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Important Toy News: Black Panther and Captain Marvel are getting new, awesome action figures
New year. New you. New reasons to buy incredible statues and figures to make your home a little bit more "super." You'd think the start of the year would be light on cool stuff, but a few companies have come out of the holiday break swinging for the fences. Take a look at the new hotness in this week's Important Toy News.
AVENGERS ASSEMBLE
Following Christmas, Sideshow Collectibles kicks off its 12 Days of Sideshow, revealing and teasing a dozen new items and collectibles it will offer up during the coming calendar year. The Avengers got a double dose this week when Sideshow unveiled two new pieces for the company's own Avengers Assemble line of statues.
Based entirely on original designs that combine a bit of comic, film, and animated inspirations, the Avengers Assemble line has thus far introduced Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Wasp, and the Hulk. Soon they'll be joined by Black Panther and Black Widow.
Though only concept art for both pieces is available this early on, the two characters look like they'll make for some very nice additions to the line. Black Panther's pose is full of action and provides a nice change of pace from several of the more stoic figures in the collection. You can also make out some fantastic costume detail, all the way down to the sculpting on his necklace.
Sideshow's put out a handful of Black Widow pieces before, almost all of which focus on the Russian superspy and her arsenal of ballistic weapons. Though the pose might not be all that original, there is some potentially nice movement to the piece with the way the wind is "blowing" her hair. You can also get a better idea of how different this Natasha is from other iterations Sideshow's put out. She's got the classic gauntlets, but the bodysuit isn't quite as tactical.
Neither is available for pre-order just yet, but you can sign up to be notified when more information is made available. Hopefully, we'll get a glimpse at some prototype sculpts before too long.
SHE'S HEATING UP
With all the hype for Captain Marvel continuing to escalate ahead of her March movie debut, it was only a matter of time until Hot Toys teased its first MCU figure for Carol Danvers. Like the Sideshow teases, this quick glimpse at Captain Marvel is just that. At least here, however, we get a look at an actual figure in development and not just some concept design work.
For a change of pace, Hot Toys is going with sculpted hair for Captain Marvel, which is something the company has traditionally not done for its female comic figures. Thor has gotten his long hair in solidified form, but if you take a look back at all the Marvel and DC pieces like Wonder Woman or Gamora, they have rooted synthetic hair. The Star Wars characters like Rey and Leia have come with sculpted hair, but those complicated hairstyles would certainly have come out looking awkward if they were synthetic.
Anyway, the suit looks great, and I'm a fan of using sculpted hair when it makes sense. It certainly does here, and thankfully it doesn't look like it will affect the posability of the head at all. The skintight suit might be an issue in that regard, as it often is in Hot Toys figures, but that's something collectors are already well aware of. Hopefully, we won't have to wait long to see the full, final version. Fingers crossed there's a helmeted alternate portrait with a mohawk and light-up eyes. Though the power effect shown in the image isn't possible, it would be cool to get some translucent bright orange hand accessories too.
A FIGURE BEYOND MEASURE
Finally this week, Star Ace actually opened up orders for the latest figure in its growing Harry Potter collection. Making the leap from screen to shelf sometime during Q2 this year will be Luna Lovegood, the beloved quirky Hogwart's student as played by Evanna Lynch.
The sixth-scale figure fits in with the rest of the characters from the Wizarding World and comes complete with her Ravenclaw sweater, her distinct wand, and those wonderful Spectrespecs. A few other accessories are also there, including a copy of the Quibbler, so you'll definitely have plenty of ways to pose her with the other members of Dumbledore's Army.
The likeness is pretty close, though it's just a shade off of being 100 percent accurate. That the rest of the figure is so meticulously detailed helps make up for that though.
You can pre-order Luna from several different toy sites for ~$210.
