SH MONSTERARTS KING GHIDORAH 2019 | Figure Review

I'm not apologizing

The first time fans got their first official look at the new designs for Mothra, Rodan and everyone's favorite three-headed baddie, King Ghidorah was through the reveal of their SH Monster Arts figures. And golly bob howdy, I could not have been more pleased with Ghidorah's new design. And the figure itself looked amazing, as well as expensive and fragile.

Ghidorah comes with his tails and wings detached from the body so that he may fit in the box. Attaching them is pretty easy. Instructions are also included.

Right out of the box I found this figure to be simply impressive. The sculpt is very nice, everything from the scales, horns and spikes look very nice. Many parts of Ghidorah are very pokey and stabby, so keep that in mind.
The heads aren't too shabby either, the smaller details are pretty well done. The eyes may be tiny but they are still well painted. The inside of the mouths look like they might have a bit too much pink in them.

The heads can rotate at the top of the neck. The mouths can open, though not as wide as I expected.
Don't try moving the tongues. Just don't.

The necks have a wide range of movement. Being able to curve forward, left, right and slightly backward.

The tails look nice and the clubs are really cool, but I noticed something odd. The left club at the end is better detailed than the right one, especially the bottom part.
Movement on the tails is similar to the necks, if not better. The clubs also rotate at the tips

Ghidorah's legs move forward at the hip, bend at the knee and ankle. Feet can also bend up, down and pivot. Positioning the legs can be crucial to balancing Ghidorah.

And know lets get to the wings.
Oh...boy...
I'm sure you know by now that Ghidorah figures in the SHMA line don't always have the best luck when it comes to their wings, even the ones on that bootleg Showa Ghidorah look a bit iffy to me.
2019's wings are HUGE, heavy and they take up a lot of shelf space. But dang do they look cool. The wings can be inserted into the large pegs on the sides. Now, with the right amount of positioning and balance, the wings can stay in place pretty well on their own. But if you so much as nudge or lightly poke Ghidorah, they will fall out and possibly get damaged or broken.

This is where the stands will come in. You have 2 for the wings, both with different height pieces to display the wings spread out or pointed up. Another stand is included to go under Ghidorah's crotch to help him better stand up and stay balanced. With these stands in place, the One Who is Many can stay in some very dynamic poses.
The wings can also be moved back slightly.

One thing I haven't really mentioned is the paint work on the figure overall. I can't quite comment on it's accuracy because in the film we never do see Ghidorah in full daylight (but then what do you expect when you constantly have a storm going on everywhere you go?) The body is mostly a light goldish yellow with some yellow shading on certain spots (maybe a little too much on the feet) and brown shading is present on the stomach and on the back of the body and that looks really good. It's also present on the wings and even though it's a little uneven, the shading looks awesome. 
But why...why in the name of Godzilla are the back of the wings left untouched? I know that figures like this are mostly viewed from the front but come on...

Unfortunately, no Gravity Beam effects are included with this Ghidorah figure and that is a real bummer. And if you're thinking of trying to get Ghidorah into a flying pose...well, may the odds be in your favor.

At the time of this writing, King Ghidorah is still available at BigBadToyStore for $179. That is a lot of money, but I'd say it's a fair price for this beast of a figure. I really love this version of Ghidorah and I dare say that it might be my favorite incarnation of him to date. This figure does him great justice and I like it very much.
I can understand how some people may have reservations towards it, hopefully I've helped to ease some of them but if not, thank you for reading anyway.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and thank you for joining me here in my lair.

So long...

I hope you have enjoyed reading this and if you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, be sure to give my Facebook page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. 
Thanks for reading!

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NECA RODAN 2019 | Figure Review

Today we look at the final character to be brought to NECA'sGodzilla: King of the Monsters line. 

(Followed by one or two (maybe) repaints)

But before we can admire Rodan, there's something you should be aware of. The neck is upside down in the package and you'll need to rotate it the other way. Now we can admire Rodan.

I think Rodan is sculpted very nicely. The head may be small but a lot of the details really stand out. I'm surprised the eyes came out looking as well as they did.

I'm jumping the gun a bit on accessories, but Rodan also has an extra open mouth head. I don't remember Rodan having a black tongue, pretty sure it was flesh colored. The teeth are a nice touch though.

The body has a nice rough texture to it and the torso is appropriately spiky.
The wings are really cool, looking like hardened magma.

One thing I'm a little iffy on is the tail. I thought it should've been a triangle shape, I feel that would look a lot better and make the wings blend a little better.

NECA's Rodan seems to go with more of a brown color with red orange highlights (some figures may be painted differently than others). The main color is present all over the figure and that's sort of a problem. Aside from the edges of the wings, no part of Rodan really sticks out. This coloring would have been appropriate to use for the beak, horns and claws and then maybe use a slightly lighter color for the base of the body.
There's also these yellow spots scattered on the wings. I think they're supposed to be embers coming off of him while he's flying? I dunno...

One really cool thing about Rodan is that if you put a light against his wings, you'll notice that they are translucent to look all fiery and awesome. That's a really nice touch!

The reason this review took so long to get out is because my first Rodan figure had a broken wing, snapped right off at the hand. Now, NECA figures are fragile enough as they are and should always be handled with care and Rodan should be even more so. His wings are very thin and can very easily snap. Avoid the rough play and keep it as a display piece.

There's not a whole lot of articulation on Rodan, given the size of the figure, adding joints to the mouth and legs would have been difficult if not impossible.

But for what we get, it's pretty decent. The head and neck can look left, right, up and rotate
Leg movement is okay, they can move forward and when they are back they can move outward.
The wings are what we are all here for though. Sad to say, they cannot go all the way up, they can move a little bit but DO NOT try to force them up. They can be moved down as well and they can even rotate at the body. The wings can be folded up and when fully expanded, the wingspan is 13 inches wide.

As for accessories, well we already talked about the other head. We also have a very nice display stand meant to look like Isla De Mara's Outpost 32 as it's erupting during Rodan's escape. When placed on the stand, it holds Rodan in place very well and now it falls to you to pose him however you like.

Overall, I do have my nitpicks with this figure in terms of design and paint, but I am willing to give them a pass and say that NECA did do a good job with their 2019 Rodan figure. And he fits very nicely with the other King of the Monsters figures, get him while you can.

Your move, SH MonsterArts.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and thank you for joining me here in my lair.

So long...

I hope you have enjoyed reading this and if you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, be sure to give my Facebook page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. 
Thanks for reading!

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NECA GODZILLA, KING OF THE MONSTERS! (POSTER VERSION) | Figure Review

Ah NECA's 1954 figure, it's what started me on the path to reviewing Kaiju figures. And now we've come back to it.
You may recall back in April 2017 I made a post about what "Poster/Color" versions of existing figures I'd like to see in the SHMA figure line. Well, it seems NECA has stepped in and gave us a figure based on my final choice: Godzilla 1954 from the poster for the 1956 recut of the first film 'Godzilla, King of the Monsters!"

It's important to add the exclamation point at the end to distinguish it from the 2019 film.

So let's see:

Green skin color? Check!
Yellow atomic breath? Double Check!!
Red lips? Umm...ok they didn't do that.

0/5, Do not buy!

Joking aside, I think NECA did a great job with this figure. We know already they can make a pretty solid 1954 figure, but can they make lighting strike twice with a repaint?

Looking at the head, I noticed a few odd things about my figure.
I don't know if it's a consistent issue with others. (If it is, do let me know)
The eyes at times look like they are misaligned not just on this figure, but also on my original 1954 figure. I'd be more freaked out if not for the fact that this would be an easy fix with some paint.

The paint work on the teeth is odd. Some teeth on the lower jaw are painted while some aren't. I'm sure this isn't that big of a deal given that you'll mostly be looking at this figure in it's intended pose. Besides, they look better than the teeth on the actual poster. Also the upper lip on the right side of the head is slightly cocked up making Godzilla look like he's snarling. QC issue or creative choice on the choice of NECA? You be the judge.

Did you like the first 1954 figure? Good, the same level of detail it had is present here. NECA simply took that figure and splashed several shades of green all over it. I love how it looks very much, it resembles the poster very nicely.

The dorsal fins on the poster had a fiery yellow color to them, the ones on the figure however have a mix of light red and white. Honestly I'm not sure which ones I prefer, but the red ones work well for the figure.

However, one downside to this figure is that it reminds me of the time when bendy wire tails were a thing. I thought we were past this?

One significant addition to this figure happens to be a hole inside the mouth, used to insert the atomic breath piece. This one appears to be the same piece included with the NECA 1962 Godzilla, only colored yellow.

It does match the poster very well and if NECA ever decides to make a 1974 Godzilla (please?), this piece can be reused for a "Fake Godzilla" figure.

I'm happy to see that one thing that was carried over from the newer figures was the fantastic box design. It includes the iconic poster with the flap image containing the same poster with the figure standing in and the back highlights the features of this figure using dialogue from the famous trailer for Godzilla, King of the Monsters!

Inside the box is a special pop out display of the poster to insert the figure into and create a really nice looking set piece for any collector shelf. Some may complain that the backdrop doesn't contain any of the poster text, which is a fair point, but I actually like the textless back ground. I just wish they went all the way and didn't include "AWESOME! -and then some!" part at the bottom.

Overall, this is a pretty solid piece from NECA and a unique figure that I'm sure any collector would be proud to own. And if this release is anything to go by, I'd love to see what else NECA can do.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and thank you for joining me here in my lair.

So long...

I hope you have enjoyed reading this and if you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, be sure to give my Facebook page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. 
Thanks for reading!

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