We were doing really well with Gipsy Danger for a while there - Poe reviewed one, I reviewed one,
Monkey Boy reviewed one... but then Shocka didn't get the variants and Rustin hates the movie for some unfathomable reason, so the cunning plan to have all the different Gipsies reviewed by different OAFEs sadly fell apart. We have let you down, dear reader!
This figure, a Toys Я Us exclusive, uses the same tooling as the Series 6 "Reactor Blast" Gipsy Danger (released alongside Horizon Brave). That's not a figure I have, or was even really looking forward to getting, but the changes made for this beauty made her entirely worth it.
But forget the differences for now, let's start with the sames.
The core of the figure's tooling is shared with "Hong Kong Brawl" Gipsy Danger, but there are many, many changes. The only pieces that are actually identical are the feet, left shin, thighs, lower torso, left arm, and head. The right shin (and knee) are both torn up, while the right arm has been torn off completely - the only thing sticking out of that shoulder is a bundle of cables. Clearly, this is taken from the end of the film, and is showing all the damage inflicted upon her by Scunner and Raiju. Even the chest has been redone, adding deep scars running to the torn shoulder and pitting around the central turbine.
All that was true of "Reactor Blast" GD, as well, so it's not what makes this an exclusive. This figure is officially named "Anteverse Gipsy Danger," so it represents the Jaeger after her trip through the Breach. If you don't recall, that's when the movie really started to bathe in the bright, beautiful colors, because apparently alternate dimensions work like a blacklight poster. To capture the spirit of this scene, if not the literal reality, NECA has molded this figure from a translucent indigo plastic, then given some areas metallic purple sprays, and painted the internal mechanics (pistons and gears, etc.) solid black. We still get some red and white stripes, the visor is golden, and the spotlights on the shoulder-flaps are given shiny yellow apps. The reactor in the center of the chest is white, yellow, orange, and red, presumably to suggest the overloading power core. This is a beautiful figure.
And the packaging only helps display it. Anteverse Gipsy Danger
is sold in the same clamshell as all the other Pacific Rim Jaegers, but rather than having the typical paper insert behind the figure, the backdrop is plastic. Why plastic? Because plastic can be translucent in ways that paper can't - the back of the package is designed to allow light to shine through it just like the figure is! While Gipsy is mostly blues and other cool colors, the insert is warm yellow and red, showing the giant... sun? Flaming planet? Eye of Sauron? visible in the Anteverse's sky, with a few lightning bolts and the barely visible edges of Kaiju pens along the sides. It's an absolute shame that this figure just got the normal clamshell, rather than something resealable, because it's absolutely worth displaying the packaging, too.
Actually, I can't believe we're about to say this on this site, but it might be worth leaving Anteverse Gipsy Danger mint-on-card. Yes, she has decent articulation, but remember: she's molded from translucent plastic. And what's almost always true about
translucent plastic? It's more brittle than the opaque stuff, and tends to break. My Gipsy's elbow shattered as I was taking her out of the tray, and the hips don't feel like they could take a ton of abuse, either. That would mean you miss out on getting to play with her accessories - a contracted chain sword that plugs into her wrist, and the giant plume of flame that gave the "Reactor Blast" toy its name - but display-worthy packaging and joints that you might have to glue into place add up to a figure that works better closed than open.
Anteverse Gipsy Danger is a terrific display piece, but if you want something you can mess around with, Reactor Blast Gipsy Danger is a better option. Given the choice, however I'd take the exclusive over the regular version any day.
-- 12/20/15
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