BLACKBEARD - McFarlane Toys Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag Edward Teach

For the number of action figures I own and buy, it's not often that I really "gush", but McFarlane Toys' new Assassin's Creed Blackbeard figure is the real deal. He's far and away my favorite McFarlane release in years (and that includes Halo and Walking Dead releases, as well).

Blackbeard stands 6" tall to the top of the feathers in his hat, making him an imposing figure beside Edward Kenway. He comes in the standard AC bubble card sans hat, with some game renders (which he honestly doesn't really resemble facially). Besides his removable hat, he comes with a sword and 4 pistols of various lengths. The sword can be worn on his hip, but looks right at home in his hand, while the pistols can be worn in the bandolier strap across his chest. I'm not sure the grips will allow for all 4 to be housed at once, but they look terrific however they're worn.

The hat fits perfectly and completes the look, though the bandana underneath is fully sculpted and weathered, and looks great, too. In short, he comes with a great number of accessories, which are also well-sculpted and painted with some neat silver highlights. It's not often that a figure will come with 5 useful accessories nowadays.

That said, it's really the sculpt that steals the show here. Edward Teach is nothing short of spectacular. The face is stern and grim. The beard is brilliant, with lots of braids and a neatly tied ponytail in back. The beard has two "wings" on the sides that might simulate the fuses that Blackbeard purportedly wore from beneath his hat and lit before battle to intimidate his foes. I'm not sure whether he wears lit fuses in the game or not, but you won't find them here.

The rest of the sculpt is just as impressive. The outfit seems to be made of at least 3 or 4 different materials, even though it's all plastic. The bandolier looks like cracked leather, his wide waist band features deep folds and a rich maroon color with dark washes to offset it. The jacket and tails look like weathered leather, while the arm straps seem like a smoother leather. The brown boots look like a softer, more comfortable leather. In short, it's the kind of sculpt that you can really spend some time returning to again and again.

The only major oddity about the sculpt, as far as I am concerned, is with the knees. They are done with the thick pins visible, which allows the calves to bend forwards. It's a weird look and an unnecessary range of motion. There's got to be a better way to design the knee articulation. My only other real gripe with the figure is with the paint. 99.9 percent of it is fantastic- there's plenty of tiny highlight work with the silver, and I've already mentioned the pistols and waist band. No, my paint problem is with a conscious design choice: the eyes. For some reason, it was decided to paint them looking to the right. I don't much care for figures that look off to the side, and to compound the issue, they seem to be painted badly. They are just off enough to ruin the faces of many of the figures that I've seen on the shelf, and I had to search through to find one I thought acceptable enough for me. I'd suggest avoiding buying sight-unseen, and I'm really skeptical about what I'll end up with from the Pirates 3-Pack I've ordered from Amazon.

The articulation is enough to get you a variety of standing poses. Blackbeard has a swivel head that works, despite the wide beard. Additionally, he's got ball pin shoulders that swing out as well as forwards and backwards, ball hinge elbows and some odd ball jointed wrists. The hips are those super-restricted McFarlane hips, the knees are ball hinged and the ankles swivel and allow for a little rocker motion to lay flat. It's enough to get Blackbeard to stand up tall and wield his weapons. I'd love a waist swivel and some better hips, but I'm ok with what we've got here.

McFarlane's Edward Teach is a terrific action figure. He's got a brilliant sculpt, excellent paint, loads of appropriate and useful accessories, and he looks great on the shelf. The articulation is good enough for my purposes, as well. Blackbeard is available as a Gamestop exclusive, where he will run you $15 or so. He's well worth the price, and I'd highly recommend picking him up while you can...

HAYTHAM KENWAY - McFarlane Toys Assassin's Creed III

Haytham Kenway was released this past summer as part of McFarlane Toys' first half of their Series 1 set of Assassin's Creed action figures. The series mixes characters from Assassin's Creed III and the upcoming Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag, with 4 figures from each game being released in two parts (part 2 is currently releasing). Haytham, like the rest of the line, features an excellent, highly detailed sculpt and paint job, along with McFarlane's current standard articulation, done in an approximate 5 or 6 inch scale (he measures 5 & 3/4" tall). He comes with a pistol and sword. The pistol grip is thicker than his hand allows, and the trigger finger isn't separated from the rest of the gripping hand, so the pistol looks fairly awkward in his hand- it's a good thing there's a sculpted holster to store it in.
The sword fits better into his right hand, but the grip is still a bit tight. You may want to soften the hand a little with some hot water before stuffing the sword in. The pistol holster has a small slot alongside it which I assume is for the sword's storage, as well.

The sculpt on Haytham Kenway is quite good. The face is passable (not having ever played the game, I have no point of reference from which to quibble), and the outfit is exceptional. There are so many tiny buckles, buttons, clasps and such that the figure remains impressive even after thorough inspection. The accessories, and his large cloak likewise feature excellent detailing. The paint work is a little sloppy in places, but not enough to ruin things. There are so many tight edges and miniature metal "things" that some misalignment is bound to happen, but it's all entirely forgivable. My only knock is on the red of his "tie", which isn't quite dark enough to cover the primer coat underneath. Additionally, there is some fantastic tampo detail which I had no idea about while the figure was still carded. There's a faint white/grey eagle on Kenway's left cuff and an absolutely outstanding "something" on the back of his cloak that are both really impressive. The sculpt and paint work really well together to create a great "on-shelf" look.

The articulation has some issues, but the attempt is appreciated. McFarlane Toys has come a long way in this department recently (which isn't to say it's where it should be yet, but we're getting there), and this line has more right than wrong. The head is ball-jointed, but doesn't have a great range in motion. The shoulders and elbows are swivel/hinge balljoints and work pretty well. The wrists are cut joints, with the hands sculpted at slight angles. This all means that you can get one or two decent poses from the waist-up. Below the waist doesn't fare as well. The hip joints that McFarlane is using on these and the Walking Dead figures are almost like a mini Play Arts attempt, with the actual joints covered by a waist piece. On the Play Arts figures, this waist piece is fairly loose, allowing the legs a wide range of movement, though it doesn't always look good. McFarlane's hips sit in a tighter waist. The range of motion forward and backwards is nearly non-existant, though the legs can swing out to the sides a bit better. On top of that, Kenway has a long coat of very hard plastic- even if you could get the legs to move, the coat would prevent you from doing so. There are swivel/hinge ball-joints at the knees and the ankles have what I think are swivels, since I can't get the left one to tilt at all. Like the rest of the AC figures, Haytham Kenway stands tall very well, but you won't get any crouches or much in the way of action poses out of him.

I'm becoming quite a fan of this line of figures. I'm not a stickler for any one scale, and this particular one is growing on me. There's something easier to manage with this smaller scale, but it's not too small to be overshadowed (which is why I tend to shy away from 4" figures or less, for the most part). There's a nice assortment of accessories, which are too often overlooked with the 7" figures, some good detailing and the articulation is good enough for me to accept at this price point. That said, I paid $10 for this guy at Walgreens, which I am very happy about (the $17 some places ask for these is offensive). Even at regular price, Walgreens only charges $13, so that's your best bet if you are interested in picking up any of the current Assassin's Creed offerings.

CONNOR - McFarlane Toys Assassin's Creed III Action Figure

The Facts:

Connor was released by McFarlane Toys in the summer of 2013, as part of Series 1 Assassin's Creed III, alongside Haytham Kenway and Edward Kenway (Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag). The figure comes sealed on a thin bubble card with some neat in-game graphics and exclusive unlockable in-game content.

Details:

Connor stands 5 & 3/4" tall, putting him in-scale with other McFarlane Toys releases (Halo and The Walking Dead, specifically), but out of scale with most other lines, including the previous NECA Assassin's Creed figures. The sculpt is solid, with appropriate buttons, wrinkles, pouches, buckles, etc. Connor has a thick build, with a barrel chest and large, rounded shoulders. Not having played the game, I'm can't speak about how accurate that may or may not be, but in terms of the aesthetics of the figure, he looks proportional. The cowl sports an eagle-type design at the point, and rotates with the head. There are lots of excellent paint apps (detailed bands around the biceps are terrific), and some poor ones (the sash is sloppy on nearly every figure I've seen), but the overall look is a good one. The face is well-sculpted and painted, though the eyes are a bit beady in my mind (this may be due to the smaller scale, and an unfair comparison to the NECA AC figures). Connor's bracer and weapons are also well-sculpted and painted.

Posing:

Above the waist, the articulation is good. Swivel head (restricted by the cowl), ball joints at the shoulders and elbows (with some rotation), and wrists. The joints are pretty ugly, with unpainted (mismatched plastic) pins and ridged hinges that really call attention to themselves. The elbow bend is restricted a bit by the bracer and forearm pieces, as well. There is no waist articulation or ab-crunch, which is the real weakness of this figure.

Below the waist, things get worse. The hips are odd- the thighs can rotate a bit and move out to the sides, but the forward/backwards movement is very restricted. I can't get anything remotely close to crouches or even running poses. But I can adjust well enough to get some pretty natural standing poses. The knees have those hinged ball joints as do the ankles (which also have a rocker joint to allow them to lie flat with wider stances).

Accessories:

Excellent. Two pistols (which fit into the sculpted holsters), a bow (with string), hatchet, Assassin's blade (it's a little thick and has an odd sculpt, but can be pegged onto the bracer or left off), and 3 non-removable arrows sculpted into the quiver on his back. They are all appropriately sized, sculpted and painted nicely, and can be worn or held as needed, more or less. 

Final Thoughts:

I really like this figure! I'm not especially picky about scale - to me, a neat figure is a neat figure, not matter the size. That said, there's something especially appealing to me about this smaller 5" scale. Connor is easy to work with, is solidly constructed, has great accessories, and can be posed well-enough for my tastes. The AC figures were on sale this past week at Walgreens, where I picked them up for $10 apiece, which is a terrific deal. If you have the opportunity, I'd highly recommend grabbing these guys while you can- Series 2 (the pirates!) is about to hit, along with the release of Assassin's Creed Black Flag...