pider-Man started his life as an experiment by Marvel Comics in 1962, appearing as a one-off in Amazing Fantasy #15. The sales of that book were so impressive that Stan Lee and Steve Ditko gave him his own comic book, Amazing Spider-Man. The rest, his many comic books, his many TV series and now two very successful motion pictures, is history—with a bright future.
An important part of this history has, at least for the last 15 years or so, been in action figures. Many action figures of Spider-Man have been available, each with its own successes and failures. Some were barely movable, which didn't do the nimble, flexible Spider-Man much justice. Others gave him a greater range of movement and even jointed the fingers of his hand so he could make the famous two-finger web-slinging fist, but even then he was limited in his poses. A couple of years ago, Toy Biz came out with a 6-inch figure with more than 30 points of articulation, including double-jointed knees and elbows, which was by far the most posable Spider-Man ever.
Until now.
Toy Biz has trumped itself with the introduction of an 18-inch Spider-Man figure that has more than 60 points of articulation and is quite literally as posable as Spider-Man should be.
Packed in a large window box, Spider-Man comes with a spring-loaded web-slinger that can be attached to his wrists and three different web missiles.
Amazing Spider-Man, The Ultimate 18-Inch Super Poseable Action Figure is molded from solid plastic, depicting the costume in the two recent feature films, which feature a bricklike miniature embossed pattern on the blue portions of his costume and raised silvery webbing on the red areas.
The box is littered with small pictures of Spider-Man in an amazing array of poses—and all of them are possible with this figure. The challenge is right there on the box. "Recreate your favorite Spider-Man poses!" And with the incredible range of movement this heavy figure (weighing in at at least a few pounds) has more joints than I've ever seen on an action figure.
A toy that will curl your toes
There are too many to list individually here, but the back of the box shows each and every one of the 60 joints. To give an idea, his torso alone has three hinges, one of which is a ball joint at the waist and another a huge ball joint at his sternum. His shoulder blades are two sockets that hinge the arms forward and backward—a feature not available on most action figures. The elbows and knees are double-jointed for extreme poses. Perhaps most impressive is the fact that the thumb has three joints, one at the base so he can flatten his hand or hold objects, and each individual finger has the correct number of joints!
At mid-forearm there is a pivot allowing the hands to rotate in any direction. The wrists bend to allow for climbing or web-slinging.
His ball-jointed head and neck allow him to look in any direction humanly possible (and some inhumanly impossible).
The hips are ball joints, with thighs attached to the joints. These ball joints allow the legs to splay out in any pose. At mid-calf, the legs pivot so that the feet can angle inward or outward. The ankles allow the feet to angle not only up and down but left and right, making it possible for him to have full foot contact with any angled surface. His toes have two separate joints to allow for bending up or down.
With an action figure this large, weight becomes a problem, with the fear that joints may not be able to hold the weight of the figure itself. For example, if the shoulder joint were not strong enough, the weight of the arm would move the joint and the arm would drop out of pose.
This figure's larger joints, like the hips, knees, ankles and elbows, solve this problem by using ratchet joints, which click into position rather than sliding smoothly. This limits movement a little, but is helpful for holding up the weight of this hefty figure. On the review figure, one wrist was fairly weak and the hand would easily drop out of pose. The fingers are truly amazing, each bending well and holding pose.
The one joint that limits movement more than expected is the hip. Allowing for many poses, it restricts the leg from hyperextending toward the chest. But this is a minor drawback for such an amazing figure.
I also found that the large ball joint in the chest had fused due to paint or glue. I carefully but forcefully bent the chest back and forth until it gave way and revealed a large ball joint that allowed for the twisting of his chest into some rather dramatic poses. So don't be afraid to use some force if a joint sticks. Hopefully it will give and not break.
The bulbous spring-loaded web-slinger snaps to the wrist and does little but cause Spider-Man to look like he has a large tumor on his arm. This was a completely unnecessary addition.
The question with this Spider-Man is—can he pull his own weight? And the answer is yes.
