You have to give ToyBiz credit. While they cater to the articulation fans with their Marvel Legends line, they keep the sculpt crowd happy with Marvel Select. Of course, the Marvel Select figures cost twice as much as the Legends with half the value, but every few months a figure comes along that's worth the price.
A maniacal manifestation of Norman Osborn's chemical-induced insanity, the Green Goblin has done more than any other villain to wreck the webslinger's world. An accident involving an untested, experimental formula granted Norman Osborn superhuman strength, a heightened intellect and an accelerated healing factor - at the cost of his sanity. The Green Goblin rides a high-flying Goblin Glider and carries a power-packed arsenal including incendiary and concussion grenades theatrically cast in the form of miniature jack-o-lanterns and gloves capable of discharging electrical pulses of up to 10,000 volts. He is Spider-Man's greatest enemy; he has been, almost since the beginning.
This is probably the best Green Goblin figure ToyBiz has ever released. While not an exact recreation of the cover to Amazing Spider-Man #39, the figure is obviously inspired by it. He's crouching on his Goblin Glider with a pumpkin bomb in one hand and a rope suspending the defeated Peter Parker in the other.
I don't know why Rustin was so surprised by the Spider-Man cartoon Lizard - great sculpting and great paint are nothing new to ToyBiz. The texture on the Goblin figure is great: he's stippled with lots of little bumps all over the green portions of his costume, while the purple is wrinkled, folded and even stitched like real fabric would be.
The look on Gobby's face is truly unnerving, as it should be. His bright yellow eyes are open wide, and his mouth is pulled back into a wicked, toothy laugh - Green Goblin and the Joker must go to the same dentist. The "skin" of his mask is pulled and wrinkled just as it should be with a smile like that, and overall he just looks maniacal.
The Green Goblin only has 12 points of articulation, but they serves him well: he moves at the neck, shoulders, gloves, wrists, waist, hips, boots and ankles. Though he's sculpted in a permanent crouch, it's okay because he spends most of his time on his glider, anyway. At 5" tall, he's just a little too big to fit in with the Marvel Legends figures, but the way he's posed will help disguise that.
The Goblin includes one pumpkin bomb and his purple purse. The bomb is very nice, a bright orange with a metallic green top. It fits nicely in his left hand without the aid of any kind of pegs. The satchel, a separate piece, hangs over his shoulder just as it should. Also, like a lot of the Marvel Select figures, Green Goblin includes a second character as an accessory.
Like Black Cat and Venom before him, Gobby's got Spider-Man. Or, more accurately, Peter Parker, since issue #39 saw the Green Goblin learn Spidey's secret identity. He ambushed Peter outside his house and carried him off into the sky. The image of Peter dangling helplessly beneath the glider, his street clothes torn to reveal glimpses of the red and blue costume beneath, has become one of Spider-Man's most iconic moments. The unarticulated figure is 6 3/4" tall and is attached to a soft, flexible 9" rope that can be clenched in the Goblin's right hand.
In place of a large display base, the Green Goblin gets his glider. 4" long and with a 6 1/4" wingspan, the glider has two foot pegs to hold the figure in place. This is the classic old-style glider, not the new-fangled technological version: a tube with flat wings and a bat's head plate on the front. To allow the glider to hover (and allow Spidey to hang properly), the package includes a 4" tall, three-piece base that plugs into the bottom of the glider and holds it aloft.
The Marvel Select series is intended to eventually have 36 figures released one per month for three years. All the Select figures share the same oversized blister cards with nice graphics on the spine, allowing MOCers to display them like books on a shelf.
The biggest factor working against the Marvel Select line is the large pricetag. These would all be pretty good $10 figures, but right now Marvel and Diamond aren't giving us very much for our money. Green Goblin, however, comes close. Damn close.
Who's your favorite Spider-Villain? Tell us on our message board, The Loafing Lounge.
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