Briareos Hecatonchires
From the recently released Shinji Aramaki film (his third Appleseed CGI animated feature), Square Enix brings Briareos to their Play Arts Kai line.
This figure comes from our friends at Hobby Link Japan
The box seems to be the standard Play Arts line affair, quite nice cardboard with an opening flap with info on the inside and a window for the figure.
One side of the box is white, the other is black with pretty much the same info on each, name checking the Play Arts line, Appleseed Alpha and the Briareos name.
The back of the box shows of some figure posing and the other figure in the line, Bri`s partner, Deunan.
The info on the inner flap gives some insight to the film and some minor Appleseed backstory, I`ve pictured if anyone wants to read
The figure comes in a plastic figure tray with cover and has cardboard surrounding it with the figure stand, the accessory guide is on the left sleeve and the stand assembly instructions are on the right sleeve.
On to the figure himself, this being my first Play Arts figure I wasn`t prepared for the weight, which far more than a plastic Hot Toys figure, considering this figure is made from PVC, ABS and rubber, I`m not entirely sure where the weight comes from.
Bri (pronounced “Bree”, his longer name pronounced “Bree-air-rios”) stands a good 10 inches tall to the top of his “rabbit ears” antenna.
He`s mostly molded plastic except for the hip/crotch piece, jacket, shoulder guards and gun holster.
The head sculpt is almost perfect, out of the box I had some issues with the left antenna being bent which I`m still trying to straighten.
On the back of the head is the Hecatonchires system information (Bri has a “Hecatonchires” model body).
I also noticed three chips on the back and top of the head, I don`t recall these being in the film and suspect it`s damage.
The antenna do rotate on single pegs, which is needed when you dress or remove the jacket (more on that later)
The Hecatonchires information carries over onto both shoulder panels.
For accessories Briareos comes with 3 sets of hands, fist, open and gun holding, his jacket, his sidearm and finally his sniper rifle.
The rifle is a good 7 inches long with posable stand, unfortunately one stand broke off the first time I moved it, again right out of the box.
So far that`s three pieces of damage that makes me wonder about QC issues.
For the rest of the rifle is just molded plastic with no other moving or removable parts, so no removable clips sadly.
The sidearm is similarly just molded plastic with no removable clip.
The jacket is attached on either side of the figure by 3 rubber pegs, after un-pegging you simply pull the jacket over his head like a poncho, this is where moving the antenna comes in, if you want to keep them in decent shape it`s best to move them around so the jacket doesn`t bend them as you dress or undress him.
Now we get to the topless look, with Briareos`s pecs and those sexy cyber abs down to his robo-rotic crotch (am I the only one to wonder what he has in his pants considering pretty much all of him externally is cyberized?).
On his back you have the spine, a piece that the promo pictures showed was removable, I have no idea how it removes, I`m too scared to force it, causing damage number 4.
On the box it says he has over 20 points of articulation, I count 24 including the antenna.
The head is on a single ball joint, the diaphragm and waist have ball joints.
The shoulders have one of those Marvel armpit joints that swing out, then they have ball joints, leading to a ball and socket at the elbow and again at the wrist.
The legs have ball joints at the hips, double knee joints, a ball and socket at the feet and toe joints.
The stand required some screwing together, it is required for certain poses as his feet and ankle joints can be sometimes a bit wobbly.
I have an issue with the screw that connects the cradle to the stand being weak and tends to droop if I don`t have enough weight on the feet of the figure.
My final issue is with the right shoulder armor, it sticks out more than the left, again I`ll have to take some time to force it back into place.
I`ve been looking forward to this figure ever since I saw the promo pictures, I recently saw Appleseed Alpha too, which looks amazing but doesn`t have the best story ever.
Even with the issues and damage I`m happy with the figure, I finally have a decent sized Briareos as I have never been able to afford the Ex Machina Hot Toys version (which itself is full of issues) and I doubt I`ll be able to afford Hot Toys`s version of the Alpha Briareos (which probably won`t be out for over a year).
Hobby Link Japan have the best prices I`ve seen for this figure, they`re running out of stock so get one while you can!
