by Ken Tuccio

My opinion doesn’t matter one iota to the folks at Disney, but personally I feel that the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise went downhill with the release of each movie.

I remember first seeing The Curse of the Black Pearl and thought it was an amazing film. It was witty, different, amazingly acted, and a lot of fun to watch. Then came Dead Man’s Chest, a flick which wasn’t as good as it’s predecessor, but far from a “bad flick”. Finally there was At World’s End, the only Pirates flick of the three that completely and utterly bored me. Its storyline was too convoluted and long, and the flick seemed more of an excuse to put together unique and unrealistic fight sequences than an attempt to create a fun piece of cinema.

With the decline of the movies, so went the interest in me purchasing any Pirates of the Caribbean merchandise. I recall when the first movie came out I went out of my way to purchase a Jack Sparrow figure, but I didn't have that same ambition to put money in the toymakers pockets after the last two flicks.

Basically, I never give the Pirates section of any toy store a second look. That was until I was in Target and saw this …

From a company called Zizzle, this is the Pirates of the Caribbean : Swashbucklers – Beastly Kraken.

Swashbucklers was supposed to be an animated series based off the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, but Disney scrapped the idea sometime after the merchandising rights were dished out. This left Zizzle with a small line of toys and no TV show to power it. Obviously, as a way to cut their losses, Zizzle decided to release the toys and hope for the best.

Throughout various toy stores you’ll see single pack figures for the Swashbucklers line, as well as larger “creature sets” such as this.

I’ll be completely honest, my interest in this figure was based on nothing but the price, as this was marked down from $14.98 to a mere $3.74 …

There’s not many action figures I won’t purchase for a mere $3.74, so this was a no brainer.

For the price I probably would have purchased any Pirates figure they had available, it could have been a set that consisted of Orlando Bloom on a toilet and I would have swiped it up and proudly displayed it on my bookcase, so the fact that the box makes this figure look pretty cool is a fun bonus.

Based off the side of the box, this Beastly Kraken comes with moving tentacles, snapping jaw, fearsome teeth, and a Jack Sparrow figure …

That’s a description that makes the Kraken sound rather kick-ass.

The image on the box looks rather cool, as the Kraken looks like an evil beast intent on staking claim to whatever bodies of water are around him, so I was curious as to whether or not the actual figure would be up to snuff …

Meh.

To me the Kraken is somewhat indescribable. In some ways it looks more like a giant log than any sort of deadly sea creature, and the teeth and tentacles don’t look nearly as pronounced or dangerous as the box indicates. Plus, from the front, it looks like Jack Sparrow is riding a very disgusting, deformed, and dangerous vagina …

As the movie Teeth proved, something like that would scare anybody with a penis as an appendage, but it’s not something I look for in an action figure.

The Kraken is a very soft vinyl, it’s eerily reminiscent of a dog’s chew toy. I would feel totally comfortable giving this to a puppy, as not only would the dog get enjoyment out of such a squeeze toy, but I’d find it entertaining to see a puppy munching on a deformed vagina.

The Jack Sparrow figure makes the set completely worth the $3.74 …

To put it bluntly, this figure is awesome. It’s got a very strong, cartoonish, anime vibe to it. It’s rather detailed for such a cartoony figure, and it moves in all different directions, making it both very poseable, and also very desirable for female action figures who have long wanted to get their freak on with a pirate.

For the price I paid, I’m satisfied enough. The Jack Sparrow figure will find its way to my bookcase, and the Beastly Kraken will be relegated to spending its days in the box of action figures we dare not speak of.

Would I have paid full price for this? Absolutely not, but for under $4 this was well worth the price.