NECA: 1966 Adam West Batman

So, it’s entirely possible some of you might have missed this last week- NECA announced via social media that they were going to reveal some new figures that would “break the internet.”  In truly awesome fashion, these figures would be (mostly) available right after the announcement.

And they were!  It might not have broke the internet, but there’s definitely some new cracks in it- they did break eBay, again, though! NECA shook the webz with the reveal of THREE new DC movie action figures, in the vein of the Keaton Batman surprise of last year. We’ll get a chance to see them all here at Fwoosh, that I’m sure, but for starters, let’s go with the Adam West Batman.

While a logical candidate, being done in the 18″ format by NECA already, seeing a 7″ Adam West Batman still came off as a major surprise, at least to me.  West has been doing pretty well in the collectible market these days, from video game skins to the excellent Figures Toy Company Mego figures, to Mattel’s pretty solid ’66 series, so again, while he is a natural fit given this current timing, I didn’t think he’d be on NECA’s radar.

But sure enough, here he is.  Like the other two figures, and most of NECA’s current waves, he comes to us in a nice, clean window box, with some art on the front, and features splashes on the back.  I have to point out a little dirty pool on the packaging, though- that’s clearly the 18″ figure in the stock shots, including his double elbows and batusi hands.  Neither of those make into the 7″ figure, and while I’m sure timing was a factor to maintain the element of surprise, still, dirty pool.

Anyway, the figure himself may be the best rendition of West yet to be found south of 1/6 scale.  The face sculpt is fantastic, though it doesn’t hurt to look through the stock and find some consistent eye paint.  The metallic fleck added to the blue/purple parts of the costume really stand out visually, and I tried to get some indoor/outdoor hots to give you a better idea of how it comes off in person.  The ribbing of the suit, and the wash applied to it really hold up to the real deal- I remember seeing one of the TV suits in person at SDCC some years back, and this really nails that look- as well as being very consistent with West’s slim build.  Yeah, I know, pop culture has tried to tell us he was a pudgy Batman, but in practice, he was more average built than anything else.  The belt also deserves unique praise here for, well, being the best damn rendition of this belt I’ve seen under the 1/6 version. The cloth cape does it’s job here, and the color match is good enough for the girls we go with, but it’s not nearly as nice as the bigger versions- in color or finish.  Just saying.

Batman’s articulation is consistent with most of NECA’s standard set, and as such is fairly similar to Keaton Batman’s. He has ball jointed shoulders and hips, the latter hidden by soft rubber underoos, swivel jointed elbows, knees and ankles, hinges wrists, a double jointed neck, and a floating lower torso joint.

The count is good, very close to say Dutch Schaefer from Predator, but like Keaton, the range of motion isn’t quite all there.  While some parts like the arms and torso actually out-do the Mattel version’s bicep cuts and ab-joint, the knees barely move back. The ankles are sixes, but the hinged wrists do up the score a bit.

For accessories, this Batman adds another bat-radio and batarang to a surprisingly growing arsenal of ’66 gear.  Both are done very nicely, especially the weathering on the batarang, and work well with the extra gripping hands he also comes with. The scale isn’t so far different you can’t pair him up with weapons from the other two Batmen figures- both the FTC and Mattel weapons can fudge nicely with him.

But no, sadly, you ain’t gonna cram him into your Mattel Batmobile.  He’ll fit in the DCC Animated one, though!

For a complete surprise $20 figure (less if you buy a DVD), getting a West Batman from NECA is pretty damn cool.  He’s not perfect, and in terms of build and articulation he’s nothing we haven’t seen before, but his sculpt is really slick, and adding him to this movie-centric scale is too hard to pass up. He should be making his was to Toys R Us just about everywhere, and if you live stateside I’d advise a little perseverance and patience before resorting to eBay- at $20 he’s just fine, but the secondary costs could potentially suck a lot of fun out of him.