The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is a Manga and an Anime which follows the life of Haruhi a high school girl who can unconsciously change reality, and her adventures in herself proclaimed SOS Brigade, which she founded to investigate mysterious happenings. Fun then ensues as she recruits Kyon a cynical classmate, Yuki who is a bibliophile, Mikuru who is a time traveller and Itsuki the esper, but alas to Haruhi is unaware of her comrades’ true identities. Mikuru is a time traveler from the future, who like Yuki has been assigned to keep an eye on Haruhi and discover the reason why there, is now an inability to time travel to any point in time before three years prior to the present story.
Mikuru is a sweet soft spoken girl who goes along with almost all of Haruhi’s silly demands. Haruhi enjoys dressing Mikuru up, much to her dismay, Haruhi also tends to get very jealous of Mikuru’s friendship with Kyon.
Sculpt:
This Mikuru is a Culture Festival special line-up, with Mikuru dressed up in her time-traveling combat waitress outfit, ready to star in the independent film "The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina"! from one of the anime episodes.
What can I say about Mikuru’s sculpt except cute and gorgeous. She is truly fantastic her costume design is very sweet, and ruffles on her skirt and bow are very well done. Her puffy sleeves hide well her shoulder joints. Her main dress is nice, made of semi soft PVC good detail and nice shape, her waist band is separate from waist which is nice as she can turn and then you can turn it and get a more natural look. Her chest is rather large though, and to me looks a bit unrealistic. Her hair is a bit chunky looking but nice none the less.
One complaint is that her feet are a bit odd, she has a bit of skin painted plastic which kind of looks like the collar of the shoe, looks strange when her foot is point.
9/10
Paint:
Paint job is great, the shading on her clothes is very good, and her hair looks fantastic. The detail on her sleeves, skirt and head band are just wonderful, with little white boarders. Her skin is a bit pasty but perhaps the anime character is it’s been awhile since I have watched it. Once again faces done really nice, very expressive.
Her guns are just one block colour but the nice moulding on them makes up for that, her futon beater is painted very well though.
All around a good paint job, the Fraulein line just keeps getting better.
9/10
Pose/Articulation:
Mikuru uses the E.L.F joint system, which is used by all Fraulein Revoltechs.
Her hands are on Revoltech joints, which move forwards and back and rotate, her elbow is a hinge joint, bending and straightening, a very natural movement, she has two joints at her shoulder, a swivel joint at the top of her arm allowing her arm to rotate, and at her shoulder a Revoltech joint so she can move her shoulder forwards back, up and down, and rotate, up and down movement limited due to her outfit.
Her neck has a Revoltech joint, so she can look up and down and side to side.
Under her chest she has a Revoltech joint, to lean forwards and back and twist.
At her bottom/top of her thigh she has a Revoltech joint that moves forwards, but not backwards or side to side. Her knee is a hinge joint, giving her a natural movement of knee going backwards, also at her knee is a swivel joint allowing her leg to turn in and out. Lastly at her feet she has a Revoltech joint allowing her to point and flex, and can turn in and out.
Her skirt does restrict her from sitting down properly, but that is no problem you just need to sit her down a different way, like legs to the side
Mikuru also has a Revoltech joint in each of her pigtails, which means they can move about and be windswept.
8/10
Base/Stand:
Mikuru comes with the standard Fraulein Revoltech stand, which is black and has her make (Fraulein Revoltech), her name and the series she comes from written on the base. The stand itself consists of a base a pole which pegs into it, and then a two jointed Revoltech Joint, which goes in the top of the pole and then into a U shaped holder. The thing to note about the Fraulein Revoltech stands is that they are too tall for the characters, and so when in the stand their legs dangle in the air, which is rather annoying at times.
4/10
Packaging:
Mikuru comes with the standard Fraulein box, with a window at the front, a picture of her posing on the side, on the other side details and pictures of the E.L.F joint system which the Fraulien Revoltechs use, and on the back pictures of her accessories and some of the poses she can do, and other info, on the bottom of the box all the authorized info, with her authorization stamp, and warning statements (all writing in Japanese)
Inside the box she is held between two moulded pieces of plastic, with a space for her hands and alternative faces, her guns and her rug beating stick, only her stand is in a plastic bag attached to the back of her casing. It is nice to see they are finally putting all the accessories in plastic casing rather than plastic bags. Also take note of the authorized sticker, each figure should have one.
6/10
Enjoyment:
I will break down my review of enjoyment into two categories, accessories, and play value.
Accessories:
Mikuru comes with some nice accessories; she has three alternative faces, one angry, one concerned or worried, and one with one brown one blue eye. She has two model pistols, which she uses in one of the anime episodes, and also a futon beater, so she can do some real maid work. She also comes with eight extra pairs of hands, that’s a lot of hands.
So many posing opportunities, she has hands for karate action, for her Mikuru beam, peace sings. A good lot of accessories I think.
Play Value:
With so many hands and good possibility, Mikuru is very fun. She can be cute, tough, or scared. She has lots of expressions. I can just imagine making her go around hitting people with her futon beater! Yes Mikuru is great figure with lots of playing and posing potential
Enjoyment is a 9/10
Over all Mikuru is a great addition to my figure collection, she is uber cute and pretty. And she looks great standing next to my Haruhi and Yuki. I recommend her to Haruhi Suzumiya fans.
7.5/10 Total
