I didn’t enjoy Nisemonogatari all that much, partly because my favorite Monogatari characters took a back seat to less interesting ones. At the very least we did get some Senjougahara action, including a memorable scene to open the series. That brings us to this figure, deftly translated to 3D by Kotobukiya.
I really like the teasing (or you might say “abusive”) nature of Senjougahara, so that’s the main quality that drew me to this figure. It does a great job capturing the moment and her personality. As a nice bonus, it comes with two options for her right arm. The default part has her holding a pair of handcuffs, but you can swap it for an alternate piece where she’s teasing Araragi with a drop of water from her finger. I don’t know about you, but I found that part pretty sexy.
Kotobukiya kept with the ruined classroom motif from the show, which also features on their Black Hanekawa figure. In fact I appropriated the busted desk from that figure just to add a little something to these shots.
Although the base is very cool and flavorful, I don’t like the way it attaches to the figure. There’s one short peg that’s supposed to slide up into her foot, but it doesn’t hold well at all. Senjougahara’s body doesn’t attach to the chair, so without a secure connection at the peg, there’s nothing holding her in place. Aside from looking strange (leaning back without a foot touching the ground), it’s worrisome during, say, photo shoots done at night on a balcony.
Paint transfer was the other problem I ran into. There was some from her hair fringe to the forehead, which isn’t too bad because that part wouldn’t be visible anyway. There was also paint transfer from the bottom of the ponytail to the shirt, which would be an issue if you prefer the short hairstyle.
Despite its faults I like the figure because it oozes character. If I’m buying a figure because I like a character, I want that figure to capture their personality. Kotobukiya did a great job doing that with this Senjougahara. The two issues I mentioned are disappointing but not dealbreakers – which is fortunate because the only other Senjougahara I have is Alter’s and that one isn’t very Senjougahara-y.
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