Let's Look At: NECA GODZILLA 2001 (ATOMIC BLAST)

I've thought this over and I decided that I wouldn't be doing a full review of this figure. The simple reason is that I already did a review of this figure, the only way this figure differs from the original is the paint job and the included accessory.
So this will be a short little mini-review going over the aforementioned differences.

Obviously the paint job is radically different from the original figure. The majority is painted a slightly darker color to depict how Godzilla might appear during night time with very little light.

We also have the added blue patches all over the body simulating the glow from an Atomic Breath.
Well, that or Godzilla's been hitting the Kaiju Blue a little too hard lately.

And the Dorsal Fins are now made of a soft translucent material and painted with a white/blue mix.

But the main event and big reason that I'm sure most people will be buying this figure is the Atomic Breath piece, which looks really cool! Side note: my Atomic Breath piece came out of the package a little bent, so it's pretty safe to assume that most others will too. But, it's not that big a deal if you got a hair dryer. 

As you see the piece fits inside Godzilla's mouth very well and there's even a peg hole inside to stick it into the mouth.
And I gotta say, this looks really good, everything just comes together so well. The only thing that would make this a bit more awesome is if this figure glowed in the dark!

The Atomic Breath piece is compatible and looks very nice with most of the other NECA Godzilla figures, as well as figures from SH MonsterArts and various 6 inch vinyl Godzilla's. 

And if you have a few SH MonsterArts effect pieces, those too work very well with this figure.

Needless to say, I am pretty pleased with this Atomic Blast Godzilla and I think it'd be cool to see more figures like this. 

In fact...if any of the NECA guys are reading this, listen up: You outta make an Atomic Breath variant of y'alls Shin Godzilla figure, with the purple breath piece, purple glowing spines and a swappable head with the split lower jaw.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

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!

https://www.facebook.com/TheGryphonsLair/

DEATH NOTE (2017) | Gryphon's First Impressions

-SOME SPOILERS MAY FOLLOW!!!-

I must say, I'm not much of an Anime fan. But if I were to pick a favorite, it would be Death Note, the story of a young man named Light who finds a notebook that allows him to kill anyone he wants just by writing down their name, begins a crusade to eliminate the world from all criminals and ends up pursued by a detective known only as "L". The minute I saw the first episode, I was hooked. I loved the show and I even loved the live-action films from Japan. Since then, talks of an American adaptation have been numerous with some even saying that Zac Efron would play the part of Light.

Well, now we finally have our American live-action Death Note movie. And...I didn't...not like it.

Let's start with some positives first.

First, my favorite character from the Anime/Manga, Ryuk, played here by Willem Defoe, was the best thing in the movie, hands down. His delivery is spot on and I love how he was portrayed on screen. In the past live-action films, Ryuk was a CGI character. But here, Ryuk is played by a real actor (Jason Liles) in a costume, with Defoe providing the voice and wearing motion capture dots on his face to enhance his appearance. Most of Ryuk's scenes have him obscured in darkness so you can't see the full effect, but on the other hand it does make him look more terrifying.

Keith Stanfield plays the genius detective L. For the most part, he has the right mannerisms that L would have, he eats a lot of candy, hunches over when he walks and talks in the same way L does in the anime. However, this L is a lot more aggressive in getting the results he wants, he goes so far as to chase down Light by car and foot, regularly having outbursts and even carrying a gun.

I thought the design for the Death Note itself was a unique update. And the score for the movie was pretty good, it has the overall haunting and foreboding tone that Death Note should.

Now for some complaints.

Similar to my views on Power Rangers, Death Note uses a few songs in it that are either distracting or unfitting to the scene, such as in the opening, the ending and the climax, which in my opinion is the worst offender of all. Death Note and 80's rock don't mix well at all. That's when we needed the intense orchestra and choir from the Anime, not songs you'd find being used on a CW show.

The Death Note in this film has a few new rules in it, which I interesting.
But there are a few big flaws I found. Light uses the notebook to influence a character named Watari to do his bidding before killing him. The rules of the book are that you need a persons face in your mind and their real name to kill them, anyone who knows the character of Watari would know that the name 'Watari' is an alias to protect his identity, and I'm pretty sure the Death Note doesn't work like that!
And then Light threatens to write Ryuk's name in the note book and kill him. But guess what? RYUK'S NAME IS ALREADY WRITTEN IN THE NOTE BOOK! He should have been dead awhile ago after that one guy wrote that warning about not trusting him. So the part where Ryuk says "There's 4 letters in my name and the most anyone's ever gotten where 2." makes no sense at all. A Shinigami shouldn't even be able to be killed by a Death Note anyway!

But by far, the biggest fault in this movie is the handling of the character, Light.

Nat Wolff plays Light Turner (instead of 'Yagami', because 'murica), but if you were to compare him the character from the original, he's doomed to suffer in comparison.
Light is a character with a genius intellect, fed up with how crime-filled and rotten the world is, he takes it upon himself to clean up the world and rule it as the new god 'Kira'. By any. means. necessary.
Here, Light is way more hesitant to kill anyone who stands in his way. In fact he's a big freakin' scaredy cat, he screams and panics like a little girl the first time he meets Ryuk, while it was hilarious to see it just seems out of character for Light.
In fact a lot of Light's more evil actions come from the character Mia (our Misa Amane stand in played by Margaret Qualley), she's the one who pulls of more of the extreme actions that Kira would do and pressures Light to kill innocents. So she acts more like the original Light/Kira than Light in the movie does. In a sense it's like the original character has been split into 2 characters for this movie.
Also, Light and Mia fall in love way too quickly, even by movie standards.

That being said...

When I finished watching this movie, I found myself conflicted. I couldn't really bring myself to hate the story surrounding these characters. As an adaptation of the original Manga/Anime, it falls short on so many areas. On the other hand, similar to my views on the 1998 Godzilla, if this movie were to exist as it's on separate entity with the characters having different names, then maybe it would have gotten a better reception. When looking at it as a spin-off in the Death Note universe, it takes the weight of expectations from fans off a bit, even though they probably would still find things to complain about.

Overall, as a fan of Death Note, I did not completely dislike this adaptation of it. In fact I actually found myself watching it again after my first viewing, and I could probably watch it again sometime in the new future.
Death Note fans should definitely keep an open mind when viewing it. That is, if they have a Netflix account.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

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!

https://www.facebook.com/TheGryphonsLair/

FIGMA ZELDA: TWILIGHT PRINCESS VERSION - Figure Review

While I may have been excited for the previous Link Figma, another figure was announced alongside it, one that would become probably my most anticipated figure for the year.
Joining the Twilight Princess Link Figma is a Figma based on Princess Zelda herself.
Last time I reviewed a Princess Zelda figure, I found it to be a simply OK attempt at capturing her elegant likeness. But that was a figure costing roughly $15. But can Figma's Princess Zelda figure, with it's price tag of a little over $60, do better?

This Figma is BEAUTIFUL!!!

From top to bottom Princess Zelda has some very impressive sculpt and detail. So, let's look at it from top to bottom!

Princess Zelda comes with 2 face plates, one with a serious expression and one where she smiles. (Removing the front crown piece is required to replace the faces)
Her faces have great expressions and the details are nicely applied, the eyes, mouths, ears and even her earrings look pretty good.

Her hair also looks very nice, wonderfully sculpted and painted. Her crown piece looks good too, and the back part is well painted (mine has a minor splotch on her hair), same goes for the other ribbons and ties.

The shoulder armor piece looks great, nicely painted and oozing with detail all over.
And the arms look good too. I saw on one review of this figure where one arm was painted a pearly white while the other one wasn't. But luckily mine seems to have a consistent paint scheme.

But the best looking thing about this figure is the dress. This is an amazingly sculpted dress, the detail of the seems, folds and the patterns is very well realized even down to the littlest things. The paint overall is great, Max Factory even did a great job painting some of the smaller details onto the dress, this stuff couldn't have been easy to make look consistent but they nailed it and should be commended for their efforts.While the tabard also looks amazing, the banner-like piece feels like it was simply glued on to the dress and one wrong move could snap it off. So I would apply museum rules to the tabbard: look, but no touch.
Princess Zelda doesn't have as much articulation as the Twilight Princess Link Figma, but what she does have is still pretty decent.

Zelda's head can tilt left to right. Her hair in the back has a hinge allowing it to move up and down, which in turn also allows Zelda to look up and down. And the head is capable of rotation, the braids in the front are pretty flexible, but still be careful as they could still come off.

The upper part of her chest can rotate and tilt forward, bend side to side a little bit and kinda sorta lean backward, but not a lot.

The arms are capable of rotating around. However, I will say that the shoulder armor can cause some problems when it comes to that. The corners of the armor will overlap with the blue tassels and cause them to bend. There is a possibility that too much of that may cause them to snap off. 
Apart from that her arms can also move up, rotate at the bicep, bend at the elbow. And the hands can rotate and bend.

Unlike the Jakks Pacific figure, this Zelda actually has legs. As you can see, unlike other princesses, Zelda is a pants and boots type of girl. 2 pieces of Zelda's gown can be moved up and can twist slightly. Doing so effects the width, so if you want to display it as wide or narrow, you may do so. The center piece has no form of articulation whatsoever, but like the tabard, don't mess around with it too much. 
Her legs have the kind of articulation you'd expect to have on a Figma figure.
The legs are capable of bending and rotating at the hip, although the dress itself does prohibit that movement. The legs also bend and rotate at the knees, her feet can rotate, move up and down, pivot slightly and there is also an extra bend at the tip of the foot. 
I don't think it really matters a whole lot since the gown itself prevents Zelda from falling over anyway.

While she doesn't have as many accessories as the last figure I reviewed, what she does come with is still pretty impressive.

The first is her sword. While the detail and paint look really nice, the blade feels flimsy. One wrong move and it'll snap like spaghetti! It's still cool to see Zelda holding this elegant weapon. 

Also included are Zelda's Bow of Light and one Light Arrow. Both of these pieces look great, sporting a glossy paint application which I think is a good detail. They are weapons of light after all, so they should look the part.

Getting Zelda to hold the bow and arrow can be a bit tricky, but with a little creativity it can be done. 

Zelda comes with a variety of different hands that can be swapped out for many different posing possibilities. One issue I've had with my Zelda figure is that when I go to pull one hand off the wrist, the entire joint socket will accompany the hand. The way I've found to get around this is to hold the wrist firmly while pulling the hand off, so if you're having this issue as well, feel free to use this method for yourself. 

Zelda stands a little over 5 1/2 inches tall, fitting in scale with the Twilight Princess Link Figma and looks good next to the Link Between Worlds Figma. 

This is probably not a fair comparison, but her she is compared to the Jakks Pacific Zelda and Sheik figures.

 I have been looking forward to this figure since it was announced almost a year ago and it does not disappoint! If you are a die hard Zelda fan, and especially if you love Twilight Princess like I do, then this figure is something you should definitely obtain for yourself. I'm very happy to have both Link and Zelda figures in my collection. 

And I'm going to keep saying this out of hope that it will eventually happen:
TWILIGHT PRINCESS GANONDORF FIGURE!!!!
C'mon Max Factory, please? 

Till next time, I've been your host Gryphon
And I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.
So long...

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!
https://www.facebook.com/TheGryphonsLair/

FIGMA LINK: TWILIGHT PRINCESS VERSION (DX EDITION) - Figure Review

As I stated in the last Figma review I made, I wanted a Link figure based on his look from 'The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess', which happens to be my favorite Zelda game.
And now that such a figure has finally been released, how does it hold up? Does it exceed my expectations or barely come close to them?

In short, Max Factory knocked this one out of the park!
Link looks amazing. 

Starting from the top, the head looks very nice. The hair is very well sculpted and the details on all 3 face plates look good.

We have a good looking hat, probably the longest of Link's hats to date. And you can see all kinds of folds, patches and seams, a nice little detail. 

And that same level of detail can also be seen on the rest of the tunic. Everything from the Belts, the undershirt and the chain mail are very well realized.

You can even see the chain mail painted underneath Link's armpits, that is really cool! Even the Skyward Sword Figma didn't have that detail!  
The paint overall matches the color scheme of Twilight Princess to a tee.

Link also comes with 2 Adventure Pouches equipped to his back. One of which has a peg hole for the included figure stand. The larger pouch is also detachable.

Looking at Link's forearms, you might see the paint on the Bracers has a few slight paint hiccups, but nothing you'll lose sleep over. Overall, they look pretty good, I especially love the guard on the left arm.
Not much else to say about the legs, they look good too. This is one tall and skinny Link.

Max Factory prides themselves on incorporating both beauty and Articulation into their Figma's and the articulation on Link is pretty similar to past Link Figma's. As I was messing around with it, I found this to be one of the most fluid moving figures I've ever owned. So basically, if you can imagine a pose, there's a good chance that Link will be able to do it. 
One standout piece of articulation is that the neck can move forward. Like other Figma Links, the hat on this one can rotate and it even has an extra joint in it allowing it to move up and down and all around.

Of course, no Link figure would be complete without his signature weapons, the Master Sword and Hylian Shield. Both of which look fantastic as usual.

Now, if you get the standard version of the Twilight Princess Link Figma, the only accesories you're getting are the Master Sword (with the scabbard), Hylian Shield, the 2 extra face pieces and a figure stand. This however is the Deluxe Version! And it comes with a few more goodies. 

In addition to the Master Sword, the Ordon Sword is also included along with the scabbard.

Another fine addition is the Hero's Bow and one Arrow. It is kinda weird how there is no string on the Bow though. 2 additional hands are included to have Link hold the Bow and Arrow, some fiddling will be required to make Link posed with it look right.

Link also comes with a "hair-piece" that attaches the Hawkeye mask Link wears when aiming the Bow. To be honest, I'm not a fan of this piece. It just looks funny to me and I'd rather pose Link holding the Bow without the mask.

No Twilight Princess Link would be complete without one of the best items from the game, the Clawshot! Which appears to be A LOT larger than I thought it would be.
The closed claw piece can be replaced with an open claw piece attached to a chain which can then be held up by an included second figure stand with a claw of it's own.

Speaking of chains, the next included accessory is the Ball and Chain weapon. A very nice addition that when used with the figure stands can be posed in a variety of nice ways.

Every included accessory looks really nice, is painted great and can lead to some fun possibilities. Now like with the Link Between Worlds Figma, the accessories come apart into several small pieces to make attaching them to Link's hands easier, so make sure you are in an area where you can easily keep track of them without getting them lost. Instruction manuals are included for your convenience in both English and Japanese.
It should also go without saying that most of these are fragile and could break easily, so be extra careful when handling them.

As you can see this Figma fits well in scale with the Skyward Sword and A Link Between Worlds Figma's really well.

And it don't look too bad next to some Jakks Pacific World of Nintendo figures.

This figure is awesome, the accessories are awesome, Twilight Princess is awesome and I am super glad that I own this figure now. It only makes me wish we had a Twilight Princess Ganondorf figure even more! In fact...maybe I should do a "Top 5 Legend of Zelda Figma's I'd Like to See" blog. We'll see.
Point is, if you're a Legend of Zelda fan, weather you go for the Standard Edition on the Deluxe Edition with the extra weapons, this figure makes an excellent piece to add to your collection. 

Till next time, I've been your host, Gryphon.
and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.
So long...

If you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, Be sure to give my FB page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. Thanks for reading!

https://www.facebook.com/TheGryphonsLair/