Justice League Unlimited cartoon, of which I am a huge fan.


I just have one small nitpick with each figure. Booster Gold comes with his robotic sidekick Skeets, but there is nowhere to put him. He just has to lay there doing nothing. If they had a small clear post to mount him that came out of Booster’s shoulder, it would be a little cooler. Doctor Fate is very well done, but I’m confused by his accessory. There is a clear rubber “magic” accessory, but I have no idea how to place it and there is no image of him with the accessory on that I can see on the packaging. Like I said, very small nitpicks, and overall the figures are very cool. I passed over the Superwoman and Parasite figures from that line because they just weren’t doing it for me…but who knows, they may end up in the collection someday.

As far as the DC Universe Classics figures go, these are great looking. The finish and articulation on these figures is excellent. Firestorm is from Wave 1 and is not part of the Collect & Connect series, but he does come with a stand which allows him to be posed in some very cool ways. He also has “atomic power” attachments for his hand that add to his look.


Captain Marvel and Killer Moth are part of Wave 6, which is the Kalibak Collect & Connect series. I was actually hunting for Captain Marvel because I’m a fan. Killer Moth ended up on my shelf because he has the head and torso for the Kalibak figure. I’ll be honest though, it’s a pretty cool looking figure and a colorful addition to my villains display.

The next set is the rest of Wave 6 which includes Superman (with long 90s hair) and Mister Miracle. Superman is fairly normal and is a decent representation of the character. Upon putting these up on display, I realized that this is the first full size Superman action figure that I actually have.


Mister Miracle is highly detailed including his flight discs and he also comes with some futuristic looking restraints that can be removed. Lastly in this pic is the completed Kalibak, who is much larger than the standard figures to add to his imposing, villainous quality.

This was a great surprise that Liz arranged it so that I could get these figures, and the hunt for them is half the fun. Now I have to find places to display all of them :-)

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