The Good: Talks, Detailing on shirt
The Bad: Annoying bobble-head look, Low playability, Low collectibility, Annoying talking function, Hardly looks like John Cho.
The Basics: A poor representation of Hikaru Sulu, the Burger King Sulu toy is a real dud, despite having a neat sound chip.
A few months back, two Star Trek toys arrived upon my desk that I did not ask for nor want. The first was the Scotty Burger King toy (click here for that review!). The second was the Sulu Burger King toy.
Basics
Used to promote the 2009 film Star Trek (click here for my review of it!), Burger King released a series of small inaction figures in their kid's meals. Each figure, like Sulu, is outfitted with a voice chip which repeats a phrase from the film.
The Sulu figure is 3" tall, an 1 1/2" wide and 1" thick. It is made entirely of hard plastic. This Sulu figure is more a caricature of Sulu, much the way Bobblehead toys are; the body is small and the head is huge. The figure is molded to include a neutral-expressioned Sulu with two tiny hands and two feet firmly planted. Sulu's shirt is molded with the textured pattern like the costume in the film. Sulu has a rather low center of balance, making him virtually untippable.
Sulu's head, looks only minimally like John Cho as Sulu and the figure is poorly colored for the Asian character.
Accessories
Sulu's hands are not molded to hold anything, so he does not come with any accessory.
Playability
The Burger King toys, like Sulu, have exceptionally low playability, especially considering that they have no moving parts.
On the back of Sulu's yellow shirt is a small button. When depressed, John Cho's voice comes out a small speaker in the back of Sulu's head! The Sulu Burger King toy repeats the line "Warp three, sir!" each time the button is depressed. The toy is loud enough that is may be heard in a bedroom-sized room clearly and the voice chip clearly uses dialogue from the actual film. Because it only says the one phrase, Sulu's novelty wears thin quite quickly.
Collectibility
Sadly, it seems I am in the minority of my subculture in loathing the Burger King toys as my peers seem to be enthusiastic to have new swag to collect. Originally given free in Burger King Kids meals, the Sulu toy now is available on the secondary market in the five dollar range. That seems to be the price these sort of toys top out at for the first decade (mint in package, of course) and I suspect within the year they will be unloaded in the dollar range loose. As time goes by, buyers will need to be careful to be sure the Sulu they are buying has a battery that has not degraded and a sound chip that still works.
Overview
The Sulu Burger King toy is annoying and barely looks like John Cho, despite having a sound chip with an authentic bit of dialogue. Between the low playability, poor likeness and the generally cheap nature of the toy, it is easy to stamp this with an "avoid it!"
For other Star Trek (2009 movie) swag, please check out:
2010 U.S.S. Enterprise Hallmark ornament
Star Trek: Countdown
Star Trek: Nero
1/10
For other toy reviews, please be sure to visit my index page!
© 2010 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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