{"id":13626,"date":"2013-10-09T00:00:47","date_gmt":"2013-10-09T04:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.oafe.net\/blog\/?p=13626"},"modified":"2024-06-18T16:16:52","modified_gmt":"2024-06-18T20:16:52","slug":"walking-dead-mystery-minis-merle-dixon-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.oafe.net\/blog\/2013\/10\/walking-dead-mystery-minis-merle-dixon-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Walking Dead Mystery Minis: Merle Dixon review"},"content":{"rendered":"

Funko, the company known for licensing every pop culture property that's even vaguely well-known for their \"Pop!\" vinyl line of figures, is getting into the blind-boxed toy craze with Mystery Minis<\/i>. They started with Disney, DC and Domo, and have now moved on to The Walking Dead<\/i>. They're sold in 24-box counter dumps, with the most common figures being packed 1-in-12, and the rarity moving up from there. I picked up a bunch at the comicshop, so we're going to have \"Walking Dead Wednesdays\" for Horror Month!<\/p>\n

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My first purchase is the dirty meth-head redneck everybody loves to hate, Merle Dixon. Left for dead in Season 1 by Rick<\/a> and the rest of the survivors, Merle makes his full return in Season 3, and that's what this figure represents: you can tell by the number of hands he has.<\/p>\n

Merle is played by Michael Rooker<\/a> in his first comicbook role (he's also going to be Yondu<\/a> in Guardians of the Galaxy<\/i>). Although technically Merle isn't a \"comicbook\" character, since he was invented for the show - Funko's license for these doesn't let them do anyone who's appeared in the comics, even if they've been drastically changed. This is possibly because of a scale conflict with Art Asylum's Walking Dead<\/i> Minimates: Minimates are 2⅛\" tall, and the Mystery Minis<\/i> are 2½\", which would put them in the same bracket. But on the other hand, there's no articulation, so they may count as a different product category. We don't know.<\/p>\n

The toy's smooth head can't do Merle's haggard looks justice, so it's a good thing he's sculpted with his bayonet arm. It's impressively detailed, from the tip of the knife to the strap around his bicep. His clothes are all dull earthtones - black shoes and undershirt, tan pants, khaki shirt - so with his pink skin and dirty blonde hair, he looks very monochromatic. He's holding a silver pistol in his left hand, but since there's no articulation, he can't aim it at anyone.<\/p>\n

Merle is one of the 1:12 figures, so he's among the easiest to find. There's also a blood-spattered variant of him, but it's packed at the same ratio. But so far, they haven't done the other variant that you're probably expecting - maybe they're waiting for Series 2.<\/p>\n

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So no, they weren't<\/b> waiting for Series 2.<\/p>\n

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The Walking Dead Mystery Minis<\/i> have been going along pretty well, with (so far) four series of figures. For 2017's release, however, they've done something different: rather than a mix of characters from one season of the TV show, they've done their first \"In Memorium\" series, honoring the characters the show has killed off. Well, some of them - George RR Martin<\/a> doesn't have anything on Robert Kirkman, and this series only has 20 figures in it, so they had to pick and choose.<\/p>\n

One of the common figures, available in a 1:12 ratio and thus in every case that ships, is Merle Dixon. Dead Merle Dixon. Reanimated Merle Dixon. Walker Merle Dixon. Originally introduced as a drug-dealing white supremacist, Merle softened slightly by the time he returned in Season 3 (because you can't make people sympathize with a character who's constantly klansplaining about why Confederate monuments are good, actually), but he was still a total dick who only barely managed to redeem himself right at the end, and then only because he was afraid of the Governor. His attempt at being an assassin didn't work out so great, and as punishment, the Governor shot him in the chest and didn't destroy his brain, so he'd come back to life.<\/p>\n

Taking a cue from what they did with their 2014 Game of Thrones<\/i> SDCC exclusive Mystery Minis<\/i>, Funko has done the In Memorium<\/i> figures in grayscale. They're not truly black-and-white, but rather a desaturated version of their normal colors - and since Merle wasn't exactly flashy to begin with, he doesn't look that different. The sculpting on these figures has come a long way in four years, so this toy has a better likeness than the original. He has a stuporous, unsteady posture, his shirt is half untucked, and there's a hole in the back of his shirt, showing where the bullet passed through. The blood on his hands, face, knees and chest is a dark red, suiting the style of the figures.<\/p>\n

Walker Merle is a cooler figure than living Merle was, and the colorscheme doesn't make him look too out of place as a zombie. If you want one, he's in the bottom row of boxes, on the left, in the middle.<\/p>\n

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<i>And now, some more OAFEry:<\/i><\/H5>