Over the last couple of years, there has been a huge push by NECA to get quality product from the Alien franchise out to the masses. With all the amazing figures that have come our way, we’ve never really gotten much in the way of vehicles. NECA has released four vehicles under its Cinemachines banner. From Aliens, we have the Dropship and the Armored Personnel Carrier, and what we’ll be checking out today is the Space Jockey and Derelict Ship from Alien.
Packaging
I had absolutely no idea that these existed and just stumbled upon them one day at Toys R Us. The packaging is a nice window box, and even though a bit bland, it still did its job of catching my eye. I honestly had no idea it was even NECA until I looked at the bottom of the box as they have the “Cinemachines” logo plastered all over it.
Sculpt
For as small as they are, they are actually pretty nice sculpts overall. Each comes in at about 6.5 inches at their longest point, so, obviously, these aren’t to scale with each other — or anything, really. The Space Jockey is the clear winner. The pilot himself may look a little soft, but the base and impressive shaft are riddled with detail. The first time I gripped it in my hand . . . okay, I’ll just stop there.
The Derelict Ship doesn’t fare quite as well. The ship in the film has an oddly asymmetrical design with barely a flat surface on the entire thing, so translating that into a toy this small is going to be difficult. The overall shape is good, but there really is no wow factor. The Space Jockey has a few die-cast elements, but the ship is just a hunk of plastic. A stand is included, but it’s both difficult to insert into the peg hole and too weak to really support to the weight of the ship.
Paint
The paint on the Space Jockey is pretty on-point and definitely serves to bring out that awesome sculpt. There is a little bit of slop here and there, and I think they went a touch overboard on the pilot, but overall they did a great job. The Derelict Ship falls a bit flat in this category as well. The ship played a much bigger role in Prometheus, which gave the audience a much better look at the colors and details. But as this is being sold based on its appearance in Alien, I have to try my best to separate the two, mostly to help convince myself that I didn’t waste my money. In Alien, what we saw of the exterior was a just a few dimly lit seconds of the ship in a distance. With that as a model, I guess this paintwork is adequate. It’s basically one color applied evenly over the entire ship. There are very little variations or highlights at all, which makes it look a little cheap.
Overall
What you get here are two small non-articulated plastic statues that don’t really fit with anything. Whether or not something like this appeals to you is most likely based on how big a fan you are of Alien or of H.R. Giger’s designs. At a retail price of twenty bucks, the Space Jockey is worth every penny. I never in a million years thought I would see that design in a big box store, but there it was. And NECA did a great job at bringing one of the most mysterious elements of that first film to plastic. The Derelict Ship is just a dud. It’s unfortunate as it’s an important element of the story, but there is no way that this toy is worth twenty dollars. I’m glad I own it, but the value just isn’t there.
But don’t let my negativity sway you — check them out for yourself!
Thanks for reading!