[Toy Review] Fran FFXII Play Arts Kai

Took her long enough to come out from her rabbit hole. Her Play Arts Kai figure is already good to go for mass production than Cloud and Tifa, but I guess the Advent Children (and other bunch of) PAKs got prioritized. Other reasons for her very long delay, MAYBE, is SQEX didn't want to spoil the HD treatment for FFXII, speculation much. Of whom am I talking about? Why it's Fran, Final Fantasy XII's bunny girl or Vierra.

"That's what sky pirates do, they fly do they not?"

~Fran~

PACKAGING

The front and back of the box

The packaging coffin-type and its design is based on FFXII logo's colors. The magnetized front cover shows a large product shot of Fran action figure and the standard logos mostly seen in PAK boxes. The back of the box shows more product shots of the toy. She's the first to have an official FFXII PAK figure. No PAK teasers for another FFXII character.

Opened front cover

Opening the magnetized front cover reveals the action figure and its accessories. You can also check out and read the character and the game's info.

Fran is unboxed and ready for her review

Packaging includes: Fran figure, Bow, Arrow, Bow gripping left hand, Arrow gripping right hand, Display stand (with instructions on the cardboard blister pack)

THE FIGURE

This is her first Play Arts Kai action figure. She's lucky because PAK standards are now high when it comes to sculpt, detail and number of articulation points.

Viewing Fran on 4 sides

As expected, Fran's hot! Probably the tallest female PAK to date. She's got a great build and quality, nice presentation too, she really looks like her game counterpart.

Wow, she looks pretty!

Fran's face is 100% accurate. Her facial expression is neutral, well she barely smiled or get angry faced in the game anyway. The face have nice paint app and its shading is not exaggerated. 

Fran's Vierra ears. They're really detailed

The bunny ears are very detailed and nicely painted, its tips have black hues. Her head piece is really detailed, great sculpt.

You may decide not to connect the ponytail to give Fran a sort of haircut
and she'll still look good.

Her white hair especially the ponytail have great paint/shading applied but the hair have few paint drops and sticks. Her ponytail is not connected on her from the packaging, you have to connect it on the ball-hinge at the back of her head. 

She wears minimal armor

Fran's black armor design is intended for mobility. It's 50% skimpy and 50% functional and casual looking for a Vierra (Fran's race of very agile bunny women). Her cleavage is exposed (she's got a pair of inaccurately big boobs). The chest piece is soft BTW. Her suit is highly detailed with very gothic-like/medieval design and it's metallic.

Fran without the ponytail.
Fran's back looks really great and I'm not just talking about her butt.

SQEX didn't skip any detail on making this figure, even the back looks great and I didn't know she have some "tail armor" behind her.

The silky cloth.
This side of the cloth, is not glued, see its tab?

Her midriff is exposed because of the silky-looking cloth which is made of translucent plastic with fading white paint applied. The crotch piece is soft for better leg movement but it's too small that you can see the leg joints.

The arms looks good.
If you notice a little scar-like sculpt there, both arms have it so I guess it's intentional.

The arms have thin-looking sleeves, this is probably her under-suit, they got red zig-zag linings. Skin paint/shading is nice and the armor parts on the forearms are sculpted and detailed pretty good. Fran also got pretty long fingers and nails.

Check out the details on the leg armor, so cool.

Fran's long legs looks great and solid like her arms. Skin paint/shading is nice and the armor pieces got pretty nice sculpt and paint app, her hip area looks big though.

Fran's heeled Vierra sandals.

Fran wears heeled sandals that is made specifically for a Vierra. It looks very nice and asymmetrical because the right foot have extra armor plating while the left foot doesn't have it.

ACCESSORIES

I only played FFXII for a short time at my bestfriend's house, but I played and finished its direct sequel, Revenant Wings, so I got a gist of Fran's preferred equipment.

That's all her stuff.

Fran PAK only got a bow and arrow and a single gripping hand for each accessory. She only got the necessary stuff, SQEX should've included some hands or an alternative face/head.

Fran's bow. I don't know what it's called.

The wooden bow have metal looking parts sculpted on it. The wooden and metallic parts are really detailed the small metal parts at the tips of the bow are soft and supported by a translucent plastic. The bow's string is made of soft plastic and can't hold the pulled pose so she can't pose like she's actually pulling the bow and arrow while aiming but you can do it! LOL.

Just one arrow? I want more!

The arrow have few designs on it making it look more special than standard bland arrows. The arrow is painted pretty well. The arrow is a bit soft and might break if you're not careful.

Both of these hands looks really good but they have a weak grip on the bow and arrow

These hands are used to hold just the bow and the arrow. The fingers are really soft and bendy.

Holding the bow

Now she's ready to fire her arrow.

The display stand.

Use this display stand if you got a weak legged PAK action figure. I'm not gonna use it but you might want to use this when you pose Fran (see ARTICULATIONS).

ARTICULATIONS, POSING AND SCALING

Fran giving us the grumpy stare.

It would suck if this Fran PAK have few articulation, good thing that this is a PAK toy with lots of articulation and most of the joints are hidden and have nice range of motion.

[left] Looking up

[right] Holding the bow up

Fran's head moves well, it can do a full 360 rotation. The ponytail on her head is ball-hinged in case that you want to pose her like she's moving or the hair is wind-swept. The ponytail is also heavy and affects her head and chest articulation. No neck articulation.

[left] Loading the arrow.

[right] She fired the arrow.

Fran's upper-body articulation and figure design makes her lean much better. Her chest and waist moves pretty good just don't overdo the posing on torso parts or the toy's gaps will get exposed.

Aim for a kill

Shoulders are ball-hinged. The arms have pretty good movement range and it can move closer to the chest. The arms doesn't have bicep swivel, the shoulder/elbow ball-hinges can do it. Wrist's ball-hinges can swivel too and moves well. The wrist ball-hinges are small, be careful on posing them.

Quick bow-firing action pose

The whole leg can raise up high forward because of the small and soft crotch piece that give more room for movement. Sideward movement might have limitation depending on how the waist is posed. Her butt really hinders the leg's movement to the back. The legs twists just fine.

Crouching for better aiming stability

The double-hinged knees moves really well but looks awkward when totally folded on this figure. They look good when posed correctly.

"Better reload quick."

Ankles are ball-hinged that moves great. The feet have poorly placed toe swivel that's almost useless. Because of her heels, Fran might have balancing issues depending on her pose.

This shot can be interpreted as firing an arrow under a huge Esper.
... or an evasive-limbo-bow-action!

Time for another 10-incher PAK action figure scaling comparison. I'm not including Fran's bunny ears for the comparison, just the top of her head and eye level.

I just noticed that Fran, so far, is the only non-Nomura designed FF character that's made as a large scale Play Arts Kai figure.

Scaling is much better when I compare Fran to the FFVII:AC AVALANCHE trio. Because of her heels (or probably not) Fran is taller than Cloud and Tifa and a bit shorter than Barret.

Fran with the Kingdom Hearts boys

Fran is obviously taller than Sora (KH3D) and Riku (KH2) which is good enough for me.

Fran is so tall!

I wish Lightning (LR:FFXIII) is a bit taller so that the scaling between her and Fran will look better. Serah (FFXIII) is puny compared to Fran.

Fran with the Variant girls (by Nomura)

Hatsune Miku (V-PAK) is shorter. Catwoman (V-PAK) is a bit shorter than Fran, making her the tallest female PAK to my collection. They all look good with each other. 

A cyborg ninja, a psycho, a bunny girl, and a government agent.
They're almost like an unstable team that fights for justice.

Ninja-heel-wearing Raiden (MGR) is a bit taller than Fran. Harley Quinn (B:AK) have nice scale next to Fran. Leon (RE6) as expected, is shorter.

QUALITY ISSUES

I found few issues on my Fran figure. While I'm posing her for the review, I noticed that one side of the transparent silky cloth on her abs is not glued, same for the "rippled" part on her crotch piece, its tab that connects it on the crotch piece is also not glued. I fixed them with a super glue which is pretty easy. And lastly, as usual, there are some paint drops, the worst paint drop is a black paint under her left side hair. 

CONCLUSION

Cue that Final Fantasy victory fanfare for Fran's arrival to the Play Arts Kai line of action figures and my collection! Fran as a rookie PAK passed on almost everything: Great build/quality, she's super poseable, she's way cheaper than Riku and Miku, talk about inconsistent pricing. I'm very happy to acquire this figure, I wish she had a bit more accessories though. I bet even non-Final Fantasy fans will buy her too. Get her fast, this bunny will get out of stock soon. I'm looking forward to see Vaan, Penelo, Basch, Balthier, Ashe and especially Gabranth as new FFXII Play Arts Kai figures. Make it happen SQEX!

Oh yeah, this is one of my favorite super-edits!

Bounty hunting somewhere in Dalmasca Estersand

This is the most difficult edit I made.

Cheers and Happy Collecting!