Tong Toy Story Woody Minifig [Toy Impressions]

I've been remiss in keeping this blog updated, which normally would be fine and status quo for the most part, except that those Lego knockoff makers in China have been hard at work into putting out sets quickly. And being that I've made it a personal mission to document here some of those here, I also have to ramp up on my side.

For your reading pleasure and possible buying information, of course, and not because I'm into them now.

*nose grows an inch*

So today, we'll be looking at the first of four Toy Story minifigs from Tong.
Price: PhP 27.50 - 50.00 each (depending on where bought)

You can see from the box art that the makers decided not to incorporate the actual Toy Story branding, which is weird because they took the copyrighted images of Woody and company and used them anyway. I have no idea what the copyright laws in China are, but maybe companies there are allowed to use copyrighted images as long as they don't use actual trademarked names. I dunno.

If you look at the lower right of the box, you can see which character is in the box. In this case, it's Woody. And on the lower left side, blurbs that claim these toys are fun and interesting. We'll see.

Here's a closeup of the company's logo.

And here's the back of the box. It's the same across all four characters:

We can also see here which Toy Story characters they chose to include. There's Woody, Jessie, Buzz, and one of the three aliens (do they each have names? I don't recall if they do), and all of them are riding some sort of vehicle.

So that's the box for the most part. Here's what's inside. We're looking at Woody first.

Get used to this, as most knockoff minifigs will come with these, with slight variations: minifig, some accessories, cards. Nope, the vehicle advertised at the back is nowhere to be found. Lying bastards.

We'll get to the minifig later, let's check out one of the cards first, purely for documentation purposes.

You have Woody's minifig shown, some desert background (???), and some stats. Check out those stats, by the way. There's "Composite index" (I'm guessing the average of all others, "Lovely index" (what?), "Flexible index" (huh?), "Outgoing index" (what is this, a dating site ad?), and "The popularity index" (shaking my head at this point).

And to top it all off, the card is laminated in some cheesy starburst foil, and even has a "New Arrival" text on the lower right. There's no rhyme and reason to this card. The "new arrival" text indicates that it's for ad purposes, but the ratings, crazy as they are, as well as the foil lamination, indicates that the card is supposed to be collectible, and possibly playable, in some sort of Super Trump way. Let's move on.

So here's the payoff.

So you have Woody AND WEAPONS. To be honest, it's a bit disconcerting to see a smiling Woody with freaking weapons. I don't recall him using a trident and scythe in any of the Toy Story movies, do you?

Here's the top of his hat. It looks pretty rough, with very visible seams.

And here's a closer look at Woody's head. The paint job is very rough, and I guess part of the reason why he looks disconcerting other than the weapons is because the bad paint job on his eyes make him look lifeless.

The bad paint job extends to the body and legs. I think that mottled gray-brown job on the legs are supposed to be Woody's boots. If you'll also notice Woody's left hand, the seam is very obvious. Also, the base of the feet themselves is slightly curved instead of straight, though it's not that noticeable from afar, to be fair.

I guess it's expected at this point, but anyway, the back of the legs look pretty rough, too, especially when you try to seat the minifig.

It's that rough.

For reference, here's the original Lego Woody minifig:

Credit: Brickipedia

Already, the elongated legs and arms are marked differences from the bootleg one, bad paint job aside.

I really can't see any redeeming quality to recommend this minifig. About the only time this one will make sense is if you're hard-pressed to have a Woody minifig and you don't have the cash to spare for the real thing, or if you're fine with having a placeholder up until some other knockoff maker comes around to make their own Woody minifig.

That might be a long wait, though, since the top makers (like Sheng Yuan) have their own plans to push through (we'll see these in future posts). So if you really need a Woody figure, Tong is the only game in town right now. Whether you're willing to overlook the drop in quality is something for you to decide, though.

Previously: Sheng Yuan Hulk