Mafex Selina Kyle 2.0 - The Dark Knight Rises

A lot of people didn't necessarily love The Dark Knight Rises. It had its share of good moments, and while I certainly enjoyed it, it didn't feel as new (at the time) as Batman Begins nor did it feel the high stakes and amazing Joker appearance as The Dark Knight had. It did tie up some loose ends from the last film and added some interesting characters. Tom Hardy as Bane was well done. I might be one of the few that enjoyed Selina Kyle's character (and she is never called Catwoman outright, but that's fine since that might've taken more time to work in in a way that kept with Nolan's vision of a realistic-ish Batman franchise).

Some people compared her too much with the other more beloved Selina Kyla (no, not Halle Berry), Michelle Pheiffer from Batman Returns. I feel that both Catwomen are drastically different in their character approach. I did love Pheiffer's unhinged, seductive and dangerous Catwoman with a handmade costume. Anne Hathaway did a respectable job though, had some good fight scenes, and I enjoyed that she became more of an ally at the end. I also liked the new look and costume they designed, it was neat (though I still don't get why everyone in film, media, and comics still puts a cat burglar character wearing very high heeled shoes...seems super impractical). It was unfortunate there was quite a bit of jumping between characters like Bane and others so you didn't get the best grasp of them all.

Mafex Ra's al Ghul - Batman Begins

Ra's al Ghul is the leader of the League of Shadows, a secret organization that seeks to cleanse the world of its crime and impurities. Ras himself has appeared in many comics and notably as the main villain in Batman Begins, Christopher Nolan's first Batman film of the trilogy. I enjoyed Liam Neeson's performance as Ras, and to be honest there are days when his ideology doesn't seem too radical! That said, he doesn't concern himself too much with innocents vs criminals in the movie, so naturally, he has to be stopped!

This figure, in particular, is the outfit he wears while training Bruce Wayne in the art of Ninjutsu. He has his black padded armour, back hooked bracers, ninja sword, and you can alternate between his masked head and unmasked face. The unmasked head is a great look-alike to the actor! And the sculpt and paint is also pretty on point, though granted they didn't have to do anything much with that given it is mostly black with mixes of matte and shiny finishes. The biggest disappointment here isn't the number of joints exactly but how very limited the range of motion is in this figure compared to nearly every other Mafex I've collected so far. It's kind of bizarre, to be honest! Not the worst figure but far, but probably the least posable import figure I've seen.

DC Essentials - Red Hood (Rebirth)

Though I don't particularly like his personality, Red Hood comes by it honestly as both a character that was kicked to the curb both in the real world and forgotten by his family. Jason Todd is the youth delinquent that managed to steal off the Batmobile and consequently became the second Robin.

From '83 until '88 he was just that. He wasn't particularly popular with fans though, and there was an actual phone-in poll to decide by fans whether to scrap him or keep him alive. In the storyline "A Death in the Family" he was killed off by a narrow margin of votes. He was later resurrected as the Red Hood, a vigilante willing to do just about anything in the name of Justice. He is definitely lawful to his own code rather than a strictly moral one.

What I like most about Red Hood is his character design. Awesome shiny red motorcycle helmet, leather jacket, his own symbol based on the intensification of his mentor's and dual pistols. He's a crafty fighter and the best example of this I've seen is through the Arkham Knight game, as well as the DC animated film, Under the Red Hood. This figure is AWESOME especially for the price of about 30ish CAD dollars. He is a DC Essentials which means very few accessories but here it's enough. His paint and design are great, and aside from some limits in ankle movement, he's got good articulation and is a spot-on representation of the Red Hood from the newer Rebirth continuity.