While last week was all about Hulk, this week the spotlight has predictably turned to the hero whose next superhero movie is under a week away: the Amazing Spider-Man! Following up hot new solicits from other companies, Sideshow Collectibles is finally ready to launch the Spidey they premiered at NYCC 2018 last October: the Sideshow Exclusive Spider-Man Premium Format Figure is now up for order! Do the eyes have it—is this another “EX or bust” piece?

Way back in 2015, Sideshow Collectibles revealed and started taking orders for their leaping, acrobatic Spider-Man Premium Format Figure (and Symbiote variant!) that are easily my favorite statues of Spidey to ever be released by any company… ever!

Four years later, Sideshow is at last ready to challenge themselves to release a (non-Miles Morales) superior Spider-Man (no, not that Superior Spider-Man) 1:4 figure. Have they pulled it off…?

Well… in some ways “yes”, and in some ways “no”. There are definitely something things about this new quarter-scale Spider-Man figure that I dig… but there’s also a lot that just doesn’t jive with my personal aesthetic sensibilities.

Once again, Sideshow has aimed for a never-before-done dynamic pose for this sculpture—and they’ve definitely achieved that. Unfortunately, my brain has a hard time interpreting exactly what I’m seeing here.

The official writeup for this statue says that Spidey is “avoiding his foe’s clutches”, but it looks more to me like Peter is doing a crazy Broadway dance move atop one of Doctor Octopus’s tentacles. I had a really hard time with this piece’s pose when I saw it in person at New York Comic Con 2018 last year, and the pose still bewilders me even in the official glam photos.

That said, a lot of love and work clearly went into this 23” Premium Format Statue, even if it’s not entirely to my taste. I love the detailing on Doc Ock’s tentacles all coiled up on the base, and the light-up feature on the tentacles is a stroke of brilliance.

What may be a stroke of heart failure for a lot of collectors is the price-tag: $625 for the Collector (regular) edition and $640 for the exclusive. That’s a big jump from the previous Sideshow Spider-Man 1/4 PF, and not necessarily one a lot of fans will be happy to pay.

The Sideshow Exclusive adds $15 to the price and adds an additional head with larger, more classic-looking Spider-Man eyes. The asymmetrical squinty-eyes portrait being the regular edition is a real head-scratcher, so I can foresee a BIG demand for the EX version of this piece.

The Sideshow EXCLUSIVE Premium Format Spider-Man on Doc Ock Tentacles Statue is now up for order, and is scheduled to be released in late 2019. Spidey statues sell like hot cakes (or should I say wheat cake?), so I’d expect the EX version to be sold out well before this ever ships, but a humongous edition size for the regular edition. Plan accordingly for your own preferences!

What do you think of Sideshow’s first new 1:4 Spider-Man Statue in years, Marvel collectors? Does this top what they’ve done before for the wallcrawler, or are you sticking with a previous Spidey statue? If you are getting this piece—do you consider it to be “EX or bust”?