Figma Ryoko Asakura Review and Appreciation

I've been watching the Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-Chan recently and I've really enjoyed the show. The one factor of the anime I've noticed is that Asakura's character gets a lot of screen-time and character development. Unlike in the original series where she's only around for 2 episodes, in this series she's an engaging, relevant character. Naturally this made me dig up my dusty old Asakura figma to take some pictures.

Here's Ryoko in her simple old style glory. She was the 23rd figma released back in 2008 (Damn that was a while ago). Anyway, let's do a quick review and enjoy some show inspired pictures.

Accessories:

Did you catch that? Because those are it, Ryoko comes with her knife and a hat for Yuki to block it with. In addition she comes with Kyon's friend's Taniguchi's head (as if you'd actually buy a spare Kyon for him...) Now that being said having a spare male head is never a bad thing. Ryoko also comes with a basic figma hand rack, but that's standard. She rivals figma Michael Jackson in terms of having next to nothing. 

Accessories: 6 of 10

Faces

Ryoko has 2 faces:

A normal smile

A closed eyes smile

Yeah her faces are lame by today's figma standards. Personally, I like a myriad of emotions to be conveyed by a figma's faces. Ryoko can only be happy which kind of sucks. Though to be fair from the limited exposure she had these at the time faces make sense (as she died happy with a smile on her face). Right now though I really wish she had an angry or crying face to better reflect her new character persona.

Faces: 6 of 10

Playability:

So typically I'd pose Asakura trying to kill Kyon and Yuki like so

However, I'm doing this whole thing since I like the new series so here's some show-inspired pictures.

Asakura in Yuki's clothes

Asakura cheering on Yuki

Asakura: "Kyon-kun, what are you doing to Nagato-san?"

Asakura also has to keep Haruhi at bay (she's literally the only one who can "control" her)

I tried (I don't own this obviously)

You can use Asakura as easily as any other school girl figure. Outside of menacing with her knife she doesn't have anything special to her. However, I had a lot of fun taking these shots (but that's because I like her character).
Playability: 7 of 10

Collection Utility:

Asakura is either a yangire murderer or a cute schoolgirl. She's fairly average at both due to her somewhat boring faces, but again if you like her she's worth. I'll give her a better score in this category since not every figure can play the killer as easy as she can. 

Collection Utility: 8 of 10

Staying Power:

I left Asakura to gather dust until The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-Chan came out. Then Asakura became my favorite character and felt compelled to take pictures of her again. She has little staying power unless you really like her character. Ok, I've become a broken record at this point, but it's to get the point across that if you're a haruhi fan (or just an Asakura fan) this is a great figma to have lying around.

Whelp that's enough for now. Thanks for reading!