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Monday, February 22, 2021

Mattel Pixar Collection 7" Scale Posable Action Figures—WAVE 2!

The collection continues! Today I'm thrilled to finally have the time to review Mattel's second wave of Pixar 7" action figures. At the start of last year, Mattel began expanding their phenomenal Disney·Pixar 7" scale figure collection (which began in 2019 with Toy Story 4) to other Pixar films—such as Monsters Inc., The Incredibles and Wall·E in the first wave—and now adds some more Incredibles to the line as well as Coco and Brave in this second wave! Onward and Soul characters were also created in this scale last year as well.

I saw these figures in person for the first time clear back in February last year at the 2020 New York Toy Fair (exactly a year ago today actually) and I was looking forward to them even back then. So happy to finally have them in my collection! Their in-store release got delayed quite a bit (some of these are only starting to hit Target stores now), but they've been available on Amazon in this Amazon exclusive closed-box style packaging since last September. Though I prefer the in-store standard open-blister packaging, I wasn't going to wait much longer to try in find them at the store. In the end, I ended up getting all four of these from Amazon for Christmas.

In this wave there are four brand new figures (well technically eight, since several of these are multi-packs): Elastigirl & Jack-Jack from The Incredibles, Miguel & Dante from Coco, Merida from Brave and Dash with Goo Jack-Jack & Monster Jack-Jack from The Incredibles. Take a closer look down below! These retail for $12.99 on Amazon and $9.99 at Target.

ELASTIGIRL & JACK-JACK

While these aren't the most exciting or most unique characters (since there have been several Elastigirl & Jack-Jack figures over the years, even as recently as 2018 with Incredibles 2), this is the first time they've been released in Mattel's signature  7" scale. Honestly though, they're probably my favorite versions of these characters to date and feel they have the most play value in [what I consider] the perfect figure size (easy to grip, pose and display—not to mention their sculpts are spot on). And with Violet coming later this year, we'll have the whole Parr family in this line! (UPDATE: Violet is now available; full blog post HERE)

MIGUEL & DANTE

Again, not the most thrilling (since Mattel just released these characters in 2017 in a smaller, but similar, 5"/6" scale), but I really like the updated designs here and the new larger 7" scale. I would say both sculpts are improvements on the originals and I'm ultimately happy that these characters are part of this assortment. Miguel's look is especially well done—even down to his "dimple, no dimple" smile. My only slight criticism here is I feel the paint job for Miguel's skin leans a little too heavy on the orange. Dante's floppy, rubbery tongue (as it was with the original) is great!

 
MERIDA

Now THIS is an exciting and unique release since this is the first ever action figure of Merida from Brave ever! Sure there have been some smaller scale figures and plenty of dolls, but never anything like this. Even though Brave isn't a top-fave Pixar film for me and Merida isn't a favorite character of mine, I still love having her in this collection. She looks fantastic! Such a solid sculpt—and that hair. She's easy to stand and looks excellent holding her bow accessory. Very impressed!

 
 
DASH, GOO JACK-JACK & MONSTER JACK-JACK


Again, Incredibles figures just hit a few years ago (so I wasn't clamoring for these), but boy do these ones look fantastic. I will honestly say that I do prefer these new Mattel ones over the 2018 Jakks Pacific 4" figures for Incredibles 2. A couple of things I wanted to note: first, they call this "Goo Jack-Jack" here on the box, but I would say this is most certainly inspired by water Jack-Jack (his power as seen briefly HERE in the Auntie Edna short film). Secondly, I do wish they included Jack-Jack's mask on the monster Jack-Jack figure (as seen on the original prototype), but it's not a big issue. Jack-Jack is seen in his monster form without his mask as well, so this does work.

I really, really hope this line continues for a long time—but unfortunately it already seems to be fading. There are some exciting Toy Story characters still slated to come out this year (as well as a fun Monsters Inc. "Getting to Know Boo" gift set, Retro Suit Mr. Incredible, Violet Parr and characters from Pixar's summer 2021 film Luca), but I'm just crossing my fingers that they don't get cancelled like so many things do these days. I would love to see Mattel tackle some A Bug's Life characters again for the first time since 1998 (Flik and Hopper would be amazing to see as modern figures) and some Up characters. It would be interesting to see what Mattel could do with Finding Nemo as well! What I'd really love to see are some unique/side characters and less focus on just the main characters we've seen enough times over the years. Who would YOU like to see made?

Pick these up on Amazon using the links below and be sure to let me know your thoughts down in the comments! Stay tuned for more from my collection right here every week. 
 
UPDATE 6/02/21- Most of these have now finally hit Target stores in the open-blister packaging! 
 


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