This summer DC Entertainment released ‘Batman: Arkham Knight‘, the latest game in their fan favorite ‘Arkham’ series of Batman video games. ‘Arkham Knight’ gives fans the definitive ‘Batman’ video game experience, enveloping them in the world of the Dark Knight that is jam packed with familiar locations, stories, and best of all, Batman’s supporting cast of characters.

From terrifying villains to loyal sidekicks, Batman’s universe is full of distinct characters, and in the middle of all of that action there is a small group who aren’t wearing crazy costumes; the Gotham City Police Department. These brave men and women are just trying to do their jobs by keeping their city safe, and they are lead by none other than Commissioner Jim Gordon. In Batman’s mission to defeat crime in Gotham City, Gordon is the one man who has stood by Batman faithfully for all these years, unmasked and moving in the light rather than the shadows.

Our friends at DC Collectibles have released a line of action figures to coincide with the successful release of ‘Arkham Knight’, with the second wave of figures hitting stores now with some of your favorite characters like Robin, Nightwing, Catwoman, and you guessed it, Commissioner Jim Gordon! Today we’re taking a look at this all new Commissioner Gordon figure to see how it stacks up!

Diving right in, this 7″ scale Gordon figure looks great! The major plus about this figure is that it’s based on the character design from the ‘Arkham Knight’ game, which utilized the most iconic look for Gordon, so this figure works really well as a generic Commissioner Gordon figure for your DC Collectibles display. The sculpt used here is great, and brings the Gordon we know and love to life in plastic form. With this figure, a lot of what makes him great are the little details that are more subtle and might go unnoticed. For example, his necktie is a separately attached soft rubber piece, rather than just being sculpted on to his chest.They also did something similar with his shoulder holster, making it from soft rubber and attaching it rather than just sculpting it on. His glasses appear to be a separate piece as well. While none of these pieces are removable, the fact that they don’t look like they are simply sculpted on makes the whole character feel more real.

The ‘Arkham Knight’ Jim Gordon figure comes packaged in a 5-sided box that features artwork from the game. Along the smaller angled side it says the characters name, which looks to be a new standard for the packaging of DC Collectibles figures. The box notes that Gordon here is figure number eight in the ‘Arkham Knight’ toyline, and showcases several other figures from the recent wave on the back of the box.

For accessories, Commissioner Gordon is a little light. He comes packed with a pistol and a walkie talkie, as well as an additional hand that looks like it’s waving. The pistol and walkie talkie are pretty standard fare, and work perfectly as accessories for the character. I really love that Gordon’s pistol actually fits comfortably into his shoulder holster! It’s a really nice touch. The additional hand is a bit odd. It seems fairly superfluous as the hands already attached are shaped to hold the pistol and walkie talkie, while this hand is just sort of left open. I feel like people would have been fine without it, and just having his hand always shaped like it was holding a walkie talkie, but at the same time it’s pretty awesome that DC Collectibles took the time and resources to include the extra hand so that people could have the option.

As far as the articulation, Gordon is certainly well equipped but not quite as ready for action as some of the others in this wave. He has the same beautiful double-jointed knees that the others in this wave have, but he lacks double-jointed elbows. While he is still fairly well articulated with a ball join neck, ball joint shoulders, elbow swivel and joint, wrist ball joint, ab swivel, leg ball join, thigh swivel, double-knee joint, and ankle pivot and swivel. Still, this figure feels like he has a much smaller range of movement than his counterparts, although if we’re staying true to character here that actually makes total sense! His sculpt is overall perfect for the character.

At the end of the day, the ‘Arkham Knight’ Commissioner Jim Gordon from DC Collectibles is probably the single greatest Commissioner Gordon figure we’ve ever gotten! I know that sounds like a lot of praise, but realistically we’ve only seen a handful of others over the years (DC Direct’s ‘HUSH’ line, DC Direct’s ‘Dark Victory’ line, DC Collectibles ‘Greg Capullo Designer Series’, and I’m fairly certain the ‘Dark Knight Rises’ movie line from Mattel covers all of them around this scale! We‘re opting not to include the new ‘Gotham‘ Select figures from Diamond Select on this list, as that is a completely different era of Gordon and also pretty damn cool!), and this one is hands down by and far the best one! If you don’t have a Commissioner Gordon in your collection yet, we cannot recommend this one enough!

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