Here’s some random crap I’ve acquired throughout my toy collecting adventures. “Adventures” are those special times when I get trashed in the afternoon and as the liquid courage courses through my veins I decide to go on a shopping spree in the toy aisle at department stores; sometimes while I’m shopping I even get to talk with little kids that’ve been left unsupervised about the hot new fads like “Pokemon” and Avatar: the Air Bender. Ok I made that up: the part about talking to the little kids anyway…

General Rieekan Star Wars Figure

Star Wars easily has to be the prime contender for the most toys ever made for one franchise; they’ve got just about every possible toy from all the films and the countless number of spin-offs that have surfaced in its 30 year history. However when you attempt to create practically every figure that ever appeared or was mentioned in some type of Star Wars context, a certain type of pattern develops. Of course the first figures to be released will be the Star Wars elite like Luke, Vader, Han…you know the characters I’m talking about. After that the second tier of characters are released, like Boba Fett, Yoda, Lando…mostly characters that had less screen time than the elite yet still play a vital role. The third wave of figures becomes a sort of mix-and-match; there are variations of the originally released characters like a Jedi Luke or removable limb C-3P0 plus strictly third-string characters like the vehicle drivers, rebel soldiers, the more prominent cantina aliens, Gammoran guards, etc. After this stage the process gets a little strained and enters into a category of obscure Star Wars bullshit, and the figure line becomes a veritable free-for-all; in the fourth phase you start seeing things like Chewbacca with snow on his face, background aliens like “Ishi Tib” (that star-headed alien that I swear never appeared once in the films), characters from the “Expanded Universe,” and often there are complete remakes of already made figures which ultimately begs the question: why didn’t they just make this character look like the remade version in the first place? Nevertheless this pattern has affected both the original trilogy figures and also the prequel ones, and now that we’re well past the hype of the supposed final entry into Star Wars cinema, Episode III, the toy line collectively has entered into a permanent phase 4 of conceptualization and production. This is evident with the release of “General Rieekan,” or as most people should know him: the dude from Empire Strikes Back who was in charge of the Rebel Base on Hoth and talked for two seconds about Han Solo’s death mark. Remember him?

Finally…I finally have a General Rieekan toy…Wait a minute, who the fuck ever wanted a General Rieekan toy? Oh I guess technically I did since I bought a General Rieekan toy, but besides that this is the type of balls-out obscurity to which Star Wars toys have succumbed. This figure line is completely out of control at this point, and a good way to get a laugh while you’re in Wal-Mart is to head over to the Star Wars toy section just to see the crazy shit the franchise is currently producing for the sake of draining every last penny out of those poor people who are still trying to collect every Star Wars toy. If you haven’t given up yet, Jesus Christ you should’ve ended your sad devotion the minute you saw this…

I am by no means a person who is on what will eventually turn out for some to be a life-long goal of collecting Star Wars toys, but I do at times find myself interested in picking up one the obscure figures just for the hell of it. General Rieekan is one of those times. For some reason General Rieekan stood out to me even though he’s practically worthless in Empire. But over countless viewings of Empire Strikes Back in my life, I’ve realized two things about General Rieekan that gives him a “beyond the Star Wars storyline” type of appeal.

First off there’s the dialogue between him and Solo that I’ve always thought was a little redundant:

Han Solo: General I gotta leave I can’t stay anymore.

General Rieekan: I’m sorry to hear that.

Han Solo: Well there’s a price on my head. If I don’t pay off Jabba the Hutt I’m a dead man.

General Rieekan: A death mark’s not an easy thing to live with.

No shit a death mark’s not an easy thing to live with. It’s a death mark. Nice philosophizing douche bag.

Second there’s his General badge that looks like the Purina Puppy Chow logo designed out of Sucrets lozenges:

This must’ve been an attempt at subliminal product placement in Star Wars for those fans that have a sore throat and need to feed their dog. Or maybe the Rebel Alliance decided that making their rank badges into tasty candy would be a nice fringe benefit for risking your life against the Empire. Wow I’ve seriously watched this movie way too much.

Because the General is a part of the phase four figure era the toy was kind of inattentively manufactured; that's also because it’s just General Rieekan. Nobody is going to get upset about a half-ass constructed General Rieekan toy. So what’s the biggest flaw you ask? General Rieekan holds his gun in a very effeminate manner.

Although they never show in the movie if Rieekan helped battle the storm troopers that infiltrated the base, I’m hoping he just escaped or was crushed by falling blocks of ice and didn’t embarrass himself in combat. This pose makes the General look like the one fighter in all the movies that the storm troopers would have no trouble being able to consistently hit with their rifle blasts. Who knew General Rieekan was gay? All right I’m done talking about General Rieekan.

Soul Caliber Nightmare Figure

I’m not bragging or anything but I used to be a complete badass fighting game player back in my hometown arcade. Soul Caliber was easily one of my biggest fighting game triumphs, and I would often find myself spending hours just beating the shit outta people dumb enough to test my skills and making several video game enemies in the process. Now that arcades have been reduced to “family fun” centers that are packed with little emo douche bags and fat nerds playing Dance, Dance, Revolution, my legacy has long been forgotten. The age of the fighting game badass is no more. But I’m sure that’s probably a good thing, seeing as that fighting games were constantly changing from the simple days of down, down-forward, forward, punch into a rigorous agenda of move studying comparable to an Ivy League medical school examination (God curse the option of practice mode). The death of fighting games gave a lot of gamers more free time, with some using it to get into collectable card games and others using it to write articles about toys. I’m not sure which is worse.

But one side note to the evolution and eventual fall of fighting games is the sudden appearance of fighting game toys a few years back during their heyday. Street Fighter, Tekken, Mortal Kombat…all the major fighting games that drained token after token from players started giving back, and it was possible to show your admiration outside the arena of seizure-inducing flashing lights and the occasional odor of the one sweaty player who forsook bathing to remain a contender (I always thought that was an interesting strategy for winning). Even the action figure empire of McFarlane Toys jumped on the fighting game toy bandwagon and threw in their own take on the characters from the game Soul Caliber. It was a business venture that caught my attention; or at least caught my attention on the discounted bargain rack at a going-out-of-business Media Play store when I bought the Soul Caliber Nightmare figure for a couple of bucks.

McFarlane is known for creating some of the most detailed figures out there, and they also create figures for franchises that generally would never be considered for a figure line like horror movies and such. Although it’s kind of an honor to be included in the McFarlane figure agenda, we have yet another instance with the Nightmare figure where certain toys were on the bottom of the priority list for attention. Well maybe in this case it would be better to say that the Nightmare toy was given too much attention.

The figure looks great detail wise, but it also came pre-posed in what makes Nightmare look like he’s laughably auditioning for the medieval version of So You Think You Can Dance? The head turns, the arms move at the shoulder and elbow, and Nightmare’s waist can rotate, but his legs remain in some horseback riding position; and no matter how you attempt to redo the figure’s already established Saturday Night Fever pose it still looks needlessly action-packed. I would’ve been more satisfied with a figure that gave me some options: like a normal standing pose that’s not forever cemented in the image of fighting game intensity. I hope you enjoy posing your Nightmare figure so he looks like he’s constantly blocking and rearing back from an opponent’s attack, because that’s all you’ve got.

There’s also a stand that comes with the figure…and I still have no clue what exactly the stand is supposed to be used for. There’s a peg for Nightmare’s foot and then there’s several holes placed in different spots for the peg sticking out of Nightmare’s other foot. But no matter what hole you decide to put Nightmare’s foot in he still stands exactly the same way. What’s the point? Also the stand comes with the ability to spin. Plus there’s two pegs sticking out the side of the stand. I can only assume that this is for connecting the stand to other ridiculously exciting looking Soul Caliber figures and their pointless stands and then you're supposed to spin around the stands so the toy has some kind of anti-climactic combat feature. I swear to you there were no instructions that came with this toy to explain the anomaly of the stand, so you’re stuck just assuming what it’s for. If only there would’ve been other figures available on the discount rack; then I could’ve had minutes of fun reenacting the very same battles that built up my reputation at the arcade. Or I just would’ve been more upset that I spent money on two of these figures instead of being upset about buying only one. Overall the figure is pretty stupidly constructed, but it looks just like Nightmare. I guess that’s worth something. It’s worth 3 bucks.

Dragonball Z Vegeta Figure

When Cartoon Network started showing Dragonball Z episodes several years back, practically every male, from 5 year olds looking for an escape from the burdens of kindergarten to 45 year-olds interested in expanding their perverse knowledge of all things Japanese were covetously anticipating every installment of the show’s often exciting yet sometimes gratuitously dramatic storyline. Dragonball Z was in everyway an excuse for men of all ages to safely sit down and watch a soap opera without the stigma that is usually attached to men who sit down and watch soap operas. Somehow the show’s inclusion of distinct elements like alien warriors, androids, and the ability to shoot massive waves of plasma from one’s hands to a daily sequence of events was enough justification for men to get in touch with their softer side.

Of course I too was unable to avoid the seductive ambiance of such a testosterone cradling show like DBZ (from here on Dragonball Z will be referred to as DBZ, because that’s how us fans refer to it), and it didn’t take long before I found myself having only one goal after work each week night: watching at least 20 consecutive episodes of cartoon super-heroes having training sequences and heartfelt moments, followed by no less than 45 installments of said super-heroes battling some galactic threat, eventually defeating said threat, and then repeating the same plot process with new heartfelt moments, training sequences, and galactic threat battles. This obsession of mine lasted for months, but ultimately ended because let’s be honest: it was only a matter of time before the galactic threat well ran dry and the characters just got plain goofy. And it was that wacky Japanese goofy that only the Japanese or “everything Japanese is above criticism” American anime fans can truly appreciate.

At the peak of DBZ’s reign over the male psyche it became imperative that there was some sort of mass marketing campaign to take advantage of the show’s popularity. In months of its premiere on American television, DBZ had officially earned its rightful place among the boy toys section at every retail store; it's a section that still exists, although more limited, to this day. I honestly can’t remember the company that got the nod for the distribution of a Kameah Meah Wave’s worth of DBZ merchandise (maybe it was Bandai?), but it quickly became possible to own plastic poseable representations of DBZ’s extensive cast; and just like how I couldn’t resist catching each episode of the show, I also couldn’t resist picking up a figure for one of my favorite characters, Vegeta. If you don’t know who Vegeta is then you probably don’t know what DBZ is so I’m not going to even attempt to explain it. However the minute I saw this toy probably about 5 - 6 years ago I immediately bought it without hesitation and without a thorough examination. It’s not that the figure is that bad, but it definitely could be better. I think that DBZ became so popular so fast that the toys were just negligently designed and produced in order to stay on course with the show. It was one of those toy ordeals where just slapping the DBZ logo on the packaging was considered good enough to throw it in a toy aisle for all to buy.

The first thing that stands out when observing this rushed figure is Vegeta’s vision problems. I can’t speak for every Vegeta figure out there, but the one I bought is cross-eyed. I have extremely limited knowledge when it comes to the painting process of action figures, but Christ can’t you at least make sure that my Vegeta toy doesn’t look like one of those people your not sure which eye to look into when you’re talking to them? My figure has serious depth perception issues that ultimately ruin Vegeta’s DBZ badass persona, and instead I get the one that needs ocular surgery. What the shit is that all about?

Also Vegeta has some joint articulation and posing concerns. The only part of his arms that move are at the shoulder; his arms can move in and out and also spin at the ball joint, but that only leaves one other pose besides the “powering up” pose (see the first picture). This toy has the capability of doing a “which way to the beach” muscle flexing pose. For all of you familiar with DBZ, you know that this pose never appears in any DBZ episode…I think…Yeah I’m pretty sure Vegeta never flexed his muscles; he was too busy killing people.

But as an added bonus and also to try and make the figure look like some attention was given to its articulation, Vegeta has bendable knees. Everyone likes bendable knees. I mean you never know when you might need bendable knees on your action figures. You especially need bendable knees when ever you feel like giving your Vegeta figure that lazy Huck Finn look for your display needs. Once again Vegeta never rested in DBZ; rest was another factor that hindered Vegeta’s kill count. Yet we have another loss of points for this toy.

I now I wish I would’ve just saved the money I spent on this toy. A crossed-eyed muscle-flexin’ lazy-ass Vegeta is not exactly what I was looking for. Oh well, that’s why God invented shoe boxes.

Star Wars, Soul Caliber, Dragonball Z…I think I’ve filled my quota for topics that should only be discussed behind the veil of a website article and not in public. I’ll keep checking my shoeboxes for even more Random Action Figures to review in the future. In the mean time I’ve gotta get to Wal-Mart. I’ve been eyeing those Star Wars Transformers for a while so if you’ll excuse me I’ve got some drinkin’ to do…

If you have any random thoughts about this random crap e-mail me: mr@destroyyourtoys.com