Today we bring you a review for Diamond Select Toys' Marvel Select Avengers Hulk figure by
John Harmon from
Mint Condition Customs. You can check out hi-res images for the figures below in our
GALLERY!
While figure collectors everywhere are still waiting with baited breath for the Hasbro 6″ movie Avengers figures to hit retail, Marvel Select has just released a figure of the Hulk from the movie. My local comic shop, Keith’s Comics in Dallas, TX, got them in yesterday. I went and picked one up and felt the need to review him right away!
Mark Ruffalo did a fantastic job as Bruce Banner, and the Hulk in the Avengers movie. That’s right, that was Ruffalo, doing some motion capture acting for Hulk, so it would be entirely his performance. I love that.
And as much as I am still very much going to buy the 6″ Hasbro movie Hulk, I couldn’t resist picking up this green behemoth as well!
Keep reading to find out if Hulk smashed (go I hate myself for that) my expectations.
PACKAGING - Hulk comes in the standard Marvel Select packaging. It’s a big window box displaying the figure, with a nice “spine” on the left with some great artwork of the Hulk, so he’d look good in package on a shelf.
The back has a photo of the figure, a description about the Hulk, and shows off the other two figures Marvel Select is coming out with for the Avengers movie: Hawkeye, and a Chitauri footsoldier. Gotta give it to Marvel Select for staying consistent with their packaging since day one. It gets your attention, and looks excellent.
The only thing that could make it better is if it were collector friendly, i.e. if you could open the package, take the figure out, and put him back inside and make it look like the package had never been opened.
PACKAGING SCORE: 4 / 5
SCULPT – Hulk’s sculpt is phenomenal. He stands at just over 9 1/2 inches tall, which is gigantic, even for a Marvel Select! As you’ll see in my photos, he’s even taller than the recent Marvel Select Red Hulk. He’s huge. He has a very realistic sculpt to him, and very movie accurate as well. Lots of proportionate muscle definition, with veins popping out all over his body.
The only part that seems a bit off is in his arms. His biceps seem too short, and his forearms seem to long. You don’t notice it unless you’re really looking for it, and it doesn’t look bad per se, but it doesn’t look totally proportionate either.
The head sculpt is great too. You can definitely see Mark Ruffalo under there. Even though the head sculpt isn’t 100% movie accurate (Marvel Selects never are), it still looks wonderful. He’s got a perfect angry expression that’s not too angry, nor is it stoic. His hair is realistically detailed too. It’s a separate piece from the head, so they were able to add more strands and more wild detail. I love it.
SCULPT SCORE: 4.5 / 5
PAINT – He’s the perfect green that the Hulk should be. It’s very movie accurate, and the perfect shade I’ve always thought is great for the Hulk. Here, he’s been painted in a very dark color, and the green has been dry-brushed over it, giving him a realistic, gritty texture.
His pants are appropriately painted brown like in the movie, though they’re just a solid color. No real detailing there. The head is painted perfectly. No sloppy edges, or misaligned eyes or teeth or anything like that.
There are some sloppy edges on the body, wherever the pants meet his skin. It’s not a huge deal, but it is there. My only real problem with the paint is the same with most Selects…it’s very thick. The articulation is wont to rub some of it off, such as at the shoulders. It doesn’t look terrible, but it is an inherent problem with the figure.
PAINT SCORE: 3.5 / 5
ARTICULATION – Hulk is surprisingly articulated for a Marvel Select. He’s not very articulate (being a giant raging brute), but articulatED. He’s quite posable. He had a ball jointed neck that allows for up and down movement as well, ball jointed shoulders, bicep rotators, single elbows, wrist rotators, a mid-torso rotator that gets a bit of back and forth motion, and plenty of articulation below the waist.
Here’s where it gets weird. His legs have DC Universe Classics articulation. He has the t-hinge hip joints and mid-thigh rotators (just like a DCUC figure), as well as single knee joints, and the new style of ankle rockers that Hasbro has been utilizing, where a peg from the lower leg goes into the foot at a 45 degree angle, so when you rotate the foot it gives off the illusion of a rocker ankle, to allow for wide stances. It’s actually all very close to Hasbro articulation.
It would be nice if he had double elbows and knees, and some more back and forth motion in his mid-torso joint so it could act better as an ab crunch, but you can still get a lot of great poses out of him. And his elbow, hip, and knee articulation is all ratcheted, so you don’t have to worry about him collapsing under his own weight or anything.
ARTICULATION SCORE: 3.5 / 5
ACCESSORIES – No accessories included with Hulk, unfortunately. Usually a Marvel Select at least comes with a cool display base, but nothing here. It would have been nice to get a base that looked like a destroyed New York street, but nope. Nothing. Kinda disappointing, but the figure is so impressively imposing that you kinda forget about it. But still, accessories are nice, especially for the price. It’s going to hurt his score unfortunately.
ACCESSORIES SCORE: 0 / 5
FUN – How can the Hulk NOT be fun? It’s the Hulk! He’s huge, he’s green, he’s nothing but raging muscle and torn up pants! I’m having a lot of fun with this figure, perhaps more than I should. I’ve been posing him with my movie Avengers (the ones Hasbro already released with the Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America 6″ movie lines), and he looks awesome.
Just look at the last photo in the set I took to see how much fun I’ve been having with him. He looks great with your 6″ Marvel Legends figures, though he may be a bit bigger than he should be, when compared to the movie. But considering Hulk’s height is always varying, I think it’s better to have him be a little bigger than he should be, as opposed to smaller.
FUN SCORE: 5 / 5
OVERALL – Overall, I say buy it. If you loved the Avengers movie, or you’re just a Hulk fan, or someone looking for a Definitive Hulk figure to add to your Marvel collection, I’d say get it. He’s definitely a movie figure, but he looks great next to the comic accurate figures as well.
The sculpt is amazing, he’s incredibly fun, and has a great range of posability. So to conclude, I definitely recommend it.
OVERALL SCORE: 3.5 / 5
