More Red Shorts Mourning

I popped into Target today, and—as always—hit the action figure aisles to see if there was anything to add to the collection. A bunch of new lines were on display, including the Young Justice figures (none for me), the Batman Legacy line (nope), the Funko Pop Vinyl figures (hmmm… have Superman already, but Batman looks pretty nice), and, in the kiddie aisle, Fisher-Price’s new DC Super Friends HeroWorld figures (an awkward name, that).

I flipped through the figures on the peg, past Batman, the Joker, Mr. Freeze until I saw it, hiding in the back, almost embarrassed. The Superman figure… sans red shorts.

Now, the funny thing about this figure is how transitional it is. Obviously, when this line was first designed, this was going to be the classic Superman model with the old costume. But at some point, DC decided it was time to start introducing the redesigned character to the toy shelves, starting with this little guy.

This figure is half-classic / half-new, with the old boot scallop, yellow belt and regular shirt-sleeves, but the new high collar and all-blue pants (the extraneous texture is irrelevant). But if you look closely at the sculpt, you can see that there are lines where the red shorts and low collar were originally designed to be painted. Even the artwork on the side of the box features Superman in his traditional togs.

I stood in the toy aisle and wept openly, again mourning the pointless demise of an iconic design. After frightening off a small child, I pulled myself together, put the figure in my basket and walked to the cat food aisle.

What, I’m not gonna buy it? Yeah, right.