DC Direct Blackest Night Green Lantern Hal Jordan

At the end of 2010, freshly back into reading comics and just a few months into authoring this blog, I read Blackest Night and got into Green Lantern like never before. I had soon collected several of the DC Direct Blackest Night figures, keeping them on card until liquidating them in 2018 as I downsized my collection. While I don't necessarily regret this, I did surprise myself when purchasing the Blackest Night Hal Jordan figure loose on eBay recently. The carded sample picture above is the Hal Jordan I sold off in 2018, one of the Blackest Night figures I most wanted to open, and am really happy to have found a loose, affordable sample in great condition.

Blackest Night: Green Lantern and Blackest Night (DC Comics, 2009-2010)

The sculpts on these DC Direct Blackest Night figures were extraordinary, and Hal was no exception. DC Direct rebranded as DC Collectibles just over a year after producing these figures and the subsequent Brightest Day Series figures, eventually adding more points of articulation in attempt to compete with other lines of figures in a rapidly expanding market. It's true that I'm nostalgic for this era of figures because I was just getting into collecting as an adult, there's little doubt that the hobby was climbing in popularity while the quality of figures was improving dramatically. The quality lantern accessories and bases included with the Blackest Night figures made them truly special!

I've said many times on this blog during my years collecting DC Direct figures, that what they lacked in articulation was more than made up for in aesthetic. I was also a huge DC Universe Classics fan at the time, but I do love the uninterrupted torso sculpt on Hal. The knees and elbows on this figure don't even achieve a 45 degree bend, but he does have swivels at his wrists, above the biceps and at his boot tops.

Below, Blackest Night Hal Jordan with my DC Collectibles New 52 Justice League Hal Jordan and Simon Baz. Not much had changed yet in regard to articulation with these two figures, who in fact have a little less without boot top swivels- gone are the figure bases we got with DC Direct just a year or two before.

Below, Hal Jordan with DC Direct Green Lanterns Soranik Natu, Sinestro, and Guy Gardner. These Series 5 Green Lantern figures dropped about a year after Blackest Night Hal, and sport a metallic green that just blew me away at the time. Everyone was into Green Lantern then, the books and figures coming out with fanfare not seen before, culminating with the oft bemoaned Green Lantern film. While the movie was kind of a letdown, I did continue to read Green Lantern into DC's New 52 relaunch, thrilled by Sinestro's reinstatement into the Green Lantern Corps! Visit Joe Acevedo's DC Direct Archive online to see all the figures from 1999 to 2012!

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SDTB Clearance Sale Continues: DC Direct Green Lantern Series Figures

More of my collection is up for auction at the Super-DuperToyBox eBay store! If you live in the Continental U.S., now is your chance to make a bid on lots of very cool DC Direct Green Lantern Series figures from my personal collection.  I loved the DC Direct line of action figures, this Green Lantern Series 3 Batman as Green Lantern from the halcyon days of their artistry! Keep an eye on my Instagram as I post images of items for sale in the future!

Another DC Direct figure for sale from my personal collection is this Blackest Night Series 3 Arisia Rrab from 2010. What a beauty! I loved Jeff Johns' 2009-2010 miniseries, and found new interest in his update of the Green Lantern mythos after reading it, even venturing further into the New 52 Green Lantern title in 2011.

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Recent Acquisitions: DC Direct

Just a quickie to show off some recent DC Direct acquisitions here at the Super-DuperToyBox! I was very excited to get hold of the Public Enemies Superman/Batman Series 1  and Public Enemies 2 Superman/Batman Series 3 Supermen pictured above. I'd been hunting on eBay for some time for these at a decent price, and while they usually run for around $35.00 including shipping, I got them for about twenty bucks each. Styled after the work of artist Ed McGuiness, they will compliment the JLA Classified Green Lanterns I scored a couple months ago!

I also found the highly coveted Blackest Night Series 2 Martian Manhunter and Series 4 Wonder Woman Black Lanterns at V-Stock for only ten bucks a pop. I'm a huge fan of this Green Lantern series by DC Direct, and these will go great with my Black Lantern Superman and Nekron!

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Labor Day Weekend Haul

Some finds from around town during Labor Day weekend  :)   More assorted issues of X-Factor, both 80's and 90's team. Buy one, get one free from the dollar comics bins at V-Stock and one 64-page Annual from '89...

... and more graphic novels...

X-Force books 2 & 3, buy one get one free, $5.99, and X-Force: Sex & Violence hardback $11.99. Not the same team as the early 90's, a new version of X-Force was formed in 2007-2008 that had Wolverine leading a more militaristic black ops branch of the X-Men, Cylops delivering the assignments. These are pretty gritty, but the art and story in these art good- I enjoyed the first book, and the second was no disappointment. While on the subject of X-Force, I also found a double-sized 50th issue Special of Cable (Jan. 1998). I have a few issues of Cable from this period- the art is entertaining and I'm a huge fan of the character...

Two UNBELIEVABLE finds:  DC Direct Blackest Night Series 3 Arisia I got for about ten bucks after the sale markdown at V-Stock, and Green Lantern Series Batman as Green Lantern for $14.99 at Slackers! Both of these are hard to find at a reasonable price, going for upwards of sixty dollars or more on the secondary market. I have been obsessed over the Batman as Green Lantern for awhile, never having seen him in the wild until Saturday. So great!

Finding any of the last two or so waves of Marvel Universe around here has been a challenge! I found Psylocke about three months ago, and have been waiting to find Jubilee and Blastaar among others, but no dice until I wandered into Jennifer here at Wal-Mart. I love She-Hulk and was thrilled when she made the Hasbro 3 3/4" roster- awesome! That included "collectible comic shot" was a cheapass move though, Hasbro- where's my figure base?? They cost more now as well, which makes it additionally insulting *sigh* At any rate, I was happy to find her- she was the cherry on top of an already good three-day weekend  :)

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DC Direct Series 7 Black Lantern Superman

Since we looked at DC Direct Nekron in my last action figure post, we'll now have a look at Series 7 Black Lantern Superman. There was already a Black Lantern Superman in this line, the more zombified Earth 2 Superman who was killed by injuries sustained while fighting Superboy-Prime in Infinite Crisis. While he didn't do much in Geoff John's Blackest Night, I prefer this slicker interpretation of Earth-One Kal-El.

Nekron is revealed as the power behind the resurrection of the fallen heroes, creating sleeper agents to be later called forth in service in the War of Light. The Lord of the Unliving seemingly reanimates Batman as a Black Lantern, creating emotional tethers between Nekron and the resurrected. With the connection in place, more Black Lantern rings are forged, taking over many of the Earth's greatest heroes... including Superman.

Again, this is DC Direct so articulation is limited  to bicep joints,  a cut joint at the boot tops & wrists, ball/socket shoulders, hinge elbows & knees, a ball-jointed head, and T-hips. This is a great sculpt that I'd love to see done in regular or New 52/Jim Lee deco. Yes, the body is mostly smooth, but the insignia and silver bands leading into the cape and shoulders are sculpted in. He's just so... sleek!  Yo Go Re over at OAFE.Net claimed his had center of gravity problems involving his stance & the weight of his cape, and while I've experienced this with other caped DC Direct figures, I had no such issues with mine. Positioning the left foot back just a bit from the right should alleviate this if you are having a hard time balancing him.

Mine has a little paint slop around the corner of the mouth and right eye- not a deal breaker though. More glaring is how the pin striping down the front of his left leg doesn't match up at the abdomen- not sure what went wrong there. He still looks killer though, and with the 20% off sale at Comic Headquarters, I got him for about $15.00- pretty good for a DC Direct. I really wanted to get this Superman and the Series 4 Black Lantern Wonder Woman after they came out, but they wasn't in the budget; she goes for $60. + on eBay now, but this Superman you can get pretty inexpensively if you are willing to pay the shipping (I was not).

The Blackest Night series by DC Direct was a huge success, and I bought several after reading  Blackest Night and Blackest Night: Green Lantern- both mandatory Green Lantern reading in my novice opinion. It's funny that I opened these last two Blackest Night figures I bought recently, but unceremoniously stowed away the others I ordered well over a year ago  :D   I should open all the rest- they really look cool! Pictured below: Series 7 Black Lantern Superman with Series 5 Nekron... what a wicked pair!

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DC Direct Series 5 Nekron

Funny thing, I haven't opened any of the several DC Direct Blackest Night figures I bought over a year ago, yet I'm opening this bitchin' Series 5 Nekron I scored for cheap a month ago   :D   I've said before, I appreciate the action figure as art, and Nekron here is most certainly the Albrecht Dürer of the form, adorned with the kind of detail that makes other action figures really look like toys.

The packaging on these is collector grade and difficult to open- a knife is required. MOC collectors probably preferred the durability of these to the easily creased card back It was interesting to see DC Direct go back to the card back/blister packaging with the new Series 4 and 5 Green Lantern figures, certainly the less expensive option.

Of additional note: there was some sort of rusty stain inside the plastic, which can be seen to the right of the packaged figure above. I'm unsure how the metal chain attached to Nekron's arm was painted/decorated, but it looks like a real rusty chain- I have to assume this somehow migrated to the inside of the package, and have read/heard multiple reports on this, some claiming the entire front covered with this stain. It's of little consequence to the figure's deco, the character having such a weathered appearance and the rust color integrated into his colors scheme elsewhere on the figure. Kinda creepy though, huh? What if it was powdery DEATH delivered from the Lord of the Unliving himself, scores of unsuspecting nerds droppin' like members of Howard Carter's excavation team??!  Hey, if you croak unexpectedly after picking one up, don't say I didn't warn ya  :D

So much greatness in one figure... where to begin?!  First the negative- he's hopelessly out of scale. While I'm a cherry-picker that has never finished a BAF in his life, Mattel recently offered a great C&C Nekron in proper scale, but with NO SCYTHE. Fail! Mattel has been skipping on accessories a lot lately, and really blew it there! One of the great things about the DCD Nekron is the accessory that's tantamount to the character. I mean, c'mon... he's basically the Grim Reaper; he must have a scythe.

And the detail put into this accessory is perhaps the best I've ever seen, from the wood grain in the handle to the dark metallic shade of the blade's paint app... just, WOW! I mean, just look at it...

Nekron's grisly open chest cavity has a high gloss sheen, realistically simulating the wetness of exposed organs. Awesomely macabre  :D  This figure is full of minutia like this, from his silver eyes to the rusty chains, making him so painterly next to the pictures I've seen of the flat, plasticky Mattel version. The drybrushing on Nekron's hide give him a zombie pallor that would make Eddie the Head jealous, and the sculpted Black Lantern Corps symbol was painstakingly sculpted onto the cranium. Look at his teeth! Nekron's pitted, rusty belt was sculpted and painted to match his metal cuff and collar, adding to the great unity in this deco. 

Nekron's impressive sculpt continues onto his exposed vertebrae in back and down the folds of charred robe. Throughout the figure, a worn texture makes Nekron look like he walked right out of the comics! He certainly has to be one of the most artful action figures I own. Like the other DC Direct Green Lantern & Blackest Night Series figures, Nekron comes with a corresponding base (his being translucent black with the Black Lantern Corps symbol).

Nekron has simple, but useful articulation: bicep joints, cut joint at the mid thigh & forearm, ball & socket shoulders, single hinge elbows & knees, T-hips, and a ball-jointed head. His scythe is loose in his grip, but easy to hold in a few positions, and will stay put under it's own weight upright in one hand with the end of the handle on the ground.

Like a lot of characters I read about for the first time in Jeff John's Blackest Night, Nekron was new to me. Rediscovering comics in the last 16 months or so, I had the additional handicap/joy of having almost no Green Lantern as a youth. Yes Nekron, the archetype of death, is not some new idea, but it was evil and fun! Ivan Reis' artwork was really great on Blackest Night, as was Doug Mahnke's on Blackest Night: Green Lantern- both mandatory reading in my novice opinion. I hear a lot of negative feedback about John's hubris in hogging the DC Universe to himself, but I don't care- I was entertained  :)

Nekron with Mistress Death, apple of Thanos' eye...

*Read more about Nekron at DC Wikia!

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