As with most of the Batman Forever McFarlane line, this Riddler figure is a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand, it is super posable which is great because it means you can put the figure in pretty much every one of those crazy poses Jim Carrey did for the promotional photoshoots for the film.
But super poseable also means you need to have tons of joins. And joins are difficult to paint over. So there are large sections (down the side of the legs, the shoulders, the kneecaps) where the questions marks just stop.
I think McFarlane could have solved this somewhat by having a few less questions marks. That would have made these gaps seem less obvious. But anyway, it is what it is.
The face is decent but nothing to write home about. Again, everything after the Uma Thurman Poison Ivy figure feels like a tiny step down.
I still mostly recommend this figure. It's great to have it in my collection but I am more excited for that Beast Kingdom figure that is hopefully coming out later in the year.
Also excited to say we are getting an extra figure to this line that was recently announced - a white suit Riddler that looks to have a completely new head sculpt. Hopefully this will be out in time for the 30th anniversary this Summer.
So now we come to my favourite figure of the McFarlane Batman Forever line - Two Face.
Although it's not a perfect likeness to Tommy Lee Jones it's got a great expressive face and I love that they've done the coin flipping in his hand.
The costume is well captured. Sure there's a couple of bits of silver paint missing but they aren't huge. It will only take me a few minutes with a chrome pen to put the three metal bits on the glove and a steel toe cap on the right shoe.
The only real blunder is that the figures has no guns! I believe that this is a recent edict by DC Comics that action figures based on their characters (even those ones made for adult collectors) should not have any guns. As a result you're going to have to find your own weapons for this figure.
My suggestion however is to make a tiny newspaper to put in his hand. Here's the link to the jpeg / pdf.
I don't want to write a typical obituary. Obituaries are always so cold and clinical. Reducing someone life to a handful of clipped sentences and a small photo. Saying nothing but vague niceties about the deceased. Things that the author never expressed when the person was alive.
If you just want to read a brief summary of Val Kilmer's life it's probably best to look elsewhere - I'm sure wikipedia is mostly correct. All the major newspapers will have a concise obituaries that covers all his highs and lows. Better yet, just go and watch the documentary from a few years back that Kilmer himself made, titled Val (2021). It covers his career in a very eloquent way and goes into some personal life stuff that I'm going to avoid.
Instead I'm going to waffle (can't think of a better word) for a few paragraphs about what Val meant to me. Val was an actor whose life was split into four parts. Rising fame. Declining fame. Ill health. And recovery.
He trained at the New York's famed Juilliard School in the early 1980s and bar a handful of off-Broadway theatre performances and one After School TV special (with a young Michelle Pfeiffer) managed to instantly get cast in a big screen movie role.
The film was Top Secret, an eclectic spoof movie that mostly took aim at 1950s Elvis movies and World War II movies. It speaks volumes to Val's talent that he managed to snag the lead role at such a young age. The part required not only acting but also comedic chops and singing ability. The film itself is very funny in places but it didn't quite have the hit rate of the directors' earlier film Airplane! Val really committed to the role though and it's a shame that he only did a handful more comedies after this because he's very funny. Also, of note to Batman Forever fans, he has a handful of scenes with Michael Gough.
His next two films were Real Genius and Top Gun. The former a light-hearted, sometimes surreal comedy about students working at a science and technology university. The latter a pulse-pounding military movie about jet pilots. It's here that I realised what range Val had. The laid back character of Chris Knight in Real Genius is a million miles away from the super intense 'Iceman' in Top Gun. I almost can't believe it's the same actor.
And I think that ability would follow him throughout his career. He always seemed a bit of a restless actor who really wanted to stretch himself with every part he played. Never trying to repeat any of his roles. He would bring something extra to the table when he was cast in a role. Sometimes this would really pay off, like Tombstone, in which he singlehandedly runs away with the film. Other times, it wouldn't pay off, such as his bizarre turn in The Island of Dr Moreau.
Throughout the late 80s and 90s his career would go up and down. Never quite maintaining a running streak. For a while he seemed to avoid anything too commercial. Instead, looking for interesting dramatic roles in films such as Thunderheart and Kill Me Again.
Then in 1994 he was offered the lead role in the third Batman film after Michael Keaton stepped down. It was an offer that he was asked to accept without reading the script. As the story goes he was in a bat cave at the time doing early prep for The Ghost and the Darkness (who knows if this is just one of those cute Hollywood myths). Reading his autobiography - I'm Your Huckleberry - I think he accepted the part mostly as a commercial decision. He was already working on The Saint and saw the two franchises as being nice pay cheques that would allow him the freedom to do more interesting and rewarding indie work.
By his own account, shooting Batman Forever wasn't much fun. Although I think he enjoyed working Jim Carrey, he didn't get on with director Joel Schumacher, reportedly not speaking to him directly for two weeks. He absolutely loathed the rubber costume which he equated to being like an elderly man - you couldn't stand for long, you couldn't hear people very well and you had to get help to go pee.
Some of his character arc was cut from the film due to pacing but what remains in the film is pretty solid. He played Bruce Wayne as a man who is truly haunted by his past and his interactions with other people like Chase and Edward is awkward. His best moments in the film are when he lashes out at Chris O'Donnell's Dick Grayson:-
"So you're willing to take a life? Then it will happen this way: You make the kill. But your pain doesn't die with Harvey, it grows. So you run out into the night to find another face... and another and another... until one terrible morning you wake up and realize... that revenge has become your whole life. And you won't know why."
Due to the fraught relationship with director Joel Schumacher, he was not asked to return for Batman & Robin. He was also working on The Saint, a film reboot of the 60s TV show and long running book series by Leslie Charteris. I always wonder how different Batman & Robin would have been if Val had stayed on. Would he have brought a bit more gravitas to the film like he had to Batman Forever? I certainly feel like the Bruce and Alfred stuff might have been stronger.
Anyway, he went and did The Saint which is a bit underrated in my opinion. It's got some silly bits early on where he puts on a ton of disguises and tries to seduce Elizabeth Shue but it mostly works as an adult orientated thriller. It's strange to think how the Mission: Impossible series ran and ran and this just stopped after one film. Financially it did okay but I guess the enthusiasm wasn't there to go further.
I feel like The Saint was the point where Val's career started tailing off. The big budget lead roles were few and further between and when they did happen like 2000s Red Planet, they didn't perform well. Like a lot of actors he retreated to indie fare and DTV movies, started playing supporting roles rather than the lead. I can't speak for most of these because there's a lot I haven't seen. I did notice he did more than one film with 50 Cent. Two bright spots in the 2000s were Spartan - a thoughtful, wordy thriller from David Mamet that I need to give rewatch soon and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang - a comedic noir thriller from Shane Black that paired him with Robert Downey Jr (Pre-Marvel). Both are well worth checking out.
The other great film from the 2000s is MacGruber where Val gamely played the villain Dieter Von Cunth but I will admit 95% of the best jokes are Will Forte's. It was around this time that Val started doing a one-man theatre show playing the role of Mark Twain. He seemed to get real joy from doing this and continued for many years performing it. I was kind of surprised he didn't turn it into some kind of film but maybe he just enjoyed keeping it a stage experience. Working on it, honing it, giving it to audiences live.
In 2015 he was hospitalized for what turned out to be throat cancer. When he finally remerged in 2017 his appearance had changed dramatically. Now only able to speak by plugging a voice box into his trachea. He returned for a few more film roles but they were mostly brief appearances and his voice was either dubbed by someone else or his character was mute. I always felt conflicted by his appearance in Top Gun: Maverick. On the one hand, it was nice for Tom Cruise to find a role for his character but on the other, killing his character off and having a funeral felt... like pre-emptively acknowledging that he was close to death.
Maybe that's how Val felt too. I wrote his autobiography - a very honest but at times very brief series of scenes of his life. He also made his documentary Val. And he got into painting. He was always throwing up whatever he had recently painted on Twitter. His voice was gone but he was still clearly bursting with creativity. Desperate to express himself.
I saw that he had started doing comic convention appearances. Dutifully signing Bat merchandise and glossy photos. I hope it paid some bills and let him travel. I was kind of hoping he'd come to a convention near me one day.
I want to finish on what Val meant to me as a child. I remember seeing Batman Forever as a kid and thinking this guy was the coolest guy I'd ever seen. Handsome, debonair, able to charm the pants of Nicole Kidman. I remember making a mental note to check out as many of his other films as possible and watching those films led me to three things I still hold dear today.
The Doors - who I was obsessed with during my teenage years and bought every album. I would have never got into them without seeing the film.
The Saint - I own at least 25 novels and have all the old TV shows on DVD. Again, I was first exposed to the character through the film.
Batman - I didn't really care that much about Batman before seeing Batman Forever. But that film, his performance, he made me a lifelong fan of the character.
Like every actor who dies, they aren't really dead. They live on films. I'll definitely be watching some Val this weekend in his memory and I suggest you do the same.
Another different type of video this week - a look back at the temporary Batman Unmasked exhibition that was in Covent Garden in London from September to December 2024 (and also Manchester before that).
I meant to get this edited last year when I actually went to the exhibition as a way to show people what it was like before they went. Unfortunately I ended up not getting around to editing it until this year, after the exhibition had closed. Oops. Oh well I guess at least I didn't spoil all the surprises.
Anyway, hope this is of interest. It was really great to see all these old Schumacher Batman movie costumes and props up close - the actual things that the actors used and wore. You could see all the scuffs and marks on them and paint was visibly peeling off some bits. There was a little bit from all the Batman movies from the last 35 years but the Schumacher stuff was what stuck out. The costumes and props from those two films are so colourful and over the top. It's probably what got me so interested in making props recently.
When you see this stuff up close you realise how important all the camera work and lighting and effects are - because the reality is that lots of this stuff looks kinda cheap when you're eyes are inches from it. It was never built to be poured over like this or last as long as it has.
The exhibition was a little pricey and short for what you got but I'm still glad I went. I appreciate the theatricality that went into it. It certain made it feel a little grander than it actually was.
Bit of a different type of video this week. I've been bitten by the replica prop making bug so I'm looking to start putting together some more.
Batman Forever had such a great collection of imaginative and elaborate props. I don't know which direction to go.
I want some challenging stuff as well as some easy ones. I want the really iconic stuff as well as the super niche stuff. Any suggestions for what to make, let me know.
Here are all the links that I put up in the video:-
I'll hopefully be doing some more of these types of videos where I just talk about stuff rather than constantly showing off toys and figures so let me know if there's a topic you want me to discuss.
Apologies for taking so long to getting around to reviewing this figure. I actually took SO long that news just hit McFarlane will be losing the DC license next year (it's going back to Mattel - read more about that here).
Anyway, on to the figure itself. This is a nice figure. I'm a big fan of the costume in this movie. I love that it takes most of its cues from the Tim Drake comic book suit.
Some stuff they've done well. I love that they've kept the interior of the cape yellow (lots of other toy versions skip over that). The head sculpt is good too. I don't know if it's up there with McFarlane's Poison Ivy but it's a solid representation of Chris O'Donnell. I was quite surprised that this is a completely different head sculpt from the Batman & Robin one.
I love that it comes with extra hands. I don't know why it has hands for grasping things - maybe the makers are expecting us to borrow some of the gadgets like the batarang and grapnel launcher from the Batman figure. But I do enjoy the pointing finger and open palm hand. It means you can give the character a bit more personality when you pose them. These McFarlane figures are so flexible they deserve to be put in good poses.
On to the bad, the colours of the suit are kind of flat and matt. Not the muted metallic tones that the movie version had. That's a shame. I have seen people do good custom paint jobs but I don't know that I have the skill to tackle this one.
All in all, a solid start to the Batman Forever line.
Although it's meant to be exclusive to Target Stores in the US I have my hands of the Spin Master "Retro Collection" Batman Forever Batmobile. I found them being sold on Amazon UK and initially they said it would ship in June! Thankfully that turned out to be false and my order got moved up to the end of January.
It's pretty surreal to see. They really have designed this to be almost indistinguishable from the original Kenner version. There are a number of changes though. It doesn't light up (but it you have some blue LED lights yu can stick them inside) and doesn't fire a missile out the front.
However, the car is much more accurate to the film. It has the headlights, the correct bonnet and the canopy slides forward. The latter is a great update as that always frustrated me about the old Kenner one that just had a hinge.
You do get a bonus figure which is nice but it's not a great representation of the Sonar Suit.
Still for £20 there's very little I can complain about. It would have been nice to get a new mold but I get that these figures are beloved by the 30/40 year old parents who will be buying them for their kids.
In the run up to the release of the Batman & Robin movie, two short books aimed at kids were released alongside Michael Jan Friedman's novelisation - "Batgirl To Dare the Darkness" by Doug Moench and "Robin Facing the Enemy" by Alan Grant. Both of whom were noted comic book writers at the time.
While the Batgirl story is set after the 1997 movie and sees her going up against Black Mask, the Robin novel is set in between the two Schumacher films and sees him finding his feet as Batman sidekick (by going off on his own... again).
It's a short, fun read and I'll do a little video with more of my feelings on it at some point in the future. There's some references to the events of Batman Forever but they aren't huge. It's maybe a stretch to call it a full fledged interquel. More of a solo spin-off.
While the Batgirl novel received a short 30 minute "audio drama" in 1997, the Robin novel didn't receive anything.
Thankfully that has now been corrected by our resident audiobook reader - Drew Griffin (so all thanks to him, not me!) - who has done another great job and brought this story to life. I hope you all enjoy it.
Have a listen to it in the link below. It's two hours of your time and it breezes by:-
I can't tell you how long I've waited to find this pretty rare vehicle set for the Batman Forever toy line. It's the last bit of the Kenner toy line - not counting the role play sets like the Combat Utility Belt - that I needed.
One slipped through my fingers on eBay three years ago and I've only ever seen about 3 or 4 for sale in my whole life. I don't know if they just weren't sold over here in the UK or they came so late in the toy line's shelf life that not many were sold/made.
Anyway, I had one shipped from the US which was expensive but it was definitely worth the cost. Bless the seller, he included a few Batman Returns Statues inside the package as a bonus. I think he thought I was nuts paying so much for shipping.
This is a really clever toy that allows you to recreate all 3 (or 4) vehicles from the film. Kudos to the designers at Kenner for thinking this up.
You just know they knew that kids would "frankenstein" their own crazy vehicles with wings and wheels.
Well, this took everyone by surprise. Toy manufacturer Spin Master has just announced they're releasing Batman Forever figures in January 2025.
The news broke quite strangely over the last few days. There was no big announcement. It all started when people in Malaysia started posting images of a Batman Forever batmobile that was on toy shelves over there. It turns out they were shipped slightly early over there.
The internet became obsessed with finding out answers and eventually the VP of Spin Master did this interview with Screen Rant to explain that 1) yes, these are Spin Master products and 2) they will be on shelves exclusively at Target Stores in the US in January 2025.
No word on if these will go to other territories but I think they will.
Anyway Spin Master have released these promotional images which show Batman, Robin and Two-Face on card as well as the Batmobile (with exclusive Batman figure). The promo poster for the line also shows the Riddler too but no sign of what his card will look like.
As I'm sure you've noticed these are almost identical to the old Kenner figures from back in the day. It looks like Spin Master is reproducing the exact same 5 inch molds with some small tweaks. Two-Face for instance has lost the gun that was fixed in one hand. Robin has the movie accurate Robin symbol now. And they've tried to make Batman closer to his panther suit appearance.
The Batman figure (both the exclusive figure that comes with the Batmobile and the single figure) look like they are based on Blast Cape Batman (without the cape missile accessory).
The Robin figure is based on Hydro Claw Robin (without the scuba backpack).
And Two-Face is based on the original Two-Face (without the cannon and coin he came with).
I could be wrong but all three figures look like they have much more articulation in the shoulder that the original figures so their arms can go out to the side, not just up and down.
The Batmobile looks to be the same as the original Kenner one just without the light up feature and missile at the front. It also has a sliding canopy which is much better that the original where the canopy had a hinge at the front.
All the figures have quite a vibrant colourful look and are different enough that they'll look good alongside the original Kenner ones. I'm a little sad Spin Master didn't create their own sculpts - the 3.75 in figure they did for Batman Returns last year was an outstanding original mold. I also don't know they picked the best Kenner molds. I feel Night Flight Batman was the best match to the Sonar Suit and Skyboard Robin was the better, more accurate Robin figure.
Anyway, I'll definitely be picking these up when I can get them. Let me know if you will be and what you're hoping Spin Master will do next - the VP mentions in the interview that more will be revealed soon!
Once again Drew Griffin has provided us with another audiobook. This it's time it's Tomasz Zaglewski's Neon Knight Forever book that charts the evolution of how Joel Schumacher's Batman duology has been perceived by fans and critics over the last 30 years.
Also if you enjoy this recording, I'm excited to say Tomasz's book is coming out in paperback in June 2025 - just in time for the 30th anniversary of Batman Forever.
Years ago I posted scans of the Merlin Sticker Album for Batman Forever but I realised recently I've never taken the time to just flick through it in a video. So here's a video of me talking about it as I go through page by page.
This sticker album is great to look at. Not only does it have a really colourful, dynamic layout but it also has some super 90s glittery designs.
Most importantly though it's got a ton of "unit stills" - which are photos rather than screengrabs from the film. All major feature films have a dedicated photographer on set who captures high quality stills of the scenes that are filmed as well as the sets and props. Often these are taken during filming or immediately after. As such they give you a unique angle on the film given that they are taken from different perspective - as the photographer will be somewhere other than where the film camera is. Sometimes (and I have been guilty of thinking this) they are mistaken as stills from deleted scenes.
Anyway, there's some great ones in here. Not least the still (to me) mysterious shots of Edward Nygma driving around Claw Island wearing a green hardhat and seemingly opening the building with two red haired assistants either side of him.
Honestly I don't know if I've ever been so excited about a figure before. It sounds crazy but I've seen a lot of Batman, Robin, Two-Face, Riddler, Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson figures.
But this figure from Mars Toys is something pretty rare - an Alfred Pennyworth figure specifically based on Michael Gough. I know Mattel did one a while back and McFarlane are including one with the Forever Batmobile - but they were 6 inch scale this is 1/6 scale and it's exquisitely detailed and furnished.
I can't really fault it. The thing that made me HAVE to buy it is of course the silver tray with the food that Alfred offers Dick when he shows up on his motorcycle. What an amazing touch.
I hope Mars Toys do more - a Kilmer Bruce Wayne? A Chris O'Donnell Robin in leather jacket?
I see they are doing a Two-Face next year but I already got the TruboToyz one. Who knows? I may have to sell that and get the Mars version.
Pleased to say that the 85th Anniversary of the Batman character has meant that Funko have released some new Schumacher movie figures. We've got a white suit Riddler and a cloaked Poison Ivy.
Very surprised they've made these considering they are new sculpts. The last Batman Forever figures they released were some cheaply made, hydro-dipped versions of the original Riddler and Two-Face.
As usual Funko have done a good job at capturing the details. The cane has the little skull on the end, the suit is shiny, the hair is pinky and flipped up. Love it but surely we need a Chris O'Donnell figure. Maybe that will come next year for the 85th Anniversary of the Robin character???
Well, I managed to get out and see Batman Forever at the cinema and it was absolutely brilliant. I always get a little bit of trepidation rewatching the film in case my feelings have shifted but I'm pleased to say it played as well now as it did back in 1995 when I was 11.
It's such a different experience seeing it at the cinema. The surround sound really amplified the Goldenthal score and the clarity and size of the screen meant you could take in all the details and colour.
I've rounded up some of my thoughts in the video below.
But wait, there's more! I've recently struck up a friendship and found myself with a new partner. I'll let him introduce himself...
Hope you enjoyed these videos. If you managed to catch it at one of these one-off revival screenings or just have some cool memories from back in the day, let us know in the comments either here or on the YouTube videos.
