I still can't believe that I preordered the Hot Toys MMS543D33 Iron Man Mk85 Battle Damaged diecast figure back in 2019. It's taken almost three years to arrive, but it's definitely worth the wait!
Click below to watch my review over on the Kool Kollectibles YouTube channel. Make sure to give the video a thumbs up, and subscribe to the channel to stay tuned for all my upcoming videos. More pics and written thoughts below.
I did get the exclusive version from Sideshow, which comes with the holo shield. It has a pretty disappointing flimsy plastic quality to it, but apparently that's to reduce its weight so that the figure's arms can hold it up properly. Either way, I won't be displaying it like that in my cabinet, and it didn't cost any extra, so in the end it's not such a big deal to me.
The other accessories are decent, but I probably won't use many of these either apart from the base and the finger clicking nano gauntlet hand. I tried as many of the light up features as I could be bothered to. It's a pain in the arse getting the panels off and inserting the numerous batteries, so I just tried the helmet and the toros, and gave up on the rest. I don't really like the use of the electronic features in my display. To me, this figure was designed for a single pose, and we all know which one that is.
Once set up in that iconic pose, this figure just looks amazing. The head sculpt I think is fantastic, with a good likeness and the usual Hot Toys amazingly realistic paint application. Swapping it out initially was difficult, but the trick is really to pull the head sculpt down towards the chest and it removes quite easily.
The rest of the figure has some pretty great articulation to allow for the kneeling pose. The shoulder armour seems to be a different design to my other Iron Man figures, and is flexible enough to move out of the way to allow the arms to move freely.
The bicep armour has a nice feature where it can be raised out and up, which then gives more range of motion of the elbow. This allows for a pretty deep bend at the elbow for that finger snapping pose.
The figure looks pretty great from any angle. The battle damage on the armour, particularly from the front, looks decent to me. There were some complaints that the paint app was too flat or not detailed enough, but I think the battle damage comes across quite nicely. The red parts of the armour have a decent transition from shiny red to a more matte finish around the battle damaged areas.
It certainly goes well with the scarring and blood streaks on the head sculpt itself. You could use the detail helmeted head sculpt, but I think most collectors buying this will just use the unhelmeted sculpt.
Getting the figure into the kneeling pose is pretty straight forward. However, the figure does end up resting on the inner knee brace that is just a plastic piece to the side of either knee. I worried that this may bend or crack over time due to the weight. I was also concerned that the paint on the figure would react and be damaged by the paint on the base. This sort of chemical reaction occurred with the previous Hot Toys Robocop figure when it was placed seated in the Robocop chair.
Since I was paranoid about resting the figure on the knee braces, and damage to the paint over time, I decided to use a few small pieces of the black foam from the packaging as cushioning under the knees and ankles. I'm hoping that over time the black foam will prevent any damage to the knees.
Together with some other Iron Man diecast figures, it's clear that the scale was smaller with the earlier figures such as the Mk3. In comparison, the more recent Mk6 fits better in scale with the MK85. But I still love the Mk3, and display it on top of it's Hall of Fame styled base, which gives the illusion of increased height.
Together with the other Endgame figures such as Captain America and Thor, the trio definitely makes for a great centrepiece in the collection. I'll definitely be displaying them like the photo below in my glass cabinet. They're three great figures from perhaps the most iconic movie in the past decade.
I'm glad I've pretty much got all the figures I wanted from Infinity War and Endgame. I'll have to see how the rest of the MCU Phase 4 turns out before I decide on any further Marvel figures. But at least this core trio makes for a perfect MCU core cast for me!