Scream’s Ghostface by NECA- Action Figure Review

Ghostface by NECA and Ghostface by McFarlane Comparison
One is a killer. The other is an idiot in a... OK they're both idiots in a goofy costume.

Whenever it’s announced that another movie is being remade or rebooted it always to the same reaction, fan after fan throwing a damn fit.

It’s nice to see entitlement at work- it really is. Now I can’t sit here and claim I’m innocent, Lord knows I’m not, but I like to think that as I get older I at least take these things a little bit better. At best I’ll say “I’m not interested” rather than… “they’re raping my childhood!” Hell, it’s not like any of us have to actually go and see the films in question. I try to keep that in mind whenever announcements pop up. Well that, and these things usually give us all sorts of new goodies- like new figures!

I didn’t care for Scream 4 all that much (the killer(s) reveal still bugs me) but I felt it was passable enough and I imagine THIS generation will love it. As it is, I will say it’s nice to finally get a Ghostface action figure- hell, we’ve been waiting since 1996 dammit.

I know what you’re saying- ‘there  already has been a figure made of this guy!’ Well see, that’s not entirely true. Back in the late 90’s McFarlane toys ‘Movie Maniacs’ line (aka the grandaddy of the horror toy genre). They released a ‘Ghostface’ figure as part of their second wave. In what can only be seen now as foreshadowing for the corporate stupidity to come- it turned out that McF didn’t exactly have the rights to Ghostface per se.

See here’s the thing, Ghostface from ‘Scream’ took his look from a Halloween mask found by the films production crew at one of the movie’s shooting locations. Wes Craven loved the look and thus the killer scored his famous look, point being the costume already existed prior to this movie (hell I remember a guy wearing it a Halloween party I attended in 1994…) Now with that in mind, it comes as no shock to learn that what McF and Co. had done was not license the film character, but actually the cheaper costume.

Ghostface by NECA
Of course McFarlane has still advertised it as ‘Scream’ and in fact had included a reproduction of the film’s poster with the figure (all Movie Maniacs did that actually). There was some hoopla leading to the figure being rereleased without any mention of the film on the packaging, and the movie poster reproduction was replaced with a generic “Ghost face” picture. So in essence THIS guy is officially the very first Ghostface figure.

Ghostface here rolls out with a surprising amount of articulation for a direct market horror figure, seems the days of them being ‘statues’ are about over. Aside from the legs, which is hampered a little by the cloth skirt (more on that in a sec) the rest of him displays a great range of movement- unlike the earlier figure who had plenty of articulation but was sculpted so that only one pose would look proper- modern Ghostface looks pretty sweet in many poses.

Another improvement over the earlier figure is in sculpt. Of course over ten years have passed between the two it shouldn’t be surprising. The new guy finally has a mask that looks about right- with a larger hood closer to how he looked in the film- in fact I can’t really complain about the sculpting. So let’s move on to the big point of contention that this guy has been seeing with people.

 

The cloth bits.Ghostface has nice legs.

See when the first pics popped up people were livid to find that lower half of the costume and the flowing bits on his arms were not going to be sculpted. Now I’ll be the first one to say I was just as annoyed as the rest. Since I, like most people, feel that mixed media rarely (if ever) works on smaller scale figures. Doesn’t help that the early pics made the guy look just… well CHEAP. Fan outrage was so bad in fact that NECA is actually producting a second version with an all plastic body.

So here comes me pissing and moaning about the damn skirt… Oh wait, no I won’t. See, while I initially detested the use of cloth, having him now I actually find I prefer it. Unless you’re really nitpicky it’s likely you won’t even notice it most of the time- I keep mine on a shelf and it looks completely fine. Sure if he’s right in front of you, one can’t help to notice it…..but how many people will really have this thing up close all the time? Like me I suspect people will have him tossed up on a shelf with tons of other figures.

Honestly I understand WHY NECA did it- to allow for a higher range of motion (he has fully sculpted jeans beneath) and I can’t complain. The new figure shows that he’ll now be stuck in a legs straight pose- which to me just draws attention to a far worse aspect of this guy: That in the end… Ghostface is a guy in a dress.

The arm tassles are a little more noticeable as even from a distance they’re kinda see-through and technically inaccurate. It’s weird but the original based on the retail costume had the movie’s tassles and the movie costume version has the reverse… Go figure.

So what’s a good killer without some sort of shovel, rake or other implements of destruction (gold star to whoever gets the reference by the way) and Ghostface of course comes with his hunting knife. It’s a tiny little thing, which means this guy has to be one of the earlier film killers (see part 4 to understand what I mean…) but either way it looks fine- so no complaints.

One last thing before I go- we do have a variant of this guy for those completists out there. Not much to speak of- same overall figure but with a decayed ghost mask (think Myers from the new Halloween movies) I didn’t get it since I can’t justify another 15 bucks for what amounts to one piece of plastic. Besides it appears that this look never actually showed up in the film- so not really a ‘must get.’

But yeah- I dig the figure, despite going in thinking I’d be dissappointed like many people are already. I’d tell you that unless you’re ultra picky it’s a fine figure for the set.

…and hey- at least it’s ‘officially’ him this time.

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About kylethoreau 146 Articles
KyleThoreau is a time-traveling axe murderer from the 1800’s. He stopped in the 2000’s because he ran out of the secret time-travel juice that the cyborg clone of Abe Lincoln gave him. He must now find the clone of Abe to return to his time-travel duties. In the meantime he has decided to report on geeky news and read comic books.

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