The Good: Great sculpt, Good accessories, Incredible collectible value
The Bad: Severe balance issues, Vastly over-accessorized, Cannot hold any of his accessories
The Basics: The Invader Zim Series One Of Doom included an Almighty Tallest Purple figure, to help one keep their Zim in line!
When I first discovered the Invader Zim toy line, it was when I randomly found the Almighty Tallest Red (reviewed here!) action figure at a local comic book shop in Michigan. Well, my ignorance of these toys completely fell away and I began immediately searching for more of these figures for my wife, who is a huge Invader Zim fan. Because her first figure was the Almighty Tallest Red, I figured the logical figure for me to hunt down next was the Almighty Tallest Purple!
From the Palisades Toys Invader Zim Series One Of Doom action figure set, Almighty Tallest Purple is the primary version of the co-leader of the Irken Empire action figure.
Basics
The Invader Zim Series One Of Doom Almighty Tallest Purple figure is an 8 1/4" tall hard plastic representation of Almighty Tallest Purple as he appeared in most of the episodes of Invader Zim (reviewed here!). This version of Almighty Tallest Purple is made of hard plastic, save for the antennae on the back of his head, which are made of softer plastic.
The Invader Zim Series One Of Doom Almighty Tallest Purple is a pretty impressive sculpt based on the two-dimensional representation of Almighty Tallest Purple on television. Fleshed out well into the three dimensional figure, the Almighty Tallest Purple figure is tall and has his mouth closed, with an irregular body shape and tiny extremities! The animators on Invader Zim designed for a specific sense of style, not for the practicality of future action figure releases! The Almighty Tallest Purple is sculpted accurately, which means that his legs are tiny and pointed without distinct feet and his arms are also very thin with tiny clawed hands. His back has a hump on it and he has almost no waist area. The Almighty Tallest Purple’s eyes are cast especially large with sockets implied to add a great level of detail.
On the coloring front, Almighty Tallest Purple is exceptionally easy to render correctly and Palisades Toys did an excellent job with him. Because he is based on an alien character created with monotones, things like skin depth and shading do not apply. Instead, Palisades kept the figure appropriately with solid colors for his purple robes, gray torso ribbing, and thin green arms and big green head. On the coloring front, Almighty Tallest Purple is perfect and his accessories match the level of detailing the action figure has.
Accessories
The Invader Zim Series Two Of Doom Almighty Tallest Purple comes with a simple “floating” stand cylinder, a Mobile Command Platform Thingy Base stand, Irken Soda, Irken Donut Bag, Tallest Red Punching Doll, Irken Burrito, 4 Irken Monitors with screen stickers, and connector tentacles.
The four food-related accessories are based on the snacks the Irken leaders are obsessed with in various episodes of Invader Zim. Sadly, not one of them fits in the grip of the Almighty Tallest Purple! The Irken Donut Bag and Irken Burrito both have the symbol of the Irken Empire silkscreed on the front of the accessory. The donut bag is a 1 3/4” tall box meant to mimic a bag of donuts. Out the top of the “bag” are brown chocolate donuts, though they cannot be removed from the bag portion of the accessory. The Irken Burrito is a 1 5/16” long cylinder that looks like a tiny sleeping bag or wrapped burrito. The white “wrap” has a blue Irken Empire symbol on it and only looks like a burrito based on the toy’s claim and the appearance of it, partially wrapped, in the television show! The Irken Soda is a 1 7/8” tall cylindrical cup with a straw sticking out the top of it. The straw is a wonderful finely detailed piece. Unfortunately, it cannot be held for long in the Almighty Tallest Purple’s hands to actually be held to his tiny mouth!
The Tallest Red Punching Doll is a neat little accessory. The 2 1/2" tall Tallest Red Punching Doll has a pin out its butt. The replica of Tallest Red can be attached to the Almighty Tallest Purple figure by removing the figure’s hand. It fits there perfectly and looks great on the toy.
The four Irken Monitors are purple and green and vary in size from 1 ¾” wide by 1 1/2" tall to 1 1/2" wise and 1 1/4" tall. The figure comes with four different stickers that fit the customized screens (I think that’s somewhat obnoxious; Palisades Toys could have just stuck them on prior to shipping, like the Monkey painting on the Robo-Parents’ wall. The stickers on the figure I bought my wife had lost their adhesive, which is an unfortunate thing and may make the Almighty Tallest Purple figures a slightly tougher sell to collectors. The figure comes with four connectors that allow one to connect the monitors to one another and the Mobile Command Platform Thingy Base. Sadly, they are terribly hard to balance and illustrate the serious difficulty with trying to translate something oddly animated like Invader Zim into viable merchandise that actually works in real-world physics.
For an added selling point, the Almighty Tallest Purple Series One figure comes with his half of the Mobile Command Platform Thingy accessory. Intended to interface with the half that accompanied the Almighty Tallest Red figure’s base, the Mobile Command Platform Thingy Base accessory is essentially a display stand that allows one to hold their Almighty Tallest Purple action figure and the monitor accessories in one place. This is a molded platform base 8” long at its straight side, 3 3/4” wide (at its widest point) and standing 3” tall. It is a gray platform with a gray railing that goes around the outside of the platform. There are six holes around the base that allow the Almighty Tallest Purple to be placed at more than one point on the platform. The Mobile Command Platform Thingy Base snaps together with the other half, which comes with the Almighty Reed figure.
Playability
The Invader Zim Series Two Of Doom Almighty Tallest Purple is a very problematic toy on the playability front. First, the figure is absolutely unable to balance on its own, which makes sense given the physics of the figure. The body of Almighty Tallest Purple is disproportionately small relative to his head and upper body, especially relative to the toothpick-like legs. It makes perfect sense that the thin legs would not hold him up. Off his stand, it is impossible to get him to remain standing. On his transparent stand – the 1 3/4" cylinder that connects to the bottom of the action figure and to any one of the six holes in the Mobile Command Platform - he is entirely solid and that helps make him a great display piece, if not a very playable toy.
The Series One Of Doom Almighty Tallest Purple has pretty limited articulation, which is also based in part on the limitations of the sculpt. This Almighty Tallest Purple comes with only eight points of articulation: torso, fingers, wrists, shoulders and neck. I was pleasantly surprised that the arms and wrists are attached by hinged ball and socket joints, which allows for greater articulation and a decent range of motion. The neck joint is on a ball and socket joint, which gives it an exceptional range of motion. The torso and wrists are on simple swivel joints, so they basically rotate, without providing much else on the poseability front.
Collectibility
This figure seems to be one of the harder ones to find and it is one of the many Invader Zim action figures (from either series) that is hard to find for less than $50 at any given time. Fans will pay a premium for this figure and one suspects that its value is near its peak; it may be a poor investment piece at the time, though it is a hard to find, wonderful toy.
Overview
The Almighty Tallest Purple action figure is a great figure to pair with the Allmighty Tallest Red, though it usually costs about four times as much as the other Irken leader figure!
For other Invader Zim toy and action figure reviews, be sure to check out my reviews of:
Invader Zim GIR from “Germs” plush
Series Two Of Doom! Hot Topic Exclusive Robo-Parents
Series Two Of Doom! Gaz
7.5/10
For more toy reviews, please check out my Toy Review Index Page!
© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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