Lady Bullseye

Really? We got her before Lady Stilt-Man? Lady Bullseye is a contract killer with a secret identity, martial arts prowess, and a vendetta against the ninja order the Hand. Well, sometimes she does, sometimes she doesn't. Depends on how long ago they betrayed her. As a child, Maki Matsumoto was going to be sold into slavery by the Yakuza, when Bullseye happened to show up on a job and killed them all. Impressed by the man who inadvertently saved her, she decided to become a professional killer. She was trained by the Hand, with the promise that she would become their leader, but soon found this was all just a ploy to get Daredevil to take the role, which was when she had her initial falling out with the ninja clan. She worked with Kingpin for a while, but ended up back with the Hand once The Punisher was placed in command. Lady Bullseye was one of the characters in the 2009 SDCC Marvel Legends Concept Case, like The Hood and Nuke. [let's make a list of those --ed.] She didn't win that vote, obviously, because the character hadn't even been around for a year at that point and nobody cared enough to vote for her. Back then, she would have used the same body they used for all the women at the time, but today we've got more options. Unfortunately, the best sculpt in the world couldn't make up for the costume design. Instead of dressing like an exact copy of her inspiration, Lady Bullseye keeps the colorscheme but changes the pattern - unfortunately, this is one of those costumes that may work great in a static piece of art, but sort of falls apart when applied to a real 3D object. According to her internal monologue, those shapes on her body aren't actually targets, like Bullseye wears, but ripples - she enjoys the way a murder causes grief to spread out around it in circles. But while comic art can cheat the poses, adjust the lines a little when needed, do whatever it has to to keep them looking like circles, and a toy simply can't do the same. The one on her leg looks fine, but the one on her chest? Not even close. Lady Bullseye gets a new head, because that's all most Marvel Legends warrant these days. Although her stylized mask is simply painted on, there's probably not a lot of re-use potential here, since she wears her hair done up in a bun with a pair of sticks holding it in place. She's got a bit of a smile, suggesting she's having fun on her assignment. When she's fighting, she controls her heartbeat and even her scent, to the point where Matt Murdock, a guy who managed to figure out Spider-Man's secret identity by hearing Peter Parker in court one day, can't even recognize her when she's in the same room with him. Although she's not quite at the level of the real Bullseye, Lady Bullseye's still got good fighting skills (and employs a lot of the same "throw things at people" strategies), so she comes with a katana and sais that we've seen before, plus a pair of spiked war fans we haven't. And there's the alternate pair of fists if you just want her to punch somebody. She has the typical articulation for this body, including the pinless knees and elbows, but of course moving her at all will mess up the lines of paint. Technically, she comes with two pieces of the Mindless One Build-A-Figure: the chest is so big it has to be done as a front and a back. Lady Bullseye definitively did not deserve a Marvel Legend in 2009, and fans were right not to vote for her. Since then, more writers have found uses for her, and she's even made some outside-media appearances (did you know Hit-Monkey had a cartoon? I sure didn't!), so her profile is higher now, just as toys being made now are better than they were 15 years ago. But as long as we're just looking at "Daredevil enemies with a cool design and not much else," Ikari is right there waiting, Hasbro. -- 02/05/24

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