Mainlining Christmas

If you're reading Mainlining Christmas, you likely knew who Krampus was even before he played a major role in a pair of surprisingly great horror movies last year. I'd love to see decent collectibles from one or both of those movies, but no one's stepped up to produce action figures to date. So I decided to try making my own. This is a Funko Magic: The Gathering Ajani Goldmane action figure. I picked this up about a year ago when it was on clearance (I want to say I spent six or seven bucks on him, but I really don't remember). I loved the sculpt on the body, but I thought the head was awful. Still, I bought him on a whim, in the off chance I'd think of something to do with him. I'm glad I did - there aren't a lot of action figures out there with triple-jointed legs. And this head belongs to a build-a-figure Absorbing Man from Hasbro's Marvel Legends line. It's actually one of two heads I have for this character - the other

One of Christmas's most hallowed traditions is the post-holiday culling of the clearance aisle, when countless toys' and decorations' prices are slashed to absurdly low levels, and bottom-feeders like us swoop in to gather samples of the year's yuletide nature. This is certainly not the first time Rudolph figures from Forever Fun have wound up on our list. Way back in 2011, I reviewed their massive display, Santa's Musical Sleigh . And, prior to the creation of Mainlining Christmas, I picked up and reviewed Reindeer Games Rudolph (which is probably the best Rudolph action figure I've come across) at The Clearance Bin. I'm still a little unclear what "Forever Fun" is. They have very little online presence - it looks like they're a subsidiary of something called "Round 2 LLC," but I'm not seeing a lot of info about them, either. I guess they're a model kit company in Indiana which tosses out Christmas toys every December

This is the second die-cast vehicle I've looked at for Mainlining Christmas, the first being the Batman: Noel Batmobile . These are part of an impressively large line of monthly Batman vehicles from Eaglemoss Collectibles. The line represents stories from all forms of media: comics, the campy 1966 series, various animated incarnations of Batman, and (obviously) video games. While Batman might not be the first character you think of when you hear Christmas music, he's had his share of holiday misadventures, including the 2013 video game, Batman: Arkham Origins . I was a big fan of the game, so I was excited when Eaglemoss produced a toy version of the Batwing. Let's start with the magazine. In lieu of actual packaging, each of these comes with a magazine. Actually, I'm a little unclear whether the vehicle or the magazine is technically the accessory, but I doubt anyone shells out $20 for the ten page pamphlet. As always, this include fold-out schematics and s

Schleich is probably best known as the main company that makes Smurf figurines, but they've also got a handful of other licenses, including Peanuts. I'm extremely torn on what to think of the company: on one hand, they produce high quality figures, but their prices feel somewhat extravagant in today's market. This is as good an example as any. This set of three figures (or two figures and a doghouse accessory, depending on how you want to look at it) started out at $20. Given that these are about two inches tall, $6.50+ feels a little excessive for a figure that small. Hell, I picked up similar toys in minimalist packaging a few years ago for just $3 each . Of course, those weren't made by Schleich. The main thing you're paying for here is the brand name and quality it implies. And, for what it's worth, these are pretty high-quality figures. The packaging assures us they're appropriate for kids over 3, which implies a level of faith in their cons

Today, I'm looking at a set of action figures that is 50% Christmas, which is a much cleaner, easily identified break than usual. Specifically, I'm looking at a 2-pack of five-inch figures, The Impossible Set, where the Doctor's appearance is based on the Christmas episode, The Snowmen , while Clara is based on her surprise appearance in an earlier, non-Christmas episode, The Asylum of the Daleks. It's kind of an odd pairing, honestly. Clara dies in both episodes due to temporal shenanigans that wouldn't be explained until later (and even then, barely). In The Snowmen, The Doctor pieces all this together and goes off in search of another incarnation of Clara. From a conceptual standpoint, it would have been preferable to get a Doctor/Victorian Clara, as opposed to the version from the distant future who'd been turned into a Dalek (I'm not even going to try and explain all this). Clara had a distinct look in The Snowmen, and I expect most collect