#53: LEGO Minifigures The Simpsons series 2 - Bartman

The second series of Simpsons minifigures showed up locally a couple months later than they did everywhere else, and a couple months after that I'm finally getting around to posting about them. I already have the first series Bart, but his superhero persona of Bartman was irresistible. The mask doesn't appear to be sculpted on, so it's just paint. Also, he has a cape and a slingshot. Finding him by touch is pretty easy. He's got the short legs that only a few figures in the series have, and his head is fairly distinctive, although feeling it through the packaging does muddy things up. I mostly felt for the slingshot as a way to identify him.

#52: Pop! Movies Trick 'r Treat - Sam

If you're a horror movie fan and/or a Halloween fan, but you haven't seen Trick 'r Treat, you are doing yourself a great disservice. Go out and watch it, right now. It's an anthology movie that's centered around one Halloween night in a small town, and it's basically the Halloween-iest movie you could imagine. Sam (short for Samhain, of course) is the living embodiment of Halloween, and is the face of the movie. NECA made a figure of him, which I missed out on and is now stupid expensive. Funko has made a ReAction Sam and this Pop version. My preference is definitely for stylized chibi cute over faux retro, so I got this version. Sam is child sized, and this Pop is slightly shorter than the standard. His head is normally round, but the transition to Pop form has given it a more squared shape. But he looks like he ought to, a kid in a homemade costume. He's even holding the lollipop that he memorably wields in the movie.

#51: Pop! Movies Hellraiser III - Pinhead

Thanks to somewhat lax parental supervision while visiting friend's homes, I saw the first two Hellraiser movies at an age when I was perhaps a bit too young for it. Thanks to memorable gore and all around weirdness, the series has stuck with me, despite most of the later entries in the franchise being somewhere in the forgettable to terrible range. I missed out on the McFarlane Hellraiser toyline, and they're a bit hard to find for reasonable prices these days. Fortunately, Funko has continued its march of making Pops of any license they can get their hands on. According to the packaging, this is Pinhead from Hellraiser III specifically. I don't know if there is some subtle costume variation, or Funko was only able to license the third movie or what, but it's Pinhead. He even includes a little Lament Configuration that he holds, although it doesn't have the distinctive detailing on the sides. Which is understandable given the small size.

#50: Batman v Superman Hot Wheels - Batmobile (230/250)

I was surprised recently to find the Batman V Superman version of the Batmobile on the pegs, since the movie won't be released for a while. So I guess that makes this the first piece of merchandise for the movie that is available at retail. The cardback says it's "new! for 2016," but they're out on the streets already. This offers one of the better looks at the new design for the Batmobile, and it looks pretty cool. It's definitely sleeker than the Tumbler, making it look more like a traditional Batmobile. Its body is all matte black, aside from a small marking on the top that looks like it's meant to be some sort of hatch.

#49: Transformers Generations Combiner Wars - Mirage

Mirage was on the pegs when I picked up Sunstreaker, so I decided to buy him as well. Like Sunstreaker, Mirage is a G1 figure that I've never had in toy form, so it's a nice addition to the ranks. Mirage is, as usual, a fancy F1 style race car. Mostly it's cool looking, but the spoiler in the back seems way too narrow. That turns into his feet, but they could have had some sort of folding panels to make the spoiler wider in car mode.

Getting him into bot mode is pretty easy, mostly just folding in his limbs and rotating a couple parts. This picture makes it looks like his arms and legs have funky proportions, but it's much better looking in person. He's armed with a similar foot/hand/gun to Sunstreaker's, and also has a sword.

#48: Transformers Generations Combiner Wars - Sunstreaker

I've never had a Sunstreaker toy in any form. Lately I've been seeing reviews of the Masterpiece version of him (and the various others that share the same mold), which got me interested in possibly picking up a more reasonably priced version of the character. Plus, when I was a kid, I thought that the Lamborghini was the epitome of badass sports car. So I decided to pick up the Combiner Wars version when I saw it in the store, although I'm not planning to do any of the combiners that aren't Devastator. So yeah, vehicle mode is a yellow Lamborghini, and if not specifically licensed to look like a real model, it's close enough looking to me.

Transformation is pretty easy, nothing too crazy involved. When I think of G1 car Transformers, I think of the car's front bumper forming the chest, but Sunstreaker doesn't follow that trend. It's a cool looking bot. He's armed with a sword and a big gun that can turn into either a hand or foot for combiner purposes. It can rest on top of the car mode roof, but that's a little too much for me.