This figure is exactly what I love about McFarlane - who else would make a figure of a pole dancer? And actually do it well? Say what you like about McFarlane, they make stuff that no-one else even comes near. Mrs. Claus is part of the Twisted X-Mas series, a follow-up to the earlier Twisted Fairy Tales and Twisted Oz figures - yet again, McF takes a nice family-friendly idea and turns it upside-down with all manner of deviance. Mrs. C is a bit unique, in that all the previous women in the Twisted range have either been evil, or had evil done to them, as an integral part of their design - Red Riding Hood's taken a rather worrying interest in gutting the wolf, Miss Muffet's fighting for her life against a giant spider, Dorothy and Gretel are enslaved against their will - you get the idea. Pole dancing doesn't seem very far up the evil scale by comparison - I know people who do it just for exercise (it's a terrific workout - next time you visit a strip club, if that's your idea of a good time, bear in mind that the pole dancers, if they're any good, are probably better athletes than the bozos on the local football team) - but then again, her husband, according to McFarlane, is a skull-faced gas-mask-wearing claw-handed maniac, so I guess it's guilt by association. As a McFarlane action figure, there are certain things you can reliably take for granted: the sculpt is excellent, the paint is well above average, and the articulation is as minimal as the costume. Mrs. Claus has swivel joints at her wrists, biceps, and just above her knees, but all they're useful for is tightening up her grip on the pole so it's just right - which shouldn't be overlooked, since it makes her a much better 'statue' than, for instance, Kia Asamiya's Poison Ivy, who isn't quite holding her floral friend as tightly as she should be, and looks a bit off as a result. But a statue is, essentially, what Mrs. Claus is - her whole purpose is to sit on your shelf, or your desk at work (if your boss will put up with that kind of thing), and look pretty. Luckily McFarlane has been in the plastic statue business for some time, and have honed their skills - as I said, the sculpt here is excellent, flawless, dynamic and full of characer from the top of her Santa hat to the tip of her sleigh bell-adorned boots. Her paint is also quite exceptional - a touch wavy on a few of the narrow edges, but well within what's acceptable, and in other areas like her face and the fine detail on her gloves and lingerie, she's outstanding. Her skirt, and the mini-babydoll fringe on her bra, are particularly noteworthy - by using transparent plastic, and a very well-judged frosting of white paint, these pieces truly do look like gauzy, semi-transparent fabric. You have to see it to really believe it. Mrs. Claus has her base, of course, which is the North Pole - according to the packaging and website photos there should be a small sign saying so, but that piece was missing from my figure, though the slot in the base is there for it. I haven't yet found another one in a shop that I can check to see whether it's just mine, or the whole batch, that's missing the sign - but I can't say it bothers me, as the base is actually quite small, so too many add-ons make it look a bit cluttered. There are also two of Santa's elves, who are enjoying the show Mrs. C is putting on - one hanging onto the top of the pole, who is pre-attached to the pole, and one in a gift-wrapped box who's packaged separately, and goes on a peg at the figure's feet, from where he looks up her dress. They're quite characterful - ugly, but gleeful - but again, the small base means that the added figures make it look a bit cluttered, and I rather think the Mrs. Claus figure alone works quite well.