Not a (book, or movie, or multimedia whatever) Review: Diamond Select Dark Tower figures!

There are only a few artists I would consider myself a completist for: They Might Be Giants, and Stephen King. I've been reading King for longer, starting with a used paperback copy of Pet Sematary back in '84 or '85. Luckily, King is incredibly prolific (like TMBG, for that matter) and has cranked out a ton of books: I think Wikipedia had it at 61 novels; and as of right now I've read 58. He's also written a number of collections; I just picked up If It Bleeds the other day. There's even more adaptations of his work, often of varying quality; and today we have a couple figures from a less-sucessful movie: Diamond Select's the Dark Tower Roland Deschain and Walter O'Dim.

The Dark Tower came out in 2017, and I know I saw it on DVD: it didn't do well at the box office, and was a bit disappointing for me as well. Kind of like the Hellboy remake, it wants to be the first of a bunch of movies, and alludes to all sorts of things without really setting them up: the movie was in development for a long time, and there were plans for a TV show as well, that maybe didn't pan out. The movie wants to impress you by throwing a bunch of concepts out and forgets to maybe focus on what it should, namely a good first story. Also, while maybe every movie doesn't have to be as long as a Lord of the Rings film, Dark Tower was supposed to be the first chapter of a sprawling fantasy epic, and it's a lean 95 minutes? Still, maybe the producers have to plan for success: it's probably easier to lock an actor in for a four-movie deal that may or may not ever happen, than it would be to try and renegotiate after the first movie is a hit.

I don't recall if there was a big merchandising push for the movie (there were statues from Diamond as well) but these were probably planned and solicited long before it came out. Roland's figure is pretty good! The Idris Elba likeness is swell, paint is nice except it's a bit monochromatic, but that's on the movie. Articulation is about average for a Diamond Select figure; though the gun-holding wrists could've used an up-down joint rather than side-to-side.

Hmm. I was going to say the Matthew McConaughey sculpt wasn't as good; but it is, it's just the older McConaughey and maybe not the face everyone remembers from his romantic comedy days or, god forbid, Dazed and Confused. (I hate that movie.) His articulation isn't as good as Roland's, and my figure is just stiff, and the texture on his coat is just--rrragh. Gross feeling, somehow. As the Man in Black, he's even more monochromatic than the Gunslinger, with black on black on black. Literally, a black coat on a black vest on a black shirt. The only bit of color is the open shirt, so the effect is that of "sexy mortician."

One thing you can often count on with Diamond Select: nice base pieces. Walter comes with a wall segment of a rotting tenement with "All Hail the Crimson King" graffitied on it, while Roland has a section of Jake's room, with a bulletin board you can attach the boy's creepy drawings of the Dark Tower onto. Walter's may be more useful; it has 'crime scene' written all over it.

These were probably around $26 originally; and I know there were sales online over the years. Maybe they're more expensive now that everyone's sold out their stock, although I should say the figure looks better in hand than the stock photo on Amazon. I got them for $9.99 a piece at Entertainmart, but I think I got the last Roland at this location. Also, I should point out these are taller than Marvel Legends figures, even though I mix-and-match a lot.