Kenner The New Batman Adventures Wildcard Joker Kenner, 1998
Day #2,878: June 26, 2025
Wildcard Joker with Calling Card Cannon & Funny Guns!
The New Batman Adventures Action Figure
Item No.: Asst. 64115 No. 64229 Manufacturer:Kenner Includes:2 pistols, card launcher, card, tripod Action Feature:Everything connects to launcher, which can shoot a rectangular card projectile Retail:$5.99 Availability: 1998 Other: The redesigned Joker figure
By the time Wildcard Joker came out, I was buying most new characters and very few outfit variants. Since they changed his look on the show too, I figured I may as well get the new action figure. The cartoon was great, and the toy looked pretty interesting. Now that I look at it with over 25 years of hindsight, I can say that it was a very impressive release but the original Joker head was just way better.
The figures were still being sold under the Kenner brand, and wouldn't shift over to Hasbro branding until the 1999 stuff started to come out. They did a nice job keeping the figure's 2D look here with a streamlined suit, with no wrinkles. They kept the tie but changed the colors, adding sculpted tails to his jacket while losing his painted lips. He's also a little cross-eyed now - he doesn't look terrible but probably could have been a little bit better. The Joker remains sturdy, with a design that closely matches the show and retains the visible teeth and the very striking green highlights on the hair. Thanks to the suit being crisper and the face having less detail, he just feel less expressive than previous versions of the character. It's by no means bad - but if you were watching the cartoon for a few years, the new look was kind of a shock to the system and the new figure may not have been particularly welcome, either.
His accessory is pretty cool. You have a green tripod that you put under a card launcher, which has a "J" as well as a diamond, club, heart, and spade - painted, no less. Some of the greeblies are painted too, and you could connect the two pistols to the sides. The card is launched by the grips for his hands, and you can mount it over his shoulders for stability during play. It's a really good design, and the launching card mechanism is still really neat to this day. It's rare that you see rectangular rockets!
It's worth noting the card, too, has painted detail - the "J" and the Joker's portrait are both a pale blue gray color, which give this toy and his gear a bit of an edge over the unpainted accessories we saw in most other lower-priced kid brands of the day. It's also worth noting that Batman figures cost about the same as Star Wars (or Jurassic Park) at the time, and managed to frequently have sculpts that were truer to the show, with more exciting play features and wacky accessories. I assume this is because the line was largely subsidized by endless repaints of Batman and Robin - that's what people wanted - so you could put the money into the gear.
When I see figures like this in my collection, I can't help but wonder why we don't see stuff like it today. The toy aisle is a lot more collector-oriented, with few fun action features because adult fans made many loud demands for articulation, and convinced anyone watching their YouTube channel that their way was the only right way. They're probably wrong - back in the 1990s, figures sold hundreds of thousands of units at their peak, and today... not. Figures like this version of The Joker did a good job making figure sculpt that looked just like the animation model to make older fans happy (like me!) and gave him fun things to shoot so the kids would buy him, too. I hope to see that direction come back again - Hasbro comes kind of close on the 2023 Star Wars Epic Hero Series deluxe figures, giving us slightly bulked-up Mandalorians with spring-loaded gear for about $13. That's roughly what Wildcard Joker would cost with inflation today. Hopefully other toy companies will give toys with fun play features another crack, because I'm finding a lot of limitations to how a figure ultimately gets displayed on my shelf no matter how many joints he has.
16bit.com is best not viewed in Apple's Safari browser, we don't know why. All material on this site copyright their respective copyright holders. All materials appear hear for informative and entertainment purposes. 16bit.com is not to be held responsible for anything, ever. Photos taken by the 16bit.com staff. Site design, graphics, writing, and whatnot credited on the credits page. Be cool-- don't steal. We know where you live and we'll break your friggin' legs.
RSS 
