Johnny with Boeure Frogs
Palisades 2000
Palisades was a toy producer that tackled a lot of movie and video game franchises, including Resident Evil, but in 2000 there was a particular focus on Sega and some of their games on the Dreamcast; Space Channel 5 and House of the Dead 2.
Johnny was released alongside another recurring zombie, Ken and two boss characters, the Hierophant and Strength (These links go to figurerealm). All the figures in the line were sculpted by Sota (famous for sculpting a lot of the Street Fighter figures), and their style is particularly obvious for Strength.
Johnny came with two Boeure frogs, a House of the Dead figure base and his two axes. The Bouere Frogs showed up in the first House of the Dead game and have popped up in-between (like in the Zombie Revenge spin-off for Dreamcast) and make some great pack-in accessories for fans of the franchise.
Boeure Frogs
Each of the frogs have their own unique pose; grotesque and aggressive but without any articulation (despite having some glaring seams around the hips). The textures Palisades managed to capture on the skin and the overall colour scheme and paint application looks great.
Johnny with Dual Axes
Johnny is one of recurring zombies within the House of the Dead series, sporting dirty long hair and twin axes, you’ll be blasting a bunch of Johnny’s to pieces every time you boot up House of the Dead 2. Overall, Palisades recreated Johnny really well, dirty and tattered. The articulation is good, featuring ball-joint shoulders and he bends at the hips and the knees. There’s no articulation in the neck, head or feet but I feel like it’s a good balance between a collector figure and something that’s stable enough for playing with.
I’ve snagged the alternative head version (thus the hole on the left side of his head). Apart from the different head sculpt, he’s identical to the standard Johnny action figure. The paint and detail in the head wound are pretty murky. I do like the look and concept, especially how it ties into the House of the Dead game and how the zombies fall apart as you blast them but with the rest of the high-quality sculpt it feels like an after-thought.
He comes with his signature axes. Both these weapons easily win the ‘laziest paint application‘ award with the green ‘brush strokes’ applied to each axe head. In saying that, each axe has four different colours (Silver, brown, light brown and green), which clearly points to its higher-priced ‘for collectors’ purpose.
Finally, each of the figures in the Palisades House of the Dead line came with a base. Using the included base makes it a bit easier to balance Johnny’s feet. Overall, Johnny is incredibly tedious to get standing due to his pre-defined pose and the joints that begin to appear as you bend his knees. Bring your blu-tac for this one.
House of the Dead Figure Base
Simply a cool-looking base to place your figures on. No pegs, no foot holes, just the logo set against overgrown brickwork. Balancing Johnny is always a tedious task but I love the way this base finishes off the whole package and creates a great balance between collectability and playability.
Overall, I really enjoy what Palisades managed to achieve with such a short line. They managed to capture a lot of the charm and atmosphere Sega built through its House of the Dead series and I hope to collect the entire lot in time. There’s only four figures but Palisades ensured they did them well. The paint applications are sharp, there’s a great amount of detail but they still feel sturdy and playable.
You can see my Johnny figure make a cameo appearance in the recent Zombie Revenge Video Game review for the Sega Dreamcast here or check out the Website of the Dead to see some great concepts for a few other planned action figures.
