[Moose]

ACTION FIGURE SPOTLIGHT: DC Direct Dr. Manhattan

Having been swayed by really cool trailers and general word of mouth, I decided to pick up the Watchmen trade that’s being plastered in display windows at just about every book store in America, and I instantly developed a fondness for this Dr. Manhattan character. To coincide with the movie release, DC released a bunch of Watchmen figures and all kinds of swag; the figures themselves are in the same scale as the other main properties they own (the Alex Ross series, pretty much all the other DC Direct figures released) so it made a nice addition to what I already had, even if we are talking about two separate universes under the same company.

To date, there have been two versions of this figure: the one I am reviewing, and the variant. The main difference is the opaqueness of the plastic- on this figure, it is just a solid blue, but on the variant, it is more of a translucent plastic which was aimed at making him more “irradiated” as his on-screen character suggests (might have something to do with being the atomic man and all). I really didn’t want to spend the extra ten bucks on the variant, as I figured this version fills the need adequately.

Included in the package are two sets of legs- one for the floating pose, and one for regular stance. To achieve the floating pose, a clear plastic base adapter is included. When finally fit, though, it tends to be a little shaky, given that its only attached to the base by one peg. Also, the basic fitting of the legs to the adapter is not entirely stable either- there are slots on the adapter that fit into the back of the feet on the floating legs, but they don’t necessarily lock in all the time. One little oddity I have yet to figure out is a certain piece that came bagged with the two pegs for the base- it is triangular in shape, and I have no idea what it is used for. The base itself is a square “city looking” gray metallic piece that raises the figure about an inch or so off the ground.

The posability of the figure is DC Direct Standard- pivoting arm shoulders, bends at the usual places, and Manhattan’s head is on a ball joint of sorts, which allows you to move the head side to side, up and down, and everything in between.

The likeness of the character is great- they nailed every little detail in musculature right down to the individual toe nails on this guy. Granted, there isn’t much to articulate as he’s basically just a “blue guy” but the sculpting was right on the mark, nonetheless. I think that is what makes the character and the toy great- it tends to really drive the movie image.


Grade Scale: 1 to 10
Posability: 6: standard for all DC direct figures
Articulation: 9: based on an actor’s real life portrayal of the character, you can see Billy Cruddup’s performance all over.
Playability: 6.5- depending on whether you do the floating pose or the standard pose, he makes a better display piece than play piece.
Price: I paid about $22 retail for this guy; hence the reason I am not pursuing the other figures at this time. Obviously, cashing in on the cashcow known as the Watchmen.
Overall Coolness Factor: 8-I only bought him for the character I liked so much from the movie and comic, so he was cool to me. I would guess any fan of Dr. Manhattan would be happy as well.