Monday, October 8, 2012

A Short Hair Cordelia Wrapped In Sackcloth Makes The Slave Cordelia Figure!


The Good: Great sculpt, Decent accessories, Good articulation
The Bad: Slight balance issue, No real collectible value
The Basics: For those who cannot find or do not want to bear the expense of the Short Hair Cordelia figure, the Slave Cordelia figure is the same basic toy wrapped in cloth.


With the Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel toy lines, there were a lot of underwhelming products. When Moore Action Collectibles had the license to the Angel toy line, they were remarkably unimaginative in a number of ways. For example, the Faith and Cordelia action figures looked remarkably alike. And as far as the Cordelia figures went, they used the same essential body with minor coloring differences or different heads. So, for example, the Slave Cordelia action figure that was exclusive to the Media Play/Sam Goody store franchise back in the day, was the standard Cordelia action figure with a Short Hair Cordelia (reviewed here!) head popped on it and then wrapped in a strategically tattered cloth.

With the decline of the Buffyverse as a marketable franchise, the Slave Cordelia has plummeted in value in recent years and is now a decent alternative for collectors to the expensive Short Hair Cordelia action figure.

Basics

Slave Cordelia is one of the exclusive action figures from the Angel figure line from Clayburn Moore Action Collectibles toys. This Cordelia get up was only in Angel and the figure comes boxed in an exclusive box with a small window or on a card for the store release. She is a 5 7/8 inch tall action figure featuring a sculpt of Cordelia Chase as she appeared in the second season of Angel when she cut her hair short. The figure is then wrapped in an off-white piece of cloth that is cut in strips at the bottom and arms. The other difference for this figure is that around her neck is a controller that kept humans under command.

The sculpt is an excellent one, capturing a wry look and subtle smile than some of the other Cordelia figures. The figure looks like Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase, which is a step up from many of the earliest Cordelia figures, which looked more like Eliza Dushku as Faith than Carpenter's Cordelia. The Slave Cordelia is well-sculpted featuring Carpenter’s cheeks and nose detailed expertly. As for the body, the Slave Cordelia is wearing heels, a black tank top and black pants that, while flared at the bottom, resemble leather pants (under the fabric). The Slave Cordelia features detailing like molded fingernails and the button on the front of her pants. Her hair is also textured for greater realism.

As well, the coloring is realistic and well done. While the outfit is colored entirely in monotones, the skin has realistic depth and shading. Instead of being a monotonal peach color, it has some red and tan in it, so Cordelia looks pretty realistic. Clayburn Moore Action Collectibles also got Cordelia’s eyes right, so they are brown with tiny black pupils and they look as realistic as they can for an action figure. Even Cordelia’s fingernails are appropriately colored black!

Accessories

Slave Cordelia comes with three basic accessories: a shovel, a bucket, and a base. The shovel is a 3 3/8” plastic shovel with a small head that is silver-gray and speckled in black to look both metallic and worn. The handle is brown and the top of it is colored in a different brown to make it look wooden. Cordelia can hold the shovel only in her right hand because her left hand is molded with the fingers touching, impossible to hold either accessory.

The bucket is textured to look like it is woven tightly. Brown and gray, it is plastic, but looks like it is a basket as much as a bucket. It has a braided handle that fits nicely in Slave Cordelia’s right hand just fine.

The base is a chunk of sidewalk and wall that looks like it is a piece of sidewalk that has broken open to expose hell. It has two pegs that fit the holes in the bottom of either of Cordelia’s feet. The ground chunk is detailed as well as the rest of the figure and is meant to look like a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame. It’s a very cool way to hold or display one’s Cordelia figure.

Playability

Slave Cordelia is a very problematic figure to balance. While her articulation gives her many options, her heeled boots require her to be contorted in a way that is very difficult to keep her standing. To alleviate the balance issues, Cordelia has holes in the front of her shoes that fit in the pegs on her stand and playsets for the Angel figures.

Slave Cordelia is also strengthened in poseability by her impressive articulation. Cordelia is articulated at sixteen points: knees, thighs, groin joint, shoulders, elbows, biceps, wrists, waist and head. The elbows and knees have hinge joints, while all the rest are swivel joints. That gives Cordelia a great range of motion for a figure without any ball-and-socket joints.

Collectibility

The Slave Cordelia was a Clayburn Moore Action Collectibles exclusive figure and was released as a Toyfare or Wizard Exclusive, as well as an exclusive on card for On Cue. Despite it being limited, that it had two limited releases actually made it pretty common and as a result, it did not retain its collectible value. While this may be found very affordably, it is not likely to rebound to appreciate for collector’s value again.

Overview

Fans of Cordelia Chase might geek out for the Slave Cordelia concept, but given how one of her hands is posed so she cannot actually hold her bucket and shovel at the same time. This, combined with the lack of collectible value does bring the toy down some. Even so, it is not a bad figure at all!

This figure represents Cordelia as she appeared late in the second season of Angel, reviewed here!

For other Angel toys, please visit my reviews of:
“You’re Welcome” Cordelia
Puppet Spike doll
Pylean Princess Cordelia Chase

6.5/10

For other toy reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

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