One of the toy companies I was most looking forward to is 3A Toys, who are at Toy Fair this year to increase their presence with retailers. They’ve generated a very dedicated grass roots fan base in the past several years producing toys based on the artwork of co-owner Ashley Wood. More recently, they’ve been branching out with licensed properties – and one of the ones I’ve found most interesting is their collaboration with Marvel.
The first 1/6 figure to come out of this collaboration is Iron Man – he’s currently available to pre-order at Bambaland (3A’s online store) in four different colorways. In addition to 3A’s unique styling for the character, Iron Man will feature mostly hidden articulation, via a thin skin covering joints that are usually exposed – in this case over the elbows and knees. I’ve been curious to see how this will look the more bent they are – the figures shown at Toy Fair show a little bunching with bent elbows, but not as much as I expected.
I think I would have preferred the joints to be exposed, like they are with Dr. Doom, the next figure that they’ve revealed. While the skin does make Iron Man look pretty sleek, he is after all a guy in a suit of armor, so joints wouldn’t be out of place. The WIP Doom looks pretty damn awesome. In previous Q&A’s Ash has said Spider-Man and Ultron are the next to come, but expect this line to have a slow burn, due to 3A’s meticulous design and development process. It took about a year from the initial Iron Man announcement to having the figure available to pre-order.
Photo credit: CoolToyReview.com – many more excellent pictures of 3A’s Toy Fair booth