Super7 Universal Monsters The Metaluna Mutant Super7, 2023
Day #2,630: September 7, 2023
The Metaluna Mutant Remco-style packaging, Target Exclusive
Universal Monsters Target Exclusive ReAction Figure
Item No.: Asst. 666 No. 1955 Manufacturer:Super7 Includes:n/a Action Feature:Glows in the Dark! Retail:$17.99 or $19.99 Availability: July 2023 Other: Like your old Kenner Star Wars Earth ants
I was told to expect that this Target-exclusive The Metaluna Mutant from This Island Earth may be a little bit hard to find. I found him and Herman Munster on a peg at Target on July 1 - there was one of each. At the scanners, they were $17.99. At the register, $19.99. I've been finding this happening a lot, with items scanning as "no price found" quite frequently or with slightly higher prices at the registers. I don't like this. But I do like the figure and its retro-chic cardback, even if it was pre-punched.
I feel kind of silly buying this because it's like two others I already own and love. The regular version of the The Metaluna Mutant ReAction Figure [FOTD #2,630] is an absolute gem, and this figure retains its red paint application but tosses the rest in favor of revealing glow plastic. It's also somewhat similar to the really great Outer Space Men Cosmic Radiation Orbitron [FOTD #1,615], itself a riff on the Mutant's original design.
Our 3 3/4-inch pal, who is much like your Earth ants, added some extra red paint to the eyes and replaced the yellow on the eyes and claws with a really nice gold plastic. It's excellent, and it walks that line of wanting to show off as much glow plastic as possible while also giving you just a little paint so you can appreciate that there are sculpted details present that you can't ignore. The mouth is still there, but the pants? Unpainted. The brainy details and the plates on the chest sort of fade in to the glowing plastic, but something had to get out of the way of the bright night glow. And it's a really good glow too - it shines almost as well as a Glyos factory figure, which is about as high praise as a glowing toy can get.
If I understand Super7 correctly, this figure is probably going to be in pretty short supply. It's something I think a lot of people are going to want, so hopefully I'm wrong and they make a ton of them. A blue glow figure was sold a few years ago, which I may regret passing on in the near future. Its paint applications are extraordinarily similar if not identical to this one, with a little more metallic flavor in the red - and it's blue. I'm a sucker for green glow things and will some day need to stop buying so many. But I love Kenner-style figures, and word has it that this was most likely sculpted by Stephen Geddes, a now-retired ex-Kenner sculptor who did some really amazing stuff. (See also: Healey Made Glyos, Garden State Kaiju Mudbelly, Kenner Walrus Man.) Not a lot of his work gets done up in glow, so it's exciting to see these areas intersect and I hope Super7 does some more glow monsters. In bigger quantities, if they don't mind.
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