Welcome to another installment of Toy News Tuesday! For all of you newcomers, this is our awesome weekly column where ScienceFiction.com’s resident toy-guru Jordan DesJardins takes you on a quick walk through all the cool happenings in the toy industry each week! Whether you’re a collector or just kind of curious as to what’s going on with toys these days, this is the place to get all the latest info! While it’s been a relatively quiet week for toy news, let’s check out the happenings for the week of March 11th, 2014!
DC Collectibles Figure Reveals
The crew over at DC Collectibles recently released some new previews of upcoming figures over at Plastic Memory! They gave us our first look at their previously unsolicited Red Robin figure from the upcoming New 52 based ‘Teen Titans’ line, as well as the first full color image of their all new Red Hood figure!
The ‘Teen Titans’ line is set for release in a few short months, with the lineup that also includes Kid Flash, Superboy and Wonder Girl all based on their look in the New 52 (are we still calling it that? It’s been what, close to three years now?). These are the first figures we’ve gotten of any of these characters in their new looks. With the titular series ending this month, it’s a wonder if we’ll ever see plastic incarnations of the rest of the team, like Bunker or Solstice. It is noteable that DC Collectibles seems to continue their trend of upping the ante with their articulation while maintaining fantastically detailed sculpts!
At long last, fans are finally getting a figure of Jason Todd’s Red Hood in his biker outfit! Granted, it’s based on his appearances in ‘Red Hood and the Outlaws’, so he’s got the large red bat-insignia on his chest, but it’s the closest official release we’ve gotten to a decent Jason Todd figure with his jacket and helmet (we dare not speak of that atrocious DC Universe Signature Series figure from Matty Collector). It is worth noting that he will unfortunately have those massive wrist-blade gauntlets attached to him pretty permanently, even though they’re mostly used for show on the series cover-art. DC Collectibles also gave us another look at the Arsenal and Starfire figures from the ‘Red Hood and the Outlaws’ line, which both look fantastic! One neat feature that stands out is that Arsenal’s hat is fully articulated! Not something you see too often, I don’t think.
Diamond Select Reveals
This week Diamond Select Toys released their all new 2014 toy catalog, which previews a vast cornucopia of both new and currently stocked products across 24 jam-packed pages! This includes some of our first looks at the new Diamond Select figures for cult classics like ‘Pulp Fiction‘, ‘Lost in Space‘, ‘Sin City’ and even Jay & Silent Bob! We also the first preview of the new Star Trek Select Warf figure, as well as Marvel Select’s new figures of Falcon the Captain himself from ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’.
For Mini-Mate fans, DST’s new 2014 catalog also showcases quite a few new series of Mini-Mates figures from across their numerous licenses like ‘ALIENS’, Marvel Comics and ‘Ghostbusters’! Of the previewed series, the next wave of Battle Beasts looks particularly interesting; showing what looks like a much more diverse group of characters than the first wave from that series offered. The Mini-Mates line for ‘Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare’ also shows a lot of promise, being vastly different than almost any other line DST has ever released as Mini-Mates.
Time to get ‘Knee Deep in the Dead’
The team over at Gaming Heads just announced their newest exclusive collectible statue, a full 3-D diorama based on the cover-art for the original ‘DOOM’ game! The statue, titled ‘Knee Deep in the Dead’ will be available as a standard release for $374.99, or the Gaming Heads website also has an exclusive edition available for $399.99 which features a light-up base that “pulses to simulate flowing lava”! This thing looks phenomenal, and would make an amazing addition to any gamers collection! It’s one of the coolest pieces I’ve seen offered overall so far this year. Here’s the full write up on it.
Gaming Heads is excited to kick off our awesome range of DOOM® collectible statues, starting with our DOOM: Knee Deep In The Dead resin diorama. Based on the classic DOOM box cover art, the diorama depicts the Space Marine in a life and death battle with demons from hell, armed only with his wits and his trusty sidearm. This is an epic center piece to any DOOM collection! The diorama measures approximately 12.5 inches tall and 17 inches wide, including the base, and comes packed in a foam interior, full-color box with a validation card which ensures your product is genuine. Cast in high quality poly-stone, the statue is hand-finished and hand-painted to exacting standards. The simulated bullet effects are removable, depending on your display preference.
This Exclusive Edition comes with a light-up base which pulses to simulate flowing lava. As this is a new line, low product numbers are available for the range and secured on a first come, first served basis.
Price: $399.99
Dimensions:12.5 Inches
Artist:Siamak Roshani
Available:Q3 2014
Limited to:350 pieces worldwide
That’ll about do it for this week’s Toy News Tuesday! What do you think of all the new offerings from DC Collectibles and DST? Or how about the new ‘DOOM’ statue? So much awesomeness to be found, and only so much shelf space to fill! While there hasn’t been too much going on this week, the few tidbits of news that hit will have to tide you over until next week’s installment! Until then… courage.
Stay tuned to ScienceFiction.com for all your latest news on all your favorites!