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Write a Review link for that item. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Classic Cartoon (Neca)About a month ago, we got our first in-person San Diego Comic Con since before COVID, and everyone knows that means exclusive toys! NECA came out the gate with five new items, but I only got one of them, and it's Ninja Turtles-related. Last year gave us a four-pack of the Channel 6 news crew from the original cartoon, and this year gave us another set of toon figures; the pre-mutated forms of four different characters. Unlike last year, this was an in-stock set that you had to pick up at the show, but they also offered online sales before and during it. If you missed out on those, your only chance for this set now is through resellers. The packaging here is much like the Turtles in Disguise set, being a big wide box with a "fifth panel" flap and artwork based off the old VHS tapes. There's a couple references to the show scattered all over the box, a nice way for the illustrator to show that he loves the show just as much as we do. Hope you don't mind dealing with plastic ties, cause there's a lot here you have to cut out. First up is Baxter Stockman, who was Shredder's right-hand man before becoming half-fly. His head sculpt is great, with messy hair, crooked glasses, and a disgruntled look befitting a long-suffering mad scientist like him. There's surprisingly not much reuse from the other toon Baxter NECA did, only recycling his waist, upper legs, and knees. The double swivel/hinge elbows are present again with him, but I find that they look far nicer with this version. Baxter stands around 5" tall, making him a bit taller than fly guy, but smaller than everyone else here. I could've sworn he was taller on the show… Next up is Splinter, or should I say Hamato Yoshi, who was an ex-Foot Clan member before he became the radical rat. If my memory serves me right, Brodie Perkins sculpted him, and he did a great job here. At first, I was thrown off by how far apart his eyes are from each other, but I looked up some shots from the show, and yes, he's supposed to look like that. I think his legs are a little longer than they should be, but the rest of the figure looks great, with some subtle wrinkling on his clothes. He stands around 5 1/4" tall, giving him a smidge more height than Baxter. The other half of this set goes to Bebop and Rocksteady, mere gangsters before meeting Shredder and Krang. Compared to the beefy warthog he would become, Bebop here is lean and mean, standing 6 5/8" tall. While his neck and collar could be a little shorter, everything else about him is pretty accurate to his on-screen appearance. Rocksteady's build is the opposite, being a short, fat man standing at the same height as Hamato. Given their similar bodies, it's not surprising that he borrows a bit of tooling from Burne, with the same forearms, hands, and pelvis (the sculpted belt is still there). He looks way off above the neck, however, with a small face on a misshapen head. With how nice everyone else looks, it's a shame he turned out like this. If this isn't the first your hearing of this line, you'll know how the paint is. The back of the figures are a darker color, as to suggest cel-shading, along with black lines in various areas. Hamato in particular looks the best paint-wise, with clean, thin lines on his face. Baxter also looks nice, with the lines around his eyes looking better than in promo shots. Everyone looks great, though, but there a few slip-ups, the most notable being a small mark on Rocksteady's eyebrow. Everyone has a similar path of articulation, with ball-jointed heads and chests, swivel/hinge shoulders, elbows, wrists, and ankles, swivels at the waist and thighs, ball-socket hips, and double-hinged knees. As I mentioned already, Baxter has double-jointed elbows, but he lacks thigh swivels. Both he and Hamato get swivels at the upper knees in addition to hinges, and Hamato also gets swivel shins. Bebop gets a ball-joint at the neck, which works well with the head. I'm not sure if Rocksteady's waist swivels, but if it can, then it's stuck tight on mine. You can manage nice poses with all of them, though you will have to be mindful of tight joints on the arms and knees. Now moving on to accessories, everyone gets extra hands in addition to the fists they come wearing. Baxter gets a pair of gripping hands, a pointing right, and a grasping left. Hamato gets a pair of karate-chopping hands, a pair of grips, and a loosely-gripping left. Bebop has a pair of grasping hands, a gripping right, and a wide grip left (it looks a lot like the grasping left, but the difference is subtle). And Rocksteady has pairs of grasping and gripping hands. They all pop on and off easily, and work great with the various accessories. The rest of the goodies are all specific to the characters, with a couple call-backs to old episodes. Baxter gets a butterfly net, two tracking devices, a jar with shrunken turtles inside (the lid and turtles are removable), and a Mouser, just in case you want another one to go with the previously released set of them. Hamato has a staff, a fishbowl, and four little turtles with teeny tiny eyes. Lastly, B&R get a bat, a club, a crowbar, a metal chain, two spray paint cans, and a boombox. There's plenty of stuff here, but one accessory I wish was here is a head of Barney Stockman that can pop onto Baxter. I've heard that may be coming soon, though. While I wouldn't call this release a necessity for your collection, it's still a cool, unique set with much-requested figures. If you end up getting this in your hands, you may find yourself posing these four in a lot of different ways, and they'll go great with the rest of your figures (if this isn't your first get from this line, that is). - 9/1/22   by RMaster007 |
| Attack Track |  | Submission Order |  | Bombshell |
| Style Guide Colors (4-Pack) | | Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Classic Cartoon Series | | Tale of Usagi Yojimbo |
| Attack Track | | Written by RMaster007 | | Bombshell |
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