Play Art's Kai Variant Iron Man Three-Point-Lands This June

Square Enix, besides being the studio of flamboyant JRPG staple Final Fantasy and the equally iconic Dragon Quest series, are also the manufacturers of some of the most thoroughly bad-ass collectibles around with their Play Arts Kai line of licensed action-figures.

We've had nothing but mad love for their runs of Metal Gear Solid and Nolan Bat-verse before, and this Iron Man variant does nothing to buck that trend. Announced at last year's Comic-Con, The Play Arts Kai Variant Iron Man is the first in a series of redesigned Marvel superheroes re-imagined by Tetsuya Nomura himself! The figure, which comes with multiple interchangeable hands, leg missile attachments, exhaust pieces, and a figure stand, is set for release this June and is priced at 9,080 Yen (roughly $77 USD).

This certainly isn't the craziest figure they've come out with (i.e Nomura-san's Batman variant), but it is one that could actually see myself purchasing. The inverted-color pallet works extraordinarily well with this figure, so much so I wish this costume would see an appearance in either the comics or live-action movie universe.

The figure's coloring and stature evoke  nostalgic memories of watching the Sentai knock-off show Superhuman Samurai Sybersquad as a kid, so that could also be a reason behind its appeal. Check past the break for more awesome pics!

Brainstorm Community re-imagines Tony Stark as a "Steam-Punk Iron-Man"

Jason Kang (via)

I first discovered the Brainstorm Concept Art Community Group via social media a few weeks back. The thing that struck me the most about the group's atmosphere was in how inviting they were to artistic newcomers of all degrees of technical skill and aesthetic temperament. As soon as I saw the results of the group's last major community event, "Steam-Punk Iron-Man", I knew I had to shine a spotlight on them.

This project turned out a wealth of varying reinterpretations and re-imaginings of the venerable "Genius-Millionaire-Playboy-Philanthropist", from Jason Kang's Rockwellian portrait pictured above, to Giby Joseph's Pyromaniacal snow-trooper,  Cheung Chung Tat's Iron-Gojira and Daniele Orlandini's phantom-like aviator, there's a wealth of inspiring creativity and familiar weirdness just below the break!

3A's Invincible Iron Man Toys Are Looking Incredible (Wallet Damage Incoming)

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Ashley Wood just shared production release photos of 3A's Invincible Iron Man, just the first in an ongoing collaboration with Marvel that will bring us unique takes on characters including Doctor Doom, Ultron, Spiderman, Thor and others over the next few years. Standing at 13.5 inches, the fully posable metal and PVC figure will feature illuminated eyes, chest and palms and ship sometime in Q3 2014.

Taste the limited palette rainbow.

Pricing wise these figures wil run for $220 a pop, with 4 variants- Classic, Silver Centurion, Stealth and the Stark Industries Prototype, which will only be available to members of the 3AA club (A yearly subscription for exclusives and other goodies). If you've got the money to burn, you can get a boxed set featuring all 4 for $800, without needing to be a 3AA member to get the 4th Stark Industries prototype figure.

As a proud owner of a few 3A toys, the craftsmanship on these 'toys' is so high that I prefer to consider them as fine art sculptures. Once you get one you'll never buy another toy again. The item will be available for preorder on February 13th at 9am Hong Kong Time (5pm PST, 7pm CST, 9pm EST) at the newly redesigned Bambaland Store. A boatload of shots from all the different variants after the break!

Tony Stark Gets His Sailor Moon On

A lot of the content I find is due to long restless nights filled with insomnia and caffeine, but there are other nights where my lack of sleep creeps up on me and pushes me into content like this where I later find sitting in my drafts. Thanks to a freshman class at Chungkang College of Cultural Industries we're finally given the chance to witness Tony Stark in his true transformative-environment.

Channeling the powers of Sailor Moon, Tony Stark gets pretty damn kawaii, and it leads me to question why all Marvel characters don't have magical girl transformation sequences. Someone get on that crossover stat, just be sure to invite me to the first screening.  

The Iron Man Trilogy Remix

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Just in time for the release of Robert Downey's latest, Iron Man 3 starring Ben Kingsley as Gaddafi/The Mandarin, director Mike Relm created this badass remix of all three movies and Black Sabbath's 'Iron Man.' The above poster was created by illustrator Mansin as part of Mondo gallery's promotion for the film. If you'd like a chance at snagging one yourself, stay tuned to the official Mondo Twitter for the announcement of the sale.

Iron Man 3 : Taste The Rainbow (Of Mark Suits)

In the third installment of Iron Man, Tony Stark will face off against his biggest foe yet, The Mandarin. Originally a supergenius posessed with the power of ten rings of alien origin, granting him various powers, it seems like the movie will ground the nemesis as a Sun Tzu obsessed terrorist mastermind instead (Played by Ben Kingsley) running an international do-no-goodery cell called 'The Ten Rings.' Originally intended to be Tony Stark's foe in the original movie, he was put off due to being too ambitious of a character to introduce in the first film (Aka, hard to top).

As part of the marketing campaign for the upcoming film (May 3), a recent Facebook initiative just finished which unlocked a preview of various experimental suits that will be featured in the film, fighting alongside Tony Stark. Check out the whole lot of them after the break!

Iron Man 3 Official Trailer

Other than The Avengers, I felt the majority of stand alone entries for the Marvel universe fell relatively flat; suffering from a predictable "super hero formula" that Marvel Studios has grown far too friendly with. Even with the cookie cutter format, Iron Man has always stood out as Marvel's flagship movie because lets face it, rich cocky assholes have never been more entertaining. Thankfully, Marvel isn't done with Mr. Stark as we're finally presented with their official trailer for Marvel's upcoming Iron Man 3.

The newest trailer is probably the most "serious" one yet, going for a much more dramatic tone compared to previous entries, although this time I can't seem to get as excited as I once did. Maybe I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed with the amount of films Marvel has been putting out, but it also seems that this newest entry to the Iron Man series is falling into the same clichés the rest of the Marvel universe seems to be falling into. Here's hoping that come April 2013 I'll be singing a different tune, because I really want to keep watching these movies.