Runaways isn’t a Marvel series I ever really expected to get any Marvel Legends from. I kind of doubt we get too many more from this “team” either, all of them are kids and a lot of them essentially just have plain clothes costumes, which Marvel Legends doesn’t really do too often. I may be completely wrong though, there is a new TV series coming this fall. It kind of seems like a fluke that we got Nico Minoru aka Sister Grimm. She does sort of fit in with the Doctor Strange wave, since the figures are all “Magic themed” for the most part.
So, I like this figure, for it’s uniqueness. It’s definitely a different looking design for a Marvel Legends, you don’t get too many “goth girls” in this line. The look does a good job of capturing the idea of the character. I have to say though that the idea is about all you really could capture here. Like I mentioned above, most of the Runaways are just kids in street clothes, and they don’t really have regular outfits. So the look isn’t super specific to Nico Minoru, but it fits who she is.
The bigger gripe I have here is the staff, which doesn’t quite look right for her Staff of One. For starters, it’s not particularly Staff shaped, it’s about half the length it really should be. The head also isn’t really proper either, the ball should be part of the staff and outside of the circle. I believe at some point she got a new staff, but I’m not positive on that, but it’s possible that this design is based more on the design of a second Staff. Still, It feels like a pretty glaring error since the Staff is essentially the center of her abilities and is part of who her character is to such a degree. It would be like making Captain America’s Shield a star or something and painting it all red just because.
The staff also is way too heavy for the figure to hold well, especially with the included magic effect attached. The effect looks cool for sure, but her arm joints just aren’t strong enough and the weight just pulls the wrist downward most of the time. This is something that could have been alleviated with a longer staff too, since the base could be balanced against a lower surface to keep things upright.
Nico Minoru also includes a swapable purple magic arm, which is pretty cool. All around this figure seems to have a lot of original tooling as well, chest, the boots, the skirt all seem to be unique, though maybe it’s just very clever use of paint on existing molds. I believe it’s the same shorter girl body that is used for a lot of Spider Girls otherwise, but if it is, it doesn’t seem prone to the awkward posing that body seems to have normally. She looks fairly natural in a lot of poses.
All in all, I really like this figure. I just hope it means maybe getting a few more members of the Runaways team in the future.
