SH Figuarts Super Mario and Diorama Play Sets A & B

I've mentioned before my love of Mario so I was super excited to pick up these the other day from a shop! In the UK! Seriously, this kind of stuff is not usually found in these parts! These are the three sets currently available made by S.H. Figuarts from Tamashii Nations and Bandai and I was lucky enough to pick them all up from Forbidden Planet.

Here's the really nice window box packaging it comes in, front and back

Mario looks incredible, seriously, like he's been lifted straight of Super Mario 3D World.

Mario has great articulation for a little guy. You can't really move his head but that's ok, his arms move round from the shoulders and have a great joint at the elbow and his wrists swivel. No waist rotation but his hips swivel, his knees bend really far and his ankles move his feet up and down nicely. You can get him in some classic Mario poses.

Along with Mario, you get a super mushroom

Again, this little 'shroom looks as though it's been lifted straight off of the screen. Sharp paint and sculpted little eyes and white spots.

You get a question block

Solid yellow with white sculpted on question marks, and the rivets are a light brown.

And finally you get a super shiny coin with a small stand

This coin is SO SHINY! It's very cool though, and the little clear stand is a great, much needed, addition.

The first play set we'll look at is the Diorama Play Set A, which comes with a grass green base

This has three separate peg holes but has two small plugs so you can cover a couple at once, a really neat touch

It comes with a couple of pieces needed to pose Mario with, the blue piece plugs into his back and the clear stand goes from bas to back

Three blocks, two brick blocks and a question block

These also come with a clear stand so you can get your display going

You also get a beautifully sculpted and painted goomba and another coin, this time with a taller stand

Diorama Play Set B is also full of cool extras so that you can get a great looking Super Mario display on your shelf.

The big things are the two warp pipes, one tall and one short. The tall pipe is deeper whereas the short pipe is much more shallow. The great thing here is, you can switch these out so you can move the deeper section out, putting the shallow section on the longer pipe body.

Spare hands that are easily switched out

You get a koopa shell and clear pegs that can be held in the spare hands

You get a second goomba!

And you get another coin, that has two stands - one tall and one short, bringing the coin count to three!

Putting all three sets together, you get some very cool displays

Seriously, I'm in love with these sets. They're just brilliant. If you can pick up all three, I'd highly recommend it. If however you can only afford Mario, he's well worth a buy. These guys are a little pricey, but I think it's brilliant that they were all packaged and sold separately. It keeps the cost down and means you don't need the accessory packs if you don't need them. I think I'll probably take more pictures of these sets and post them up here in the future, this guy is really good fun to play with!

I really hope SH Figuarts get to do more of these sets with other characters - Luigi, Bowser, a full koopa, Toad, a Boo with a flight stand, the options with this are almost limitless!!

Good luck hunting these down, but if all else fails, there's always online.

Go Figure!

Marvel Select Gambit

When I saw the Marvel Select Gambit, I knew I had to have him. I'm not Gambit's biggest fan by any stretch, but I've always enjoyed what I've read when he's appeared in comics, or when he's been in the cartoons. And this guy is an excellent looking, comic accurate figure.

This figure comes in the oversized Marvel Select packaging that showcases Gambit up front, stores his base in the back, and shows off his accessories.

His accessories include a small bundle of three charged playing cards, two different 'swoosh' effects of thrown playing cards, a different pair of hands, and his staff

These are all lovely little pieces which are sculpted and painted well.

I especially like the throwing cards. The semi transparent charged flames coming off them look very cool and he looks bad ass when holding them too!

But my favourite throwing cards are these ones - you can see that these have a specific section for his flat hand - these are my preferred posing cards with the figure for sure

Onto Gambit himself now, and his articulation is what we expect from the Marvel Select toys. His head moves side to side, and up and down a little. His arms move up and down at the shoulder joints and have elbow articulation, and his wrists swivel. He has a torso crunch (how else do you think he got those sweet abs?!), but no waist articulation, his knees bend (the joint is nicely hidden behind the knee pad), and his feet move up and down at the ankle.

The sculpt and paint is where Gambit really shines though.

His coat - which has several browns, nice shading, different textures and even a nice little silver paint app on his belt buckle - looks brilliantly windswept and makes the figure look super dynamic. Gambit's torso is magenta (that's right, not pink!... It's totally pink) that has some shading accentuating his muscles. There's some nice silver piping at his neck and over his hips, that is sculpted on with it's own little notched details matching his staff. The pink detailing runs down the side of his trousers to his lower legs which are a nice silvery blue paint for his boots. The stand out for me though, is that head sculpt, with the mask, the flowing hair, his stubble and his very cool red eyes!

The display base that Gambit comes with is a really nice corner of the Danger Room from the mansion. It's sculpted nicely enough and has some variation in paint and gives Gambit a nice solid flat base for posing in.

I absolutely recommend this guy if you're a collector of Gambit figures, Marvel figures or if you just want a cool looking superhero (that's why I bought him!) then he's well worth the money! I foolishly bought this guy online then found him in store 2 days later. It's always the way!

Go Figure!

K'Nex Super Mario Mystery Figure Blind Bag Series 4

I love the Mario series, it's possibly my favourite videogame series of all time what with the amazing Mario Kart entries and the like. Super Mario Bros 3 was my first gaming love on the NES. I still remember getting it for Christmas. Hot damn that was a good time!

I knew these K'Nex mini figures existed but I'd never seen them before, but when I was out today I spotted a peg of the bags in Forbidden Planet so I had to check them out. There were more K'Nex Mario toys, but it's these blind bags that really got my interest. All of the bags on the peg were the same figure, all feeling very round. If you use your eyes, you'll see that the roundest character on the front of the bag is Bo-bomb. So no prizes for guessing who I got.

Still don't know? Well, it comes with a little paper insert too

Yep, I got Bo-bomb! Which is great, as that's really the only character in this wave that I wanted.

As you can see, there's some very minor assembly required with this guy. There are three peg holes on his body - two for his feet and one for his key.

These all just pop in easily, leaving you with a super sweet looking Bo-bomb!

I love this little guy! Such a simple little toy but it looks like it's been lifted straight from Super Mario! Very neat paint and the sculpting is great, with sculpted on eyes and a neat little fuse. If I can find the series that has Shy Guy, Dry Bones and the Para Koopa Trooper I'll definitely be trying to get those!

Go Figure!