They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.. I say it depends on what you imitate.
A few years ago (2015) a little company called Mezco released a line of figures for the Mortal Kombat X. Slightly smaller than a true 1/12 scale figure, Mezco I think did maybe 2 waves before cancelling the project all together. Maybe it was because of poor sales, maybe it was because they wanted to focus on their One:12 line. Either way, collectors were left hanging.. but not before they released a figure of Kitana.
If you've lived under a rock for the past.. what... 25 years or so, Kitana is a character that was introduced in Mortal Kombat II, when things got really interesting story and character wise. She is the Princess of Edenia, the people who live in the alternate dimension known as Outworld, daughter to Queen Sindel and step-daughter to Shao Khan. I've not played the MK games in a while, but I do believe that she's featured in all of the game in one form or another.
Kitana, like all the others in the Mezco series, was released with several hands and weapons, which have been a mainstay of the MK series since I think it was 5. Kitana comes armed with two daggers, which are her folded up fans, and of course, the fans themselves.
For the $20 USD MSRP, I generally don't have too much to complain about. The figure comes with a decent number of accessories, as well as good articulation - neck, shoulders, bicep swivel, wrist, waist, hips, thigh swivel, knee and ankle. You're not going to be able to do anything super extreme, for for a general purpose posing perspective, you're probably going to be OK.
Paint apps themselves are general good - in fact, if I do say so myself for the price and size of this thing, the figure probably punching above it's weight class. Paint apps, even on some of the smaller details, are razor sharp with the only real paint "errors" being some missed paint on her right thigh where they missed a sliver of her blue outfit and some missing paint along the thing black bicep band. Gold paint seems to over applied leading to splotchy finish but at least it's a controlled splotchy wear - makes her look like she's wearing subpar jewelry rather than her hand slipped while doing body paint.
Sculpting is again very impressive. From the overall sculpt to the fine detailing on her outfit, things look great, especially the necklace that she wears. There are some slight flaws when it comes to finishes and assembly gaps. Also, perhaps due to tolerance issues, Kitana tends to drop her weapons. Speaking of weapons, there is some pretty good detailing on the blades of the various pieces.
So if I'm happy and things look good, where am I going with this? Well... I didn't buy Kitana simply because of well sculpted side-boob.
Some of you may remember I bought a little figure released under the One:12 line called Wonder Woman, and I wasn't blown away by it.
As soon as I saw this Kitana figure, I knew it looked kind of familiar.. and now I know why.
My hypothesis is that the reason behind the lacklustre articulation on the Wonder Woman figure is that, quite honestly, I didn't think they tried to. After fiddling around with the two figures, I offer the following findings.
The Mezco One:12 female body, to me, is an upcycled Kitana body, which in itself might be an upcycled product from before. The One:12 body is improved, of course. It's a true 1/12 scale product. The wrist, neck, and ankles are now ball joints, knee joints are slightly reworked, and the hips aren't horrible looking SOTA style balls. Materials used are nicer, and there is more paint work (at least on Wonder Woman as she has exposed skin everywhere).
But the underlying message here is that while range of motion is better on the One:12, it doesn't really offer anything above and beyond that of good old Kitana. In some ways, Kitana actually is better than Wonder Woman. Waist movement is restricted, understandably by Wonder Woman's outfit, but Kitana can actually bring her arms down to the side of her body.
Speaking of arms, strangely enough it appears with the exception of the ball jointed wrists, the arm design is essentially identical.
So overall, if Mezco can claim "over 30 points of articulation" on the One:12 body, it would ring equally true for Kitana. After all, it's points of articulation being marketed, not so much the quality of them.
If my theory is correct, then this upcycling is equivalent to putting a Lambo body kid on a Corolla. It looks prettier, but the underlying perform is that of an economy car. It also goes to explain why articulation feels so limited on the One:12.
If I'm wrong about the upcycling to save money, then it means that the person who designed this "new" female body kind of sucks at their job.
While it's still early in the life cycle of females in the One:12 line, prototype pictures for Captain Marvel haven't exactly given me the sense that this body is going to change for the better. But hey, they are prototypes and there is hope that maybe things will change with Hela, whenever she is finally released.
Otherwise, here's to a line of pretty looking figures that can sort of pose.
