Avengers: Endgame and thus the entire Infinity Saga is finally available for you to enjoy from the comfort of your couch over and over again. To celebrate this momentous occasion in cinema superhero history I thought it would be appropriate to review a Diamond Select piece featuring my favorite child of Thanos, Ebony Maw. Sculpted by Cortes Studios, standing 10 inches tall The Maw makes a haunting hush pose, silencing his latest victim. This telekinetic torturer is poised to become the creepiest villain in your collection but not much else.
Full disclosure, if it wasn’t obvious Ebony Maw, is my favorite of Thanos’ minions. I love his ability to talk his way into anything he wants and how he can convincingly manipulate anyone in his path both physically and mentally. The films do a fine job showing Maw’s telekinetic abilities and devotion to his master but due to our brief time with Maw we never get to truly see what makes him a dangerous encounter. While the MCU didn’t fully develop Maw’s character like his comic book counterpart, I also felt the design of Maw fell flat and unlike his comic book doppelganger, it was another aspect of the character that just didn’t pop.
Unfortunately, this carried over to the statue as the movie design does not translate well to a stationary figure and instead we get a mediocre figure with nothing more to offer than a fondness for the character. Let’s begin with my favorite part of the statue, the pose. I think this is the perfect pose for a Maw piece and when creating one there really is no other choice. It embodies the character’s power and menacing presence while mimicking one of his coolest moments in the film.
The rest of the statue is a bit of a mess and again I stress this is more the fault of the movie’s design. Its main flaw is it’s just a grey mess. The Maw’s grey skin-tone bleeds into his grey robes and thus what little details we get are lost in a sea of grey tone. Had the film and thus the statue adopted the white skin-tone from the comics, this problem is adverted and our villain now pops has we get a nice contrast between clothes and skin. And from here the problems compound as the statue offers little in the way of outstanding details or eye-catching visuals. The design of the character just doesn’t offer a lot for the sculptor to work with and unfortunately, it shows. It’s a nice tribute to a top tier villain but it will not be the standout in your collection.
Ebony Maw is a terrifying monster who will bore inside your mind, torture your soul and make you, your worst enemy. He is a great adversary who becomes a grey pole thanks to the design from the MCU. His comic book design offers much more in the world of flamboyant desk displays so it’s unfortunate that just a stale direction was chosen for his live-action introduction. Fans of the character like myself will definitely fawn over this piece as its the perfect Infinity War souvenir, but if you not a fan this statue probably isn’t worth the fifty bucks as it just doesn’t provide the necessary wow factor to make it to the premier spot on your self.