Monday, January 27, 2020

Heavy Metal - TAARNA!

Figbiz 5" Action Figures - Heavy Metal: Taarna the Taarakian - Incendium 2019

This figure brought back a flood of nostalgia for me. I was too young to watch the Heavy Metal animated film when it came out in 1981, but a decade later when I was a full-fledged junkie of the Sci-Fi Channel, this movie was often playing and I was mesmerized by animation that was clearly not meant for kids. The concept was foreign to me. Even the scarier animation of my youth like Return of the King and the Last Unicorn were still aimed toward young audiences. But Heavy Metal only played late at night and featured a lot of nudity, sexuality, and graphic violence... if my parents only knew what I was watching. And in reading the movie synopsis now, I'm pretty sure I was seeing a really watered down version of the film - heavily edited for cable TV. The most iconic story in the movie was the white-haired mute warrior Taarna. Clad in a ridiculous thong (but with sensible armor on her legs and arms), she flew around a post-apocalyptic world on a mutated pterosaur and got into swordfights. It was classic fantasy gold.



































Her scabbard has a tiny rubber peg that fits into and even tinier rubber hole. I couldn't get it to clasp properly (100% due to my impatience), so I don't have any pics of her wearing it.








The animation of Heavy Metal is actually my least favorite style out there. You can tell that many of the scenes are just traced live-action film.  Rotoscoping is fine when used in moderation, or altered in a cartoony way (like He-Man), but when it's this blatant I think the end product looks weak. Animated movies like Lord of the Rings and American Pop are practically unwatchable to me.




The movie was based on characters and stories from the Meavy Metal magazine. I've never seen any vintage Taarna comics, but I would love to.




Speaking of comics, Taarna appeared in a new series in 2018. I bought the collected edition but haven't read it yet.








There have been a few variations of this figure released so far.
These first two "prototype" releases were bagged exclusives at conventions.
Black was NYCC and Red was SDCC.
(at the time of this posting, both are still available for sale on the Incendium website).







Then there is an exclusive figure on a chrome card and metallic details on the figure itself.
This is available in an exclusive bundle with a skateboard on the Incendium website.














Time for a Comparison Pic!





Cheers!



1 comment:

  1. Awesome figure. Couldn't believe what I was seeing when I first saw that movie. I was probably 14. 8-O

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