Cosplay Wednesday 4/24/13

I think that's how Joker would greet a doppelganger.

The art piece this is based on is after the jump along with some related pictures.

Iron Man (2008) Blu Ray

He...Is...ah you know the rest.

Rating:  4 out of 5 Billionaire, Playboy, Philanthropists

Plot Synopsis:  Tony Stark loses his heart but gains a conscience in this, the origin story, of Iron Man.

Toy Review: Green Lantern SDCC and NYCC con exclusives

Overview:  I was actually really excited about getting these as it looked like DC was finally getting it's shit together for decent figures in the 3-3/4 inch scale.  In the press release revealing them DC said that if they sold well and there was demand then they would produce more.  I'm all about that so I got these, unfortunately not directly from DC but the sellers of eBay were charging reasonable prices for them and demand is demand I guess.  If you buy from the gray market then the gray market will buy them directly from DC.  Money is still made and if it's a modest mark-up then it's really no different than buying them from a Toys R Us or a Target or a Big Bad Toy Store (the best online toy store, I think, EVER!).  You can see the BBTS flyer behind the figure, I didn't get these from there, I just happened to get a big BBTS order in on the same day.

  I was really happy about getting these and I was really excited to get them open and then I opened them.  Anytime I open an action figure I test all the obvious joints, it's something I've done since I was a kid and I thought action figures only came from my parents.  I get the figure, I test all the joints and then I play with it.  Well I tested the joints on these and immediately got a 50% failure rate.  Opened Kyle and Kilowog and Kyle broke, opened John and Atrocitus and Atrocitus broke.  I would be less frustrated if a whole set broke but as it is that's like another $75 to $100 to buy the two sets again and have doubles of two perfectly fine, not really custom compatible, figures.  I contacted DC and got nowhere so now it looks like I'll have to repair them myself.  I've looked online and have a few ideas about how to go about it.  If anyone has any suggestions (I'm not shipping them anywhere to get fixed) I'd love to hear them.  This is the closest I've gotten to completely regretting a purchase.  I typically don't buy things I'm on the fence about wanting so I'm usually really psyched about everything I buy but this time I wish I either been more careful testing the joints (even though I wasn't that aggressive) or just passed on buying them altogether.

The boxes, I like this whole model DC has going with their figures.  Only two packs and in a nice box.

Toy Review: Iron Man 2 Undercover Assault

Overview:  Originally this pack was announced at SDCC 2010.  It was supposed to come in at the very end of the Iron Man 2 toy lines life.  They showed images of it and promised it would come out as a Target exclusive (hence the "Only At Target" image).  Then it was quietly cancelled.  It was cancelled so quietly that no one seemed to know that it was cancelled.  I went to Target on a weekly basis looking for this and I went to a lot of different Targets in my area all in the search of this item.  Mostly because I wanted a decent Black Widow (which is something I'm still looking for).  But it persisted in not showing up anywhere and the forums were no help.

  Going by One Per Case a bunch showed up on eBay in May of 2012, which I totally missed out on.  The War Machines were prolific on eBay, you can buy 5 of them for like $20 but there was nothing else out there.  Then finally I read this announcement and found out that the packs actually made it to retail in the UK.  Although it tells you the ACTUAL retail price which makes paying the outrageous prices on eBay THAT much harder to swallow.  But I was able to get it for the cheapest price I saw it for from a nice Irish person who was very nice to do business with.  So now I actually have it and it's okay.  I'm really glad I got it but after everything is said and done I'm probably only going to use the Stark head and kit bash a Tony Stark out of a Professor X.

The front of the box.  I like the mechanical hands holding the helmets.  I took all these pictures in a hurry in my living room.  I have to do a better job at the pictures but I'm usually in a hurry and I don't have the best lighting which is why very few of them turn out well.

Toy Review: Indiana Jones SDCC "Lost Wave"

Overview:  All I really wanted was the Toht and German Mechanic figures.  I had a chance to get both of them, for about $70 and $50 a piece, respectively, months before but I passed hoping to find them at a more reasonable price.  Those months went by and nothing popped up on eBay that wasn't the old Kenner figures.  Then finally my eBay notifier hit on several full sets available.  The price for this, because it was damaged packaging, was the lowest of the several sets that popped up and it was only a little more than what I would have spent to get just Toht and German Mechanic.  Of course shortly after I bought it a bunch of individual figures showed but the prices weren't any different than before so I wouldn't have saved all that much money had I waited literally 12 hours.  Ultimately I'm pretty happy with it.  The figures themselves have the same amount of articulation as your average Star Wars figure, good upper body (ball jointed shoulders and elbows and some wrists plus a swivel at the waist) but a pretty immobile lower body (H joint at the pelvis and a basic knee joint).  The Marion paint deco is a little off but I'm happy with the two figures that I really wanted, the rest went into the fodder box.

The outside box, the comic con sticker in the lower left hand corner.

Toy Review: Super Helicarrier

Overview:  I became a member of the Hasbro club pretty much exclusively for this and the Masters of Evil team pack (I ended up also buying the team pack through eBay so I have two team packs sort of by accident).  I kind of waffled back and forth on if I really wanted to buy it but when they went up on the Hasbro website for an actually reasonable retail price, and the not the insane scalper eBay price, I just decided to go for it.

  From the moment I saw it I immediately thought it was the USS Flagg for the current generation of kids.  I never had the USS Flagg but I knew someone who did and they were the popular kid at school.  Everyone wanted that thing but very few parents could afford it.  My parents didn't let me play with/buy me military toys so I was lucky to have the 6 or 7 Joe's I managed to scam from my friends or get from my aunt (who either didn't know or didn't care about my parents no military rule).  So I would go to this friends house another friend would bring their Terrodrome and we would all huddle around our respective sides and play sometimes in the sandbox and sometimes in the basement.  So this is sort of my chasing the USS Flagg and I wanted it mostly for that reason.  It's not as robust as the USS Flagg so it's not anywhere near a substitute but, let's face it, they ain't going to make anything like the Flagg ever again so this is as close as it's going to get.  All in all a good purchase, it's a little flimsy at the joints where the sections connect but when it's on a solid surface it doesn't really matter.  It makes a great resting place for my Costco exclusive Quinjet.

The outside box.  I immediately saw it at the FedEx place holding it for me and I got a little giddy.

Update.

So I've been transferred to a different branch of Department H.  This means fewer hours and less responsibility and a more normal schedule.  What does all that mean?  Well hopefully it will lead to more normal updates.  My goal today is upload a couple of toy openings, I've been sitting on the Super Helicarrier, the Indiana Jones SDCC "Lost Wave" and the most recent which is the Iron Man 2 Undercover Assault 3 pack.  All of which I actually opened and played with so they have no more value.  Which if you know how much those sets cost you'll realize all the money I flushed.  But they were worth it.  Plus I'm going back through Marvel Phase 1 since I got the super special box set and that will be the next set of reviews.  But I have also been watching other stuff including Son of the Mask and the Birds of Prey TV series.  Hopefully I can make this new schedule work and that will result in more time and effort spent here.

CONsent

Whereas the last article was just a good article in general this great article is focused on cosplay.  I even commented on it, my comment was probably stupid.  But I thought it was really interesting.

http://www.16bitsirens.com/consent/

Another really good article.

So reading the previous article has sent me down this rabbit hole of really great, enlightening articles that I would like to share with my incredibly small corner of the internet.  The stuff I've been reading today has actually gone a long way in making me think about this subject differently.  I'm not to "cosplayers are an oppressed minority" yet but I'm not where I was.

  I hate, hate, hate going back through and editing my work.  Not just because I'm lazy but my writing is a part of me growing and evolving as a person and I like that evolution to be on the page.  I am not who I was a year ago and if you go back and read those (especially the earliest "persona" stuff, ugh) I want that to be evidenced.  But what I've read today makes me want to go back and edit the old stuff.  I don't know if I will, because again, evolution and to a certain extent preserving what was written (even if it was written under a totally different and now seemingly stupid mindset).  But here is something written by Megan Marie, actually the first cosplayer I ever put on this blog.  I should have asked permission from her then, I regret not asking first now and will remove the entry if she wants.  So please enjoy and I hope you take as much away from it as I have.

http://meagan-marie.tumblr.com/post/46396481491/what-would-you-do-if-you-werent-afraid

A Great Piece on Cosplay

This found it's way into my Facebook feed.:

http://dragonfyredesigns.wordpress.com/2013/04/06/please-dont-touch-the-talent/

I'm trying to be better about getting permission to repost from something that seems more private but I can't find a way to currently contact this person, it seems like he may have just started his blog and hasn't gotten that up and running yet.  But I really found it interesting and it's from the perspective of a cosplayer, a cosplayer who seems to really have his shit together.  So read it, it's really good and I agree with much of it.  I take a much more hard line stance than he does and I have offered no alternatives other than simply "not cosplaying" if you don't want attention.  But reading this has opened my mind about things and has caused me to rethink my stance and really that's the most important sign of a well written article.