If you want the best figure of Faye Valentine from the classic anime Cowboy Bebop, then look no further than this one!

Unboxing / Assembly / Review

Figure Review

F4F Faye Valentine Exclusive info

I bought it here

Otaku Sinh’s collection

Timeline

• Ordered on 10/17/2021; 10% down payment = $38
• Switched card payment to Paypal connecting to Blockfi = 1$
• Email for final payment on 12/29/2021
• Payment on 01/13/2022 for $385.99
• Shipped from US Warehouse on 05/24/2022; UPS ground
• Arrived 05/27/2022
• Shipping cost = $45.00
• Total cost= $424.99

Price

What I come to realize when shopping around for resin figures, is that it’s most likely going to cost at least $400 to get one. With the rising cost of various materials and shipping, expect that price to keep climbing. A majority of the resins listed at Specfictionshop.com costs anywhere between that $400-1300 price range. If you want massively huge, detailed and high quality figures, this is generally what you’ll be working with.

With the release of the now canceled Netflix live-action Cowboy Bebop, I fell for the nostalgic hype train and landed my first polystone resin figure pre-order late last year! As of 06/24/2022, it’s still listed as a “last chance pre-order” for $379.99 with $45 shipping at the official F4F online store. Most of the F4F exclusive and definitive figures are not available at many other sites, at least the ones I frequent like RightStufAnime, Crunchyroll Store, BBTS, EE and Speculative Fiction Shop. Although, I did see an Exclusive All Might Silver Edition figure land on the Crunchyroll Store. Mainly, you’ll only be able to get the standard editions of F4Fs at these US online sites.

Other comparable resin figures that I’m looking into is the Yusuke 1/6 Scale from Yu Yu Hakusho, made by Taka Corp and the pre-order I made for the Ikigai Izuku Midoriya from Tsume are in those price ranges. If you are looking for some affordable licensed resin figures, I think F4F have competitive prices. If you want another high quality figure of Faye, look into Megahouse’s Spike/Faye 1st GIG Set, which might be the more affordable alternative for still a high quality figure of the character. Other than ththe Megahouse figure, the only other figure that I can think of that is getting a future release is the PUP.

So far, I’m only comfortable with ordering resin figures from BBTS, Specfictionshop.com or directly from the company website. Let me know if you guys have any good experiences with any other websites. If you are ever going to get into resin figures, expect to pay at least $400+. This Exclusive Faye Valentine figure is limited to 1500 pieces, meaning these figures should maintain a lot of their value. I like to think of these anime figures as a fun way to store some of your value like gold or bitcoin.

First 4 Figures (F4F)

What F4F Provides

F4F has a very easily navigable website where you can find various different pop culture pvc and resins figures. A majority of their figures are for popular classic video game franchises like Metroid and Spyro. Most importantly for anime figures, they provide one of the highest quality figures for those hardcore fan bases that lack options on the market.

For Cowboy Bebop, they have released Spike, Jet, Ed & Ein, this Faye Valentine figure and currently have a Vicious figure available for pre-order! These come in a standard or an exclusive version, which provides extra replaceable parts. Some of these other franchises like Yu-Gi-Oh, they provide various different packages for standard, exclusive and definitive versions. The exclusive and definitive versions may come in a more elaborate design. If you buy those bundles, you’ll be getting discounts. Looking at the standpoint of dollar value, they might be diluting the market with too many options. In the end, it’s still an overall win for the consumer to have that many options. We’re here to buy and keep it, right!?!

Ordering from F4F

If you plan on making a purchase off of the F4F website, then it’ll typically require a ‘non-refundable’ 10% down payment on your order. They do offer monthly payment options. Once the product has finished production, they send you an email notice for the final payment. Because of the Chinese holidays around February, expect at least another one month delay if you’re expecting anything during that time. For this Faye figure, it took about 4-5 months before arriving to the US warehouse. It may be sooner for countries closer to China.

Please note that if you are a US customer there is a foreign transaction fee! Please use a 0% foreign transaction fee debit or credit card and save a little bit of money!

Customer Service

I did have an issue with the All Might: Silver Exclusive Silver Edition figure. I will make a blog post for this figure in the coming weeks. In short, I received a defective figure and was able to get a replacement part. Everything customer service asked for was reasonable and did not cost me a dime for a the replacement part. There are a couple other figures I want to make videos for first, before I venture into unboxing that replacement part. Keep tabs on the YouTube channel and blog in the coming weeks.

Shipping

I forgot to take pictures of the other box inside this one, but it comes with another smaller brown box. exactly like the one shown above. There are foam dividers for the corners for the inside brown box to withstand shipping punishment.

Faye Valentine F4F Box

Even thought the box was within 2 other boxes, it still comes with some dings and dents on the box. Click on the images and zoom in on the corners.

Assembly

This parts come in a foam box, rather than the lightweight plastic boxes that typically come in PVC figures. It did not come with an instruction manual, but is very easy to put together.

There’s really only 3 parts you can put on the figure: that is the figure body onto the base, the regular or exclusive hands and the regular video or exclusive video parts. The hand does seem a bit loose when you put it in the peg hole, but it still gets the job done by staying in place. There wasn’t any issues putting the video part onto the base as there are simply 2 obvious holes where the pegs go in.

Aesthetics

This is my first polystone figure, so it was a nice change to feel the figure be as heavy as it was. I think I just associate the weight with being valuable. Overall, this figure weighs in about 9 lbs and about 4 oz. All the pieces seem very sturdy, but the downside is that if you ever do end up dropping this figure, because of the weight, it’s probably going to shatter. So, just be very careful when you are moving this figure around!

Face

Looking at F4F’s sculpting of Faye’s face, I would say at most angles, the face looks pretty accurate to Faye’s animated artwork. When you facing directly at Faye’s face, her nose does look a little bit too pointy. At any of the angles not directly in front of her, she looks fine. At some angles, she does look a lot like Fred Luo off of Outlaw Star.. I apologize if I ruined her for you guys.. I think I would have preferred a more expressive look on her face. Shes comes off with a cool and chill kind of vibe. Having a goofy, frustrated or sad look might have added a bit more to the scene of Faye holding the video tape over the gun. Maybe they could have made different face plates? Overall, I’m still happy enough with the face. I would still deem this figure’s expression to be acceptable to most fans. Then again, you be the judge!

Pose

Looking at the pose that they picked, I think this definitely looks like a Faye Valentine pose. Her outfit and sex appeal shines well through the figure. The glossy paint that covers her outfits pops off of the figure. Having her have one leg up on the box really brings out the attractive qualities of her hourglass figure. With her long legs, it brings along that added seductive quality of Faye that fits very well with the character.

Sculpting

Let’s be real here guys. The most important part of this figure is her sex appeal. So, how well sculpted are her proportions? Let’s just start with her legs. The “realistic-ness” and details of her legs looks amazing. Her calves on her bent left leg and the little details around her right knee area makes this figure look just that more realistic. When I look at my Elizabeth Bunny figure, there’s just not as much emphasis on details of her legs.

Looking at her chest, abs and arms, it’s definitely all at a reasonable proportion. Even the little details in her fingers looks pretty life-like and it shows well in the pictures!

I don’t think the brighter lighting and pictures does this figure justice. She is a bit more on the paler side, which is still pretty accurate to her anime design. I had her displayed on my dining room table to see what she looks like with natural lighting and it looks pretty damn incredible! 

Paint or Sculpting Errors?

There are some painting errors here and there. You’ll only find them if you are examining the figure up very close as it is barely noticeable. If you look at her chest area, you can see the painting on the line of her shirt is slightly off. Looking at her red jacket, the red does bleed over a little onto her flesh.

Probably the most blatant and concerning error is the black scratch mark on her hand. I can’t quite get it to wipe off, so I’m pretty sure it is a light scratch. On the standard edition hand with the gun, there is a little bit of red paint and the tips of her fingers are missing some of the flesh colored paint.

The figure does come kind of grimy and dirty. There is this sandy kind of residue covering all the pieces, especially the base where it’s very dusty. However, it’s nothing you can’t just wipe down yourself.

Pictures

Last Thoughts

All in all, this figure is a great design that displays some of Faye’s best qualities. If you want Faye being Faye, this figure is an accurate depiction of her. A couple of issues that people may have are with the face and the light scratch on the figure’s body. Other than that, I think most people will end up liking this. Would I recommend this figure? Yes. Just be responsible with your money!

Preview