Sentinel comes through again with the triumverate figure from Into the Spiderverse! Spider-Gwen leaps onto our review pages, along with Peter Porker, the Spectacular Spider-Ham!!! Really excited to bring this review to all my readers as this has been a figure I've been waiting on for a hot minute!
Until seeing Into the Spider-Verse for the first time, I didn't know much about Spider-Gwen (also known as Spider-Woman and Ghost Spider). So, her background comes to us courtesy of: Gwen Stacy | Into the Spider-Verse Wiki | Fandom
"Gwendolyn Maxine "Gwen" Stacy was bitten by a radioactive spider managing to gain superhuman abilities she used to become the superheroine know as Spider-Woman. Managing to fight against multiple villains, including Doctor Octopus and Vulture, who individually terrorized her home city. Unfortunately, after failing to save her best friend Peter Parker from his death, a guilt-ridden Gwen decided to distance herself from others.
A couple of years later after these events, Gwen was pulled out of her dimension by Kingpin's Super-Collider into another universe where she would meet and befriend Miles Morales and alternate versions of her best friend. After Miles showed he was ready to be Spider-Man, she along the rest of the Spider-Gang manage to stop Kingpin before he caused irreparable damage to the Multiverse. Sometime after this, Gwen was returned to her home universe by Miles, and she continued with her life as Spider-Woman."
As I mentioned, I'm pretty excited to bring you this review, so let's jump into our first category:
ACCESSORIES: 10/10
The amount of stuff packed with these two figures, (yes, I'm counting Spider-Ham as a figure) is nothing short of incredible. Starting with Spider-Ham we get: two sets of legs/feet, one hammer holding arm, a pair of arms for holding his camera, a pair of straight arms, and a pair of bent arms for "hands on hips" poses. His tail detaches and can plug into both sets of legs. He has a web thwipping arm, a camera, and two interchangeable heads. That's a lot of stuff for essentially a bonus statue! Gwen comes with two different masked head sculpts, a removable hood, a pulled down hood attachment, two unmasked head sculpts with different facial expressions, two detachable hair pieces that can be interchanged on the unmasked head sculpts, six pairs of hands: fists, web swinging, thwipping (with webs attached), wall crawling, fingers splayed open, and relaxed. One cell phone holding hand, a cell phone, a webline for swinging, a civilian torso and skirt, that the lower torso and legs can attach to. Sadly, the arms don't move and the uncostumed Gwen is referred to as a statue in the instruction booklet. Additionally, she comes with the standard Sentinel flight stand, which also has a small support for Spider-Ham. The sheer number of accessories really helps to accentuate great dynamic poses for photographers! As you all know, from my previous reviews, I have been very impressed with Sentinel's Into the Spider-Verse figures and everything included, Spider-Gwen carries on that outstanding tradition.
APPEARANCE: 9.5/10
Honestly, my only complaint at all about this figure is the bow-legged thigh gap she has due to the design. Sure, you can bring her legs fairly close together, but the hips are wide enough (designed to accommodate the leg pegs) that there's still a noticeable gap. Otherwise, both of these characters are absolutely perfect in matching their on-screen appearances! The paint apps on Gwen's unmasked head and hair are incredibly well detailed, with such subtle differences as the slight "side eye" on one sculpt and the shy smile on the other. Even the eyebrow piercing is painted on both sculpts, staying true to the character's animated design. Her changeable hair sculpts are also done quite well, with the longer hair and the shorter, spikey design which shows more of the shaved side of her head. The paint giving her that dirty blonde look, with darker roots at the part is exceptional and conveys both aspects of Ms. Stacy's personality and iconic look. Even the statue portion, dressed in her school outfit is rendered nicely. There is no paint slop anywhere and all of the lines across both her outfits are crisp and clean. In costume, her two masked heads are simple and elegant. I am a big fan of the pearlescent white used for her costume as it gives a certain very ethereal appearance (hence the "Ghost Spider" moniker.) The eyes on both masked heads are applied cleanly and the squinting look really makes for an excellent counterpart to Miles' curious expression mask design. Sentinel absolutely crushed it with the look for Spider-Gwen. The comical appearance of Spider-Ham caught me off guard in the film and made for some of the most enjoyable scenes as far as I'm concerned. Sentinel took this likeable little guy and turned him into a great looking three-dimensional figure. I've got the Marvel Legends Gwen/Spider-Ham and while that one is nice; this version is light years better. The fact that he has so many swappable parts helps give a more dynamic look to an already neat looking character. Both facial expressions are perfect examples of the character and the paint on every piece that comes with him is very cleanly applied. Even his camera and hammer have variations on color on each. There are no solid bits of plastic, but instead thought and care put into the look, to give us an awesome screen accurate figure.
ARTICULATION: 9/10
Sentinel has a great history of incredible articulation engineering and Spider-Gwen features a lot of good, but I do have a few small concerns. Before getting to her, let's get Spider-Ham out of the way. Naturally, his design is by nature, limited. Both head sculpts sit on a ball and can look up and down, and turn side to side. The torso for the different legs plugs into a ball and socket, which allows you to turn his waist. The tail plugs into a socket and can rotate, though it really doesn't make much difference. All of the arms plug in using a ball/socket feature and can rotate 360 degrees. Personally, I prefer displaying him with the splayed legs, action stance as I can get him to balance better and stay upright. Surprisingly, for such a little figure, he's got a lot of decent mobility. As for Gwen... even with the detachable hood on, her head movement is very solid. She can look up and down, turn side to side and tilt her head. The neck is also on a joint, which increases her head movement range. The shoulders are designed to raise her arms out to a solid T pose, but not much beyond that, simply because of the sculpt for the ball/socket design. Her biceps rotate easily and her elbows bend all the way in. The only real problem I have with Sentinel is that the hands are on pegs, which ONLY allow for rotation at the wrists. There is no hinge for up/down movement. Her torso features both upper and lower joints, allowing Spider-Gwen to get into deep crunches, arch way back and tilt quite deeply, side to side. The torso joints also allow for rotation, giving her greater flexibility. Her legs will split fully, can kick forward almost straight up, have limited rotation at the socket in her hip and have double jointed knees which bend fully in, bringing her foot to her back. Her ankles hinge up and down very well and rotate on their pegs easily. Her toe joints are sturdy, and on mine actually take a bit of effort to bend. If the civilian clothed portion had moveable arms and the wrists hinged, I'd likely have given this a perfect 10.
AFFORDABILITY: 7/10
Sentinel, as with other imports, do not make inexpensive figures. This figure is available online at stores like BBTS for $169.99, making it a pricey edition to any collection. The quality of the product and the number of extras you are getting, though, do justify the price and make it a worthwhile purchase for fans and collectors alike.
Overall, as with both the Miles Morales and Peter B. Parker figures, Sentinel's Spider-Gwen strikes just the right chord for me. I really enjoy having this figure and completing the trio of heroes, plus the addition of Spider-Ham is a neat bonus. After all is said and done, I'm very excited to give the Sentinel SV Action: Into the Spider-Verse Spider-Gwen a solid:
9.5 out of 10 ToyBoxes
Thank you, as always, for your support of Dan's ToyBox. Make sure to check back over the next several days as we've got a number of new reviews coming. Until next time... GEEK OUT!!!