HWOARANG

It was the 2000 when we got a huge wave of videogame action figures like Final Fnatasy VIII, Resident Evil, Crahs Bandicot, Tomb Raider as well as Tekken from the japanese brand Epoch. It was like we were actually going to get every Tekken 3 character back then, even those characters that were not playable (like Devil Jin).

Serires 3 started with the "Blood Talon" Hwoarang, Jin´s eternal rival. Sculpted by Hiroki Hayashi and in 1/10 scale, Hwoarang is the same size as Jin and can stand on his own perfectly and is articulated on the neck, waits, left shoulder, rigth elbow and left wrist.

And unlike the characters in the first serires, the figures from serires 3 are sculpted in a more casual pose, not battle stance. Hwoarang is standing calling someone in front of him, mostly Jin i guess because they loosk really good one in front of the other, with Jin ready to battle and Hwoarang calling him with a smirk.

The relaxed pose dosnt make him easyer to move around tough since thanks to the limited articulations (one arm can move, the other cannot) he looks kinda stiff in most poses aside of the basic one. He is not using his Tae Kwan Do outfit but his more complex motorcycle outfit with boots, chaps, jeans and a tigth and very sesy short and his goggles on his forehead.

The sculpt is good, with a very sexy musculature and a lot of fine details on his gloves and hair, his face is very simple but expresive (he is very simple on the game too) and the paint match the sculpt really nicelly. There is not slopynes in here at all, every section is perfecly painted and clean with his chaps even having a blue paint deco that makes them looks like used leather.

The skull on his back is also really good looking, such a cool design! But the best part is his head, or more preciselly, his hair. The paint on his hair is really vibrant and full of different tones, reds and orange to make shine a really good sculpt.

Aside of his black base with the Tekken 3 logo, Howarang also comes with the King of Iron Fist Tournament trophy since he was the winner of the thrid tournament, a pretty ugly thing with Heihachi´s grining head on it painted in golden. The other accesory is an electric guitar that we never saw on the game but fits him perfectly Is kinda difficult to make him hold it naturally (i cannot be done actually) but the guitar have a black rubber band soo it can rest on Hwoarang´s back or shoulder.

While i am not sure wath to think about the change of pose, it was evident Epoch wanted to expand the serires to something else by adding more accesoryes and articulations and while this is not the best figure of the series, is still the only action figure of Hwoarang.