DIMIC

Finally, the next Darkstalkers statue has arrived at our house. Even though he’s not my favorite male character of the games, he’s still awesome!

Lord Raptor (or Zabel Zarock as he’s known in Japan) has appeared since the first Darkstalkers (or Night Warriors, or Vampire Saviour) game and is one of the most known obscure characters of the series. But, like I said, he isn’t my favorite. But so far, I’m just really happy that Jerry (from Pop Culture Shock) is continuing the line! I really do want the complete cast and that includes this one as well.

A bit of background information about Lord Raptor:

Raptor was a charismatic young rock star who was an expert guitarist and was known as the “God of Metal”. He was unknown before the release of his first album, “Oral Dead”. Though not a success initially, enough interest was cultivated until his second album was released. It sold 200.000 copies in a month, and reached one million in three months, becoming the next sensation in the metal scene. He instantly became famous throughout Australia.

Raptor killed himself and over a hundred fans in what would be his final live performance.

Because of his notoriety as a power-hungry criminal, he was noticed by the Emperor Ozomu, who baptised Raptor’s soul in darkness and thus resurrected him as a zombie. Ozomu then used Raptor’s bloodlust to his advantage, enlisting him into his services with the promise of more power. Although Raptor agreed, his true plans were to kill Ozomu himself and rule as Emperor. Ozomu knows this and has sent a small one eyed frog-like creature named Le Malta to surveilance Raptor, though he also doubles as Raptor’s ally. But when the Emperor and his castle disappeared, Raptor was puzzled. When he arrived at the location where Ozomu’s castle used to stand, he found the entrance to the Majigen. This time, he intended to kill the creator of the Majigen and take his role.

A few days after Raptor’s death, a strange leather-covered book was found in his house. The book was called “A Chapter of Tolagido” and was written in what seemed to be ancient Hebrew. The book explained the existence of another world called “Makai”. The words in the book resembled the lyrics to his hit songs, and in a topic titled “A curse to give sacrifices to the king of Makai”, the lyrics to Raptor’s song “Sacrifice” were found. This song was the last played during the concert where Raptor and his crowd died.

With further research, it was discovered that the preparation for the curse took a long time. Since the first album was released, Raptor had already started to brainwash his potential victims. His apparent aim was to start the curse with his music and obtain sacrifices.

Source is the all mighty Wikipedia (of course). Even though he isn’t my favorite, I do like him. He’s one of the more funny characters in the game, a bit like a hyper-active child. It’s cute as long as you don’t have to put up with it 24-7.

As you might know, this is the third statue made by Pop Culture Shock in this series. The first two were Morrigan and Felicia and they’re both still available on the SideShow Collectibles website (Morrigan Regular – Felicia Exclusive). If you want to read my reviews on them, just click here and here. Just to say, they are soooo worth it!

This statue was (digitally) sculpted by John Cleary, and he did an incredible good job! I just love the sculpt, it’s clean, has a lot of details and it’s totally Raptor. The paint is also not bad. It’s not the best I’ve seen, a bit simplistic, but it’s certainly not bad. Not a lot of paint misses or anything like that. It just misses a bit of definition accomplished by shades and such. But I don’t really complain. He’s wonderfully done and I really, really like him.

As you can see, the exclusive isn’t a different color (second player color is red) this time. It’s a bit of a shame but hey, the Morrigan exclusive was also the regular color. The exclusive part of this statue is his extra guitar for ‘alternate display’. The second guitar isn’t bad, but he doesn’t fit as snug as the regular guitar. I think the magnet in his hand isn’t strong enough and also his ribs are in the way of properly displaying it.

There are two things that make this statue a mixed media one. One, his pants are made of cloth and two, the strings on his guitar are real guitar strings! Awesome ain’t it. That’s one of the main reasons this statue was a bit more expensive than the other PCS’s. But actually, I’d love to pay even (a bit) more if Jerry just could change the Styrofoam in which he’s packed. White pieces of styro are everywhere after unwrapping Raptor and putting him back. Everywhere!

Since he only shipped about a week ago, I don’t know about issues yet apart from one guy. Apparently, he got paint flakes on Raptor’s back (somewhere near/around his spine). Also his exclusive guitar was snapped in two at the stem and the string were all coiled. Bit painful to receive a statue like that. Luckily for us that we haven’t had a single problem with any of the PCS statues so far aside from the bat that broke during shipping of our Morrigan. But that’s an easy fix so we’re good.

Oh, and did I mention I got number 2? Yeah, that’s the same number as my Felicia (and our Vega). If I ever find the Morrigan exclusive n°2, chances are that I buy that one too! Isn’t that number just lovely?
Speaking about numbers, as you can see on my base and card, it says that there are 175 made of the exclusive, while on my shipper it states 200. A bit confusing that. Also, the bottom of my box says 400 but since the only indication that it’s the box of an exclusive is a sticker, I think that all those boxes are the same. Still it’s also weird…

Conclusion
I really hope that Jerry continues it because this line just keeps getting better and better! I loved my Morrigan and Felica, and even though I didn’t really liked the character at first, I now love this statue as well. I can’t wait to display the three of them together, it’s going to look awesome. If you like Darkstalkers or just Rock Zombies, you can’t go wrong with this statue! He’d die for you!

Pictures

Item reviewed: Darkstalkers (Night Warriors) – Lord Raptor (Zabel Zarock)
Type: Mixed Media (resin with cloth)
Manufacturer: Pop Culture Shock
Variations: regular (without the alternate guitar)
Rarity: Both the regular and the exclusive are still in stock on the Sideshow Collectibles website. You can also still find the regular edition for a decent (read: cheaper) price in local (web)shops. 175 (ex) and (probably) 400 (reg) made worldwide.