Hulk Smash Hot Toys!!!

The biggest member of the Avenger team is finally in collectors hands, and it’s one behemoth of a figure. So does he make the team or make you want to SMASH…..

The sculpting and painting of the Hulk are well done and on par with the other Hot Toys Avengers. The rendering of the facial snarl is spot on, making it look like the creature from the film. The body sculpt is well done matching the look of this savage Avenger, right down to sculpted chest hair.

The Hulk pure muscle from head to toe, and the sculpting brings that look to life.There are some ascetic issues around the joints, but since he is the only Avengers character that doesn’t have gauntlets or some sort of wrist guard, it is much more visible than the others. It’s a necessary evil in doing a character like this without loosing articulation so those spots are necessary to make this less of a statue. The feel of the plastic is very soft,giving it a “skin” type quality feel, adding to the realistic look of the figure. All the crevices and creases are shaded properly to give that living feel to the figure. The shades of green are all uniform and nothing seems out of place.

Where this figure becomes limited is in the articulation. Sorry, no handstands folks. I tried for almost 30 minutes and could hear the groan of springs from his arms trying to hold the weight. His head rotates on a ball similar to smaller figures with just a little more give. There are eye posts under his hair, which allow them to be positioned where ever he is looking, but his squint hides them for the most part. Moving down the body, the shoulders move and can rotate about 70 degrees out from the body. The shoulder joints have some play in them and can be actually moved to adjust arms. Moving them down though will leave gaps at the top. Arms can bent at elbows, but feel as if your stretching the plastic really hard and for an expensive figure may want to be careful how far you push the boundaries of the skin.

There are two sets of hands; clenched and open. The fingers on the open hands have wires allowing you to move them to hold things or change hand poses. And if you have a Loki you can so you can get that partial clench around Loki’s neck or leg to recreate one of the best scenes from the film. The Hulk’s knees can bend, but have the same issue as the elbows. The feet can rotate left and right, but there is no ankle rocker motion, so there are limited ways to pose this big guy.

The biggest issues with this figure are the lack of accessories. You get tattered pants and an extra set of hands, and that’s it. An extra head or crushed piece of metal would have been nice addition. However, looking at the size of the figure compare to the others, it is understandable that most of the cost went into the figure itself. In addition the standard figure stand is not included.  For many collectors constancy is important, so skipping the stand might be a big issue with collectors.

Overall the Hulk is a bad ass looking figure. Up close there are a few issues, especially when you consider a price tag over 300.00. The extra cash seems dished out for the bigger body size, but they also took away so much. Because this is a higher end product, many collectors will find minor issues with the figure as well, but when you consider the character some can be forgiven. Every collector will want a Hulk to complete their Avengers team, even though of the team he will be mostly a statue piece. But collectors ask yourself this question: Hulk smashes and really not much else. You don’t need him to be as flexible as the Black Widow, do you?

Author- David Harryman