almost too easy

reviews of spawn.com figure previews presents:

spawn series 34 - spawn classics — we ran out of new ideas so we’re just going to remake a bunch of old ones.

this is the second or third wave consisting of remakes of classic mcfarlane figures, although we’re using a pretty loose definition of ‘classic’. some of the figures that have been chosen are the more iconic and original stuff they’ve done, others are pretty random.

technically they’ve been updating and redoing figure concepts all along, they’ve only recently said ‘let’s do nothing but rehashes this wave’.

these are pretty much crap as well, since all the rehashes are NOT to redux a figure that didn’t get done properly the first time around, but simply to reimagine classic figures in the current house style. i’m not trying to be mean, there’s clearly a market for this, but they’re on like their fifth house style, and this is easily the worst they’ve ever had.

they’re not even faking it with the articulation anymore, which is actually good since we’ve lost the ugly mid-thigh cuts and worthless swivel nothings, but that means they’ve finally given up and started making statues instead of toys. everything is preposed, but most of the poses aren’t terribly interesting.

the sculpting has tried to be more ‘realistic’, which means the details are more muted, so they’re not as interesting to look at. they aren’t really bothering with the accessories of late, maybe one each. they’re not toys, so who needs more than one thing? and they don’t really have bases anymore either. certainly not the mini-dioramas of years past.

(no accessories or bases, no articulation, four figures a wave instead of six… maybe there isn’t a market for this?)

around 2000 they hit their peak, with lots of usable articulation, and a nice detail level that was stylized, and dimensional, and the figures had either tons of gear, or a big interesting base. sure, lots of figures went way overboard with the clutter, but many others found a balance, and they were never short on ideas.

spawn toys in the late 90s were the tmnt of their day, the successor to the batshit crazy toyline throne that tmnt picked up from motu and ran with. but eventually the mcfarlane guys decided that toys weren’t cool anymore, and slowly the fun and originality crept out, and the articulation followed, and now finally the dynamic look has gone as well.

the spawn line has been piss weak since like 2003, nothing but bland statues and rehashes of older, better figures. the dragons line was their first new idea in years, and it took the new spawn style and put it to good use: giant monsters.

pulling in a huge variety of influences from chinese komodos to medieval fire-breathers to insane deep ocean creatures to norse sea serpents, even wizard dragons with crystal balls like all those pewter figurines. the dragons were colorful, dynamic, gorgeously executed, and used the bases to give a sense of scale and power.

all the things spawn toys had stopped being, the dragons were. it’d have been nice to see five fully posable dragons instead of 30-odd non-articulated ones, but at least they were almost all interesting. whereas the spawn stuff i hated it all for being so boring, the dragons i just wished they could move.

the upcoming fully-posable halo 3 stuff is the most exciting thing mcfarlane has done in a long time. i just hope the plastic quality does the job. i don’t want fun toys i have to treat delicately, i want scifi gijoes that i don’t have to worry about.

anywho, let’s get on with this. follow along at home by clicking on ‘final painted sculpt photo’. the first will generally do the trick, look at the rest if you feel the need.

pirate spawn 2 — why yes, we too have recently seen pirates of the caribbean!

first seen in 2002’s wave 21, spawn: alternate realities, when the best recent pirate movie was hook.

kind of shot themselves in the foot here, didn’t they? it doesn’t really look like a spawn at all, it’s just a zombie pirate, and you’ll get better versions of that in neca’s pirates of the caribbean line. it’s not much of a zombie, and the costuming is pretty bland as well. he doesn’t even look like he’s a pirate captain, just some guy who deserted the british army.

ironically enough, this is a perfect place to put in some of that mcfarlane hyperdetail they used to employ. dude could use some heavy embroidery and more fanciful detailing, like dustin hoffman in hook, or captain teague in pirates 3, who has a figure on the pegs as we speak.

the original version is actually better, with a more interesting look, better detailing and gear, and actual articulation! five years and three wildly original pirate movies later, and they can’t even improve on the concept of ’spawn as a pirate’.

poacher 2 — we haven’t done an elephant in awhile. should we do another elephant? let’s do another elephant.

first seen in 1997, in total chaos series 2. see, back in the day, mcfarlane wanted to just make a bunch of random figures, and they thought, why the fuck not? let’s throw in a secret wars ‘all these random dudes are fighting for some reason’ backstory. so they did. i guess it was popular enough to warrant a wave 2? i forget, i don’t think i ever saw them much, and i know i didn’t buy any until wave 2 hit clearance and i wanted one for parts.

the actual spawn waves at this point had absolutely nothing to do with the comics either, so i guess they decided it wasn’t necessary to make a separate line. also, any figure that said spawn on it sold great, while total chaos probably didn’t.

anywho, poacher is/was a big elephant, who killed people and kept trophies. irony at it’s finest? who cares. it’s a big freaking elephant-man. this is the kind of thing mcfarlane EXCELS at, and it shows, because this is easily the best figure in this wave. big cool looking sculpt, plenty of mass. the tattoos are a nice touch. his costuming is minimal and well executed.

his ears appear to be tied back and dangle down his back like jar-jar, which is wierd, but i guess it works? the four tusks like an oliphaunt is a little odd but again it works fine. sword doesn’t do much for me, but at least it looks practical, so that’s an advancement for the company. i like that the human skull he’s carrying has a robot eye, it’s a nice fit with the total chaos concept. what there was of it.

no articulation of any kind to be seen, though. looks like his wrist might swivel, but i’d bet on that being it.

i have to say, though, the original poacher is a better figure. his sculpt is just as good but more stylized, he’s actually posable, he’s got better gear. poacher 2 has a skull and a big cleaver thing, while poacher 1 has a bone club, two different crazy spear-things, and a freaking elephant gun.

i hadn’t noticed at the time and now it’s kind of weird that he had no ears, but all in all, i think poacher 1 looks like he’s about to kick everyone’s ass, while poacher 2’s just kind of standing around.

i’m ebaying the original instead.

manga spawn 2 — now we have watched other, different anime. we mean manga. we understand the difference.

look, i’m not going to proclaim that the manga spawn line was brilliant. we got four random figures that could have fit into any other spawn wave without any trouble, nothing even vaguely japanese about them. but we also got the totally wicked evangelion-styled manga curse and the badass gundam-styled manga spawn. there is nothing wrong with good giant robots, and these two were gorgeous. and fully posable too!

sure, this was 1997 articulation, but swivel joints at the shoulders elbows hips and knees, and usable ones as well, is better than any spawn toy has gotten in like four years. back then we barely even knew better, the x-men line was still blowing our minds with hinged ankles and ball jointed shoulders standard on every figure, and batman didn’t even have moving knees.

what was important was that mcfarlane still managed to pull out a perfect character design now and then. getting two amazing robots in one wave made up for the other four. and wave 2 brought us several more cyborgs and robots in matching visual style and articulation, including one of the nicest variants they ever made, manga cyber violator, which was the violator as a robot.

sure, the ‘manga’ moniker was just because anime was hot! back then, and really the only strong japanese influences were from anime robot shows, not any actual manga. they still made some nice figures.

of course, while the company meant well on the toy front, at the time their reach almost always exceeded their grasp. their nice designs and usable articulation were coupled with soft soapy plastic that started to break down as soon as you opened the package, if pieces hadn’t fallen off already.

i will give them that while the fun and innovation and dynamism has gone downhill, you’ve gotten an inverse increase in the quality of paint applications, and the smoothness of the sculpt. you can actually look through their back catalog and track as the two trends crossed paths and the company started to die creatively while producing ever more well-made crap statuary.

back on target. manga spawn 2. eleven years later, remaking the figure. step one? remove every single design element from the original that was cool. the protruding m-logo on the chest? gone. the spawn mask helmet? gone. the crazy translucent wasp wings? gone. actually, the entire design scheme is gone. the only similarities are that they’re both red robots.

now, this is not actually a bad robot design. it’s just not terribly exciting. and it’s not spawn. while it didn’t always work out, back in the day there were specific elements from the spawn costume that would generally carry over to new versions. the white m stripes on the chest, the mask, the color scheme, the presence of silver spikes or blades. a big cape of some kind usually helped the effect.

manga spawn was one of the best iterations of that, taking the core design elements and recasting them with gundam robot stylings to create a fusion of the two that was totally cool. this new guy? just some kind of racing robot thing. his arms are too big, his hands don’t make a lot of sense, his head is generic, and he doesn’t have any feet.

also, while it would be easy to give him elbow joints, it looks like they didn’t bother. probably moves at the shoulders, wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t.

as i said, it’s not a terrible robot, and taken on it’s own, a fully posable ‘robot spawn’, it would be fine. but as a remake of one of the most elegant spawn designs mcfarlane ever made? this is a complete failure.

also, the racing paint job doesn’t really fit the spawn concept in any iteration. and seriously, it says ’s.23 ms.2′ on his thigh in giant red letters. fantastic. now we’ll never have to ask which series this figure was released in. at least the first time around the random text on the figures was in kanji.

wings of redemption spawn 2 — if the original figure had been articulated, this one wouldn’t even need to exist.

first released in 2002, wave 21’s spawn: alternate realities, based on the cover of spawn #77.

seriously, while nothing in this wave is as solid as the original version, this one is extra wierd. it’s the exact same design, just in a different pose. the only significant difference is that the wings on the first figure are much bigger. i think the bigger wings and the pose on the original are superior, but the costume is identical, so if you like the action pose, go for it.

it’s hard to justify this figures existence though. can we maybe get a third figure of this same costume in a third pose? or maybe just one with full articulation and alternate folded/open wings so we can recreate both poses? as well as many others?

poacher at least changed up the look a bit with different tusks, the ears, and the tats. also a different shade of gray, and some costume variations. this guy is literally the same except with the m stripes and he’s flying.

the base doesn’t add much. and it looks like he’s supposed to be interacting with something, yet there is no fifth figure in this wave to go along with him. i guess you could pick something else from your collection to have him hovering over, but again, i prefer the standing pose of the first edition, so i guess i’m not the target here.