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Flood Pure Form Stalker

August 26, 2011 | By Errex More

It has become very common place in first person shooter video games to include at least one type of antagonists that are kind of gross and fairly easy to kill individually, but whose strength comes from their numbers, rather than their combat prowess, like zombies, insects or, in the case of the Halo franchise, the alien Flood. In the Halo games, the Flood combines traits from both the Alien series facehuggers with the relentlessness of zombies, depending of their state of evolution.

McFarlane Toys produced a couple of figures based on different strands of these aliens in their Halo line, one being basically a zombie-like Marine for Series 3, and the one I’m reviewing today, the Flood Pure Form Stalker from Series 6.

Out of the gate, let me state that the Flood figures, as a whole, tend to be the less striking visually in their respective assortments, but from the two I mentioned, the only one worth getting is the Stalker.

The Flood Stalker is disgustingly detailed. You look at the thing and you immediately think in how much would you hate it if for some magical reason, the toy you just bought became alive, even retaining it’s current size.

The thing is all mandibles, and pincers, and gross-looking fleshy wrinkles that manage to convey the otherness of Lovecraftian creatures mixed in with the biological accuracy of some of the most horrible insects I have ever seen on documentaries or real life.

However, the toy is surprisingly well made. It has insect like thorax and abdomen, with a pair of rear legs ending in feet with four splayed claws and a pair of frontal appendages that end in nasty looking pincers. Amidst the mandibles, the Flood Stalker has a trio of appendages that resemble coral formations, which serve the purpose of infecting it’s prey.

Articulation is expertly hidden within the creature’s design and is configured in such a way that it is possible to enumerate it in a vaguely humanoid fashion, even though the creature looks nothing like one. The Flood Stalker is articulated as follows:

• Barbell mounted neck.

• Swivel thorax.

• Barbell mounted abdomen.

• Pegged hinge hips.

• Hinged knees.

• Pegged hinge ankles.

• Pegged hinge shoulders.

• Hinged elbows.

• Pegged hinge wrists.

• Swivel first pincers.

Each of these joints works well, although the neck and abdomen joints have very little tilt in them and function primarily as regular swivel joints. The one jointed pincer blade on each of the front appendages allow the Flood Stalker to grab other figures and the sculpture is sharp enough to rupture skin if you are not careful operating them.

Given the nature of the character, the Flood stalker comes with no accessories, which it’s fine, considering that the whole toy is something of an accessory itself. However, it does come with a plastic achievemente medal representing one of the many awards you get by performing certain tasks in the game.

These tokens are octagonal disks with a decal on top for the specific achievement it represents, and the number 3 engraved in the Halo font at the reverse. The achievement that comes with the Flood stalker is the “Incinerate Medal”.

Other than cost (about one third of the original retail price), the one main reason I got this one is because I thought it looks versatile enough to fit in with many other action figure lines, not just Halo. The immediate link that came to my mind was the Geonosians from the Star Wars prequels, but it would also be right at home tormenting RDA marines from Avatar or chasing Narnians.