Sculpt: Green Lantern reuses the now very commonly seen DCUC “standard male” body that has been used on most of the conventional male characters so far in the line. Body reuse in this line doesn’t really bother me, so long as Mattel and the 4H produce enough “bucks” of varying size to not have every single character be exactly the same height. For Hal Jordan, this body works since Hal is generally depicted in comics as a pretty big, beefy guy. Hal’s face sculpt is unique and is a strong representation of the character.

Paint: Hal doesn’t really benefit from much paint shading. The green lines on his costume detailing are tight and crisp and there is very little bleed or slop. His face, unfortunately, is unpainted flesh-tone plastic which leaves him looking a little “plasticky”. The paint on his mask is hit or miss. I’ve seen one Hal with a strong, tight paint job here and another with a lot of paint miss and slop around the face mask. So inspect these if you have the opportunity before you buy. Hal does also have some highlighting in his hair to pull out the texture there and his power ring is well painted on his fist with a rich, emerald green.

Articulation: Green Lantern gets the standard DCUC articulation model. Since his costume has no obtrusive details, he gets the maximum range of motion from his 25 POAs.

Accessories: Hal Jordan comes his actual green lantern for recharging his power ring as a pack-in.

Quality: The quality of figures in the DCUC line has been very high over the first two waves, but with Hal and this third series the paint is starting to feel a little more sparse and the plastic quality seems a touch softer. This soft plastic yields a lot more “warpage” of joints given how their limbs are bent and wedged into the package. My Hal has a pretty badly misshapen right arm due to the way he was packaged. Overall, though, he is still a solid figure and one of the best versions of Hal Jordan ever made in action figure form.

Sculpt: Sinestro is an all new sculpt for the DCUC line, which ordinarily is a good thing. Unfortunately, Sinetro’s all-new sculpt is, um, midget sized. For a guy who is listed in DC’s handbook as being 6′7″ his figure only stands a touch taller than Robin. Sigh. This is the first big “miss” for Mattel in the DCUC line. Fans might be forgiving this one time, but hopefully errors of this magnitude won’t become the norm. Apart from his woefully undersized stature, Sinesto’s sculpt is great. He has the most “natural” looking shoulders of any figure in the line so far. And his head sculpt is out of this world (heh). He has one of the most emotive facial expressions I’ve seen on a 6″ (er, 5″) figure.

Paint: Sinestro has a great paint job. All of his detail work is tight and crisp with no bleed or slop. The Sinestro Corps variant in particular is really nice. The yellow covers the black base very nicely and he just lot of shard detail work done on that uniform. His face and hands are drybrushed with a lighter pink over a darker purple shade to give him lots of shadowing and lend a more lifelike finish to his alien flesh color.

Articulation: Sinestro gets the DCUC standard and all of his POAs work really well. I’m happy that Mattel has resolved the “wide stance” issues on their body sculpts. Older figures were plagued with the inability to bring their legs close together but that is no longer case. Sinestro can get into a lot of good, dynamic poses.

Accessories: Sinestro comes with this yellow lantern for recharging his evil power ring.

Quality: Like the other figures he’s a little rubbery but it’s not a deal-breaker. The real disappointment here is his size. The paint, articulation and plastic quality are all pretty solid.

(Standard Release Coming Soon!)

Variant

Sculpt: Like Green Lantern, Nightwing also makes use of the DCUC “standard” male body. While I liked it on Hal, I don’t like it on Dick. Nightwing should be a smaller, leaner figure. At it is now, he stands at the same height as (or even a little taller than) the figures of Batman, Superman, and Green Lantern. I had really hoped that Mattel and the 4H would no Nightwing justice with a unique sculpt (that could then be used for many of DC’s other heroes of slighter build). As it is, he just seems too darn big. And this the first time in this line that body reuse has started to bother me. Enough about the body, though. Nightwing’s headsculpt is great. It’s probably the best action figure representation of the character so far.

Paint: Nightwing is mostly black plastic but what detail he does have is nicely done. His costume’s main detail is the big blue stripe painted across his chest and back. The stripe is tight and crisp and there is no bleed or blur where the blue meets the black. He has a gloss black finish to his boots to make them look shiny and polished. His face, unfortunately, is just unpainted plastic and there is some slop on his eye mask. Actually, there’s a huge portion of the sculpt of his mask that just didn’t get painted at all. I’m pretty disappointed in the sloppy work there.

Articulation: Like GL, Nightwing enjoys an unencumbered 25 points of articulation that make this easily the most poseable Nightwing figure ever produced.

Accessories: Dick is hooked up with his pair of trademark escrima fighting sticks. He has clips sculpted into his back that allow him to stow them away nicely when he doesn’t want to wield the batons. I really like the way Mattel and the 4H continue to work accessories into this line in a clever and functional way.

Quality: Nightwing is pretty solid. His joints are tight and firm, and his fighting sticks clip snugly into the slots on his back. His plastic feels a little softer than what I’ve grown accustomed to with DCUC, but it’s not rubbery enough to be a cause for concern. The major criticism here, like with the other figures in this wave, is the sloppy paint job.

Sculpt: Robin, for many, will probably end up being the “hit” of the wave. His sculpt is absolutely perfect. There were a lot of reservations when he was announced and promo pics first showed up. Mattel and the 4H have a penchant for body reuse and it started to look like Robin was going to turn out way too big and muscular. But in this production release all of those fears were assuaged. Robin gets a brand new, unique sculpt and it is perfectly fitting for a teenager character of his stature! Robin’s face is equally perfect, with his spiky, chunky hair and slim chin with a fierce look. His hands are sculpted to hold his weapons well and his cape looks great and is soft enough to be flexible and not restrict his poseability.

Paint: Robin probably has the best paint job of this series. Every detail is crisp and perfect. From the yellow fasteners on his chest to his oversize utility belt to the inner yellow lining of his coat, everything gets full, precise coverage. This is a relief, since figures with yellow paint apps (Red Tornado and Firestorm) so far in this line haven’t turned terribly well. Good work, Mattel!

Articulation: Robin has the same breakdown as all the other figures. He gets a good range of motion out of his arms and legs, and his ab crunch is pretty effective too. The only place he’s limited is in his neck where his coat’s collar restricts any up down or side to side movement, leaving him with pretty much just a neck swivel.

Accessories: He’s no Deathstroke, but Robin is hooked up with plenty of accessories. He gets two batarangs and a long fighting stick. His hands hold his staff well and you can get him into some pretty neat fighting stances with the it. He doesn’t hold his batarangs well, though. There doesn’t seem to be a good way to fit them into his sculpted hands.

Quality: I have no quality nit-picks with Robin. Due to his smaller size and the “softening” of the plastic for this series I had concerns that his joints would feel week or rubbery but that isn’t the case. He is a solid, well-made figure. This is definitely the best action figure version of Robin to date.

Sculpt: Deathstroke is a unique sculpt and a real standout in this wave. His body armor chain mail is very detailed and similar to the great work done by the 4H on Aquaman in Wave 2. His wrist and boot cuffs are big and exaggerated, an excellent representation of how he is most often drawn on the comic pages. His regular head sculpt has a nice shape to it, and somehow manages to convey his mean and menacing personality through the subtle shape of the covered fabric. The variant unmasked head is a work of art, a beautiful sculpt of an intelligent and insidious villain.

Paint: Deathstroke’s paint job is a mixed bag. His boot cuffs and other orange accents are mostly unpainted, leaving them very bright and “plasticky”. I would have really liked to see some airbrushing or other shading there. The pearlesque blue finish to his body armor scales is beautiful and applied very nicely. His head and face, however, suffer from a good deal of bleed and slop, with speckles of black marring his unpainted flesh-tone plastic of his face. On his standard head the line between orange and blue blurred and not as crisp as I’d like it to be. Were it not for these few small paint blemishes, this would have been a flawless figure.

Articulation: Deathstroke, like all the other figures in this wave, has the DCUC standard articulation breakdown.

Accessories: This guy is loaded down with accessories! He has a big rifle/machine gun with a shoulders strap, a sword with scabbard, a long fighting stick, a bandolier, and a thick, pocketed belt with a pistol that fits in a holster.

Quality: Deathstroke has a good plastic quality and his joints feel tight and stable. His weapons are somewhat flexible, but rigid enough that his sword retains a nice straight edge. His variant face is marred with paint speckle and a bit of slop, but that seems to be the case with all of these figures. And, you might notice that my variant Deathstroke has two left arms from bicep to wrist. Sigh. The quality control on this wave is pretty bad. But overall, Deathstroke is probably still the best figure from this series just because of all his accessories and playability. If you can find one with good paint apps (and all the right parts) then I think you’ll love him.

(Standard Release Coming Soon!)

Variant

Sculpt: Grundy is a wonder to behold. This is what a BAF should be! He’s huge, he’s insanely detailed, and he just has a very strong, imposing feel to him. His tattered blazer is nicely shredded and worn in, as are the ripped legs of his pants and other various clothing details. His fists are gnarled and body, with bulging veins and coarse knuckles. His face is square and creased with an unyielding grimace. The 4 Horsemen knocked it out of the park with this one.

Paint: Grundy’s paint job does his amazing sculpt due justice. All of the detail paint apps that were missing from the regular figures have found their way here. Airbrushing, drybrushing, tight crisp stamp work. It’s all good. Grundy looks phenomenal.

Articulation: I’m very pleased to note that Grundy has the full set of DCUC-style articulation points. In wave 2 Gorilla Grodd was significantly short-changed in the articulation department and I had concerns that that might be a sign of things to come for the DCUC BAF but Grundy has proven me wrong. He gets the full complement of articulation and can pull a huge range of motion from all those joints. Should you desire your Grundy to do splis or pirouettes or snow angels, he can pull it off!

Quality: Grundy is a big, solid hunk of plastic. All of his pieces snap together well and there are no ill-fitting parts or loose joints. He is engineered wonderfully. This is definitely the best C&C figure in the line so far. In fact, Grundy is so awesome that he totally makes up for the quality issues on the other figures. He’s great!

Don’t forget to check out DCUniverseClassics.com for more pics and info!

LOBO

Sculpt: Technically, Lobo is a reuse of the BAF Despero sculpt. But since Despero hasn’t been released yet, that makes Lobo seem like unique sculpt. The body shape works perfectly for him. He’s big. He’s muscular. And he’s blowing up with detail! His head sculpt is tremendous, his face looks very angry and disgusted. His over-sized hair is very nicely done and doesn’t limit his neck mobility as severely as you might think. His knee pads and lower leg guards and boots are all highlights, as well as the detail in the belt. The only drawback here is that the low-hanging belt is pretty hard plastic and it does limit his hip movement quite a bit.

Paint: Lobo’s paint job is pretty much perfect. He has airbrushing in his fleshtones to highlight his build. His hair gets a nice drybrush to show off the texture. And his belt and boots are done up with some nice grungy drybrushing to make them look worn and stained up with blood and dirt. Dawg has a good paintjob as well; he mostly benefits from a gray wash in his fur to accent the detail in his sculpt.

Articulation: Lobo has 25 points of articulation - the DCUC standard. He has nice range of motion in his upper body and lower legs, but like I mentioned aboved he is hampered in the hips by his rigid belt.

Accessories: Lobo has plenty of pack-ins. The first thing to notice is the package itself. Lobo’s shell is designed to pop open and be closed back without having to be cut or torn in any way. This is a nice touch. Inserted into the front of the package are a pair of functional 3D glasses. There is an insert behind the figure that converts into a display (think of something along the lines of the old dioramas they used to plug in with the DCSH figs). The 3D card on the base displays a cosmic starburst scene that makes it look like Lobo is bursting through the board when you view him standing on it with the glasses. The figure itself includes a pistol that fits in a holster on his belt, a pair of removable 3D glasses of his own, a huge gun, and his sidekick, Dawg.

Quality: The quality is great. From the packaging to the paint detail to the strength of plastic this is a very nice figure and well worth the hiked price you’d pay for him (since he’s a con exclusive). All the joints are tight and Lobo feels very dense and solid. You won’t regret this purchase if you manage to get your hands on one!.

Visit Lobo’s page at DCUniverseClassics.com for more pics and info.

Sculpt: As far as sculpt goes with the Scarecrow, we’re really just talking about his head and his straight-jacket. Everything underneath is just a direct reuse of the Goon body from series 1. But that’s okay. That Goon sculpt was great and very well articulated, so I’m happy to see the Scarecrow benefit from it. Getting back to that head and face sculpt - Wow! I’m am VERY impressed with the sculpt on this figure. For a scale this small, this is some of the best detailing I’ve ever seen on a mass-market figure. The wrinkles and folds of the cloth are exquisite, and the mask on his head is freakin’ perfect. You knocked this one out of the park, Mattel!

Paint: The paint totally does the sculpt justice. The coat has a heavy dirty beige drybrush all over to really pull out those wrinkles and folds and to make it look kind of sepia and weathered like everything else from Nolan’s movie Bat-verse. The mask is very well painted as well, with crisp detail in the eyes and mouth and the dirty stitching. Really well done!

Articulation: Like I said, underneath he’s a reuse of the Goon, so he’s got waist twist, ab crunch, forward and lateral hinge hips, thigh cuts, single knees, and ankle rock and tilt. His neck is ball-jointed and he has single hinge elbows and twist wrists. The only thing he’s missing are bicep cuts, but here I don’t mind so much because they would have had to have come across the buckles in the sculpt of the sleeves of his coat and that straightjacket is just sculpted so darn well I can respect the decision to choose form over function on this one.

Accessories: He gets a weird little soft-goods version of his Scarecrow mask that fits in a Gotham City Police Department evidence bag. The cloth mask is very well made, with solid stitching and a good likeness to the actual movie prop. But it’s still a random and useless accessory, like all the other “evidence” items in this line. I just don’t get it…

Value: As nice as this figure is, the value isn’t so great. These are 12-13 bucks depending on where you find them and to me that is just too much for a mass-market figure in the 6″ scale with no BAF. (Hell, that’s too much even if it did have a BAF). I really think Mattel is just cashing in on the movie hype by raising the price on these unnecessarily. Sigh.

I passed on this one. For me, there just isn’t enough different about this figure from the original The Dark Knight Movie Masters Batman to make him worth dropping the additional 13 bucks. Plus, this version of Bats is even SMALLER than the already undersized TDK Bats. No go for me! Batman ain’t s’posed to be scrawny! C’mon, Mattel!

Okay, I’m gonna keep this short and sweet. The good - they are sculpted by the 4H and they feature nice paint detail and good articulation. The bad - they are tiny and they cost a lot. These retailed for 11.47 at Wal-Mart (although I’ve heard TRU has them for 9.99). Ouch. And when you look at the scale pic below you’ll see that they’re not even close to Mattel’s DCUC figs. Which I find very strange, since both lines are supposed to be a 6″ scale. I guess DCUC is more like 6.5″ scale and MM is more like 5.5″ scale. The long and short of it is that they won’t fit in together. Which is a bummer because I really wanted to stock up Gotham goons to square off against my comic accurate Bats figs. Oh well.

Bats is done up quite nicely in his movie duds. I don’t really like the clunky, segmented, armored look of the movie batsuit, but that’s an aesthetic thing; the toy does a remarkable job of remaining faithful to the source and the detail is excellent. He gets standard DCUC style articulation and it’s all pretty functional, except where his shoulder armor plates restrict his range of motion a bit.

These Movie Masters figures come with a strange, gimmicky, and useless accessory. They each have a little plastic bag labeled as Gotham City PD Evidence and then an oddly sized mask that you can fit in that bag. I don’t really understand it. I would have much rather had a display base or - gasp - some batarangs or something. Bats himself comes with no accessories. Lame.

The thug is also really nice. Great detail. I love his face sculpt and all the paint detail in the mask. And his little bolo tie is neat. He also great articulation with nothing left out. He even has the ab crunch under his blazer. And he gets the strange evidence bag and little plastic mask like Batman did. What he’s lacking, though, is any sort of weapon of any kind. Shouldn’t this guy have a gun or a baseball bat or a crowbar or something? I mean… it’s a twelve dollar figure and all it comes with is a plastic baggy and a little mask. What’s up with that?!

Initially I had passed on the Joker because of his articulation shortcomings, but after seeing the movie I was on a Joker high and I just couldn’t pass him up a second time. He looks pretty good. The face is sort of crooked and wonky, and doesn’t really look anything like Heath Ledger’s Joker, but as a toy, it works. He does also suffer from the “lazy” articulation I alluded to above. He has no bicep cuts and no torso artic at all. And there’s no reason why those POAs are missing. The Thug has every point of articulation that Batman does. So why did The Joker get robbed of his poseability? I’m sorta baffled by this one. This could have been a “toy of the year” contender, had he only been given solid articulation. Drat!

Yeah, these are tiny. I really almost passed on the whole line altogether just because of the scale.

Now that the cost of action figures is going up due to oil prices the “value” of a fig is weighing much more heavily into my choice to collect them or not. And for me, I don’t think I’ll be buying any more Mattel Movie Masters figures. The TDK MM figs are small, and the plastic feels “cheap” and rubbery (think ToyBiz. heh.) compared to what I’m used to from Mattel. And both of my figs have loose, soft-feeling joints. That isn’t something I’ve experience yet with DCSH/DCUC. If these were 8 or 9 bucks, I wouldn’t complain. But, for 12 dollars a figure I need more, even with the rising costs. I mean, DCUC is still in the 10-12 dollar range and they are much bigger, better figures and they have a BAF piece included. I just bought a bunch of NECA TMNT figs for about 13 each and they knocked my socks off with pack-ins, bases, paint apps, high-quality plastic, etc. Just because prices are rising doesn’t mean companies can’t still strive to pack value into their figures. The value on the Movie Masters just isn’t there. Unless you’re just a huge fan of the movie and are dying to have some TDK toys, I’d recommend passing on these and just focusing on the comic-accurate DCUC figs.

The Four Horsemen have set the bar pretty high for themselves with this line. We expect a certainly level of detail from the six inch scale figure at this point, and this is one line that has yet to disappoint. Aquaman is a shining example of the 4H’s sculpting talent. His face/head sculpt is outstanding. It just exudes so much personality and character. I think it’s the best head sculpt of the line so far. And Aquaman’s awesomeness doesn’t end with his head - the rest of him is outstanding too! From his scale-mail shirt armor to his belt buckle to the fins on his calves, his detail is just tremendous. And his paint is great too - he gets a nice subtle dry brush on his chest and arms to bring out the texture in his shirt, and his hair has highlights of varying shades of blonde and dirty blonde. He also has some airbrushing in the musculature of his legs to bring out the definition there.

Aquaman also gets hooked up with a big trident accessory. I really like how Mattel and the 4H are managing to squeeze in so many accessories in a BAF line. Aquaman’s trident is every bit as detailed as he is, with great paint applications to set off different parts of the ornamentation on the fork of the spear. My only complaint is that the gold paint on the handle tends to flake off when you pop it in and out of his hands. That’s a bit of a bummer, since the plastic underneath is a milky white color that really shows through. Oh well, that’s a small nitpick. A little care when taking the trident in and out of his hands will avoid any major rub off.

There is a variant “modern” version Aquaman with longer hair and different costume details. I’ll add him when I find him!

At first glance, Black Manta seems kind of boring. Sure, he has a great sculpt and the DCUC standard articulation, but he’s just an all-black guy with a weird helmet. But once you start really looking at that weird helmet, you’ll realize this another exquisitely detailed figure. The helmet and backpack have a lot going on in terms of paint detail - there’s a subtle wash down in the grooves of the pieces, and there are lots of different spots of red and purple on little accents here and there that really make the pieces pop.

BM also gets treated well in the accessories department. He sports a spear/trident of his own as well as a nifty little laser gun looking thing. Manta’s accessories don’t seem to have any of the paint rub off problems that Aquaman’s did. This is another nice figure and an excellent baddie to complement Aquaman.

Firestorm is sort of Black Manta’s antithesis. At first glance, he looks freakin’ awesome, but once you study him closer, you’ll see a lot of flaws. I mean, his sculpt and detail are still great. The level of sculpting detail has been so consistent with this line that I’m starting to take it for granted. So I don’t want to discount how great he is in that category.

Where Firestorm fails is in the paint department. He has two shades of red on his body, where he should really only have one. His costuming around his face is a much darker shade than the red on the rest of his body. And, his upper knees (lower thigh) are unpainted, but cast in a red color that isn’t even close to the rest of his leg. He has a similar problem with his painted yellow pieces not matching his molded yellow pieces. His translucent fiery hair is pretty neat though!

Color matching issues notwithstanding, Firestorm is a great addition to the collection. There is going to be a running change to Firestorm to release his variant modern version in future case mixes. Hopefully Mattel will fix up some of the paint issues on that version. Then it will be spot on!

Harley Quinn is one of my favorite comic book characters and probably my most anticipated figure from this line so far. So, it’s tough for me to give an objective assessment of her! For the most part, Harley reuses the standard DCUC/DCSH female body. It’s the same base we saw on Catwoman and Batgirl. She does get new lower arms and hands, as well as new lower legs and feet. Her sculpt is great. Her articulation is great. Her detail is great. But her paint… well, it’s good. But not great.

The first thing you’ll notice is Harley’s uber-blue face. A little blue shading is understandable, but she’s just way too blue. She looks like a smurf jester or something. That’s a bit disappointing. Other than that, she doesn’t really have much going on in the paint department. She does have some sharp costume details, like the little checkers on the outsides of her legs.

Her weapons are really nicely done, though. Again Mattel didn’t short-change us on pack ins. She gets a big mallet and little cork pop gun pistol thing. The problem with her weapons, though, is that she can barely hold them. Her tiny little hands are too rubbery to really hang onto the handle of the mallet. It takes some “creative” posing to keep it from falling out of her grip. Oh well. Again, these are minor gripes. This is still a figure that is definitely worth picking up!

I can’t say I was terribly excited to get another (weird and random) version of Superman so soon in this line, but here he is. Both of him! The Superman Blue / Red electric versions were a blight from the 90s that I had hoped to someday forget ever happened. But here comes DCUC2 to immortalize this “iconic” era in Supes’ history in plastic form. Hurray!

Setting aside my aversion to this look for the ole Man of Steel Energy, I gotta say that these are great figures. The paint on his little jagged costume details is incredibly tight and crisp, and the white covers the base color really well, with no bleed through at all.

But the neatest thing about these figs are the little electricity accessories. They are somewhat soft and pliable, and have a nice translucence to them. They just look really cool. The ones for the arms are removable, and the big shoulder blitz pieces fit in through a peg in the pack, so they could be removed too - if you wanted to tug hard enough. I also like that we got two different headsculpts here. Mattel easily could have just done a straight repaint, but they opted to differentiate the two figs a bit by giving Red a menacing, teeth-grinding look. Pretty cool.

SUPERMAN RED

And now we’re on to Grodd, the Collect & Connect figure. Grodd is a bit of mixed bag. He’s big - super big - and that’s pretty neat. You definitely feel like this is a figure that warrants BAFdom. And like most other figures in this line, his detail is outstanding. The sculpt of his fur and chest muscles is better than pretty much anything I’ve seen on a mass-market line. He seems like something I should be paying 16 bucks for at my comic shop. But therein lies the problem.

One of the neat things about this line is how nicely all the figures fit together because of the 4H’s sculpting style. Because of his “lifelike” detail, Grodd loses some of that. He just doesn’t match up that well with the other figures in this line. I’d have liked to see him have a blockier chest and more smooth texture on his face and chest. My other gripe is his articulation. He has very little outside of his arms. I realize he’s a big barrel shaped monkey, so I don’t expect 30 POA or anything, but Grodd would have benefited from perhaps a mid-torso style joint (like what Hasbro does with ML now). It could have fit under his chest muscles without breaking up the sculpt and given him some much needed body artic.

Articulation aside, Grodd looks great. And I’m plenty happy to have him up on my shelf. (Now we just need The Flash to torment him!)

You can see lots more pics of each of these characters at DCUniverseClassics.com.

It’s tough to come up with any criticisms for this figure. I guess the only thing I don’t like about him is the hokey “Crime-Stopper” label that Mattel gave the figure. But that’s really inconsequential since they changed the name of the figure to “Classic Detective Batman” halfway through the production run. The toy itself is flawless. He features an outstanding sculpt by the 4 Horsemen, complete with the big, beefy broad shoulders and exaggerated ‘heroic’ proportions that are the trademark style of this line. His head and face captures classic Batman better than any other toy I’ve seen, and his articulation is top-notch. I know we got several versions of ole Bats in the DCSH line, but this one isn’t just ‘another bats’, it’s a welcome addition to the collection. It’s the first ‘classic’ rendition of the character that I own in action figure form, and his articulation and range of motion are better than any Batman previously released by Mattel. Plus, he comes with some cool bat-accessories. Mattel is really impressing me with the value they’re packing into their figures these days. This Batman is really the perfect figure to anchor the first wave of this new line.

Etrigan, for me, is the shining star of this series. He is just sheer action figure perfection. By far the biggest figure in this series, Etrigan features an impressive sculpt with deep muscular grooves and excellent paint shading on his torso. But it’s the detail in his face sculpt and the texturing on this legs that really makes this figure a work of art. His tattered cape/cloak is really well done, too. You can tell the 4 Horsemen put a lot of love into this guy because his every detail is just exquisite. And, of course, the articulation is all there, making him superposeable and super-playable! I can’t image why anyone wouldn’t be buying all the figures in this series, but if for some reason you only want to get one or two, make sure this guy is among them.

The 4 Horsemen have expressed how much they like Kirby’s New Gods and how they intend to work as many of those characters into the DCUC line as possible. Orion’s inclusion in the very first series seems to support that claim. This is another great figure. He uses the same body as Red Tornado and Batman, but his trim and paint detail makes it tough to notice. The head-sculpt is spot-on. (Man, I’m getting tired of saying that… Why are the 4H so good at capturing comic likenesses?!) But where Orion sets himself apart is in his accessory – his astro-harness. The harness is molded in soft rubber so it’s plenty flexible and it follows his articulation nicely so as not to restrict his range of motion while he’s wearing it. He looks really good facing off against Darkseid up on my shelf. I can’t wait for Mattel and the 4H to tackle Mr. Miracle, Kalibak, High Father, Big Barda and all the other New Gods characters!

Every wave of action figures these days has to have a runt, and The Penguin fits that bill. But just because he’s small doesn’t mean he lacks character! What we get in this version of The Penguin is exactly what you’d expect from any figure in this line. Sculpt detail, nice paint apps and good articulation. His articulation’s not great, though. The Penguin lacks lateral thigh movement. He just has a standard t-crotch. But, since this is a character that’s really known for doing splits, I guess that doesn’t matter much. He does get a cool accessory in his trademark umbrella, and he looks darn nice up on the shelf with the rest of Batman’s rogues.

Red Tornado is another ‘knock out of the park’ for Mattel and the 4 Horsemen. It’s becoming difficult to think of new things to say apart from “Great sculpt! Great paint detail! Great articulation!” What’s interesting about Reddy is that he shares the same base body as both Batman and Orion, but it’s tough to tell unless you put them side-by-side and really examine the sculpt of the musculature. His trim and paint job do more than enough to set him apart from the other figures in the series. And Mattel hooked him up with an accessory – a little swirling orange ‘tornado blast’ effect that snaps on his wrist. Pretty nifty. I consider this guy another ‘must have’ figure for any fan of DC Comics or superarticulated action figures in general.

Apparently there was some issue with the licensing of the name ‘Metamorpho’, so, officially, Mattel’s figure is Rex Mason, The Element Man. Rex is a rather interesting and unexpected first build-a-figure for the new DC Universe Classics series. But that’s not to say he’s not welcome! The character choice seems to be Mattel’s way of saying they really do have the adult collector in mind with this line and they intend to hook us up with all of our demanded characters - no matter how off-beat or obscure.

In this regard, Metamorpho is the perfect build-a-figure! His unconventional design and shape-shifting powers really let the 4 Horsemen get creative, crafting snap-on accessories to complement and augment his limbs. The construction of the figure is solid, he snaps together well and feels just as durable as the other figures in this line. My Metamorpho has some ‘looseness’ in one of his legs, but it’s nothing that really hampers the figure. Like the rest of the figures in this line, Metamorpho has tremendous detail in his sculpt and really nice paint applications. And, of course, he gets hooked up with standard DCUC articulation and demonstrates a really nice range of motion in his joints. He’s the perfect way to cap off a really fantastic first series from this awesome action figure line!

Check out more pics and character biographies of all these great figures at DCUniverseClassics.com!

SUPERMAN

I wanted to review Bats first, but it’s technically a toy line for little kids, so for that reason I felt like I need to lead off with Superman. Okay, there’s not much to critique with these guys. They’re cute, they’re well-constructed, they’re durable, and they’re just a heck of a lot of fun. If you have kids, or if you’re still just a big kid at heart, you’ll love these. Superman comes with a piece-together plastic brick wall that shatters apart when he steps on (or you press down) the button in the base plate. It works surprisingly well. And I dig his cloth cape. (How come the ‘collectors’ figures don’t get cloth capes but the kids toys do? hmmm…).

BATMAN

Oh yeah! Okay, I’m a sucker for anything and everything Bats-related, so I just had to get this little guy. Bats comes with a nifty air-compressor powered batarang. It’s foam, so it’s unlikely that you or your youngin’ will put an eye out. And I was really pretty impressed with the engineering. There’s a little peg on one side of the launcher that ensures that the batarang spins around as it’s propelled off from the air gun. Pretty neat! Also, you can get Bats in a nice variety of costume decos. He comes standard as blue on grey, but there are also black on grey, blue on black, and all black on black variants. I picked up the black on grey as well… cuz I had to. I just had to!

Variant:

FLASH

Little Flash here is about as cute as they come. His smile is… infectious! Flash comes with a whirly-zoom clear display base that is mounted on free rolling wheels. You plug the tube of an air pump into the back of the base and slam down the pump to send little Flash whooshing across the floor. It works alright on a flat surface, but is a lot less functional than Supes’ smashin’ wall or Bats’ cool batarang.

AQUAMAN

w00t! This figure was actually my ‘white whale’ for quite some time. I finally found one at TRU after months of hunting a couple weeks ago. He’s excellent! He gets the classic Aquaman look, right down to the painted on scales and little ‘fins’ on the backs of his legs. Awesomeness. His action feature is a whirlpool base that you fill with water that shoots out of his trident when you press him down. I haven’t actually tried it yet… What’s wrong with me?! That’s the coolest feature yet!

LEX LUTHOR

Oh my! Look at that sexy little bald head! Lex is decked out in removable krypto-armor (or whatever it’s supposed to be) and comes with an air pump back-pack and a cool kryptonite gun. I guess it’s less of a gun and more of a jackhammer. When you squeeze the backpack, the kryptonite ‘blade’ of the gun pumps in and out. Like he’s going to repeatedly poke Superman to death one Krypto-inch at a time! Muuuaaahahaaahaaaa!

GREEN LANTERN

Hurray for ethnic diversity! Mattel could have easily gone with the classic ‘Hal Jordan’ version of the lantern, but they threw us a curve ball by outfitting good ole John Stewart - the African American Green Lantern! (Look at me making a racial issue out of a toy designed for three year olds!). Well, ole GL is a pretty darn fun little toy. His gimmick is very similar to Luthor’s, only cooler. His little air pump backpack makes his uber-neat snap-on green lantern fist pump outward, knocking the hizzell out of some fizzoes. (Oh dear…)

——————————————————————-

BATMAN

The Batman released in this series is pretty much just a straight repaint of the excellent Batman we got in the third series, save for one seemingly minor but really important alteration - he gets series 1 Bats’ belt. This smaller, slightly more flexible belt gives his hips a greater, freer range of motion, and it just looks more streamlined than the clunky, oversized belt that came on the series 3 figure. Fans who have been clamoring for a classic black and grey Batman won’t be disappointed by this release.

——————————————————————-

BRUCE WAYNE TO BATMAN

Here’s where this assortment really takes a downhill slide. Mattel opted to include several releases from their old 2003 Batman line. The first of these is ‘Bruce Wayne to Batman’ - a gimmicky kids toy that features a poorly articulated Bruce Wayne with snap-on accessories to make him look like a weird, shiny blue armored version of the Dark Knight. The most frustrating thing about this figure is that his silly action feature doesn’t even work. The Bruce Wayne head is spring activated and ’sinks’ into the chest cavity, but there’s no mechanism by which to get it to stay there. So, keeping his ‘Batman’ head and cape piece in place is nearly impossible. And I have no idea what the Bat-themed dual spotlight thing is supposed to be… Sigh…

——————————————————————-

CATWOMAN

Catwoman has long been one of the most anticipated figures from this line. She was unveiled as a prototype a couple years ago at SDCC, and since then we’ve been patiently waiting for her to finally make her way to retail. Now that she’s here, the wait seems worth it. The figure itself is outstanding, featuring a subtle retooling of the Batgirl body that has become the DCSH standard for a female sculpt. From her catlike goggles down to her trademark boots, this incarnation of Catwoman really captures the character. And Mattel didn’t short-change us on the accessories. She gets her trusty whip, her pet kitty Isis, her cute little removable backpack, and a string of stolen jewels. Good stuff.

——————————————————————-

CLAYFACE

Mattel’s ambition with including Clayface in this line is admirable. The engineering of this figure is really impressive - the 4Horsemen managed to sculpt and design an imposing, superarticulated action figure of a character that is essentially just a giant lump of shape-shifting clay. Their work-around for this was to give the figure a solid torso and legs with classic DCSH style articulation, and then mold his arms in flexible rubber with internal wire guides to make them all bendy and malleable. It all came together nicely, and this guy looks great up on the shelf!

——————————————————————-

THE JOKER

This Joker is another of the aforementioned re-releases from the 2003 line. His articulation is limited, especially in the legs, and he is ridiculously out of scale with other DCSH figures, being considerably shorter and smaller than he should be. He comes with a bevy of semi-cool accessories - a gas mask, a squirt gun, a backpack, and his big green oversized mallet, but none of that really makes this figure worth picking up. Hopefully we’ll get a new, better Joker at some point in the Classics line.

——————————————————————-

NIGHTWING

Nightwing is the final figure in this wave, and just like the Joker, he’s a rehash from that old line. And, also like the Joker, I find myself waiting for a new version of this character in the Classics line. Again we see limited articulated, and his sculpting/style just really doesn’t fit in with the rest of DCSH. He gets one, just one, of his trademark batons and some kind of weird Nightwing logo shield thing. Eh. This figure’s a pass unless you’re just a huge fan of the character and you missed the first release of this figure.

Knight Shadow Batman is an all-black repaint of the Series 3 Batman with a new head. The figure isn’t specifically comic-accurate, but it’s believable enough that Bats would have an all-black costume with a full-face-covering cowl in his arsenal of bats-related gadgetry. This figure also comes with the same assortment of batarangs that did the Series 3 version.

Like KSBatman, this version of Batgirl is just a repaint of the original Batgirl with a new head. But, in this case, it qualifies as a new character! Cassie Cain is the second individual to don the cape and cowl of Batgirl, and the feisty little mute prefers to keep her face completely hidden. How mysterious and frightening!

Gotham’s poor District Attorney turned criminal mastermind gets an excellent figure in DCSH. Two-Face uses the same base body as Clark Kent from the two-packs, with new hands and a new head sculpt. His scarred face-half is sufficiently grisly and creepy, as is his red, claw-like acid-burned hand. Another outstanding effort from the 4-Horsemen. He also gets a tommy-gun accessory to use in mowing down pesky do-gooders.