Jakks Pacific Simpsons Family 4-pack review

As many already know by now, The Simpsons is an all time classic, it's one of the most beloved animated shows made in the United States, and is often talked about for the overall decline in quality during later seasons. Humor has fluctuated between very clever to lousy, it went from having a series like Family Guy accused of plagiarising it to plagiarising other adult animated sitcoms (even if they're usually under the same company), later episodes focused more on the celebrity cameos more than any memorable events, blah blah blah. Look, there is so much to say about a series such as this, yet at the same time, it's like trying to describe what water tastes like. In spite of how much it changed, especially when Disney bought Fox and turned the series into an occasional cheerleader for their other brands, it's not hard to still be a fan of the earlier episodes for having the right balance between humor, commentary, and overall heart that is usually lacking of late. I'm sure you already know we have merch for the characters over the years, but with Jakks Pacific taking the license for a mainline series, what's the worst that can happen? I wanted to at least get the Simpsons family before I think of wanting to continue the line, but we thankfully have a gift set featuring all of them as a whole. So now we must ask ourselves if it's worth paying $20 for this vs twice the amount for them individually? Find out for today's review!

Here we have Homer Simpson in-hand, being generally accurate to the character design as well as a toy based on the cartoon art style can be. You have the physical appearance right with the tubby body, the shape of the head is proper with the space between the eyes and the strands of hair still in his head, not to mention the way it's shaped with a curve at the back. Paint apps are mostly reserved for the head, which it and parts of the arms are seemingly molded in a PVC-like material while the torso and legs are ABS. Thankfully, the eyes have not been painted deeply or looking weird, especially knowing how basic paint apps can be for these in addition to the lower quality control standards. The arms look broken due to how they usually remain positioned while in a vanilla pose (facing inwards than forwards), but beyond that, the rest of the figure looks about as natural as possible. One thing I will say is that some figures have their copyright info or serial numbers stamped in the backs; thankfully, Homer's is merely sculpted rather than painted in plain sight, I always question why they can't be in the feet.

His articulation is mostly shared with the rest of the characters in the line, with neck rotation, shoulder rotation, outward arm movement, bicep rotation, hinged elbows, wrist rotation, inward hinges, a diaphragm joint below the shirt, ball jointed hips, hinged knees, and slight ankle movement. His accessories include a box of dozen donuts, with one of them actually for him to hold and be posed as if eating it with the bite marks. You can easily use this for almost any other action figure and make whatever toy photography you please. He doesn't hold the box that great, but at least it can balance on the arm as he offers any to his friends. I swear, after seeing the Simpsons Movie promo art of him eating his donut, I usually go for the strawberry frosting with sprinkles at my Dunkin Donuts or 7-Eleven despite liking chocolate frosting more. For other versions of Homer Simpson out there, you have the Hulked Out version from the Stan Lee episode, Baseball Homer, Sick Homer with that moldy sandwich, and King Kong Homer with seemingly the same head sculpt as Hulked Out Homer (which makes sense given it's the same dude). He really was a Kwijibo this whole time, huh?

Up next, is Marge Simpson. And despite being shorter than Homer, her taller hairdo at least gives her some height of some extent without betraying the price these go for. That being said, my photos either make her blue hair appear brighter or they are always like that. Regardless, we at least have the proper shape needed for it, not to mention that the green on her dress is still accurate even with my photo set changing things. Her proportions are generally accurate to the show, with a sort of hourglass build for a mother of three, though her blouse is very rigid and is moreso for form than function. Naturally, Maggie is included with her because why sell just this tiny baby figurine by herself if you can include her with the one family member most commonly seen with her? Maggie's PJs are the right color, if using a very slight teal tint than the usual baby blue, but it still does the job. Sadly, her pupils are a bit wonky compared to her mother, who has hers applied right. On the bright side, Maggie's legs are sculpted in a walking pose to make her sculpt less static since she otherwise has a bit of a diaphragm joint, rotation at the shoulders, wrists, and neck, and outward arm movement. Marge's production info is stamped on the bottom of the dress, which is annoying but it does remind me of when she had a tramp stamp for a couch gag. While the articulation is generally consistent with the other characters, her legs are practically useless due to the rigid nature of her blouse. It's as limited as the skirts we had for the female Power Rangers figures from around Jungle Fury and RPM to the ones from Super Megaforce and Dino Charge. I guess it could have been possible to make the bottom area of the blouse a flexible material, though I can theorize maybe Jakks didn't want to risk aesthetic issues and they wanted to keep everything looking consistent. She can hold Maggie in her arms, however it is not entirely easy to do given the balancing issues that pop up with her tiny feet and just being somewhat top heavy. If we were to get any variants of Marge, hopefully they're in a different dress altogether and possibly a different hairstyle. On a positive note, their eyelashes are painted properly.

While Maggie was their third child, Bart is naturally the firstborn kid of the family, and is this the next one to focus on. Once again, we have the general proportions of the character design right, and I always like how Bart's head shape makes him look like a work whistle with how cylindrical he is in addition to the overbite. Honestly, a character design like this definitely has that troublemaker feel, especially given how he used to behave in the past versus his later years mellowing out compared to different characters like Stewie Griffin from Family Guy. The blue seems right to the shade he has in the show, but the shirt appears to be more red in my photos than it should be; he's generally known for having an orange shirt (or salmon in Bart Gets an F), and while it still looks fine on him, I always get this "make up your minds" feeling everytime I see merchandise choose either red or orange for the shirt color. Amusingly, the copyright info is nearly hard to see with the text being washed out on my photos.

With articulation being the same, let's talk about his sole accessory: a skateboard that he can ride on no problem; hope you like it because it ends up being reused twice for Blue Shirt Bart and Bartman. I kind of want to get those two along with hoping we get a Pieman Homer. Hockey Bart is kind of cool, and hey, he is at least ice skating and not skateboarding this time.

And finally, we have Lisa Simpson. Arguably the least interesting of the family apart from her high IQ and overall focus on solving problems, though as much as I hate to admit it, Ned Flanders calling her "Springfield's answer to a question nobody asked" is accurate to her know-it-all nature. He indirectly predicted how flanderized she became past Season 12, so maybe that's where they got the term from. Her head shape is accurate to.the show, though she always came off like a duck-billed sun in 3D compared to the mouth shapes on the other characters. Her dress is kind of a reddish orange or an orangish red, though it doesn't quite match the same promo art where it does appear orange. Could be worse like the confusion I have with Bart, but to be fair, you're likely going to see Lisa in that podium meme than the average merch where Homer or Bart are present.

Her articulation is slightly better than her mother's, but the diaphragm joint is ridiculously loose on my copy; she ends up having a hard time standing because of her small feet and due to the inability to disassemble her and tighten the joint. It sucks too because she also has an issue holding her saxophone. It's possible to get her posed playing with it, but even the small C-clip hands make it difficult. Though technically not the right scale, I do want to point out a 2.5 inch Cool Lisa figure that has her in hipster drip, complete with a skateboard to go with her carefree attitude. I bring her up because it's a potential retool I'd like to see Jakks come up with, and with that Bart Simpson skateboard already present, why not make this a reality for the 5 inch scale?

Speaking of which, for a size comparison, here we have Homer Simpson next to fairly prominent 1/12 and 1/10 scale lines, with Christopher Reeve Superman and Renew Your Vows Spider-Man as some of my examples. While they may be a bit taller than the other offerings in the McFarlane DC Multiverse and Marvel Legends lines, Homer Simpson is still too small for either franchise as a whole, and you may be better off sticking a larger version of the character with him or putting him with other lines that are meant to be 5 inches. That being said, you can always do what that one guy does and pose Abe Simpson beating other characters up, which will always be the style no matter what time we're in.

Overall, I think this set is pretty decent if you just want to own the Simpsons family or are looking to get a test drive and see if you want to continue the rest of the line. I mostly like how they turned out, but I know that you're better off getting this set at $20 if Target still has them. Not only is it easier to get everyone in one swoop, but paying that price versus the fluctuation between $13 to $17 per figure times four makes me happy I didn't get them individually. They are not worth the midway price point between $10 and $20, because not only are they kind of cheap, but the articulation isn't always great, and the scale doesn't give them that much to work with for other lines compared to the Nintendo and Sonic merch. D'oh-n't pay nearly $50 for the standard releases and find this set if you haven't. Also don't have a cow, man.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Transformers Titans Return Trypticon review

Trypticon may not have much of a personality in most franchises he's been in, but at least he makes up for it with his character design. If you ask me, turning into a Mechagodzilla-looking robot instead of a humanoid robot is a whole lot more appealing than we give credit. He was best known for getting his T-Cog swapped with Metroplex's in the G1 cartoon (with less than needed results), damaging the Autobots before fighting the Dinobots in the G1 comics, falling off a tiny bridge in The Headmasters against fucking Wheelie and Daniel, and having a less than stellar fight against Metroplex in the Prime Wars Trilogy. Thankfully, he had a pretty solid Aligned incarnation that eventually became the Nemesis, while his Cyberverse counterpart was the mafia boss of the Mercenaries (utilized better in that series than in the WFC trilogy). After failing to get the AOTP version at Ross, I at least got the Titans Return version from my longtime friend Ernie Krause, and it shall now be reviewed today!

Here we have Trypticon in his city form, which is more of a battle platform more than anything, really. It spreads out, it has ramps, and in the center is Full-Tilt's alt mode. We'll get to him in a moment, but as far as being a battle platform is concerned, it's at least able to resemble a station whereas something like Star Convoy looks like a dead robot whose legs are replaced with some base. Trypticon could use a few extra guns beyond the ones that point upwards, but I find he could use something to cover the holes in his toes. Those purple clips near what will be the robot hips are clips meant to connect him with Leader Class figures from Titans Return as well as fellow TR figure Fortress Maximus and Siege Omega Supreme. All in all, it's bigger than the G1 toy and does a good job at giving off a huge playset-like scale. 

Transforming him in his mobile station mostly means keeping what will be the legs compact and pointing the cannons forward. It rolls decently well with some wheels at the bottom, though Hasbro labeled this as a spaceship or the Nemesis. That wouldn't be a reach if it weren't for the shape not matching the actual Nemesis (aka the figure we got in Legacy Evolution), the lore making sense only for the Aligned continuity, and this not really resembling much of a space ship beyond the winglets. That and there is a hole that goes through the middle section, but the more I look at the clear green plastic, the more I wonder if this spaceship thing was meant to go further as something Brunt could pilot like a Titan Master would ride its transtector. 

Takara made a bonus mode where the tail opened up to form a new beast head while the dino.legs become the front legs and the cannons become.rhe hind legs. While modes like these usually come off like the toy designers trying to come up with any extra modes they possibly could to make their product seemingly do more than necessary (looking at you, Japanese G1 Transformers and early Sentai mecha), there is at least some credence to those being intended; the tail has no other reason to open beyond potentially hunting at being another beast head with the "eyes" and how close it is to the robot legs. 

And then we get to the proper dino mode, which means bending the tail so he can stand upright, hinging the head forward before rotating the base where it hinges, uncurling the arms, and bringing the cannons back. The resulting robot mode is not only massive as all Titans should be, but the sculpt work is outright impressive. In the current era we're in where figures lose greebling, the rich detailing makes this figure almost makes the stickers feel redundant, though they are at least used better than on later some Titans Return/Power of the Primes figures where they either clash badly with the chrome foil on certain spaces (cough POTP Elita-1's wings) or tend to be poorly applied in the factory. In fact, this continues the tradition of separate sticker sheets being used for the Titans before Siege Omega Supreme retired the practice, and it's arguably more satisfying doing this on a bigger toy than what the factory workers dealt with. As for the articulation, his head can look up and down as well as open somewhat, shoulders rotate, move in and out, bend at the elbow, hinge at the wrists, and open at two points for the claws. The hips, which on my copy had the spring issue resolved given earlier copies suffered from breakage issues, can move front and back as well as in amd out, bend at the knees, ane pivot at the ankles. Using Titan Master Necro lets us re-enact a neat feature for this toy: eating the small robots!

His stomach can be opened up after removing Full-Tilt and his base, allowing you to access the Titan Masters after they were swallowed by the giant Transformer.

Because it would make no sense for Trypticon's entire head to use any sort of compatibility with the line, Necro instead serves as a more accessible button after attaching him behind his head...

...which reveals a cannon hidden underneath the orange (horn). You can still access it without the smaller robot, but it's easier the intended way.

Before we wrap things up, let's take a look at Full-Tilt's vehicle mode. It's solid purple with black in the gun and wheels, and there is very little to break up the former, but at least the shape of this cruiser is not as frumpy as the old toy. The snap-on wheels on a toy released with an expensive set sucks, but you have some nubs for the Titan Masters to stand on.

As usual, Necro can sit comfortably inside and blend in too much with all that purple. Seriously, plenty of Titan Masters were severely limited in color break-up that the ones we got since Earthrise are thankfully painted somewhat.

For a comparison with the partner we got 2 years later, here he is with Siege Brunt. The shades of purple are not the same between the two, and they are obviously differently functional toys, but on the bright side, Full-Tilt was always a Transformer and was actually playable in the PS2 Japanese G1 game as mid as it was.

Transformation is pretty standard, with the legs flipping down and the arms shifting in place before the back panel flips back so the Titan Master can go in place. The resulting robot mode is slightly less purple due to the chest and head adding an extra bit of color, and I guess the same goes for the midriff. The bot mode feels closer to a mass-produced, military drone version of Beachcomber with all of the personality sucked out, though with the tires on the arms and legs, he at least isn't entirely just a purple guy. Honestly, I'm hating on a guy who is mostly just a bonus from the whole set rather than the main focus, so Full-Tilt does what he needs to do at the end of the day.

Head sculpt is the standard visor & mouthplate combo we've seen numerous times in G1, only in purple. At least it's visually sharper than his old toy wished it could be. Articulation consists of ball joints at the shoulders and neck, swivels at the biceps and thighs, and hinges at the elbows and knees.

For a size comparison with Brunt, we can see a bit of duality for Trypticon's small partners. One is a normal Transformer yet is pretty generic-looking and overall insignificant beyond who he's partnered with, and the other is more unique in terms of design yet uses a robot mode clearly taken from the Centurion Drones. Either way, I have Brunt reunited with Full-Tilt before I could even get my hands on T30 Metroplex despite having Siege Six-Gun and Kingdom Slammer.

The best part is that you can technically make Brunt compatible with Full-Tilt as a Weaponizer, even with there being fewer 5mm ports than on the average WFC Trilogy figure. It's not perfect, but it is at least possible.

The sole repaint we have is a more cartoon-accurate version of Trypticon, meaning the grey is closer to black, the green that's either opaque or clear is now a vibrant teal, and the purple is closer to a pinkish shade. I've seen some fans repurpose him as Gigastorm from Beast Wars II with the aid of an add-on piece representing the horn. If my Ross stores had this, I would have gotten him and reviewed him instead of the TR version.

For anyone wanting to pair him with Omega Supreme in honor of the War for Cybertron game, here you go. I know they both got third party versions that are actually based on the game, but I doubt Hasbro would ever make their own with how shite Gamer Edition was. I would easily prefer they focus on the other AOE Dinobots after Grimlock. But as for Trypticon, I love him the most out of any Titan we got before and after him. Sure, it's easy to be biased when you're into kaiju, but he not only manages to look awesome in general, but he also represents a one-of-a-kind aspect we don't get with the other titans where his robot mode is the beast, and I wish I could see that more often beyond the cassettes and RID15 Underbite. Whether you get the TR or AOTP version, he is the real epitome of dino-might. If you can get one Titan, make it this one, even if you don't plan to pair him with anyone else.

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

S.H. Figuarts Vegeta (Old Style Battle Clothes & DB Super) review

Vegeta should be no stranger to anyone who's been either a fan of anime or at least read my reviews; from stern and aggressive Saiyan prince to eventual husband of Bulma and son of Trunks, he represents one of the many characters to experience redemption or general 180 in their character development when they join Goku's friend group. When it comes to how representation on my review site, he's been in the usual battle armor, at least twice without the shoulder pads, and representing his early evil appearance, the Super Saiyan powers he unlocked later in Z, and his Daima version (the grown up version). Now we have a chance to look at another pair of Vegeta figures like we have in the past, at least to add some synergy with the history of there being two Goku reviews with a pair of figures each sharing the spotlight. This time, we're going with the Old Style Battle Clothes and the Super Hero movie version of the character.

Here we have Battle Clothes Vegeta in-hand, essentially a darker color version of the same armor design we've usually seen on the character. While the darker blue might have been a choice I could live with, the stock photos seemingly made his clothes appear almost black or less blue than they appear in my review station.  The anime even couldn't decide what it's supposed to be if we consider the master quality between different releases. Regardless, I always think this works well if we ignore the inconsistencies between screencaps and the stock photos. Plus, to the proportions generally remain consistent with what we previously got in the line, though we do have a small bit of gappage between the pecs and the stomach. Not the worst example, but could be tweaked better. All around, I want to say that this Vegeta manages to generally work well enough as it stands, though the colors for the spandex-like part of his battle clothes may not be consistent with the Frieza Saga.

His head sculpt is slightly different from the version we got from the Scouter version, with a haircut not as over the top while also being somewhat more proportionate for a body that lacks the shoulder pads. The print work for the face is always top notch, but wait till we go over the alternate faces. Speaking of, he has 4 of those as well as 3 pairs of hands, a set of crossed arms, and a trio of alternate torso pieces to represent his Saiyan armor getting damaged.

His articulation is standard for all of the versions of Vegeta we covered before, so why don't we talk about the accessories? I like that we get some unique facial expressions representing him in pain with small tears shed or in pure rage, all fitting for the character. As for getting the battle damaged plates on there, it's a neat idea on paper yet the execution is tedious. You not only have to find the right spots to pry them off, but it can be a little annoying to keep them in place if they're not tabbed in right. Also, swapping the arms with the crossed set is more annoying here than with prior versions of the characters we had in the past.due to the updated shoulder joints.

The faces are nice to have and are honestly better than the goofier ones from Power Level 27000, but the battle clothes parts are somewhat tedious at times. As for the price, where I got mine from Premium Bandai, I believe it was $80, twice the amount I would pay for the usual Figuarts at my local Target or Walmart. Granted, this is a less prominent look for the dude, but I doubt it's really worth making that high of a price for him when the accessory count is only slightly higher than what we normally get. Maybe if he had an extra faceplate or an additional set of hands, I could stomach it more. At the very least, he makes me want to get Gohan and Krillin in the same armor.

As for Super Hero Vegeta, this is closer to a more casual outfit that the dude would wear, though it is a bit of a midway point to the battle clothes that he's usually associated with when you look at the gloves and boots. Thankfully, the boots have some paint in the toe region, though I will have to comment on the shirt not matching the pants in regards to its finish (shiny vs matte), while the areas that are painted on the arms don't match the molded areas that are flesh tone, a common problem seen with Hasbro Marvel Legends. It's noticeable on the neck region than on the arms, but while not as bad as the example I mentioned, it still sucks given this is an import, and a fairly expensive one by $10 when it came out versus the 2021/2 Legends price. Still, it works fine for a base Vegeta, though the slight aesthetic issues do hurt it. Some have also commented on the side profile for the head not being quite right to what Vegeta looks like though it could be easy to blame how Super's animation quality looked. 

With the articulation being the same, I want to instead focus on the range for some of these joints. The butterfly joints looks uglier here on Super Hero Vegeta than on the Battle Clothes version, likely resulting in the torso not being as broad as it should be, and the hips have worse range. On the plus side, his thumbs up hand and smirking face imply I recommend him if you see him at a cheaper price. I got him for $28, which is lower than what the MSRP price is, but it's easier to stomach this than $80 in spite of the worse joint range or aesthetics not being as good as on Battle Clothes Vegeta. 

Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ and a half out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (for both but for different reasons)