A vast majority of the photographs that I took at this year’s Toy Fair happened within the DC Direct showrooms, because I’m a complete DC Direct action figure junkie - even if a vocal part of the collecting community usually expresses a fair amount of dissatisfaction with DC Direct’s limited articulation and inconsistent scale between different series of similar figures. None of that stuff really bothers me, because while limited in poseability, the figures are almost unfailingly iconic, and a difference of a centimeter or two in size doesn’t matter. You know, when you realize that you could have really, really bad eczema or could be sent to a parallel universe where there was nothing to eat but marshmallow peeps or something. Your priorities change.

But the DCD gallery is here. (You can check out the main gallery page HERE for the rest of the images from throughout the Fair.)

No one, however, complained about what could be called ‘the big reveal’ of DCD’s showrooms - a set of five Marvel Family figures, including the evil Dr. Sivana (with tiny Mr. Mind), a classic looking Captain Marvel aka Shazam! (the fifth Captain Marvel figure, I think, but never enough), little Billy Batson & Hoppy, Captain Marvel Jr. and the very first appearance of Mary Marvel. Not only does this fully emphasize the iconic nature of this company’s figures, but it makes for a great display unto itself. They’ll be due out late this year.

While some other things were near-surprises, Wizard Entertainment gets the rare privilege of spewing Toy Fair spoilers a few days ahead of time, all over the internet, every year. Since they ARE the world’s leading comic and toy magazine consortium, there’s a certain fairness to it, but generally I prefer my stupefaction to come firsthand and not through web-compressed JPEGs. On the other hand, I’d rather be told some things ahead of time instead of finding a mysterious rash LATER, but I’m old fashioned that way. So, one thing we learned about ahead of time was the presence of a Kubert based Superman line of figures, which includes another Bizarro (again, can never have enough), the titular Superman and the first appearances of Zod and Ursa. These are also scheduled for a late 2007 release. Bless Bizarro, a man who goes around screaming exactly what he’s not thinking, all of the time. That makes for some awesome, right there.

I spoke briefly with one of DC Direct’s managers regarding their ‘Reactivated!’ line of figures, which has been re-releasing the company’s earlier, more difficult to find figures - sometimes with slight improvements or additions. Since the original Kingdom Come line of figures was a notorious disaster, including heads that were too big to fit onto neck-holes and peeling stickers instead of paint applications, I was assured that the future Kingdom Come Green Lantern will include painted on details. Which will make the one I have now, whose stickers have all fallen off inside of the sealed package, look like a waste of money. And no, there won’t be a trade-in program. Those were early days of DC Direct, and their improvements have been enormous since then. It isn’t too many companies that are willing to revisit such old projects (or pull new releases, as they did for the ‘Crisis on Infinite Earths’ line) in the interest of improving upon the quality for collectors.

Also on display, though not news, were the first few waves of the exciting DC Minimates, finally re-managed from within the sweaty grasp of Art Asylum. Until now, licensing had prohibited individual Minimate figures, instead creating a compromise where they were packed in with LEGO-like building sets called ‘C3’ (which often were missing pieces, had high prices and poor character selection), but these initial re-offerings explore almost all facets of the DC Universe instead of concentrating on movie properties or core characters. We’ll get the entire Justice League, an array of rogues, Deadman, Spectre, Hawkman, Red Tornado, members of the Justice Society… and even Ocean Master, all smartly packed out in two-packs featuring related characters or arch-nemeses. Gone are the early days of Minimates where we had to suffer through blind-packed figures, exclusive figures wedged into huge sets of figures that we already had, and eighteen thousand Wolverines. Art Asylum’s finally got some Minimate smarts in ‘em, making the line collectible again, instead of just aggravating.

Also for the first time on display was DC’s deluxe 13” Batgirl figure in classic duds (with an exclusive retailer-incentive alternate costume version, also). That, in addition to a classically attired Batman, make some great additions to a line that already includes Superman, Aquaman, Flash, Green Lantern, Shazam!, Martian Manhunter, Lex Luthor and Two-Face. They’re out of scale with just about every other figure in existence, since they’re an inch taller that 1/6th scale, but they stand alone. DCD does extensive fabric research and comparison to get these costumes as realistic as possible, going as far as purchasing a huge quantity of fabric from a NYC retailer and shipping it to their overseas manufacturer to make it available for production. This attention to detail is akin to what Sideshow Toys introduced me to at my first Toy Fair, so it’s wonderful to see it spread throughout the industry. Now, just give me a Wonder Woman and I’ll name my first child after you guys. I can hear it now…. ‘Dinnertime, Time-Warner AOL CNN HBO New Line Cinema Dr. Frankenstein David! You can play later!’

They’ll also be introducing the Ame-Comi line of figure-statues, which feature DC heroines as anime characters, appropriately disproportional and revealingly-clad. The initial line will include Catwoman, Power Girl, Supergirl and Batgirl (all with huge eyes and brimming with discomforting buxomness), but will continue on into Poison Ivy, Hawkgirl and Wonder Woman. I can’t help but be continually unsettled by anime-type statues that feature women with exceptionally young female bodies and faces displayed as such, but that’s me just getting old and uptight, I bet. DCD is no stranger to working with Japanese aesthetics though, since they’ve been importing Kaiyodo and Kotobukiya’s DC-based statues and figures for a while now. This year’s new statuary offering will be a Koto Catwoman, retailing at around 70 dollars, if trends hold.

Beyond their usual superhero fare, DC announced that they’ll be branching out into non-comic properties under the banner of DC Unlimited, and their first figures will include a wave of four characters from the new cartoon Afro Samurai, and four figures from World of Warcraft. While vastly different from their typical offerings, the company explosively showed off the action and artistry that they’re capable of, displaying figures akin to those of McFarlane or SOTA Toys. This comes right on the heels of Sideshow Toys announcing their intention to make their own World of Warcraft items, marking what is certainly a strong pent-up desire for the game’s plethora of players to make their online world into a physical one.

Stay tuned for the rest of Toy Fair, conveniently crammed into two short bloggings! And after that, New York Comic Con!

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Article Tags: convention, DC, DC Direct, Javitz, NYC, Toy Fair, ToyFair, Wizard Entertainment

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