Alex Ross' Justice

A Closer look at Tim Bruckner's Joker and Wonder Woman

At Comic Con in July we got a sneak peek at the 3rd assortment of DC Direct's Justice line, based on the art and comic series of the same name by Alex Ross, in the form of the Hal Jordan Green Lantern figure sculpted by the uber-talented Karen Palinko. This week DC Direct solicited the entire third assortment that includes: Green lantern, Poison Ivy, The Joker, Plastic man and Wonder Woman.

DC Direct and their talented stable of sculptors are still working out innovative ways to disguise useful articulation in their artist specific figures that maintain the look and feel of the artists work brought to three dimensions, but still serve the fans so not every piece is a preposed slightly articulated statue. With that in mind DC Direct has allowed us this closer look at the Joker and Wonder Woman Justice figures sculpted by fan-favorite Tim Bruckner.

The challenge they faced in translating Alex Ross' Joker into an action figure, was to be able to pose him in the iconic "hands resting on cane" position and yet have the articulation flexible enough to allow him to strike alternate poses, such as having his arms to the side. They gave him modified ball jointed shoulders, a redesigned inverted ball jointed neck, ball jointed wrists, redesigned elbow joints and V-crotch articulation to give him a broad range of poseablity while keeping the integrity of the sculpt intact.

The redesigned inverted ball jointed neck, for instance, maintains the look of the head and neck being one solid piece instead of a cut or swivel just below the jaw line, and hides the articulation in the collar of his tux so that you can still have him look up or down as well as side to side.

The same effort was made in trying to maintain a high level of naturalism with Wonder Woman. Tim has sculpted Wonder Woman several times for DC Direct in the form of statues, busts and action figures, and he really wanted to improve upon his past work and innovate some new features that would still maintain the look of portraiture, but still be an "action" figure. She has a modified pivot assembly hidden in her neck that allows her to change the angle of her head as its turned. She has ball jointed shoulders, redesigned elbow joints, a more natural knee joint and a hidden T-crotch joint assembly that allows a broad range of motion while keeping the actual joint assembly hidden in the costume. Another innovation Tim worked into this figure is his redesigned elbow joints that appear pin-less from the outside (still a visable pin on the inside of the joint) making the outside of the arm look more natural..

A big "Thank you" to DC Direct and Tim Bruckner for this opportunity to take a closer look at these highly anticipated pair of figures.