Non-Bot Reviews: Banpresto Soft Vinyl Style Heroes Shin Ultraman

Time to take a break from robots, and talk about another recent thing I’ve been into: Ultraman. Even if you don’t know much of anything about this long-running Japanese franchise, you’ve probably seen something from it. It’s that show where the giant red and silver guy fights a bunch of giant monsters in a city, like a weekly Godzilla flick.

They still make Ultraman shows today, and they still use guys in suits stomping around model sets, just with the occasional CGI enhancement for a laser beam or whatever. When it comes to long-running Japanese kid’s action franchises, I’m more of a Kamen Rider guy, but I’ve got to give it to Ultraman, there’s certainly a push to make it more accessible. You can just watch a bunch of different Ultraman shows online, freely and legally, on the official YouTube channel, or Tokushoutsu, or on their own dedicated website, Ultraman Connection, if you make a login. Most of these shows have English subtitles, and a few of them have high-quality English dubs (we’re past the days of like three people shoddily dubbing Godzilla flicks). The currently-airing show, Ultraman Blazar, seems to have been designed to be a good jumping-on point, and you can just give it a watch right here (if you don’t mind skipping though a bunch of ads for other Ultraman stuff every commercial break).

But before I got into watching any of the shows, the first Ultraman thing I saw was the 2021 movie, Shin Ultraman (pictured above), when it got a limited theatrical run over here in North America. What drew me to it was that it was directed and generally created by the same production team that made the previous (Japanese) Godzilla film, Shin Godzilla, (which is also really good, if you haven’t seen it) and is sort of a pseudo-sequel. Shin Ultraman doesn’t feature guys in suits, it’s all CGI, but it’s all motion-captured with an eye to capturing the look and feel of suit actors, and was a good time at the movies, even if I wasn’t familiar with the source material.

Now, there’s a good deal of merchandise for Ultraman, like any Popular Japanese thing. There’s expensive high-end SH Figuarts, there’s more mass-released Ultra Action Figures, and there’s stuff like today’s subject, a big Vinyl of the big man himself. Vinyl’s a thing I’m wholly unfamiliar with, but I know about it as a historical Kaiju Toy Delivery System. Basically, they’re Big Rubber Toys of Giant Monsters. Godzilla was made to be rendered this way. These days, there’s an entire market for these things amongst collectors as much as kids. All I know is they’re big, cheap, made of a kind of soft material (sometimes they’re called Sofubi because of that), and tend to be only marginally articulated, if at all.  And lo and behold, my local Gamestop (which has gotten heavily into the Anime and Tokusatsu scene) had this guy on the shelf for a fairly modest $25 Canadian. I could have gone a more traditional action figure route, but this guy won out for being on sale in front of me in person. Plus, I get to see what I think of an entire collecting scene I’m unaware of.

The Sculpt

Ultraman’s jumbo-sized compared to most action figures, but not too tall. Sure, he he towers above most Transformers, even the taller Leader-class figures. But he’s a pretty skinny humanoid (that skinniness is a part of his redesign), so he doesn’t take up too much shelf space, and that larger size makes him feel like he scales well with a lot of the other stuff in my collection.

Sometimes, Sofubi stuff like this is stylized, or simplified, but they didn’t do that here, this Ultraman’s a really detailed replica of his onscreen design, which was deliberately designed to be kind of weird, a little funny, a little ofputting. He’s an athletic, but thin and limber humanoid, with an impressively detailed amount of musculature and subtle lines sculpted into his slightly-too-human body, with only his slightly upturned elf-shoe looking feet, and his stylized head being thoroughly alien.

He’s very proportionate, save for maybe his hands, which seem a tiny bit too small to my eyes. His pose is just standing there, ramrod straight, but in a way that looks natural, if a bit awkward.

His head features an odd, alien look with a big fin in the middle of it, bulbous, diagonal Roswell Alien-looking eyes, odd little mechanical-looking projections instead of ears, and a similarly stylized imprint where the mouth ought to be. He’s a little awkward, a little menacing, and a little disconcerting, just like in the movie.

His essence is well-preserved.

The Colors

Ultraman’s got a fairly simple set of colors, making it easy to replicate here. He’s almost entirely  just two-tone red and silver, in different swirly patterns. I think the red’s all vinyl, and the silver’s all paint. It’s a bit uneven in a few places, but done pretty well, considering all the intricate patterns the two tones trace across his body. The only other color is a bit of yellow-white for his eyes. It’s really straightforward, but that’s what he looks like

Build Quality

This is a Vinyl/Sofibi, so Ultraman’s made of a softer material than your average Transformer. He’s hollow, for one thing, and he’s flexible enough that can squeeze, bend and flex his arms and legs very slightly, though they return to their shape, so he’s not a bendable figure or anything. I think part of the appeal of Kaiju characters being rendered this way is that the material makes you think of the rubber stuff the physical suits themselves are made of, and I instinctively get the appeal.

Oddly, instead of making him flimsy, the vinyl material makes him feel almost more durable. He’s definitely in no danger of getting damaged if I were to drop him off the top of a shelf, for one thing. He does have one quality control problem to him, though: One his feet is a bit warped out of the box, so I have to stand him up carefully, lest he lean forwards. When I’m done with my review and photos, though, I’m going to give him the same treatment as Legacy Laser Optimus Prime’s sword, and dip his foot into a mug of hot water, so I can bend it more into shape. For now, I’ll use a drink coaster to help take some of these photos.

Articulation

So, the thing is, Ultraman’s got almost no articulation. His shoulders move, and his waist moves, and that’s it. I knew what I was getting into, so it didn’t take me by surprise. This type of toy typically isn’t really articulated, and was originally created for a kid to wave around and smash into other vinyls, instead of for a collector to pose. Still, I can grouse a little bit. I do wish his pre-posed hands were fists instead of splayed open, so he could, like, punch his opponents. As it is, you can make him sort of karate chop, but it mostly looks like he’s reaching or grabbing something.

Okay, the one joint I do wish he had is head articulation. I feel like that would have gone a long way towards making him just a bit more expressive. Apparently, there’s an even bigger Shin Ultraman vinyl that does that, but that one definitely hits the “Too Large” quotient in my mind.

The thing that I keep thinking about is that this limited level of articulation works better when it’s a Vinyl of an actual Kaiju monster, since they tend to be immobile, lumbering things. Shin Ultraman is Just a Guy, so he feels like you should be able to pose him a little bit more, at least at the level of a 5-POA action figure.

Then again, that would break up the extremely clean sculpt, and I get the sense that this is the type of item that lives a bit more on the shelf than in the hands.

Overall:

So, this guy’s not bad, but I’m on the fence on whether it’s something I’m into. It certainly sets out to do what it wants to do very well, which is “be a Vinyl replica of Shin Ultraman, from the movie.” The sculpting and paint on it is immaculate, it’s a really good replica of the hero from the motion picture, one that captures his unusual vibes very well, and it’s well-scaled with the rest of my action figures. It’s moreso a question of whether the thing that it’s doing is something you’d like. If you’re getting something like this, you’re not here for the articulation. You’re here for the vibes. An item like this, it’s almost adjacent to a statue, instead of an action figure, which is its own separate market. But, very importantly, this is a lot cheaper than a statue. And I will say, it’s well worth the $25 Canadian I found it for, and I’ve seen it go for more money than that online.

I like what’s here, but I think this is a one-off thing for me to stick on the shelf, instead of an entire type of collectible I’m going to get more of. Okay, maybe I’ll get another if I can find a Shin Godzilla vinyl around the same scale for him to square off against, and a smaller Shin Kamen Rider, if they made one. But that’s about the extent of my interest.

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