DC Universe Classics Wave 1: The Demon!

Reaching to past figures from DCUC,

To review this figure finally.

Had him now for many months,

Always close to opening him but never took the chance.

So in my new den, I've taken him out of package,

To play around with, and bring you some photo-age.

The Demon, Etrigan, his name might be,

But Jason Blood is his human reality.

Say this rhyme he does to change,

From human form to the occult, strange:

"Gone, gone the face of Man,
Rise the Demon Etrigan!"

A weird minor comic book character he might be,

Rising to prominence in JLU Animated on TV.


A favorite of mine he's been since then,

Especially in an episode when,

He becomes a little baby,

And helps the Justice League defeat Mordred and his Mommy.

So how does he fair from paper to silver screen to plastic?

Click onwards to see the embed and more, I also threw in some comics!

Like: His bigger buck, broader from shoulder to shoulder,

Especially the upper torso, arms, and thighs irregular.

Like: His head sculpt with face all scowl-y, molded yellow,

His teeth and horns and eyes well-detailed--the washed shading--bravo!

His ears, nay fins, are are comic book accurate,

A face so wild and demon-like, it's hellishly immaculate.

Like: Etrigan's hands I do so love,

Soft supple plastic, holding crystal balls high above.

Tridents, magic pendants, are no problem at all,

In his demon hands, look very magical.


His fingernails are painted black as night,

Long and gnarly, to show his devilish plight.

Dislike: There's only one issue I have with Etrigan,

It's his thigh cuts that seem to have a problem.

Not movement-wise because the swivel joints are perfect,

But seam-wise because the cut there seem disjointed.

Like: The blue of his cloak, tattered and torn,

Has been the victim of some online scorn.

"It should be darker," some have said,

"Better to match the torso's dark red."

But I like the blue, it makes the figure pop,

It's also comic book accurate, without being too over the top.


RATINGS

Aesthetics: 9/10 - "Pretty" is not a word you call a demon,

Especially one of from the Rhyming class, like Etrigan.

But he does look awesome, I would say,

And I doubt anyone would say nay.

From head to hands to tattered cloak,

And the Demon's buck, built like oak.

Impressive, considering this is Wave 1,

There's no way a figure looking like this couldn't be fun!

Poseability: 8.5/10 - His large chest restricts his front-of-body arm movement,

But longer limbs and thicker legs allow for poses more than decent.

His tattered cape, short as it may be,

Still adds support to certain poses, like on a single knee.

His lovely hands can scratch, grab or cast (spells),

His neck joint near perfect, rotating up, down, and round well.

An eye scratch here, and high-kick there,

How can you not love his flexi-yellow derriere?

 






Fun: 9/10 - As you can see from this review,

Writing like the Demon speaks, can be a laugh and a few.

But that's nought to do with the figure, which has a brilliant sculpt,

You could look at him all day, but your eyes would pop out,

That would be fun until the point where your eyes,

Become blurry, start to sting, shrivel up and die.

Then you'd be blind and the last thing you'd see,

Is Etrigan laughing at you, because to demons, these sorts of things are funny.

Value: 10/10 - Hard to find he is in Singapore,

But in the Phillipines, he's abundant in most stores.

If you could find him here he'd cost $25 (US$19) at least,

But for $12 (US$9.25) in Manila, the Rangerlord found me this beast.

He doesn't come fancily decked with any accessories,

Except for Metamorpho's left arm and "element- hammer"--the CnC piece.

And for all the tooling, yellow skin wash and sculpted detail,

This guy is a winner, with "Value" that's way far from fail.

Overall: 9.2/10 - Etrigan is from the very first wave of this line,

And 15 waves later he's still a piece-of-ass fine.

Starting from a couple of years back, with this sort of quality,

It's easy to see why people got into DCUC.

Mattel haven't always maintained this level of detail,

But to be fair they have to make some money on retail.


Content to use a more standard-sized buck,

They gave some characters short shrift, like our good friend The Shark.

Hopefully, the toy makers at Matty can see,

What a great buck did for Etrigan, and may they use it more freely.