MAYOR

 I love The Nightmare Before Christmas. When i was a kid that movie was my main fixation and obsession and not only show me a new way of animation and a new face of Disney (that never saw again) but turned me into a follower of an specific director for the first time; Tim Burton. And while the toys Hasbro did in the 90s were pretty much my favorite ones and i took them with me averywhere, it wasnt until NECA release they action figures series that i found the ultimate version of the characters in plastic form.

But long before NECA and while Hasbro was doing his thing, in Japan there was this company called Jun Planing that released the first figures of the movie in that part of the world. For the longest time i hear theyr figures are the best ones yet based on the work of Tim Burton and i must admit, theyr Corpse Bride figures looks beyond perfection but i was never able to afford theyr products, specially since now they are deffinetly discontinued.

In the end i take a chance and got The Mayor from theyr 1/6 scale figures. Aside of the box being damn pretty, this is in scale with Hot Toys, Sideshow, ThreeZero, Asmus, Mondo and other premium high quality brands and just like them, this Mayor have real fabric clothes. And just for reference, The Mayor is a small guy that reaches the chest of a standar human being or the belly of a Predator but his hat is HUGE and goes beyond the 8´ mark. 

For startetes, he cna stand on his own perfectly and thats a HUGE plsu given how small are his feet and his round shape, this gigure shows an impresive balance and i think this is the very first time i see a figure of The Mayor standing on his own. He is articulated on his neck of course, but also the shoulders, elbows and the left wrists and thats it. Honestly with this character design is pretty difficult to articulate him since any articulation on the legs would destroy his balance soo this is the maximum movement one can get in this guy.

I am not sure how the shoulders are articulated, i think they are ball jointed since they open very nicelly but the jacket make the arms be back at the starting point soo i got the feeling the shoulders articulations are kind of delicate. The elbows have a one direction joint and botht the head a wrists can rotate.

The sculpt is really magnifiscent, the texture on the hat is on point with the one on screen and the shape on the face and huge mouth size and eyes are also perfectly sculpted as well as each one of the big teeth. Really, this character is extra cartoony but not always they manage to sculpt the rigth proportions....just like Diamond Sleect did. The hands are funny looking and the spider bow tie and the ribbon on his chest looks terrific!!

His pants have a pretty good fabric texture as well while the shoes are simple, sculpted, but still just plain black. The pants are grey with light gray lines and both the red onf the ribbon with MAYOR written inside as the spider on his neck are perfectly painted and stand out a lot. The color of his arms is consistent with the color of his happy face and he have red fingernails.

Each teeth have a black line to divide them and the soft punk gums as well as the spiral aya are perfectly painted. The other face with the white skin and blue lips and fangs and bulging eyes is soo good looking i am not sure wich one display.

The jacket tailoring is really high quality, specially on the tiny and perfect buttons in front and the neck build. The fabric is thin and is made with velvet wich makes it feel really elegant but i am afraid it will be a dust magnet. The sleeves are kinda lose but that soo they dosnt limit the arms articulations and the end part of the sleves have a wire to open them or wrap them around his wrists. Its seems the jacket could be removed but the ribbon keept it in place.

He has no accesorys aside of his megaphone. The design and color of the item is very simple but effective and have an extra hand attached to it soo the left hand must be removed to swap it with the megaphone hand. Tough the shoulder articulation is not strong enough to keep the megaphone up and sometimes this item make The Mayor lose his balance.

While the figure is really huge, is completelly hollow soo it makes me anxious to consider how resistant that spheric body and hat coud be is he lose balance tough the fact is soo light deffinetly help the figure.

Overall, i always considered the NECA mayor as the ultimate figure of the character and while that one have a toon of accesorys, this one is much better on every possible level and thats quiet impresive considering this is a 1998 figure. This is the closest i can get to own an actual replica of a puppet from the movie.

This collection is not that big tough, aside of this guy theres Jack, Sally, Ooogie Boogie, Dr Flinckenstein and Lock, Shock and Barrel and while i like Jack and Sally, i seen them hundreds of times already but i am very excited to get Lock, Shock and Barrel.