KR|Enmity Review #13: Tor-Qen

Toy prototype details

Name: Tor-Qen^TM

Subtitle: blade-whirling warrior

Line: KR|Enmity

Item type: action figure - Nº 12 in the line.

Character details

Name: Tor-Qen

Real name: Eq-Tor

Classification: mutant human

Sex: male

Home: Tahron

Era: 20 years before Foundation

Affiliation: Dark Legion

Rank: ensign.

Background

First appearance: KR|Enmity #1 - Flares of enmity

Brief bio: an outlier and labourer who showed the mutating effects of the chemical weapons deployed during the Reptonoid domination of O-Kin, Eq-Tor was upgraded to a violent gladiator by Wordron, using vicious bionic body parts of his creation. Renamed Tor-Qen by his friend Labramar, he carried a gigantic chainsaw with shooting toothed wheels, and a spinning drill bit, with which he enjoyed nothing more than fighting in his master's arena and slaying his foes like a fury. Tor-Qen was killed by Tir-Hing during one of such hand-to-hand fights and, eventually, his whirling technology was transferred to the Flail-Fling^TM, a devastating vehicle that became a key tool of the Dark Legion in their fight against the Therioms.

Articulation

Standard, except that the wrists are ball jointed.

Description

Head: he wears a light-green oxidised bronze helmet with a half mask, a number of curved golden spikes bordering the flat skull-cap and a neck guard composed of multiple overlapping bronze lames. A gullwing-shaped glossy purple visor covers the eyes, while the mouth is wide open to form a rectangle (exposing the teeth as a sign of combativeness) and is surrounded by reddish skin

Body: reddish skin, exposed arms and legs

Wearables: a bronze armour with light-green details, two segmented (i.e., made of overlapping bronze plates) bracelets, two segmented bronze boots with diamond-shaped knee guards, a spiked bronze belt and a segmented loincloth made of overlapping light-green oxidised bronze plates (reused from Strictriss). The armour's armholes are edged with curved golden spikes (which are more prominent over the shoulders), while each bracelet displays a round golden cooling vent at the side and each knee guard carries three projecting prongs.

Tor-Qen's stylised armour.

Action feature

By default, instead of hands Tor-Qen sports two giant bronze "motorised" weapons: a long geared chainsaw on the right and a rotating drill bit on the left (of course the positions can be exchanged to one's liking). I love the insanity that is sometimes injected into Key Raiders, and Tor-Qen’s butchering extremities may be the craziest I've seen so far. The nasty looking, kidney-shaped chainsaw can be disassembled by removing the three spinning gears from one side of the guide bar (onto which the golden cutting chain is sculpted), so they can be used as shooting saw blades. The drill bit is conical and has a blade-like tapered golden screw thread.

Weapons and accessories

Since the guys at PoliganToys thought that Tor-Qen wouldn't look menacing enough, they decided to include an alternative toothed wheel that features a dual hatchet-whipper. This is meant to replace the furthest away chainsaw gear, in order to add an extra element of viciousness in the form of two swinging axes attached to two diametrically opposite points of the bronze wheel; each hatchet is composed of a curved light-green chain (sculpted, not real) and a golden cleaver blade with a serrated cutting edge. This really looks great and completely ridiculous in an amazing way!

Additionally, Tor-Qen comes with a pair of swappable bronze cybernetic hands, which are, I imagine, much more practical in most situations. Update: a pair of swappable milling cutter-hands will also be included.

Final thoughts

Character value: ♦♦♦ I usually like most of PoliganToys’ decisions when it comes to secondary characters, and with Tor-Qen it's no exception. I think they made a good choice in including this figure in the line

Articulation: ♥♥♥ This is what you’d expect from a standard KR figure

Sculpt and paint: ♣♣♣♣ He is a completely bizarre action figure. The interesting combination of man and machine gives him a very unique look on the shelf

Accessories: ♠♠♠ His prosthetic weapons still seem a little too big for my liking and even though that is his primary selling point, I might go ahead and give him the extra set of hands. Too bad the milling cutter-hands briefly shown in the comics were not included

Playability: ♪♪♪♪ He actually looks pretty terrific displayed alongside the other Dark Legion members, something I wasn’t expecting, and I’ve had a lot of fun playing with him

Overall: ☺☺☺ Tor-Qen is not the best in the KR|Enmity line, but he’s well above the average. The idea is not new, but it's still interesting, and the folks at PoliganToys did a fantastic job of making it part of the line.

KR|Enmity Review #12: The Deity (Enmity Edition)

Toy prototype details

Name: The Deity^TM (Enmity Edition)

Subtitle: mystic arbiter

Line: KR|Enmity

Item type: action figure - Nº 11 in the line.

Character details

Name: The Deity

Real name: Kai-Xi (originally Wēn Kǎi xī)

Classification: spirit (formerly human)

Sex: female

Home: China

Era: 20 years before Foundation

Affiliation: neutral (formerly belonging to the Theriom faction)

Rank: divinity.

Background

First appearance: KR|Enmity #3 - Notes of vengeance

Brief bio: once a member of the Therioms who played a significant role in trapping Bi-Harr's mental powers beyond the multiversal walls, Kai-Xi raised to a powerful divine form after her own demise and chose to be tasked with maintaining neutrality throughout Tahron. Although she could no longer take part to the war, the constant struggle over the Key often called her to preserve the balance between good and evil forces.

Articulation

Standard down to the waist, excluding hinged abdomen; since she has a new dress/robe piece, her articulation has been changed a bit with a hinged thigh/crotch piece.

Description
Head: Asian features, cream white skin, black hair (arranged into a cross hairstyle and held together with a golden headpiece), hazel eyes

Body: covered from neck to toe except for her hands, which show cream white skin

Wearables: an extremely elegant and highly complex garment formed of a set of coloured clothes, which create a layered effect. The items include: a long, nicely decorated red dress (with serrated leaf gold patterns, a high-neck bodice and a pleated skirt), a thigh-length dark-green jacket (with long, loose sleeves, under which we can glimpse two dark-green bracelets, and embellished with light-green arabesque patterns as well as white collar, lapels, cuffs and hem), a light-green apron-like piece worn over the front (with pieces of triangle-shaped orange cloth sewn onto its hem) and tied at the back (with two long, narrow orange strips of fabric running down the sides of the skirt), and a dark-green belt around the waist. The bottom of the dress is nicely sculpted and doesn't come flush to the ground, giving her the illusion of floating.

Action feature

Like with her Foundation version, The Deity doesn't have any particular action feature, apart from the fact that she comes with a clear stand. This has a ball joint on the end, which expands her floating poses in a great way.

Weapons and accessories

Aside from the stand, The Deity comes with the very same staff that accompanied her Foundation version - a light-green wooden stick topped with a fire pattern that resembles the Chinese character 凤 (phoenix).

The figure also includes two additional items of clothing: a poncho-like robe made of pliable translucent orange plastic and seemingly tied in a bow at the front towards the bottom, and a red shawl with decorative serrated leaf gold patterns, seemingly tied in a knot, that can be worn over the arms.

Variant

In addition to the standard version, the Enmity edition of The Deity will also be released in a "statue" variant, since such a sculpture is briefly shown in the throne hall at Theriom City in the second comic issue Terror from the clouds.

I’m not getting into the specifics of this figure, since it's just the standard version with a few differences that I'm going to list below:

- The whole figure has been painted in a cool bronze colour

- The only accessories are her staff, which is a bronze repaint of the non-burning version that came with the normal form of Kai-Xi, and a bronze pedestal

- A number of pretty rare and pricey deluxe variations of this figure will come in a fancy packaging that will transform into a cardboard playset (likely resembling Theriom City) and will feature light&sound effects.

Final thoughts

Character value: ♦♦♦♦ The Deity joins the KR|Enmity corner of the shelf as a great figure and a character that is really important to the collection

Articulation: ♥♥♥ It’s still disappointing to see a figure "without" legs, but the skirt piece is kinda beautiful

Sculpt and paint: ♣♣♣♣♣ The sculpt is extremely nice, with strong details, and I love the quality of all the "textile" layers on her outfit

Accessories: ♠♠♠ The extra dress pieces are pretty soft pieces of plastic... they wrap around her body well, but keeping them on there limits posing significantly

Playability: ♪♪♪ Once people have this exquisite Asian lady in hand, I think most will really dig her

Overall: ☺☺☺☺ The Deity is a great example of what the neutral figures are capable of and she adds a lot to help fortify the mythology.