Toy OTD: McFarlane Toys "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" Tableau: You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch

McFarlane hasn't been doing a lot of animation toys lately (aside from the Hanna-Barbera and Simpsons lines - compare that to the scale of the Spawn, military, and sports figure collections), so it was nice to see How The Grinch Stole Christmas toys emerge this fall. They look great, having the trademark McFarlane wealth of detail. The sculpt is strong, and the paintwork is, too. A big plus is the number of different colors of plastic used to reduce the number of paint passes.

I'm not crazy about McFarlane's steadily increasing need to create mini-dioramas for their character figures. On the plus side, you can connect this room to the base of another toy in the line, and create an even bigger tableau. On the minus side, these things gobble up shelf space like there's no tomorrow, reduce the amount of work that can be done on the character itself, not to mention driving the overall price point up. Still, this one evokes Maurice Noble's layout work very well, and the whole set-up feels very appropriate to the television show - there's no silly signs, logos or banners telling us what TV special this scene is from.

Unfortunately, there's some scale and model problems - the toy sack is too small, the fireplace has no back to it (odd considering how thorough the toy generally is), and the Grinch's legs look short and stiffly posed compared to the rest of the figure. They're small but significant details.

Toysrus.com sells this item for $12.99 + shipping, which might turn out to be less than I paid at my local comics shop. Check out the rest of the line at spawn.com!

McFarlane's Simpsons Figures - Series 1

Here's pictures of the upcoming Simpsons figures from McFarlane Toys, courtesty of spawn.com. These are a big step up from the recent Hanna-Barbera figures - the staging is clear, the poses and attitudes are strong, and true to the characters. Three out of the five are iconic scenes from the show. The dissect-able Scratchy is a great touch!

My only complaint is that it's primarily the main characters over and over again. Anyone who's a veteran of the Playmates line may not want more Homers, Marges and Barts. Gentle Giant's Bust-Ups! have done a better job of serving up more obscure cast members, or picking really striking variations of the main characters. Still, there's a good amount of homework being done here, and toy-less fans of the series should love these when they hit stores in March.