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Thorin Oakenshield (6 inch)

April 11, 2014 | By Errex More

Even though I still consider myself to be a 1:18 scale action figure collector, truth is the number of larger-scale figures on my shelves has grown steadily this year. Once the 6-inch scale barrier was broken by the Star Wars Black Series, it became surprisingly easy for me to allow other lines to follow, namely The Bridge Direct’s larger scale action figures inspired by the movie The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.

One thing I find really interesting about the figures made by The Bridge Direct is that each character scupt is the exact same regardless of scale, and then blown up or shrinked down for each line segment. Of course the larger-scale versions get to have augmented articulation, but also they often get extra bits and pieces not found in the smaller-scale version.

While this statement doesn’t really apply to Bilbo, Tauriel did get a nice handful of arrows and the subject of today’s review, Thorin Oakenshield got a spiffy fur trimmed vest. This is vest is made from a flexible plastic and nicely sculpted with a furry trim. It was designed to go under Thorin’s hair and rests quite naturally over his regular clothes.

Thorin wears under the vest the exact same garments he has in the smaller scale version, consisting of short coat of mail, leather pants and heavy boots. He also wears a baldric across his chest and leather bracers on his forearms. All of these pieces display geometric patterns decorating almost every surface, done in the style favored by dwarves in the Peter Jackson directed movies. The head sculpt is excellent, with long, flowing hair and beard but also a definite resemblance to actor Richard Armitage.

The articulation design on this figure is clearly a step up from the 3.75-inch scale one, at least in number of joints, and consists of:

• Barbell mounted neck.

• Pegged hinge shoulders.

• Pegged hinge elbows.

• Swivel wrists.

• Swivel waist.

• Pegged hinge hips.

• Pegged hinge knees.

• Pegged hinge ankles.

Being a larger scale figure, Thorin has a better range at the hips thanks to the thinness of the scale mail he wears, but the overall range is not that much beyond what the smaller version had. The rubber vest accessory prevents the neck joint from moving at all, but without this piece of clothing the range improves quite a bit.

The paint job on the 6-inch Thorin is quite good, even if the color palette isn’t that varied. Other than the boots, no piece of equipment displays much in terms of weathering, but there are quite a bit of extra details painted neatly in solid blocks of color.

Thorin comes armed with a short dwarven sword and the elven sword Orcrist, both made from harder plastic. Also included is a scabbard for the elven blade and the iron wrought oaken shield he carries on his left forearm.

Although this time the shield stays in place much better, Thorin cannot carry the elven scabbard on his back unless he is wearing the fur vest accessory, as the holes in both the back of the figure back and the blue scale mail are slightly misaligned and a little too large to hold the accessory securely.

All things considered, I think the 6-inch scaled Thorin Oakenshield turned out to be a nice, all-around solid action figure.