McFarlane Toys No-Body 1997

I mentioned in my review of Crutch that he was part of a very odd wave. Well, if you doubted me before in my description of the Hawaiian-shirt wearing, pirate welder owner of a pet rat and user of weed whackers for crutches that the line really was that odd, let me introduce you to one of his wave-mates, No-Body. This guy, in some ways, makes Crutch look absolutely normal with no issues at all.

It's hard to argue that the idea of No-Body isn't based in at least part on the classic Ninja Turtles villain, Krang. Unfortunately, that design was taken, and McFarlane Toys had an unusual aversion to being sued (seriously, the guy spends more time in court than at home, so his unwillingness to commit copyright infringement is a little odd) so they took random bits around the toy shop and glued them together to make No-Body's.. uhm.. body.

Now, to be fair, I don't really know for sure that this is what they did, but it certainly does look that way. The body just makes no sense whatsoever. Sure, there are arms and legs as well as some kind of trash can for a head, but your eyes just don't know what to make of it. It violates what we normally think of for a body, so it just confuses us with all of the random details blurring together. That really isn't the biggest sin of this figure, however.

No, the biggest sin is that there is a mutant type brain that sits inside this figure, but will spend 99% of its time being hidden behind the giant, red grate that keeps anyone from even knowing that it's there. Seriously, once you pop the brain into the opening, close the grate, and place this figure on the shelf, you're going to forget the brain is even there.

As if that wasn't bad enough, this figure also had a tendency to fall apart inside the package. Yes, there are mint on card collectors (the ones that don't open their packages) with various parts of their figure hanging off. This, for the record, is typically frowned upon in the collector community. Once you open the package, (and I was fortunate enough to receive one from BigBadToyStore that hadn't fallen apart), you're going to immediately notice why the figure falls apart. The ball joints on the shoulders are absolutely hideous. I mean, they are so floppy they are essentially non-functional. Sure, the arms have great movement!! Well, as long as you don't want them to actually stay there, that is.

He has a gun that plugs into the top of his head, although it doesn't plug in very well. There is also a flexible tube that runs around his body and does a fantastic job of getting in the way of rotating the head (which, technically, can rotate 360 degrees).. when the antenna isn't getting in the way, that is.

On the plus side, his legs are thick and steady and manage to not be completely broken, so that is a plus. Also, uhm.. he has colors? There's almost no paint whatsoever, and what is there is sloppily done, but it is actually colorful. I guess that's a plus. Also, he maintains a great, leisurely sitting pose that is actually pretty hilarious. If I had an in-scale tie and coffee mug, he would absolutely be my office worker drone on the shelf. I've included pictures so you could see what I mean. :)

It might sound like I don't love this figure, and that's mainly because I really, really kind of don't. McFarlane Toys is always such an interesting company, however, where one figure can be totally amazing and release next to another figure that is just a new bar for the definition of crap. This figure is too weird to really fit in on the shelf, too fragile to play with, and too tall to look good among other early McFarlane figures. He's really pretty darned useless.

If I paid more than $3 for this guy, I would have been really disappointed. As it is, I don't really feel ripped off and I have another figure to fill my 90's toy collection obsession, but I really would not recommend this guy to anyone. Where Crutch had a unique presence that justified his existence, No-Body just fails on pretty much every count. If you want an historical representation of a crappy toy, this is a great one to go to. Otherwise, stay far, far away.

But Crutch is still totally awesome in all his oddness.