NEW PRODUCT: TBLeague - Hell's Messenger Golden/Silver (PL2022-202A / PL2022-202B)

1) 1 * demon form head sculpt
2) 1 * human form head sculpt
3) 1 * TBLeague 1/6 scale female seamless body with metal skeleton
4) 1 * breast armor
5) 1 * hooded cloak
6) 1 * shoulder armor
7) 1 pair * forearm sleeves
8 ) 2 * forearm armor
9) 1 * waist armor
10) 1 * leather mini skirt
11) 1 pair * calf sleeves
12) 2 * knee shin armor
13) 1 pair * boots
14) 3 pairs * interchangeable hands
15) 1 * spear
16) 1 * sword
17) 1 * doll stand

Packaging:
1 product/individual box
GW: 2.63 kg
Measurements: 24.3cm*22cm*38.0cm

4 products/master carton
GW: 11.53 kg
Measurements: 51cm*46.3cm*40.5cm































































#TBL #TBLeague #female #Halloween #fantasy #skulls

Yawn. The only cool thing are the skull heads. The rest just looks cobbled together from previous sets. I’ll keep buying their bodies, but TBL are becoming repetitive.

Eehhh... I like the headsculpt, otherwise I'm not interested.

I agree re negative/repetetive -- and this comes as a relief, actually, given that as I see these this morning, I'm on my way later today to pick up (and pay for) the Ghost Soldier and the Night Warrior that came in at the same time.

I agree also that the skull faces are the only interesting thing, but even there, I'd want to see them in the flesh or lack of it to see how well the impact works. They'd probably look more logical on a clothed/covered body rather than as an anomaly on a bikini babe.

I also note another generic and useless base, where TBL should have learned how much it unnecessarily adds to the Shipping Costs of post-Covid 2022. They should stay away from bases altogether, except maybe where it is some genuinely useful dio component of furniture or statuary. At least (not that it matters to me in this case) they've avoided doing that annoying thing where the color variants come with different accessories.

I'm more interested in TBLeague releasing a new body type at this point, provided it's not another new anime type body.

Yawn indeed. But I gotta say I love the head sculpts. I appreciate the triangular shape, as opposed to the usual round faces, and the relaxed eyes, as opposed to the usual young wide open look.

I also really like the cloaks, since they are fairly neutral and could easily be used for other characters.

I think it's beautiful, and beautifully done, but it's also one more in a long string of sets that look like a cosplay joke and are too cringy even for proper fantasy. They did not provide a clear enough shot for the skull face, and they really need to make those bases optional. But it's all good news for my wallet.

I agree that this set seems rather boring. Still, I like the cloaks, which might fit to a lot of fantasy outfits.

Diana wrote:But I gotta say I love the head sculpts. I appreciate the triangular shape, as opposed to the usual round faces, and the relaxed eyes, as opposed to the usual young wide open look.

The faces are beautiful.

The sculpts are OK, and what there is of the clothing looks nice, but while it's good to be back to (somewhat) more realistic bodies I'm really struggling to find any positives with TBL's full sets now. None of the 'armour' appeals in any way.

The inclusion of the base is made even more redundant by the fact that it looks exactly like the Gethsemoni base, but with a fancy trim and a few skulls sprinkled on it.

Some new (and overdue) base bodies please now, TBL.

GeeWillikers wrote:The inclusion of the base is made even more redundant by the fact that it looks exactly like the Gethsemoni base, but with a fancy trim and a few skulls sprinkled on it.

I'd bet you Dollars to Donuts that this one started out as a "Sideshow Court of the Dead" design, to go with the Kier and Gethsemoni, and then got adjusted and re-branded (de-branded) down to a generic TBL figure after Sideshow transferred the "Court of the Dead" 1/6 license away from TBL to ThreeZero (Malavestros, Demithyle),

Moonbase Alpha Male wrote:

GeeWillikers wrote:The inclusion of the base is made even more redundant by the fact that it looks exactly like the Gethsemoni base, but with a fancy trim and a few skulls sprinkled on it.

I'd bet you Dollars to Donuts that this one started out as a "Sideshow Court of the Dead" design, to go with the Kier and Gethsemoni, and then got adjusted and re-branded (de-branded) down to a generic TBL figure after Sideshow transferred the "Court of the Dead" 1/6 license away from TBL to ThreeZero (Malavestros, Demithyle),

I thought they just wanted to release something for the Halloween season, so they cobbled something together, using/adjusting elements they've already designed to save time.

I like the headsculpts and alternative skull sculpts, and the cloaks. I could definitely find use for all of those items.

The heavy bases make these recent tbleague figures prohibitively expensive, though. :/

Load of bollocks. Nothing we haven't seen on previous figures.

Diana wrote:I thought they just wanted to release something for the Halloween season, so they cobbled something together, using/adjusting elements they've already designed to save time.

I doubt that there would be any "Halloween season" connection to TBL putting together a figure that isn't coming out for probably 9 months at least. The Court of the Dead specificity makes more sense to me given what happened with their license. I suppose we'll never know.

At the rate TBL are currently throwing sets at the wall to see which ones stick, I'd say these will be out in December or January at the latest.

GianToy don't seem to be in any hurry to put them up for PO though, which is unusual.

More bikini warriors.........HoOrAy!

Nothing for me to like here. With the exception of the pauldrons/gorgot, which is quite cool, the armour is fairly boring, and all been done before. The bra looks strikingly similar to a certain witch figure that came out not so long ago. And as moonbase said, the rest looks like Court of the Dead cast offs.
The skull heads could be interesting for something else, but they don't really work with all the exposed skin.
The regular heads are quite ugly imo, and their expressions are blank and boring. The hair colours don't really suit the dark theme of the clothing, either.

My wallet is happy though!

I wish TBL would branch out to other genres, or just stick to releasing more realistic body variations.

TBL seem much more intent on making a fast yen than conceiving an original or even interesting concept at the moment, which (given the grinding of the rumour mill over at BBICN) is vaguely troubling.

I really do want to support them, but I would have thought the quickest and most profitable revenue stream would originate from producing more base bodies and striving to diversify inside that corner of the market, at least in the short term. Their current model of releasing one or even two bloated and mediocre sets every month seems to be losing steam quite quickly, and is only serving to frustrate and overwhelm their customers.

I freely admit I just don't get their current strategy at all.

If they are going to insist on concentrating on full sets, they need to be more considered conceptually, less bloated - at the very least those bases should be optional - and their release dates need to be paced a little less frenetically.

The cataracts in my eyes must be getting worse, because I think they both look great.

Yes, it’s another seemingly endless variation on the same tired theme.  I don’t disagree.  I just feel like these Hell’s Messengers are much more cohesive than previous offerings.  All of the individual costume elements seem to complement each other well, both aesthetically and thematically.   Too many of these sets, especially during the last year or two, look like they were kitbashed from three or four different figures.

The sculpts are beautiful, especially by TB standards.  They’re still a bit on the sweet side for messengers from Hell, but at least they look like they’re present and alert instead of tripping on mushrooms.

Moonbase Alpha Male’s “Sideshow Court of the Dead” theory makes a lot of sense to me, because TBLeague hasn’t shown the ability to design anything this coherent on their own in awhile.  I also agree with him that TBLeague doesn’t seem to be cognizant of how much these semi-useless bases are increasing the final shipped cost to consumers.

I still haven’t purchased any TBLeague figures since the Spartan Commanders, so that probably helps with my perception as well.  I had the Night Warriors on preorder but ended up cancelling them.  My experience with the Plant Controller has really turned me off on 1/6.  $200 to $300 is just too much money not to be completely satisfied with a figure.  I’ve said this before, but I think the value in 1/6 lies in the creativite side of the hobby, and when they were handing out creativity, I was in line waiting for a second serving of ice cream.

Anyway, since I’m in the States, I can negate the extra shipping cost of the bases by buying from Big Bad Toy Store, but as I’ve learned the hard way, I want to see in hand pics before I pony up.  If they closely resemble the promo pics, I may be in for both.

I also thought these were less 'meh' than some of tbleague's other recent offerings, even if not necessarily anything original. The main problem (other than repetitive design complaints) I have with TBL's boxed figures is the unnecessary bases, which makes the costs ridiculously high.

And as for not buying sight-unseen, that's been my modus operandi for 1/6 scale as well --- aside from Hot Toys. Those are about the only ones I feel 'safe' enough to pre-order.

170 USD each at Big Bad Toy Store with $4 flat rate shipping in the US.   Even after sales tax, that’s 185 USD shipped.  The price is certainly right, so it’s looking pretty good for adding these two to my collection.

BTBS is charging a $17 non-refundable deposit on preorders.  That’s the first time I’ve seen that.  They must be getting tired of cancellations and slow moving inventory.

skywalkersaga wrote:And as for not buying sight-unseen, that's been my modus operandi for 1/6 scale as well --- aside from Hot Toys. Those are about the only ones I feel 'safe' enough to pre-order.

I agree. Hot Toys is about as safe as it gets. I do have the Sideshow Exclusive Wonder Woman 1984 on preorder.

If TBL had produced this design and this design alone over the last let's say three or four months, it would be OK. But only OK, because it's still too piecemeal and derivative of some of their other sets. They could very easily have combined the more interesting elements of this figure with their Pompeii Warrior and/or Ghost Soldier and made something altogether more satisfying, and the same goes for combining elements of their recent Spartan Warrior and Amazon Soldier figures. They are certainly spreading their already limited palette far too thinly just for the sake of releasing something - anything - new on a monthly basis.

For me personally though it's as much a case of them oversaturating the market with too fast a release schedule and engendering a sense of fatigue as anything.

Yeah, I don't really understand their reasoning for going about things the way they do.

I think it just sells enough?

Well it's tbleauge, a lot of simple design decisions could have made the figure interesting but that's the way it is. They mostly lack the feel of telling a story with their characters and equipment.

They could have made the skin red, removed the hair, put on some horns instead, make the whole eyeballs shiny black, add Mephisto/Spock eyebrows, have a split tongue sticking out as an option. Make the armor some kind of bone exoskeleton. Don't know.

If I were to pick-up one of these, it would be the silver, because she'd work well with Lady Death and my other horror/fantasy type figures. Bonus points for not having one of those "sad n' pouty" head sculpts. I agree though that if you're going to have a figure called Hell's messenger, she should look a little bit more demonic/ ghoulish/ succubi-esque.