Monday, August 31, 2015

Corner Bites Issue 2-A: The Japanese Articulated War -Revoltech Edition-



Welcome to another issue of the Corner Bites and just before August ends, here's a little something I've wanted to discuss for quite a while now; today, I'll start talking about major articulated lines that I collect namely S.H.Figuarts, Figma, Revoltech and MAFEX. These four are somewhat what I classify as the main 1/12 (6-inch) lines from Japanese figure companies and even though they're not always following a standard scaling format, each line has their own strengths and weaknesses so sit tight for a rather thorough discussion on each line as we go to the first one after the jump!




First off the bat is Kaiyodo's Revoltech line! Revoltech literally is a line that revolutionizes around the so-called "revolver joints"; these are those clicky hinge joints with pegs that allow rotation on their connection points; while it's their own "Tech", the use of revolver joints really didn't age well as this proved to be one of the line's greatest weak points since the clicking points definitely prevents you from doing dynamic poses pretty well as it holds the body in fixed positions which most of the time misses what you envision.  Additionally to the cons of sticking primarily to Revolver joints is the fact that posing Revoltechs is very tricky and is a pretty frustrating task for those who are new to the line especially when fiddling with a pure revolver jointed hips which is why I was glad when they incorporated a separate mechanism on Tokusatsu Revoltech Mk V's hips so that you can seamlessly raise his legs.

Photo from Revoltech Mk V review.

From what I've heard though, I believe they have removed the clicking part on their Revol Mini line but I definitely don't care since it's not in the scale in focus BUT if there was a line that incorporated less clicks and more seamless versions of the revolver joint, it's probably the Revoltech Queen's Blade line as there's definitely minimal clicks in there. 

Probably the last of Revoltech's weakness is that they can't seem to capture human anime characters pretty well, the very first few ones would look derp in one way or another and that some of them ended up getting blocky proportions (especially true to those released in the Yamaguchi line) though there are really good Revoltech human "anime" character releases such as Alice from Queen's Gate, Ymir and Aldra from Queen's Blade, Lupin the 3rd from his namesake. For monsters, robots and suits though, Revoltech definitely delivers most of the time (note that Revoltech Yamaguchi was around 80% mecha releaes) and sometimes I wish they'd just focus on such releases. (Some notable releases for suits and monster-ish releases would be Iron Man Mk I, Zet, Alphas and Alphonse Elric.)


While the Revoltech line pretty much slowed for a while with the mainstream 1/12 scale  with the introduction of Revol Mini, they are pretty much branching out to more exquisite releases such as the Revoltech Ninja Turtles from last year and then the on going Star Wars line and Takeya (the guy from S.I.C.) line although the Takeya line doesn't really pick up much on actual show characters. I really think the TMNT line was one of their almost perfect lines in terms of aesthetics as the Nick version of the turtles perfectly fit the blocky aesthetics of revoltech and that the gimmicks are definitely well thought out. 

Of course, if there IS one thing Revoltech is pretty much known for among my friends and probably internationally, it's THE release of Tokusatsu Revoltech Woody! (a.k.a. Hentai Woody among my friends) 

Photo by my friend, pugotuknene.
Known for it's "raep" face, Revoltech Woody is pretty much a balance of what I want in a normal revoltech, an aesthetically pleasing mold, a balance of clicky and seamless revolver joints AND a very innovative use of movable eyes, a first in his time I believe. Revoltech Woody's poses are limitless thanks to the eyes and face and not to mention that his included accessories all go well with him be it that you use him as a normal Woody or *cough*a pervert*cough*

Another photo from pugotuknene.

Woody is probably the best selling piece that Revoltech has ever offered and when I say best selling, I mean BEST SELLING piece by having a total of 9 releases (8 re-releases with the latest one being part of the Legacy of Revoltech line scheduled to be released this coming November) and 1 color variant, a number that is definitely insane and probably the highest number of re-releases I've seen in my years of figure collecting.

Of course, while my thoughts on revoltech are more on the bad side, the line definitely isn't bad and that sometimes, because of licenses and all that, it just attracts you to buy it as there probably won't be any other rendition of them in the 6 inch articulated scale. (I'm looking at you Queen's Blade!) 

That pretty much wraps my Revoltech cover of the "Japanese Articulated War". I'll be back soon with the next installment which would be Medicom's "slightly new" MAFEX line.

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