Re-Halloween 2025: Creature from the Black Lagoon from Toony Terrors by NECA

 

   The Creature from the Black Lagoon got a lot of love during 31 Days of Toy Terror this year, didn't he? Well, I've got one more Gill Man review for you as part of the Re-Halloween festivities and it's the Creature from the Black Lagoon Toony Terror figure from NECA. I really like NECA's Toony Terrors and while I don't pick up every release, I'm certainly grabbing all of the Universal Monsters and classic horror characters they put out. The Creature looks incredible hear! I think NECA has largely done an impressive of translating all of the horror characters they've tackled into a classic "Saturday morning cartoon" aesthetic but there are some that just standout and the Gill Man is one of those. He looks like he just stepped out of his own animated series! Imagine a funky 1970s or 1980s cartoon where the Creature and the other Universal Monsters solve crimes from Castle Frankenstein, probably with a couple of kids and a talking pet. Yeah, now you're in the right frame of mind. Imagine the PSAs at the end of each episode where the Creature shows up to talk to kids about the hazards of diving into shallow water, swimming alone, and not throwing plastic into the ocean. I want to live in that timeline! Let's check out the Toony Terrors Creature from the Black Lagoon after the break...

The Facts:

Height: 5 7/8ths inches

Articulation: Balljointed ankles, swivel shoulders, swivel wrists, and a balljointed head.

Accessories: Fossil

Non-Scalper Price: $15 to $19 dollars 

The Positives:

* As you can probably tell by now, I'm really loving the Creature's aesthetic here. While this take on the Creature looks like he stepped out of a cartoon, it's also a very idealized version of the character. In some ways he's been simplified, but the colors are really vibrant and just pop. The brownish orange highlights kind of put me in the mind of Battle Cat/ Cringer, so I'm even more into this guy because of that.

* I notice that the headsculpt for the Creature seems to vary quite a bit between different figures due to the unusual proportions of the character's head. This one looks spot on to me. Some sculptors make the top of the creature's head too large and too long, but here I think he's spot on. He's also a bit more expressive than usual which I think is a result of the open mouth with large, red lips and a visible... tongue? I think that's a tongue. The eyes are cool, too. The slits still give you somewhere to focus but there's still enough of an alien or nonhuman feel to the Creature to make him seem mysterious.

* This guy looks great from the back. The sculpting on all of those scales and fins running down his back look excellent. NECA still brings their A-game and talented sculptors even when dealing with a stylized line like this.

* His hands are impressive, too. Besides just the webbed fingers and claws he has a really interesting texture on the palms of his fishy hands. 

* His clawed feet are pretty gnarly, too. Also, the scales on the legs are just really well done. 

* Toony Terrors are not the most articulated action figures out there. Honestly, they're more akin to the pre-posed "collector" figures of the very late 1990s to the mid 2000s like old school McFarlane's Movie Maniacs, NECA's Cult Classics, and SOTA's Now Playing. Still, there are some basic joints here like swivel shoulders and wrists and a balljointed head for adjusting the pose on your shelf. There are also balljointed ankles but those are more just to help you keep him standing upright well. 

* The Creature doesn't come with anything that he can really use but he does come with a the fossil of another of his species from the Devonian period. It's nicely mounted on a base so you can display it alongside the creature or put it with another figure that comes with lab equipment and such. It's a cool extra!

 

   I really like this guy. He's most likely my favorite of the second series of Universal Monsters focused Toony Terrors and probably one of my favorite Toony Terrors overall. The pose, the colors, the detail; all of it just comes together to make for a really fun take on the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Throwing in the claw fossil is also a very welcome touch, especially with the prices on these having gone up a bit. This is an Epic take on the Gill Man and one of my favorite plastic depictions of the character. I've got one more figure from this series that I'm planning to check out this week so stay tuned and keep your eyes open (though even that may not help...).

   Looking for more of the Creature from the Black Lagoon/ Gillman or other Sea Creatures inspired by him? I've reviewed plenty of other Gill-Man-like creatures including the NECA Crypt Club 4-Pack w/ the "Scaly and Scary" Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Funko ReAction Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Creature from the Black Lagoon (Glow-in-the-Dark Costume Colors) and Creature from the Black Lagoon "Monsters of the Silver Screen" edition from Super7's ReAction series, the Diamond Select Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Vinyl SODA Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Tiny Nightmares Creature from the Black Lagoon, Wavecrawler from Hasbro's Kre-O line, the Imaginext Gillman, the Creature from the Black Lagoon from Monster Force, the Gill-Man from the Big Bucket of Monsters, Leonardo as the Creature from the Black Lagoon from NECA, the Sea Creature from Mezco's Tower of Fear, and the Swamp Creature from Lego Monster Fighters.

For more Toony Terrors check out the following:

Ash

The Bride of Frankenstein

Elvira 
Frankenstein

Freddy Krueger

The Grady Twins
Jason Voorhees
Leatherface
Michael Myers  

The Mummy

The Phantom of the Opera

Sam
Vincent Price
The Wolf Man