ALF (Neca) Thread

[Nebraska]

When I was a kid, cartoon Alf always seemed taller than puppet Alf so I'm cool. Oddly enough, when this figure was first solicited, I pictured him to be this size, but I'm not sure his actual height was originally listed.

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[SalemCrow]

Took some photos yesterday and the boy from Melmac was one of the subjects.

IMG_20230119_191630878_HDR~2 by lionpride75, on Flickr

IMG_20230119_191649313_HDR~2 by lionpride75, on Flickr

This works for me. He's sitting on a plastic folding chair from a wrestling figure.
IMG_20230119_192121142_HDR~2 by lionpride75, on Flickr

[Detrimental_Fig]

Target is getting ALF In. Picked mine up and MAN, he's a great figure! I love that NECA gets creative with the engineering on these figures for more "expressive" characters. The way his lower jaw and upper head are ball jointed, he can do some of those "puppet mouth" askew looks. I think my only actual nitpick is the sunglasses. They fit into a little notch under his hair and between his ear. It's a bit precarious cause the sunglasses are so tiny and thin. But once they're in, they're good. Just have to be careful with them.

Super impressed with this figure. It actually makes me even more excited for the Dinosaurs figures coming.

[Nebraska]

Picked up Alf & the deluxe E.T. at Target last night. My store received 3 Alfs & he rang up for $34.99. My store also received 1 Elliot/E.T./bike and 6 of the telepathic E.T.

I've yet to open Alf, but he looks awesome.

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[NORM]

Alf might be among my figures of the year for '23.

[The Gill-Man]

Picked up ALF at Target on Friday. He's a fun figure, and I've enjoyed playing around with him. Yeah, I do wish he was more in scale with my other NECA figures, but at the same time...I get why they went with this size. He is so detailed, and and his various accessories make for some great scenes (right now, I have him on my desk offering a Mars Attacks alien a taste of his cat sandwich!

[Night Wolf]

Went to target to look for Alf but didnt find him. I did see D&D cartoon figs, croc master classified and movie skeletor. didnt buy nothing though.

[MaximumCrapping]

I know it's not diet, but can you give regular a chance?

[Robogeek28]

Saw him at Target this morning, and he is indeed a gorgeous looking figure.

Sadly in hand he's just too big....oh well.

[PG-Superfan]

If you're a TV show scale nut, put him with 1:12 figures. His quality holds up with many of those and there's a lot of properties he'd fit in with.

Personally, I think the comics and cartoon were much better than the live action TV show. The live action show was probably comparable to Full House whereas the trading cards, comic book, and cartoons were legitimate classics of their time period.

I think the cartoons compare really favorably against The Simpsons at its peak. In fact, it almost feels like The Simpsons borrowed from the ALF cartoons in several ways, especially the wild opening that introduces a ton of characters and ends with Gordon and his family sitting down on a couch to watch TV together, followed by a gag. The animation was good, easily the best animation ever applied to a live action sitcom tie-in, and the animation staff went on to do Batman: The Animated Series.

Ever collect the trading cards? The main 2 sets are a forgettable Topps media tie-in but kids went crazy over the Garbage Pail Kids-like Bouillabaseball cards chases. Again, ALF with a family is so much less interesting than ALF's deep mythology.

Maybe in part due to the personal problems of the Tanner Family cast, every revival since has tried to ditch the live action TV show and embrace weirdness, from the X-Files lite TV movie to the talk show to the cameos on Mr. Robot and the Johnny Depp Art of the Deal movie.

At no point are we likely to see the Tanners from NECA. (And they'd be fairly easy to customize from 1:12 dolls.) If this does outrageously well, what we'd likely see would be more Melmacians. The likeliest scenario is probably Toony Classics figures based on the ALF cartoon but maybe we could get Bouillabaseball players as a step between that and Ultimates similar to the Gremlins Mogwai figures NECA is doing (and similar to the GPK toys).

The scale is actually very accurate to the Marvel comics relative to NECA 7" figures.



And while the Marvel comic loosely followed the continuity of the show (until the show was canceled on a cliffhanger), the comic made ALF's size a plot point a couple of times and a giant dog was used as a decoy for him.

I don't think it's a big deal. His size was always a function of being a puppet and by extension having a little person portray him in a suit sometimes. If he had a major relaunch, he'd probably be CGI and they could make his status whatever.

I think from a comedy theory standpoint, he needs to be smaller than a human to be "cute" and to offset his boorish behavior sometimes. An alien that's 8 foot tall that peeps on women in the shower and burps a lot isn't funny. It's Jabba the Hutt. And his personality in the cartoons is somewhat different where he's average height. He gets away with some stuff by being smaller, weaker, and non-threatening.

The height more or less works okay for me with 7" figures because he's still "small". It's not a great fit with 6" figures but NECA isn't selling those. (Although its TMNT come close!)

The figure itself is one of NECA's finest. The cartoon shirt's a bit flimsy but this figure more than any NECA figure I've seen is one that holds up for play.

The articulation is fantastic (probably NECA's best, honestly) and essentially nothing is too tight or needs to be pre-heated. It helps being designed around mostly ball joints. The only thing to watch out for is that the back of his shin overlays might get worn over time.

I think literally anything people could point to and complain about has a justification. The elbows are a bit more narrow but he gets range on par with a Classified figure. Some may prefer alternate heads to his head articulation setup but they really designed this to allow you to mimic his puppetry. His jaw doesn't just open. It TILTS and angles the way the character's jaw does.

Some might take issue with some of the proportions as they don't reflect the suit worn on the show (and eagle eyed people might notice his eyebrows are higher than the puppet's were). But he's a dead ringer for how the character appeared in painted media illustrations like trading cards and to an extent the cartoons, including the higher eyebrows, narrower knees, and big feet. This is an idealized version of ALF.

And I think if you're a fan of more than just the TV show (or even, dare I say, a fan of everything but the TV show), this figure is full of rewarding details.

He has his Melmacian cartoon shirt. (Perhaps most famous from the anti-drugs PSA where he teamed up with the Muppet Babies, Ninja Turtles, snd Smurfs.) He has Melmacian slimeballs (which were minor in the show but heavily used in the comics). He has sunglasses from across media. And he has his ham radio, which featured in not just one of the show's more poignant subplots but across media.

This is ALF in his most idealized form, much like the Gremlins figures based on movie posters.

[Night Wolf]

Yea, i remember the cartoon, it was superb.

[mrboshek]

A few hours after my complaint post (see below) Target had a whole row of ALFs. I thought we were passed over this week because the rep usually stocks Monday or Tuesday and the only new item I noticed was ET w/bike.

This is such a great figure. Anyone on the fence because they think the size is wrong should forget that concern and buy it anyways. I was surprised his jaw was more than just a hinge and also has some swivel motion. Reading previous posts more closely, I see Detrimental_Fig already mentioned that. Neca has been a roll lately. Their D&D figures felt mostly great out of the box and so does this. Three figures in a row without needing a hair dryer. I might do dab of shock oil on ALF's hips because they're a little too squeaky.

My two Targets I've been to have too many ETs and no ALFs. Boo ET. Go home. I like ET. I'm old enough to have seen the first run in the theaters, but I've never needed an ET figure. I'm sure I've owned a non-posable figure, but I most remember the light up finger prosthetic .

[Dr Baghead]

I got ALF at Target… he’s too big.

However, he’s also the best figure NECA has ever made. His mouth/neck/torso/arms have get movement and make him incredibly expressive.

The only solution for the ALF scale problem is MORE ALF.

ALF as a one off, he’s too big, but a collection of ALF in different costumes, maybe other Melmacians from the cartoon (gotta at least make Rhonda, right?!) well now they’re their own thing like the Gremlins!

ALF’s height is all in his legs, that boy’s got gams for days! (Which us accurate, I’d rather have this tall ALF with a proper sized head than a weird tiny ALF) If he is stand alone, I’ll tuck him behind a box or something so I can crouch him down a bit, his torso feels 1/10 scale, it’s just I’d prefer the top of his head comes up to a Ninja Turtle’s chest not their shoulders.

[Night Wolf]

His feet are huge, maybe extract out 1/2 inch from there?

[Dr Baghead]

His feet are huge, maybe extract out 1/2 inch from there?

Would you tell Michelangelo to extract half an inch from David because he was making other men feel inadequate?!

Exactly! You wouldn’t dare defile a masterpiece and such is why shaving or chopping any part of ALf is not an option!