Speed Demon is one of those great, longstanding villains that will never aspire to world domination. However, those are the perfect villains to make great single-issue threats and/or works well with other villains to create dynamic evil groups to plague our heroes. I’ve always assumed getting someone like Speed Demon was inevitable; it just took a while for the inevitable to become a reality.
Speed Demon fills a lot of niches. He’s been a brief member of the Thunderbolts, a Deadly foe of Spider-Man, a Superior Foe of Spider-Man, a Master of Evil, a member of the Hood’s Crime Syndicate . . . basically you can plop him down in the midst of a group of bad guys and he’ll fit right in.
The Superior Foes angle is played up on the figure’s packaging, and also on the little pack-in he comes with, which I’ll get to later in the review. He also comes with Absorbing Man’s torso.
Speed Demon makes his debut on what has come to be referred to as the “Pizza Spidey” body, which is the newest body being used for lean, Spider-Man-esque characters. It’s appropriately lithe for the character and has a lean, kinetic look perfect for super-speed poses. I know this body can be a bit controversial due to the long ab section and limited hip spread, but, really, what body isn’t these days? I think it’s a huge upgrade to the body this character would have previously been on, which was the body the Future Foundation and Big Time Spider-Man figures utilized.
Speed Demon has an appropriately smarmy head sculpt. There are a number of different ways to sculpt a grin, but there’s really only one way to sculpt a grin that looks skeevy, and this one accomplishes that perfectly. He looks like he’s about to grope my other female figures at high speeds.
He comes with two sets of hands: a pair of fists for beating people up at high speeds and a pair of flattened hands for aerodynamic sprinting. I’ve really enjoyed this trend of getting extra hands with our Marvel figures, because sometimes one set of hands just doesn’t do everything you need a figure to do. I’d have been disappointed with just the “running-styled” hands because at best you can karate chop someone, but you can’t punch them. The hands swap in and out easily.
The paints are simple and clean. The design is a nice gold that pops out a bit more than if it were just yellow. This is one of those great costumes that is simple and iconic.
As nice as the figure is, the pack-in almost steals the show just by its existence. There are some things you don’t ever think you’ll be getting. Then there are other things that you doubt would even be a possibility. Silvermane’s head on a radio-controlled car falls into the latter category. What was a random joke concept thrown into the Superior Foes of Spider-Man comic (which was great — check it out) has made it into plastic form. Not only is this the wackiest pack-in this side of Howard the Duck, but it also serves as a vehicle (har har hardy har har) for an actual Silvermane head. While getting a full figure of the cyborg septuagenarian has long been one of my action figure dreams, it’s nice to at least have some representation for him. I don’t have any of the recent Ultron figures, but people have been popping his head on those to great effect for a simple Silvermane stand-in. Like getting Hammerhead with the previous Chameleon figure, it’s a cool way to get an extra character head that can become an actual character with some ingenuity.
The RC car’s wheels don’t roll, so it’s a solid block, but it does have a ball-jointed neck joint so Silvermane can look around while he scoots here and there.
Speed Demon has been a long time coming and his arrival is very satisfying. Good body, nice extra hands, and an awesome pack-in . . . this one hits all the right notes.
The Absorbing Man series featuring Speed Demon is in stock at Big Bad Toy Store. You can order a case with just the 7 figures needed to build Absorbing Man, or buy the case with an extra Ben Reilly Spider-Man for an extra five dollars