A scale figure for Haruhi Suzumiya?! What year is this?

Unboxing / Assembly / Review

Figure Review

Haruihi Suzumiya Kadokawa info

Otaku Sinh’s collection

I bought it here!

Price

¥15,200 (Figure)+ ¥5,269 (DHL shipping) = ¥20,469 or $139.26

Timeline

Paid on Sat 10/29/2022
Shipped on Mon 11/01/2022
Arrived on Tues 11/02/2022

AmiAmi

I have tons of orders from AmiAmi and this order doesn’t have anything uniquely different from the others I’ve made. Check out my catalogue of other figure reviews if you would like some more insight into AmiAmi or other anime figure companies.

At the end of the day, trust, safety and ease of transaction is what anime figure collectors need the most when buying from Japan and AmiAmi is arguably the top option.

Shipping

AmiAmi shipping boxes have specific labels on their boxes. You can see their logo and their specific size of their boxes. In this case, this scale figure came in a “100 size” box. Many 1/8, 1/7 and 1/6 scale figures come in “100” or “120 size” boxes. The bigger the box, the more you can expect the price of shipping to go up.

You can tell by the way AmiAmi packs their boxes that they understand that customers like their anime figure boxes to be as safe as possible. Sometimes, they opt for bigger boxes to make sure there are ample amount of packing material to keep it safe. The only area to note is that the bottom of the box has it most thin layer of packing material.

Kadokawa Figure Box

This figure is your typical scale figure box. The theme of the box echoes the Haruhi Suzumiya theme colors from the show of red and white.

Box Errors

When you buy anime figures from overseas, it’s almost near impossible to receive a perfect condition anime figure box. The biggest culprit of any damage to the figure box is some kind of crease on the box. For this box, there are two very slight crease or dents on the box.

Assembly

This figure comes with the figure, a face plate, a pair of arms, a base and a paper manual.

The most important step to note is the removal of the stock arms.

Make sure you remove the right arms first as noted on the manual!

One issue I did run into is that the peg arms are pretty tight on. It took quite a bit of strength to get it to come off. Unfortunately, my fingers slipped one time and my nails scratched a little bit of the paint off in the process..

Besides the arms being on way too tight for my liking, it becomes looser and easier each time you swap parts.

Aesthetics

Design

The two poses you can make of Haruhi are ones that you can find on The Intuition of Haruhi Suzumiya book 11 of the light novel and one that is similar to the manga cover of book one. I don’t think you can really go wrong by choosing original art covers from the light novels or manga.

The sculpting and the paint seemed to accurately reflect the character. On the art covers of the light novel, manga and anime there might be darker shades of blue used than on the figure, but the choice of colors works just fine.

For a figure like Haruhi Suzumiya, it’s hard to think of anything of worth to make for her base. This is one of the few exceptions where the simple design of her base actually makes ton of sense with the logo on there. If the creators were able to come up with a more elaborate design, it would have been a major plus.

Complaint?

If there was one thing to complain about the figure, maybe the face doesn’t look entirely like the character? Comparing my pictures versus the in-person look of the figure, the face definitely looks a lot better in person.

Haruhi Suzumiya is an OG character that has been around for quite some time, meaning there are tons of other figures of her. Check out other figures of her here.

Errors

Overall, the painting is very high quality and what we should be expecting out of scale figures. There is only a really small white paint smudge on her hair and that’s it. I was only able to see it with the arm removed.

One other slight issue I have is her opened mouth. It’s kind of hard to find a good “open mouth” sculpted face plates that look realistic and this one is no exception. The colors and the depth of her mouth just seems a little bit too bit too flat.

Pictures

Last Thoughts

If you were a fan of the anime in 2006 and 2009, then this release is quite a nostalgic one. For the light novel readers, I’m sure it feels good to get good quality releases for an older series. All of those feelings aside, the quality must match the price point and I think for $140, this is a tremendous value buy. Other figures like Kotobukiya’s ARTFXJ only includes one face swap for anywhere betweeen $120-150, so this Kadokawa release with an extra pair of arms feels like a good value. For the smoothness of the sculpting, paint and accuracy of the figure, the $140 price point just makes a lot of sense. If you are a US retail buyer, you are looking at $200+. That is a pretty hefty premium you are paying, but judging by any new options of quality for the character, that might be the only choice.

All in all, it’s still a good figure at $200, but it’s a great one at $140.