The Michael Bay-produced Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie hasn’t officially opened yet, but there have been rumblings of “positive reviews” floating around, which is suprising considering how much ire Michael Bay’s involvement and each character’s redesign caught when news and images first started popping up. And I’ll tell you something — I’m warming up to them. Mind you, this is coming from someone who still has a problem with all their masks not being red, but each time I wander through Target or Fred Meyer, I find myself spending more and more time browsing the Turtle pegs looking at these. It was inevitable that I’d eventually pick up a Turtle to accompany my Shredder, so I dipped my toe into the proverbial ooze with this guy: Raph in Disguise.
And I think I may have made a bit of a mistake.
Check out the video below for additional thoughts and an articulation breakdown:
The packaging should be sufficient to give anyone a good idea of what to expect from the figure, but evidently I didn’t look all that carefully because I thought I was getting a full Raphael figure that could wear this disguise as a display option, but what I actually got was a Raphael who can ONLY wear this disguise. Totally my own fault, but ouch.
For a figure wearing a giant overcoat, it’s not a bad figure. The coat is convincing and is made of a soft plastic that allows his legs to move some, but more on that below.
His head sculpt is the same as the standard retail Raph figure, which has grown on me so much since I first got a look at it. Even the nose doesn’t bother me anymore.
This is about it for his range of articulation. His legs are articulated, but the coat gets in the way, so there’s not much going on down there. So this is what we get: he can raise his arms. (There isn’t even any elbow articulation!) His wrists swivel as well, but he doesn’t come with his signature sai, so they just kind of spin just because they can.
When he’s in his full disguise getup, I like him quite a bit. He reminds me of Ben Grimm, which could never be a bad thing. The scarf and sunglasses fit well, but the hat just kind of sits there and can be knocked off his head by a light breeze. Be careful you don’t lose it.
He’s just about the same size as the NECA Raphael figure, but quite a bit larger than the Raphael based on the current cartoon. Since I haven’t been paying the strictest attention to the movie previews, I’m not sure how large the Turtles are supposed to be, but I like the way he looks with Shredder. They seem to be a good match.
If you’re going to get just one movie Raphael, don’t get this one, go for the standard retail version. Get this one if you’re going to go a bit deeper into the movie line because as far as strict action figure standards go, he’s a little bit disappointing. He succeeds in being a disguised Raph who just stands there, however, so if that’s enough for you, then he can be purchased at the fine shops below:
