Wednesday 12 March 2014

Toybox REVIEW: Doctor Who 3.75" Scale Zygon

Doctor Who 3.75" Zygon Figure

As I've very much come to terms with the fact that 3.75" is the scale most Doctor Who figures produced by Character Options are going to be from here on out, I've also come to terms with the fact that I'll probably be buying a lot less as well. Daleks are always going to be a priority no matter the size, but until the sculpt quality improves it looks like I'll be sticking to a few choice figures per wave. And the choice figure of wave 2 is of course the Zygon, the classic Who monster that made its' first (and only) appearance in the 4th Doctor story Terror of the Zygons before making a return in the 50th anniversary special The Day of the Doctor last year.

Living in a box...

"Didn't we see this pic in the last review?"Check out my fancy coloured stand!

The backing card of the packaging is completely identical to the one seen in my previous Assault/Imperial Guard Dalek review, however with this Zygon hailing from one of the more current episodes it is a standard inclusion and thus the front card features the modern Doctor Who logo. Unlike the Heritage Line figures it does not include the story in which the character appeared in, which is a real shame if you ask me. A little inclusion like that would have looked great for the "never remove from packaging" collectors among us.

"Please don't stare at my cold sore!"

BlehhhWhat a beautiful barnacled body

On first glance Zygons have gone through a very minimal amount of changes between the classic and modern series, however when you compare the two versions side by side you can see there are actually obvious alterations. The new version has a far more pronounced ribcage, as well as far less sucker-y bits around the shoulders and crotch. The biggest difference of all though is the face, with the Zygons' terrifying flattened look replaced with a more generic snarl with fangs (because doing it to the Ice Warriors wasn't enough). The sculpt gets the sunken eyes right, however the mouth is moulded into some weird grin which makes the overall thing look a little odd to say the least. It certainly isn't as bad as the human figures this line is producing for sure, but this isn't perfect by any means.

Obviously due to the way the costume is on the show there isn't any head articulation to speak of, but everywhere else there is a pretty good range of movement. On top of the expected hinged elbows and knees, the shoulders and hips are ball-jointed to give a nice range of outward motion. The hands are even on swivel joints to allow a movement there as well. However paint quality control might also be a widespread issue to look out for if you pick up the figure in hand - as you can see mine has a rather fetching splash of black paint on his top lip which makes him look like he's got a rather nasty coldsore.

I'm going to get yoooou...

RarrrLook at all my range of motion!

Once again the non-Dalek figures in this wave come packaged with a Doctor Who logo stand, just like the Character Building figures have been doing since they began! However this time Character Options have decided to mix things up a little, as the stands are in fact silver rather than the usual TARDIS blue. I'm not quite sure what prompted the change (the silver logos the BBC have been using for the 50th anniversary perhaps), but its certainly an interesting one. Will each wave be having different stand colours from here on out? Only time will tell.

Standing on his pretty standI wonder how a cyber Zygon would look...

Once again it seems that really only the Daleks are going to come out unscathed when it comes to this new scale, as I find myself rather underwhelmed with the Zygon. I was never a fan of the redesigned face for the modern series, and sculpted here only reinforces that opinion even more. Its got a semi-decent range of articulation even though its lacking a neck, but there's still feels something that's missing from the figure. Maybe its the fact that only a few years ago you could buy a classic 5" Zygon for exactly the same price, and despite not being all that different was actually a much better figure.

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