Ninja Talon

After the unqualified success of the DC Comics Designer Series Talon, expectations were high for the new Talon based on the not-very-good animated take on the Court of Owls, Batman vs. Robin. Or at least I imagine they were. I don't know. Anyway, this is a long-winded (short-winded?) badly-written way of saying that this new Talon, it ain't too good. I'm a huge fan of the Court of Owls, so my disappointment with the flat-out bad Batman vs. Robin animated adaptation was nullified only with the knowledge that we'd get another Talon figure. I think the concept of the Court of Owls and their Talons is a terrific addition to the Batman mythology, and I'm overjoyed to add more unique versions of the Talons to my toy collection. Unfortunately, this toy is a major letdown, matching the quality of the property from which it is based. Let's start from the top. The sculpt here, while reasonably screen-accurate, is incredibly soft and lacking in detail. No doubt this is in part bringing the simpler animated design to plastic, but there's so little actual sculpting here - his body is nearly entirely free of sculpting aside from his gauntlet, which is limited to only on one hand and barely exists. The image from the movie on the packaging is significantly more detailed than the actual toy. What few details there are here are painted on instead of sculpted. The paint job here is limited to five colors - literally five colors - which is insane in this day and age. Worse, some of the application is splotchy, especially on the head, belt, wrists, and super-weirdly, the ass - very disappointing. At first glance, the articulation isn't too bad - balljoints at the neck, shoulders, legs and elbows, with pegs at the knees, but the balljoints in the neck and elbows are incredibly limited and don't allow much movement, and without movement at the wrists or feet, there's barely any poses for him outside of "standing in front of you." There's no waist movement either, and with both hands open he can't make a fist, and could only hold a weapon in one hand - if he actually had any. Yes, this "Ninja" doesn't feature any weapons at all. The small knives he wields in the movie are limited to parts sculpted onto him and painted with splotchy yellow paint. And that's it. No accessories, no weapons, no nothing. So what we get here, for the same price as the fully articulated, highly detailed Talon complete with nearly a dozen weapons, is this poorly detailed, barely articulated junk. So this is not a good figure, not at all. But as an addition to my Talon army, it is... acceptable, but only on sale, like I got it. If you're like yo and only chasing one of the Talons, then the other figure is the only way to go. But if you want an army, like me, and can get this guy discounted, then maybe consider it. Maybe. Consider yourself warned! -- 10/08/15

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