Madness and greatness are two sides of the same coin. Every time a new Figma is made, the gods toss the coin in the air and the world holds its breath to see how it will land.
Well, I got Zagreus in today. I had low expectations because 1) the last Figma I bought, TotK Link, is genuinely one of the best action figures I own, and 2)
Niko recently explained how Figma/Max Factory works.
I regret to inform you all that Zag's hugely disappointing. It's a strange figure because it's not total junk, but the flaws are so glaring that he'll always be a "what if" for me. I've been railing against Bandai for overengineering their figures for the last few years, and Figma is equally prone to head-scratching decisions.
I'll start with the good. He's gorgeous. He was pulled right out of the game. He holds your eye because of his colors and the subtle paintwork. I'll call out the shading on the chest, the ombré of his fiery feet, and the red, orange, and yellow in his laurel crown. The skulls on his shoulder are perfectly designed. They're all on ball joints that get out of the way and don't fall off at the slightest touch. Some of the articulation is fantastic. While the butterfly joint is totally useless, like, unbelievably so, the shoulder gets incredible range. It's mostly due to how big the gap between the shoulder and joint is, but it doesn't look as terribly gappy as you'd expect.
That bleeds right into the negative. The articulation on this figure is unacceptable for a $90 toy. His elbows and knees reach slightly more than 90 degrees. The neck joint confounds me. The head itself gets decent range because it's on a ball joint, but the ball joint at the base of the neck may as well not be there. If you attempt to move it, it makes contact with
something internally that prevents it from moving at all. The big losers are the torso and the left shoulder. I partially expected this due to how stiff he looked in promo images. All your poseability comes from the lower legs, right arm, and head. This figure should've been done with soft goods.
This is one of those imports that falls apart if you push the articulation too far. With the shoulder, that's fine. You still get good range. For the torso? Forget it. Move that thing at all and he crumbles. In the first game, Varatha (the spear), was my go-to weapon along with Aegis (the shield). I'm disappointed that they couldn't include all of the Infernal Arms for the purchase price, but worse yet is how goddamn heavy Varatha is. I wouldn't leave it in his hands long-term because it'll definitely sag and loosen the joint. His weapon-gripping alternate hands are attached to static ball pegs, locking them into a pose, which I think was done to counteract the weight of the weapons.
Zag's also incredibly top-heavy. If you can find his center of balance, you'll wind up with a nice pose, but don't expect to use the left arm or torso. I'd probably give the figure a 6/10, but I don't hate it. I love the character too much for it to be much lower than that. All this said, I'd absolutely buy a Melinoë. Her costume is somewhat more figure-friendly than Zag's, but the skirt would still cause major issues.
If Zag's costume were less ornate, I'd go the custom route. I guess it's doable now that I have Zag's head, the skulls on his shoulder, belt, and knee pads, but I don't know that I could stomach mutilating a figure I spent $97 on.
