Sôchaku-Henshin Kamen Rider Femme & Kamen Rider RyugaBuy it for the Femme, get the Ryuga as a bonus. Kanzaki commands it.
What it is: Two very long-awaited Sôchaku-Henshin (sometimes known as '"Armor-Transformation") figures based on Riders from Kamen Rider Ryuki, Femme & Ryuga's release means we now have all 13 Riders, plus Alternative, who is joined by an exclusive Alternative Zero. And in the near future, Ryuki Survive & Knight Survive!
What's the deal: Starting in 2004 with Kamen Rider Ryuki & Scissors, Bandai at long last began releasing Kamen Rider Ryuki Sôchaku-Henshin figures two at a time (along with other Riders from Faiz, Blade, and Hibiki) and finally finished the basic 13 Riders in December 2005 with a two-pack featuring two of the most popular Riders from that saga after the big 4 (Ryuki, Knight, Zolda, & Ouja): Kamen Rider Femme, the lone female Rider out of the motley crew of 13, and Kamen Rider Ryuga, the evil Mirror World double of Ryuki himself. Both made their first appearance in the theatrical Ryuki adventure Kamen Rider Ryuki: Episode Final, and got a cameo in the 13 Riders TV Special. Outside of that, they've never appeared anywhere else, but that didn't stop Bandai from pulling out all the stops for this little set.
When it was first announced that Femme would finally get her Sôchaku-Henshin figure, there was a mix of anticipation and hesitation: would Bandai really go all the way and give us a quality representation of everyone's favorite revenge-crazed con artist, or would they just slap Femme armor on a male Sôchaku-Henshin figure and call it good? I'm proud to say that Bandai did the former, and has done what could quite possibly be the best toy version of Femme yet, at least until a hopeful Medicom figure (expect that in like... 2035 or something.)
Not only is she a whole new body beneath, but everything, I mean everything, else is new as well: Femme's V-Buckle is uniquely designed to look good on her smaller frame and allow for her sword's holster thingy to be attached just as it should be. Her gauntlet armor is all-new too, to fit her smaller arms. What am I getting at here? Well, the male Ryuki Riders were by and large able to get by sharing a couple parts (underlying body, V-Buckle mold, wrist armor mold, etc.) but Femme's a whole different story. Bandai really put a lot of care into making her, and it doesn't stop there. Fully armored up, Femme looks amazing. Some might find her little slimmer than she should be (especially around the waist) but I think it works well, and she manages to not look too bulky (as sometimes happens with other Sôchaku-Henshin figures) but very sharp and sleek.
She can be posed just as well as any of the male Riders, which means Femme can now do almost any pose you want. Femme doing a Rider Kick? Check. Femme dancing? Check. Femme kneeing Ouja in the groin? Check. Plus most anything she did in the movie, of course.
There's a couple of neat details that really make her stand out amongst figures in this line. One is the interchangeable hands. Early prototype photos showed that she would come with a set of closed hands (for holding weapons) as well as open hands. What we didn't know until she was finally released was that the closed hands would still work like the regular male Rider hands, in that the fingers are articulated. Nice! This allows for a wide variety of variation with just the hands alone, and Femme can easily hold any of her weapons- and she comes with virtually everything she needs save for Blanwing (who was in the last EX Mirror Monsters set.) Of special note is the two-piece cape; it's plastic so it looks very cool when positioned correctly, as if draping naturally. The cape pieces can also be maneuvered up so you can recreate how Femme looked during her dramatic entrance at the opening of the film. One last thing: kudos to Bandai for giving Femme real heels and not adding any extra plastic junk to her feet like they've done on past Femme figures; she'll take a little more effort to balance with the cape on, but otherwise she stands just fine, and looks pretty smooth to boot. Pun intended.
After the slam-dunk that is Femme, it's hard to get excited about a guy that's basically a mostly-black repaint of Ryuki with a slightly different helmet, but Bandai did a good job of making Ryuga a worthy figure and easily the last one we'll need of the character in this scale for a while. Ryuga was one of the lucky guys to get an R&M set back in the day (again, mostly a Ryuki repaint) and like the Sôchaku-Henshin Ryuki, this incarnation tops the previous one. As if knowing everyone would be buying the set for Femme, Bandai at least added a few nice extras to make Ryuga appealing beyond just being a rehash thrown in to drive up the price. He comes with two helmets, one with the red lit-up eyes and one without, which is a great idea and is faithful to the film. He also includes a second, blank V-Buckle, with no Contrct Monster emblem on it. I don't know why exactly, since Ryuga was never seen with anything like this to my knowledge, but it's a welcome addition all the same and makes him even cooler (plus you can use it with any other male Rider, I guess to make "Pre-Blank Form Ouja" or something.) Aside from that, everything you got with Ryuki you get here, with black used in place of red. Of course, Ryuga does have his own personalized mini Advent card stickers, as does Femme.
Final Vent: Femme is flat-out one of the best Sôchaku-Henshin figures ever, and in my opinion, the whole set is worth it just for her. Ryuga's basically an accessory (albeit a very nice one) and you'd want him anyway to complete the whole crew. If you're a fan of Ryuki, Sôchaku-Henshin figures or just Kamen Rider Femme, this is the set for you. And even if you're none of those things, I'd still tell you to buy one!
Where to get them: HLJ still has it in stock, so get one while you can. Better yet, get two, customize the Femme as Kamen Rider Sigma, and I might just buy it off you!
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