Cassidy

Well how's this for a reversal: an Irish person who could suck the blood out of the English! Cassidy is an Irish vagabond, a glutton for every possible vice, and when he stumbles across the weird town of Annville, he quickly becomes Jesse's most wild-ass, bestest friend. Up for any kind of adventure, his hedonistic lifestyle and humanist views are constantly at odds with Jesse's faith. Rather than follow the comics exactly, Preacher basically seemed to throw all the books into a blender and then just go with it; they were more concerned with the tone than the specifics, moving and rearranging things as needed. That's fine, it worked with Walking Dead, and it worked here, too. Fortunately for Cassidy, he didn't get changed much: he was a self-serving (if well-meaning) scum bag in the comics, and he was a self-serving (if well-meaning) scum bag on the TV show. Other than that, what possibly matters? Cassidy was played by Joseph Gilgun, who did a great job of embodying the character: scrawny, dirty, shifty, and yet the kind of guy who feels like he'd be your best friend after knowing him for an hour. The portrait was done by Jason Frailey, and does a fine job of matching the actor. The eyes are a bit close together (which may be more about the paint than the sculpt - too bad TV Cassidy didn't wear sunglasses like comicbook Cassidy did), but the crooked nose is perfect. Other than the glasses, the show's costume department stuck close to the source for Cass's clothes. He wears blue jeans, a plain white tee, a plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and a denim vest. This part of the figure was sculpted by Thomas Gwyn, who did a wonderful job making the cloth look layered and natural, despite actually just being a single piece. The paintwork on the plaid is quite crisp, though of course it wears off the interior of the elbow joints as soon as you move them. Cassidy also has tattoos on his arms and hands, done in an appropriate dark blue and applied perfectly cleanly. These figures were released in 2017, so you can probably predict what the articulation is going to be like: balljointed head, swivel/hinge shoulders, swivel/hinge elbows, balljoint wrists, a balljointed waist, swivel/hinge hips, swivel thighs, swivel/hinge knees, and balljointed ankles. They'd have done better today, but then, they'd also have done way worse even further in the past. None of the joints were stuck, or even remotely stiff, even opening this bad boy nearly a decade after it was made. Like we said above, the paint scrapes off the elbows, but that's never not an issue, is it? Casssidy includes an extra pair of fists, but no hands designed to hold any of his accessories. What accessories are those? Two bottles of Hard Hammer beer, just like Jesse had, plus another hymnal for some reason (this time in red instead of blue). There's also a bottle of Ratwater whiskey, which has a silhouette of the Saint of Killers as its logo - the closest we get to seeing him in this toyline. It really would have been nice if they'd given him an alternate smiling head. Or his glasses. Preacher was a good show, but it clearly didn't make for a successful toyline: NECA released Jesse and Cassidy, but stopped there. We didn't even get to complete the good guys with a Tulip! The DC Direct figures from the turn of the century at least managed that, plus a Saint to menace them. Both the figures in this line are made well, but being unable to collect the full group makes it pretty understandable why these made it to the end of TRU's lifespan. -- 02/15/26 Cassidy in the comics had a cameo in The Boys; should The Boys TV show bring Joe Gilgun on for a quick appearance too? Tell us on our message board, the Loafing Lounge.