Jesus Christ, another review!
Have you seen that thing pointing out all the similiarities between the story of Jesus and the Egyptian god Horus, suggesting
that ya boy Oily Josh was just a whitewashing of older myths? It's not new. It was popularized by a YouTube rant vid totally legitimate movie, you guys, called Zeitgeist in 2007 and Bill Maher's Religulous in 2008, but both of those follow the 2005 book The Pagan Christ by Tom Harpur. Harpur, in turn, cites Gerald Massey, a self-taught Egyptologist who died in 1907 and was a noted quack. Massey's Ancient Egypt, The Light of the World is full of historical speculative fiction, half-baked philosophical ideas, and study of the zodiac, and he just presents it all as accepted fact without any evidence. (There's a reason no scholars have ever taken him seriously.) Basically, the entire "Jesus = Horus" thing is 100% fabricated, presumably spread today to make aetheists feel superior.
Chris Gawrych, who's done a lot of stuff with NECA and the Four
Horsemen (as well as being the mind behind Space Force) has finally made his own toyline, Biblical Adventures. Rather than just being generic "Bible" toys, like have been released in the past, these are inspired by classic artworks and feature the kind of quality you expect from an action figure these days. And since my personal belief is "if a Kickstarter features an exclusive figure, you make sure to get that one first," I was happy to get the Transfiguration Jesus.
There was a normal Transfiguration Jesus in the line (in "Book Three"), available in a two-pack that allowed you to have him be either fully clear or a translucent brown. The text in the Kickstarter seems to conflate the Transfiguration with the Resurrection, but those are two different things (though there is an artistic tradition that imagines it as sort of a preview for what Jesus would be like after
coming back to life): in the story of the Transfiguration, Jesus and three of his disciples hike up a mountain, where Jesus begins to shine with light; then Elijah and Moses appear and converse with Jesus, God says Jesus is his son, and then it's over and the group goes back down the mountain, with Jesus making everyone promise not to talk about what they saw. Anyway, that "glowing with holy light" stuff why the toy version was translucent. This exclusive is translucent blue, easily set apart from its main-line counterpart(s). Even his robe, which is softgoods, is a gauzy material, allowing light to shine through it nearly as easily as the plastic the body is made from.
D13 Toys designed a plain body to serve as the core
for all the figures in the line. It's 6" scale, and muscular, and has lots of articulation: a balljoint/hinge head, balljoint neck, pec hinges, swivel/hinge shoulders, swivel biceps, double-hinged elbows, swivel/hinge wrists, balljointed chest, swivel waist, balljoint hips, swivel thighs, double-hinge knees, and swivel/hinge ankles. The lower edge of the robe and the sleeves have posing wires in them, so you can make them hang naturally. Since the garment is basically just a large shirt, not something that needs to be folded over itself to close, the legs do get slightly limited - if you want Jesus to do some Jean-Claude Van Damme splits or a high kick, you'll have to work around it. Make sure not to lift it high enough to show his Jesus-junk!
As a limited exclusive, this Jesus doesn't get as many accessories as the other incarnations do. Buy other Jesuses ("Jesii"?) and you'll get different robes, books, halos, energy effects, etc. Heck, the non-exclusive
Transfiguration set even includes the Shroud of Turin! All this one gets is some alternate hands and a display stand. Not even one of the cool stands, like paving stones or sand or water, just the plain flat one. The hands include a pair for holding accessories, a pair flat to show off his stigmata, and a pair from the "Sacred Heart" figure, which means a "blessing" right hand and a left hand holding a heart wrapped in barbed wire, with flames and a cross shooting out of the top.
Dang, how very "Hot Topic in 2005"!
However, this exclusive does have one bonus feature the other doesn't. Remember when we said the Transfiguration was about Jesus glowing with energy? Yeah, you guessed it: this toy glows in the dark! And that's where the thinness of the robe comes in handy, too, since you can't make cloth glow, but this is delicate enough that Jesus' body will shine through it even if you don't take it off. Love that! Since Chris Gawrych is the one who had to deal with the infamous Mythic Legions "Halfnon" situation, we're willing to bet this one came out right the first time.
While the other Biblical Adventures figures come in packaging designed to resemble a Bible, including a "cover" that can be opened, Translucent Blue Transfiguration Jesus does not. His box is just a gray rectangle with logos on the sides, lorem ipsum text on the back (which is why this review opened by talking about Horus, instead of quoting any specific text) and a faux address label and stamp on the front. In other words, it's designed to look like what old-fashioned mailaway figures shipped in! Or, more specifically, think of the '90s: robes, beard, light blue color, comes in a plain white box... this whole thing is an homage to Oh-Blueberry-Wan Kenobi!
Force Ghost Jesus wouldn't have normally been my first choice from this line, but he does show off the quality well, and being a Kickstarter exclusive means the only way to get him now would be on the secondary market. D13 Toys has already had to eat the tariff increases on these figures, because they didn't get on the boat soon enough, so we really hope those extra fees don't sink the company; the new body is a wonderful design and we look forward to seeing it reused on more toys in the future.
-- 05/21/25
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