Minifigures - The Lego Batman Movie, Villains Part 2

Tidying up the bulk of the 'villain' figures in the blind bag series, so largely another collection of background no-marks that were highly unlikely to get a Minifigure official or otherwise had not some brilliant maniac decided to make absolutely certain this was the most fun Batman movie ever (no, the Adam West stuff is shit).

THE JOKER

Thanks to several distinct looks - comic book, drug suicide guy, guy out of 30 Seconds to Mars - there's already a plethora of official and unofficial Joker figures out there and the character gets a further more exaggerated redesign for The Lego Batman Movie, with more clownish make-up and a huge messy swept-back mop of hair plus Zach Galifianakis as voice actor, a fantastic move in that it's managed to upset fans of Heath Ledger, Jared Leto and Mark Hamill all at the same time (which is a good thing) and this despite the thing being a comedy. There are versions aplenty in the boxed sets, most featuring longer coat tails. The blind-bagged version comes in an Arkham Asylum uniform and is obviously present so the film's major villain can be presented in the series without robbing a big money set of a selling point. However, the minor genius is that apart from the head and hands there's absolutely no unique marks on the overalls, which means in ten seconds flat you can whip up an Arkham inmate version of basically anyone.

KING TUT

Unlike most of the characters featured King Tut actually originated from the sixties TV show, being belatedly brought into the comic by some hack or another who liked the show's repetition, heavy-handedness and laziness. Presumably. As with Orca or Catman the figure being a recolour probably helped get King Tut into the film and onto the shelves as he's effectively a repaint of the early blind bag Pharoah figure. However, there's no corners cut on the extensive paint masks including lots of luxurious gold trim and to be honest if you wanted to model an Egyptian scene with realistic skin tones you could do worse than recruit this guy as an actual Pharoah. Lego thrown in a snake and a sceptre too.

MIME

That Mime was created in 1987 explains a lot about her look; while there's whiteface to justify the Mime thing with her dark purple mohawk, fishnet top and black/dark pink outfit she looks more like a villain from Jem and the Holograms than super-serious Batman comics. If anything this makes her even better; the new wave look is a rare one on official Minifigures and it adds some fun visual variety. Once again heavy painted details really help bring the look off while she has two energy bolts for whatever her powers actually were. One of the coolest things about the range is the spread of eras, with daft Batman villains from most decades getting roped in rather than a focus on just, say, the sixties stuff.

THE RED HOOD

The Red Hood has a convoluted past - the criminal originally became the Joker maybe but later was a largely unseen separate villain whose costume was used by the guy who became the Joker while years later the same title was taken on by Jason Todd, the second Robin, on his return from death. This is basically why DC reset their universe every few years. The figure is present in its' original Golden Age form with the gigantic opaque dome over the head, cloak and evening dress, right down to a printed bowtie on the shoulder armour. But he can't be the Joker because the Joker's in the film so not for the first time Lego have a bit of fun - popping the dome off reveals the head of the Jason Todd version of the Red Hood. Nice. And with the dome in place it's a fitting tribute to a villain who was one way or another crucial to the relationship between Batman and the Joker but still looked absolutely ridiculous.

ZODIAC MASTER

A sixties creation following the standard template of the era - find something vaguely topical, make a supervillain who uses it for crime - Zodiac Master was naturally all about astrology, initially using it to apparently predict disasters he was actually responsible for, selling his apparent premonition as a service to various other criminals. So the Minifigure gets his cool (well) zodiac-symbol suit covered with paint apps, plus a crab for Cancer and a fish for Pisces. It's about as good as Zodiac Master is going to get; let's just be thankful DC contained their astrology tie-ins to this one guy unlike Marvel doing all 12.

Minifigures - The Lego Batman Movie, Villains Part 1

It's hard to miss the upcoming Lego Batman Movie, span off the character's superb showing in The Lego Movie. And it looks like a cracker even if I'm getting increasingly sure I've seen most of it now from the myriad trailers. Not only does it look like a cool film but its' off-beat nature means the stranger end of Batman's Rogues Gallery are getting Minifigures, characters that would never have done so any other way. They're spread across sets but some have also been released in the long-running and much acclaimed series of blind bags, a biggest-yet set of 20 coming out. If the ones for the Lego Movie are anything to go by the characters featured will be a mix of variants of main characters (in this case some oddball gag costumes for Batman, the Joker etc.) and guys who will likely to either a one-off punchline or even background, like the 2014 series' Velma Staplebot or Panda Guy. But who cares, we still get awesome Minifigs out of it.

THE CALCULATOR

Typical of a dippy seventies Batman villain, the Calculator consisted of taking something - the mid-seventies boom in pocket calculators - and running with it as far as possible. Someone spoilt the fun a bit by turning him into a proper character for Birds of Prey but there's none of that here as Noah Kuttler is rolled back to his debut appearance where the numerically-obsessed villain dressed in an outfit adorned with visual nods to - yes - a pocket calculator. The Minifigure's more bulky, no doubt due to the desire to reuse the extant cowled armour one-piece; there are only a handful of newly cast pieces across the blind-bags, most of the new toolings being channelled towards the boxed sets. However, it does mean they can go to town on the paint apps and in addition to a neat pattern up the side of his fetching purple/white jumpsuit the Calculator has his numberpad chestplate present (it's too small for actual numbers but '+', '-' and '=' are present so you know what it is) and a visor reading '07734' - presumably 55378008, the only other thing anyone put into a pocket calculator, wouldn't fit. The overall result is smashing, one of the best of the series - and just about serious enough to fit in with other non-movie Batman villains in a display. 

CATMAN

My middling knowledge of Batman was exposed when I nearly discarded Catman as just another nutty Batman costume variant but no, he's actually a separate guy, albeit one who started out as a bit of a joke - firstly by trying to frame Catwoman for a spate of burglaries (because they both dress like cats, right?) and then having much fun made of him for being such a dim idea before being another guy to be Gail Simoned into respectability (she also announced the character was bisexual via Tumblr, just in case you'd missed the sort of desperate posturing for attention the industry's been reduced to in the past decade). Anyway. The character's thing has always been his costume being close to Batman's and that's not wavered in the face of boring identity politics, so naturally he's a recolour of Batman in Minifig form. It's well-done with some good paint applications, not to mention a brown version of the new utility belt piece. The only parts variation is the addition of a pair of Wolverine-style claws; while it's better than nothing not for the first time I'm wishing Lego had a smaller version made.

ERASER

A sixties creation, Lenny Fiasco crossed Batman's path due to placing adverts everywhere extolling his ability to remove all evidence from crime scenes for fellow criminals. Naturally he decided to so so dressed as a giant pencil with the eraser end as a helmet. I'd make fun of the name Lenny Fiasco but it's not bad for sixties DC. Anyway, he's yet to become all hip-and-happening for the 21st century, his main appearances since seemingly further gag ones in one of those manchild-friendly Bruce Timm cartoons with fellow loser villains. The Minifig is spot-on for the sixties version with its' ostentatious yellow pin-striped suit and the head is a new piece that does the job exactly - with a nice side-helping of absurdity as there's theoretically a person in there but unlike the comic they can't cheat with someone having a narrow head and the result is his head is about half the width of everyone else in the universe's as a result. It works, and the addition of a notepad for upcoming jobs rounds him out nicely.

MARCH HARRIET

One of the more recent additions, the comic version of the March Harriet provided T&A for an Alice in Wonderland gang as one of DC's intermittent attempts to combat the grimdark. Thankfully the Lego designers get more action than the DC artists so Harriet looks less like she's wandered in from Hustler's This Ain't Alice in Wonderland XXX; the emphasis here is more on cute and unhinged than slutty with a reserved take on the costume and a smart reuse of the extant Bunny Guy headpiece. And so she doesn't look too harmless she had a Tommy Gun, making for a solid and cringe-free figure.

ORCA

Another relatively recent addition thanks to Harry Llama, Grace Balin is unique among recent female superheroes through not actually being even remotely sexy in her super form; rather than some sort of tarty mermaid she's basically an Orca on legs, though occasionally some of the more sexually frustrated artists give her a pair of comically pendulous breasts. Just a massive pair of tits on a walking Orca. She's considered one of the worst Big Two characters to have appeared this century and with good reason. About the only reason she's getting a workout here even in a film full of weird bad guys is that the Minifig Shark Guy (a.k.a. Left Shark), thankfully with the whole boob thing played down. A neat piece of work is the head recoloured to be a gaping mouth inside the shark head. It's about as good a piece of merchandise as a crap character is likely to get but I'd really rather have seen the Condiment King; I'm sure any kids buying the figure, Googling for more info and being greeted by this would agree too.

Toy Review - Machine Robo Gashapon

In a curious one-off revival 'classic' Machine Robo gashapon figures were released in 2001 by Bandai. For those who don't know, gashapon are basically vending machine toys; the ones made in Japan are particularly collectible and are of relatively high quality and complexity compared to their Western equivalent. It's often said they're more expensive but compared to the ones seen in UK Toys R Us stores (usually selling Disney figurines and the like rather than generic licence-free stuff) the price doesn't seem too bad - these retailed at ¥200, which is about £1.50. Of course, it could get more expensive as in shops you'd be getting a random one each time.