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VMF or Variable Motion Figures is Yamato's large scale, posable action figure line. The line based its rosters on Female Anime characters from different Anime series. The VMF focuses on good sculpt and articulation. It's also 1/7th scale, making it a unique toy line.
I will review today, VMF Motoko Kusanagi, a character from Ghost in the Shell.
Review
I will review Motoko in three categories:
- Sculpt (Form and Color)
- Articulation (Movable Parts and how can it be moved)
- Fun Factor (How did I enjoy it -- and any other stuff)
Sculpt
Motoko Kusanagi is depicted in her Ghost In the Shell: Stand Alone Complex costume (season 1). It is a pink legless, tubed-topped leotard with matching thigh-high stockings, combat boots and shin-guards. She completes the ensemble with a pink loose belt on her waist and a blue leather jacket with the sleeves folded three-fourths on the arm. Her hands are covered in fingerless gloves.
The parts are made of PVC plastic, with the belt and the jacket as separate parts. The sculpt of the toy is just amazing, flesh muscle parts are well sculpted as well as the parts that depicts clothes. The look of the characters in terms of clothes and details are well represented, though I did notice a difference, in the anime, Motoko should have her belt snugly fitting her waist as opposed to the toy's loose hip clinging belt. The loose hip-clinging belt does have its own charm and is not really a distraction from the beauty of the toy.
Motoko Kusanagi's most distinguishing physical feature in SAC is her voluptuous figure with full hips and heaving bosoms, you'd say she's pretty well built. In fact, she is... 90% of Motoko Kusanagi's body is Cybernetic which means she's a full product of science. Though her body is not just for show, her cybernetic body is one of the most advanced at the time, superior in strength and durability compared to other models, add that to Motoko's impressive fighting skills and high level hacking skills makes her one of the most dangerous individuals in the whole Ghost in the Shell universe. The sculpt doesn't disappoint. Her hips are sculpted to be full and her bosoms hers sculpted to heave. But not just that her arms and legs are sculpted quite nicely with muscle tone in the right places to invoke Motoko Kusanagi's true tough-well-built-chick look. The sculpt of the hair also follows, resembling Motoko's trademarked hairstyle.
Motoko's leotard is pink along with her stockings, with a hint of blue for the straps of the shin guards and her boots. Her gloves are painted dark blue, almost black and her leather jacket is painted matte dark blue. The color of the sleeves and the jacket actually differs slightly since the "vest" was painted with a powdery coat that is easily scratched. Her body is painted flesh and the material seems to gloss when hit by light in the right angle, Her hair is colored blue and her eyes are painted red-violet. Though the face was painted quite perfectly, something about her facial expression gets to me. She doesn't have that confident look that Motoko Kusanagi shows in GITS: SAC, in fact she looks lifeless and placid. There is also some lines painted on her face, right above the eye and below the eyebrows which I can't figure out what its for... either it’s a fake eyebrow or an eye-lid drawn wrong. In the pictures you won't notice them, but close-up the line just pops out. The placid look may work for me, but that "make-up line" thing doesn't.
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However, one thing I found quite nice is on her nape is her Cybernetic ports (a group of six slots located typically on the nape of a Cybourg, which is used to attach networking cables for use on hacking or accessing computers using one's cyberbrain). The ports are painted orange and not that noticeable on the figure, but getting closer and it pops right up, a very nice detail.
Motoko also has another feature, using interchangeable parts; you can have her appear without the leather jacket.
Motoko is around 9 inches tall, towering over almost any other toy.
Articulation
VMF, from the name of the line, suggestions posability in their toys and VMF does this... well to an extent.
VMF Motoko has 20 points of articulation with double jointed knees, hip ball-joints, ankle joints, thigh cuts, elbow joints, wrist joints, ball-jointed shoulders, neck joint and a torso joint. An issue arising with posable figures is some people tend to be put-off with the joints showing, which is indeed something that subtracts points from a figure's overall score, though I do understand that some figure to ensure they are posable a few shown joints couldn't be avoided... Motoko has four very exposed joints, her shoulders and hips are ball-joints but the shaft in which the ball is attached in is quite long and more often than not the shaft is visible, though when wearing the jacket, her shoulder joints are hidden, but the jacket impedes posability quite a lot.
Though I did understand that showing joints are necessary sometimes, what came next totally caught me off-guard. The way the ball-joints are assembled leaves some parts of the actual ball-joint exposed, which when posing the toy causes the ball to POP-OFF. Though the parts could be simply re-attached, some poses are near impossible using the VMF Motoko since posing them in a certain way causes the parts to come-off. Though they do come-off, its far more tolerable than the Fraulein Revoltechs' attempts on making all their figures into Venus De Milo (sorry Kaiyodo ^^; ). You can still do a lot of poses for the VMF, but you need to understand the limitation of the joints, an upshot to this design (as I have figured out) is it prevents joints from breaking or being snapped off, since any amount of excessive force or stress caused by posing causes the ball to pop-off preventing strain on the shaft.
Fun Factor
One of VMF's core features is the toys includes some interchangeable parts, which is a bit of a let down since her only "interchangeable parts" are another pair of arms to depict Motoko without her leather jacket. Attaching this piece to the figure is actually simple, simply remove both arms from the shoulders and remove the forearms from the "jacketed" arm (also remove the jacket -- which now became a vest), attach the new arms to the forearms and attach the arms to the shoulders and viola... she is skimpier!
Also included in this pack, are two weapons. A Seburo M5 and a Seburo MN-23. The M5 is the frequently used side-arm of Motoko Kusanagi, while the MN-23 is a bull pup design sub machine gun that is frequently used by Motoko and Section 9 during combat operations.
The First weapon is the M5. The second is the MN-23.
Also included is a stand with a peg that connects to Motoko's boot. Aside from being something just to stand on, the stand does little for me. First of, Motoko has no problems standing up and doing simple stand poses, which means for standing the base isn't that important. Second, the stand uses a peg to connect to Motoko's feet, but she has ball-joint ankles, which is useless on keeping balanced when posing her in a dynamic pose. It wasn't until I figured trying to do this specific pose that I found use for the translucent stand.
I wished they released Motoko Kusanagi with her trademark visor just to complete the look.
Also, I would like to point out one specific detail about this toy. The VMF figures costs around ¥7800 ($71); I got mine for 3,350 php. That is a costly sum for a figure this size. In fact she costs more than what I paid for any of my Leaderclass Optimus Primes.
Overall
Nice sculpt, a bit disappointing on the face.
Okay articulation, exposed, easily popping-off joints.
Few accessories, an unneeded stand.
Costly price.
Rating: A-
Err... wait... I think right now you're asking yourselves, why did I score it an "A" (though a MINUS at that) when all my comments seems to indicate that it wasn't a great toy?
Well let me answer you with this argument.
Though arguably, the VMF Motoko could have used a lot of improvements to make it perfect. But Out-of-the-box, it has enough features to make anybody who buys it contented. Sure, it's pricey, but the sculpt of the figure (sans the blank-face), is quite impressive and there is good posability after all, though lacking in accessories she has enough for what she really needs and considering this toy is marketed for PVC collectors, the price becomes bearable. Also this is the kind of figure you'd buy ONLY if you are interested in her as a character. There are only a few good posable Motoko Kusanagi figures out there, but she's the only one dressed like this, the look that is the poster image of Motoko Kusanagi for the Stand Alone Complex franchise.
Recommendation:
Buy this only if you are a fan of Motoko Kusanagi and have ($71) to spend. Otherwise let it go.
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Thanks for reading
