Sarah Jane Adventures Figures
It’s hard to explain to anyone who wasn’t alive for a good stretch of the original Doctor Who series and then “wilderness years” where the character was represented only in print and audio form, but the current state of the Doctor Who universe – three thriving (and, more to the point, usually consistently enjoyable) series running more or less simultaneously is a marvel. A decent line of Doctor Who action figures which not only brings the new series characters to our toy shelves but is veering dangerously close to producing all ten (soon to be eleven) Doctors is even more of a marvel; that both of the spinoff series have action figure lines compatible with the Doctor Who toys is practically an embarrassment of riches. … Read more
Released in January 2009 to coincide with the buzz that followed 2008’s The Next Doctor Christmas special, the Ages of Steel line (which seems to be an internal designation since it doesn’t seem to appear anywhere on the actual packaging) is an interesting experiment in blurring the lines between the classic and modern Doctor Who series. With completely unique packaging to match, Ages of Steel is a mini-series of action figures of Cybermen down through the ages. It’s also a thing of beauty. … 
In 2008, the news became official that Doctor Who collectors had scarcely hoped for: Character Options, makers of the roughly-5″ scale action figures from the new series of Doctor Who, would at last be stepping in the past and creating figures of characters from the classic series. While fans may have thought it was a long time coming, Character’s long-delayed entry into classic series merchandise was fraught with difficulties to which most of the fans weren’t even privy: another company, Product Enterprises, had the classic series merchandise license locked down, forcing Character to sublicense through them with the BBC’s permission. And even with the license secured, it wouldn’t be an easy road, with many a participant in the original series no longer living – getting likenesses approved or denied would prove to be a headache, as some actors’ estates simply didn’t consider this merchandise a priority. But one of the earliest assurances, thanks to the BBC’s part-ownership of the designs, was that there would be a boxed set of various styles of classic series Daleks. … 
We’re doing something a little bit different in this ToyBox review of Doctor Who goodies; rather than focus on a specific season or product wave, we’re focusing on figures from the stories written by Doctor Who’s future show-runner (and record-breaking three-time consecutive Hugo winner) Steven Moffat. With his uncanny knack for bringing real watch-from-behind-the-sofa psychological horror into the Doctor’s family-hour comfort zone, with an economy of post-production trickery, Moffat has more than earned his new gig. Since his first episodes as executive producer don’t begin until 2010, now seemed like a good time to pause and look at the collectible characters that have emerged from his scripts. … 
Character Options doesn’t seem to have consciously built collections around these specific episodes of Doctor Who, but by coincidence, as their much-loved action figure range grows, the earlier seasons and episodes have been revisited enough that one can put together episode-specific subsets. In the coming weeks we’ll more or less randomly sample some mini-collections from the first two seasons of the new Doctor Who that have emerged. … 
In 2000, I wrote what I fully expected to have been my last Doctor Who toy review as Dapol gave up the ghost with a final box set of Dalek variations. If someone had told me at that time that I’d be getting the first wave of an incredibly detailed new line of Doctor Who action figures six years later, I would’ve told them they were crazier than the Master. And then I would’ve placed my pre-order.