It’s beginning to look a like Christmas around here with all the 3A goodies that keep showing up on my doorstep. Surprising me yesterday was 3A’s Ankou EX Fat Drown. Ankou is a character from Ashley Wood’s Adventure Kartel line of figs. They’re known for tirelessly hunting down zombs and crushing them with their mighty robotic claw hands.. or some such silliness. The original Ankou were your standard 1/6 in size, same as Tommy, Shadow, JC etc.. basically, the 1/6 version of human size. EX on the other hand, is NOT human size.. Oh, nay nay… this guy is MASSIVE at just shy 16 inches tall. Ankou EX was originally available in 4 flavors; Medic, Laurent, Shadow Security, and Fat Drown. Partial to track suits coupled with action figures, I went with Fat Drown.

PACKAGING

I was happy to see that Fatty D comes in a beautifully illustrated box by A. Wood. The cool thing about this box is that on the front you have the painting of an Ankou EX with the name, 3a logo’s etc. But on the back, you get the full image unobstructed by anything. 3A could have just left it white (they usually do) and been done with it, but they gave us a full color box front and back. Great for displaying if you have the space to do so!

and with this guy, you’ll need a LOT of space.

WHATS INCLUDED

Once you get past the box you’ll find cased inside a plastic clamshell your Ankou EX. Each Ankou came with something a little different. Medic and Laurent came sporting boiler suits (think janitor social wear) and hip packs, while Shadow Security included the packs as well as an extra head, one smiling, one frowning.  Fat Drown comes with nothing but his beautiful self and a track suit. I’m a little jealous of the extra head SS gets, and a couple hip packs or something would’ve been nice just to HAVE, but Fatty D feel’s complete without them.

Also included in the box is this awesome poster which has the cover art on the front and a mini comic page on the back. This has become a way for Ash to further expand the story/adventure of the AK world. It doesn’t really reveal anything about the character or flesh out the world so much as it’s a fun and cool bonus. I find myself looking forward to them regardless of how much/little story they tell. Cool artwork abounds!

THE BREAKDOWN

The first thing that strikes you with this guy is just how astonishingly massive he is. He will tower over all your other AK figures. I would definitely prefer to be on his side of the line if a situation arose in a dark alley or side street. Zombs beware indeed. Out of the box he feels very solid. He’s not particularly heavy but you don’t get the impression that you’re handling a hollow delicate flower. The paint and weathering on Down are really well done. It’s not a complex color scheme by any means, overall blue grey body with some cool decals and a nice level of carefully placed weathering.

The dusty/dirty track suit (or “tracky”) combined with his colossal size is all sorts of silly, aka awesome sauce. The tracky he’s adorned with is well made with stripes down the arms and legs, the “down” logo and a hole sewn into the back for his exhaust pipe. I had a little difficulty telling with the track jacket on which way his arms and legs could be bent as some of the joints were twisted in an unnatural direction. On top of that some of the paint/weathering had stiffened up a joint to the point where bending felt like it’d mean snapping something I didn’t wish snapped. Taking off the tracky jacket to examine the joint placement and how things were arranged helped out quite a bit.

Once you remove the jacket you get a peak at Ankou EX ‘s/3a’s all new XL bulky robo body. It’s pretty impressive looking overall with various robo-influenced details on the chest and back, including decals and joints. Speaking of joints, the articulation on EX isn’t bad but don’t expect Tommy Mission or Tomorrow King levels here.

The arms for example, have a sort of double ball joint in the elbow that rotates 360 degrees and allows the arm to bend backwards and forwards. It’s kinda strange however, that the way the forearm and upper arm are molded keeps the arms from bending very far, say 70 degrees or so at most. On top of that the shoulder joint is basically a ball joint molded into the body with the arm stuck onto it. You can get some pretty good rotations but it’s a little limited how far you can push it. I think the most curious omission is any kind of bicep joint to allow for easier inside/outside twists in the arm. I say “curious” because there is literally a seam sculpted into the arm that looks like it’s meant to twist there, but it’s static. Poor Ankou EX will never know the joy of scratching his nose.

The body itself has a couple points of articulation, one in the chest cavity that allows for some side to side/front to back rotations and a waist joint that’ll allow you to spin your Ankou roughly 180 degrees left/right. It’s really well done.

The legs are pretty standard fair and can comfortably support his mass. The feet are awesome! Chunky cleats on the bottom with a pin joint through the center. Also I’d like to note how well this guy can balance! I’ve put him in several awkward, slightly off balanced poses and he stands up just fine. Impressive!

Posing FattyD is a lot of fun despite some of his limitations. The neck, elbow and shoulder joints are a bit soft and rubbery. This allows them a little give when posing so they’d don’t really “stick” exactly where you try to put them. They sorta bend to the place you push them and then relax back out a little. That’s not to say he won’t hold cool poses, for he certainly will if you work at it some. He’s simply not the Bruce Lee of upper body articulation.

Fat Down has a lot of presence. His size alone makes him stand out (and above) on the shelf, but I also noticed how small and quick shifts in his pose could change his whole personality. Just slumping him over a little made him look dopey while pushing his chest back and raising his head gave him a foreboding appearance. I know for a fact I’m going to have a great time changing him up every few days.

You can tell Ash and 3A put a lot of thought into the new Ankou EX body.

FINAL SUMMARY

There’s not a lot to dislike about Fat Drown. Visually he’s just fantastic. He’s huge. He looks awesome. He feels like a really well made toy. I do wish the articulation in the arms was a little more forgiving. I suppose one wouldn’t expect Fat D to pull off any crazy ninja moves when all he really needs to do is swing his arms and crush zombs with his massive claws, but there’s some room there for improvement. Stick with lumbering hulk-like poses and you shouldn’t have any issues with it.

I was never a big fan of the original Ankou’s. They just sort of blended in on my shelf of zombs, zombots and the Adventure Kartel Crew. Despite the linked namesake to his “lesser” cousins, he’s superior in almost every way. I am honestly surprised and thrilled with how well Fat Down came out. There’s so much character stuffed into this vinyl it hurts.

GALLERY