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Sunday Toy Chest: Funko ReAction NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS

There’s less than a week left until Halloween, which sadly means that there is only a few more days to celebrate Nerdoween with Team Nerdist! This marks the final Nerdoween-inspired Toy Chest for the month, and we’ve chosen the confirmed Halloween (not Christmas) movie Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas as the subject today.

Funko has no shortage of differently styled lines of figures. The bobblehead-esque POP! Vinyls are the most familiar, but the ReAction series, from which today’s figures come, are purposely designed to appear like the retro action figures of the ’70s and ’80s, specifically in the style of Kenner figures. The articulation is minimal, usually relegated to just five points. The style applies to both new and older properties. Both the CW’s Arrow and The Flash each have their own line of ReAction figures, as do films like Alien and Back to the Future.

The Nightmare Before Christmas series in the ReAction line, released last year, currently offers six different characters from the film, and four variations of the Jack Skellington figure. Three of the Skellington variations with different facial expressions are widely available, while a special Comic-Con exclusive version was released that includes Jack’s adorable ghost dog, Zero. Rounding out the final five characters are Sally, The Mayor, Barrel, The Devil, and Behemoth.

Jack Skellington’s three variations include a standard smiling face, a shocked/intrigued face, and a menacing grin. Each version comes with the same two accessories: the pumpkin with emerging ghost, and Jack’s ledger. The heads of each swivel left and right, and the remaining four articulation points are at the shoulders and hips. Jack’s legs do not fully extend to a proper 90 degree angle, so sitting the figure down requires a bit of additional finagling on whatever it is you might choose to sit the figure.

Sally, who has the same five points of articulation, is slightly more posable in the way we expect from the ReAction line. Her hip joints allow both legs to extend into a full sitting position. Her head is in fact articulated, but the mold of her hair makes her range of motion very limited. Looking to the right and left is not a strong suit of the ReAction Sally. Her two accessories are the slotted spoon with which she tricked Dr. Finklestein, and the basket of goodies that she set up to Jack’s tower. The sculpt on both is impressive, given their small size. The slotted spoon actually has holes, rather than indentions which I imagine would have been easier. The basket even has a molded bottle of “spirits” and fishbone plate.

The Mayor is probably one of my favorite molds of the entire line, if for his odd shape and clever usage of molding. Even though it would’ve been perfectly acceptable for Funko to avoid articulating the legs given the Mayor’s squat stance and barely visible legs, each one moves independently to the front. The mold prevents the legs from angling backward. The Mayor comes with a stack of scrolls that represent his constant collection of plans; plans for this Halloween and the next, plans for helping Jack overtake Christmas, etc. Of course, he also comes with a megaphone bullhorn. His two faces can be easily switch around thanks to the articulation point where his neck (or lack thereof) meets his shirt collar. The hat is not removable, but makes for an easy turning apparatus to switch between his moods.

Barrel is one of the “Boogie Boys” gang in Halloween Town, and his removable mask is held in place by two indentions just in front of his ears. He comes with the Scarry Teddy accessory even though he did not carry the doll in the film. Scary Teddy was one of the many chaotic gifts that Jack Skellington left in peoples homes while he was impersonating Santa Claus.

The full series was released last year, and we haven’t heard any rumblings of a second wave. It would be nice to see a few more figures from the movie, though. Perhaps Oogie Boogie, or Santa Claus, or even Dr. Finklestein? I know I’m game for more!

Have you picked up any of these for yourself? Let us know which ones in the comments below!

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