Sonic (with Star Spring) (Sonic the Hedgehog (Jakks Pacific)) Review

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Sonic (with Star Spring) (Sonic the Hedgehog (Jakks Pacific)) Review

Sonic (with Star Spring)
Sonic the Hedgehog (Jakks Pacific) (Jakks Pacific)For someone who rarely plays Sonic games, I've been a big fan of the merchandise the franchise has gotten. Hell, I even own a bubble bath bottle (it's amazing what you can find at thrift stores), but the action figures are what I most enjoy. I've grown up with the Toy Island, Jazwares, and Tomy lines, but I got very few of them when they were out. Then we got Jakks Pacific, who has been putting out an expansive and well-made line for a few years now. Rather than cover each wave, since I don't think I've completed any of them, I'll be covering them in batches, starting with the main three heroes: Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles.

Jakks has kept the packaging motif pretty uniform for the line, with the cardbacks featuring a blue background, a yellow ring behind the bubble, and a render of Sonic in the upper left corner. The back of the card gives a brief bio of the character, alongside a cross-sell and showing off where the joints are. Since there's none of the those annoying plastic ties in there, it's easy to remove everything from the tray, but the heads can make it a bit tougher than necessary.

I believe it's easier to sculpt characters when they've already been in 3D, and Sonic has been in three dimensions for years. Jazwares was the first to get the designs perfect in plastic, and Jakks follows suit with a great likeness. The head is properly proportioned to the body, and it's a solid chunk of plastic, too. The confident expression fits Sonic's personality, and I would like to note that the face is a separate piece from the rest of the head. The paint on the face and ears is clean, especially for a mass-market figure, though it looks as if the ear paint is fading away.

Sonic stands right at the 4" mark, making him taller than his Jazwares and Tomy predecessors, but it's the scale Jakks likes to work with when it comes to video game characters. Jakks had to take a few liberties with the design to implement proper articulation, with thicker shoulders and legs, and the torso marking being a bit farther from the chin. The marking and shoes have fairly clean edges, and the body as a whole is a slightly dark but bold shade of blue. As for the articulation, Sonic has a swivel head, swivel/hinge shoulders, hips, and knees, and ball-jointed wrists and ankles. The arms are too thin to allow for elbow joints like Jazwares, and there's no torso joint to split up the marking, but the articulation feels much nicer than previous figures, and there's plenty of movement in the legs for deep stances. The arms are preposed to make up for the lack of elbow movement, and they help in dynamic poses.

Much like the Mario line, each figure comes with one accessory, and the wave one Sonic has a Star Spring. There's actually a spring inside, and you can push down on it to make it pop up a teensy bit. A little gimmicky, but it looks great. Jakks has a good strategy of keeping major characters on the shelves through variants; change the expression, hands, and/or accessory. Case in point, Sonic was rereleased in the following wave, with a grinning expression and a snowboard. The variants are a good idea, as it gives collectors more than one version of a character, and newcomers won't feel they're missing out. Out of all the Sonic variants, the only one I got was the wave 14 release with the item box, mainly due to the angry expression and swapped hand gestures.

Next up is his little buddy Tails. Unlike Sonic, his mouth is centered rather than on the side, and the smile is oddly painted red. The cardbacks had the mouth painted black, and it frankly would look nicer. The rest of the head looks nice, with clean paint and sturdy-feeling hairs. He's smaller at 3 1/2", putting him in proper scale with Sonic. As with him, the limbs are a little thicker to make him a little more durable, and he has the same articulation, with the addition of a swivel for his tails. Said joint is important as the tails being up weighs him down and prevents him from standing up, so you'll want to turn them so they support him. The first wave Tails had an item box, but the wave two reissue has the "fast shoe" box. Other than the different accessory, both releases are the same, which is good for those who, like me, missed out on the first release.

Speaking of wave two, it's also the wave that gave us Knuckles. Compared to the other two of Team Sonic, he has much bigger hands and feet, but he's no taller at 4". His expression is much like Sonic's, but with an open mouth. While he's meant to have thicker limbs, the arms and legs here are a bit thicker than necessary, but like the others, that's mainly to add some sturdiness to him. The paint is similar to the others, with good work on the face and chest crescent, but the shoes could be better. He moves the same, but the head can barely move, due to the arms and tail getting in the way of the hair. It's a common issue with Knuckles figures, I believe, and the arms and legs at least pose well. He comes packed with a green Chaos Emerald, which I believe is supposed to represent the Master Emerald, something far too big to fit in a bubble with this figure.

The Jakks Sonic line has become one of my favorite toy lines, and by now, it shouldn't be hard to see why. The figures look great, feel durable, and are well-priced at $10 a piece, on top of a wide selection of characters. If you're a newcomer to this line, it's pretty easy to jump in, but keep in mind if you're searching for these at Target and Walmart, you're likely to find nothing but Sonics, so I'd advise looking through other toy retailers, or going online, to get the other necessary characters.

- 1/4/25