I have to admit, I sometimes feel like a bit of a masochist because I’m still sticking with Medicom’s Mafex line for my DC collection. My experience so far has been pretty hit and miss, the hits are good, but the misses tend to be pretty awful. I feel like if I just stick with it, they will figure things out and start producing really solid figures. Mafex Batman vs Superman Superman here is definitely par for this course.
I want to start with the good things, and why I stick with the line. I really like the sculpts. The proportions are good, the stance is good, the heads tend to look really good, which is what matters. It’s definitely better than most domestic releases. I also really really like the use of cloth goods for things like capes. Cloth works sooooo much better than plastic or rubber, especially when done well.
I also, for the most part, like the pricing. Recent releases are starting to creep up a bit admittedly, but the price of the line tends to be on the lower end for import figures.
The bad bits though really stick out and really get in the way. The biggest and only real bad bit is the looseness and joint tolerances. Superman for example, his head tends to fall off at the base of the neck. It feels like a problem that could have been solved by even a few millimeters more length on the neck ball post so it stuck down into the socket just a bit deeper. It’s weird too because you can attach the head, then pick the whole figure up by the head, which suggests it’s solid, but then after a bit of wiggling or posing, it just falls right out.
His legs are also a little loose. Its not horrible and the figure isn’t super heavy so it doesn’t cause major issue but it can cause some frustration with getting him to hold a pose.
On Superman, I also wish his cape had wires along the vertical axis as well as the bottom. I’ve seen custom fixes for this and may look into adding some wire myself. It’s not a huge issue, but it would make the cape a lot more dynamic, though it’s already pretty dynamic and flows nicely around the figure.
For accessories, Mafex Superman comes with 3 (total) sets of hands and 2 heads, one normal, one with an angry head and colored eyes, as if he is powering up to use his heat vision. He also comes with a standard Mafex stand. It’s not an amazing parts count, but there isn’t a lot that Superman really uses as far as gear like say, Batman.
All in all it’s not an awful figure, I just wish Mafex could figure out it’s lose joint issues. This isn’t the first figure I’ve had from them with similar issues.
