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Batman has turned into a huge toy franchise; figures, play-sets, games, the works. Unfortunately, the figures have had one problem; gimmics. A friend of mine and I had a running joke that the next Batman assortment was going to include a Barbecue Grill Batman with special condiment utility belt. Oddly enough, for most Batman fans, it was never the gadgets that got them into the character. It was the basics; the dark costume, the oath at a grave-side, finding a symbol to terrorize evil-doers, some demon to haunt them in the night. Here are a handful of figures that symbolize the Dark Knight.
1. Dark Knight Detective Batman, Batman-Legends of the Dark Knight. The Legends of the Dark Knight line took it's cue from McFarland Toys; lots of detail in the culpt, up the size to something larger then your pinky. Although the figures for the villains were stunning, the line still concentrated on the gimmicky Batman figures, until this piece. This is Batman at his best (see the review capsule in the Archieves); the wonderful scowl, the Bernie-Wrightson-esque long ears, and the huge, billowing cape. Ok, the figure needs more articulation and a few more perks(see the Wish List). Still, it captures the Caped Crusader perfectly.
2. Combat Belt Batman, Batman-The Animated Series. The one problem with Batman is the utility belt. As cool as it is, the utility belt is almost impossible to recreate on the scale of an action figure. However, Hasbro came close with this piece from the very first series of Batman figures from the Animated Series. The sculpt on the figure itself is a dead-on reproduction of the Dark Knight as interpreted by Paul Dini and crew, and the utility belt it comes with is equipted with a number of neat little gadgets.
3. Dark Knight Detective Batman, JLA. Ok, ok, technically, this is a repaint. The figure is originally from the Batman and Robin line, which coinsided with the movie.(No comments on the movie. Ugh) I like the figure because we are finally getting away from the blue-and-gray-weird-purple look from the '70s and going into a much cooler looking all-black look.
4. 100th Edition of Batman. Once again, the nice thing about this piece is that it's simply Batman; no gimmics, no folding helicopter rotors, just the Dark Knight with a large batarang. Unfortunately, this is not in the all-black color scheme I like. Still, Hasbro does a good job with a very dark blue and violet. Also, the piece comes with a very large, gothic stand.