Product Description: Baan: The Dark Knight - The Joker with Crime Scene Evidence. With this you can experience the denizens of Gotham city in all their heroic or hideous glory with movie masters figures.These highly detailed figures give you up-close-and-personal look at the freakiest make-up of the Joker and his Gotham city thugs.
Happy Trails The Joker w/ crime scene evidence figure is quite a collectible for anyone who loves The Dark Knight, and collects movie memoribillia. This figure is a collectible that, from what I can tell, is a rarity to find in local retail stores, and will be a collector's item. I wouldn't say there is much educational value...considering it is The Joker, but it is a sweet item. I would not recomend opening the item out of the package because it will lose face value, the other two smaller versions of the Joker action figure would suffice for small children, this one is for the vault.
Must have for Collectors and Batman fans alike! I'm just going to make this short sweet and to the point. This is an excellent collector's item, really a must have. Completely, 100% satisfied.
Holy Dumb Luck, Batman! Monty Moonlight here, folks. Yep, I'm rewriting this review. Why? Because I finally hold a Movie Masters Joker figure in my hands, that's why. You may remember this review previously being titled, "Aargh!!! Forget It!" and rightly so. I still say these figures are ridiculously hard to find. I had given up on an active search. In a town loaded with Targets and Wal-Marts, and even one Toys R Us, nobody was restocking much of anything, despite the fact that we have plenty of avid toy collectors and people who buy toys for other reasons. In fact, we are on the border of Mexico, and believe me, our neighbors south of the border love to drive over and shop till they drop, making it very hard for the locals to find anything. I did it though, I finally did it. I drove to the Target just a few blocks away early this fine Sunday morning (fine nothing, it's outrageously hot around here) with the intention of picking up Freakazoid season one and maybe some nacho cheese sauce. Of course, I wasn't going to leave without checking the toy aisle, and low and behold, there on the rack was one Movie Masters figure, just one: The Joker. I snatched it up right away and bought it for something like 12.99, plus tax. And Freakazoid and a jar of nacho cheese sauce.
It's a good feeling, let me tell ya. As I had said the first time I wrote this review, there has been a lot of stuff out there about a recall, baloney about Heath Ledger's family being the cause of it, other stuff about it being because the figure's face was too scary and needed a repaint. All stuff to drive up the prices for the scalpers. I don't buy any of it. I really just believe that Mattel dropped the ball and didn't make/send out enough, and some retailers didn't order enough, and Mattel hasn't been vocal enough about the situation. They didn't anticipate the demand for some inane reason. People have talked about and posted pictures of a so-called Wave 2 Joker. The tell-tale signs are air holes in the side of the package and a less scary face paint and/or face sculpt, one with cleaner lipstick application, less scary eyes, and a brow that is more noticeably furrowed and shows some flesh tone. Well, all I know is, while the one I found had the air holes in the package, its face looks to me just like the Wave 1 Joker (I've seen pictures of the two styles side by side), aside from the cleaner lipstick, which I really prefer. Frankly, I think there are just a variety of looks out there, and paint job qualities, but that's just my opinion.
As for how I happened to find one, well, primarily, like I said, dumb luck. However, something else that might have played a factor is stashing. You know, people find the figures, are low on cash, and stash them somewhere they think no one will look so they can come back and buy it later. Why else would The Joker, the most coveted Movie Masters figure besides the chase figures, Wave 1 OR 2 (though I don't believe there really IS a true Wave 2 Joker), be the only one left? My assumption is that someone unearthed this one and the employees restocked it, and I was just there at the right place at the right time. How long it was stashed I can't imagine. Incidentally, I think your only chance is to be at a store very early.
Do not fret, however (unless you do believe in the fantastically perfect Wave 1 Joker and would not be happy with anything less; in that case, good luck on Ebay with about 50 bucks). I am under the impression that Mattel is trying to remedy their shortcomings. Apparently, Toys R Us is now carrying Batman/Joker Movie Masters 2-packs, if you can find them, but give it time. It seems they are starting to recognize the demand, and we might start finding Movie Masters merchandise a little easier in the future. In fact, there's already word that we should expect a Batpod for these figures soon and Twoface in 2009. I certainly hope that will be followed or released with Liam Neeson as Ra's Al Ghul and a Commissioner Gordon figure, and hopefully some Superman movie figures. In the meantime, I'm just thrilled to have the Dark Knight Batman, Scarecrow, and finally the Joker. Perhaps now I would pick up some chase figures, Batman Begins Batman, and a thug if I ever run onto them, but unless they do some different masks on the Thugs, they're kinda pointless. Having one Thug is like having one Olsen twin. It ain't right.
So, to end this up by making it a real review, I guess I should actually talk about this toy. Naturally, I'm kind of in a state of euphoria right now just from getting one, but it really is a great figure. Based on the movie version of the Joker from "The Dark Knight" as amazingly played by the late Heath Ledger, this one comes with a knife accessory and the only good evidence accessory, a movie replica Joker card and baggy to put it in. Now, the actual figure's face probably could have been better, but it's still very good. It also depends on the paint job you get and which paint job you're hoping for. I counted 15 points of articulation, though it's possible the waist twists as well, but I couldn't get mine to and didn't want to risk breaking it. The jacket and a chain that hangs from his waist are a soft plastic, and everything is pretty nicely detailed. He stands fine and seems to hold his knife well even after removing the packaging band, though I haven't tried to remove the knife and don't intend to anytime soon. If you land one of these figures, I'm sure you'll be happy with it, especially if you have a Batman and Scarecrow too, but don't waste a ton of money in gas searching around for one. If you're going to do that, might as well use Ebay. Just try to schedule any necessary shopping trips as early in the morning as possible.
Insert lame pun. "The Joke is on you" etc HAHA, honestly if you purchase this figure at this price, you should be slapped in the face multiple times. Enchanted Days $79.98..really, Toy Time $79.49..seriously..my favorite Kidsville Toys $89.95 plus shipping..ZING!! I really want these third party sellers to respond, no reall respond to me, I want to know your reasoning behind this. Besides the obvious ones I do not need to state. Whoa, Heath Ledger is dead so let me pay close to a hundred dollars for a piece of plastic that was manufactured in a third world country. What an awesome idea! Acutally, spend your money on this, because in the end it is plastic and meaningless. Enjoy! Collectors market, what a joke.
Dark Knight I love Batman and Dark Kight the movie. I just wanted to own a piece of the phanomenon. Great product in great condition.
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