Review and images by JimoAi; edited by bmathison1972
Many fish toys made by toy companies like Lego and Playmobil are usually generic fish with little to no effort to identify them to any species and are usually accessories thus not much effort are put into creating them. A few exceptions do try, but they often nail the sculpt passively and the colours usually are hit or miss. Today, we’ll be looking at an exception: The Kinder Surprise Moorish idol (Zanclus cornutus). This figure is part of the Natoons series which is usually packaged in Kinder Surprise eggs and includes many other animals, often mammals. In the 2020s, the line has improved the sculptural quality vastly as they went from generic cutesy animals to ones that are somewhat identifiable, although they are still lacking in detail for the most part. This Moorish idol is only the second fish made for the new line of Natoons so far, the first being a shark; within the same series, there are 17 other animals in the set as seen in the website here. We’ll take a look at how well this figure fares in terms of accuracy and quality.
About the figure: The Moorish idol measures 3.5 cm from snout to tail along the curve, putting it in the 1:3-1:6 scale range. As said, the figure is turned to the left, which is similar to the Papo figure but more squat in the proportions with a simpler paint. Also like the Papo figure, it lacks the philamantis extension.
The figure’s action feature is that it bobs around its aqua-colored coral base when moved by an opposing force. The fish is removable from the base but it leaves a peg on the fish. The colour scheme is the usual black, white and yellow that is a trademark of this species and instead of paint, the different colours are made up of separate parts, which leaves no room for sloppy paint.
The pelvic and pectoral fins are attached and are part of the same sculpt and there should be some white markings on the 2 black stripes on the face and near the base of the tail. The distinct yellow band on the sculpt is ommited, but since it’s a toy meant for children, I will be more forgiving on this omission. The accompanying leaflet comes with a QR code to scan the toy in the accompanying app similar to what Mattel is doing with the Jurassic World line.
Overall, despite being a cheaply-made toy that’s heavily inspired by an existing figure, I feel that this is very well executed toy of one of the most recognizable reef dwellers. The fact that it looks like the species it’s supposed to represent gives me hope that Kinder may make more quality animal toys in their surprise eggs over generic cutesy animals. I can’t say I recommend chasing this figure down, as there is already several well done Moorish idols, including Yujin and the now-retired Papo version. US readers are out of luck if they want to hunt this figure down through Kinder Surprise eggs, as the eggs are banned in the States, so the best bet is to buy the figure on its own or as a full set which can be found on eBay for a relatively low price.
From left to right: Kinder, Papo, Yujin, Colorata
We have Kinder Eggs in the U.S. The toy is just packaged separately from the candy instead of within the candy. That Moorish idol is pretty neat and I agree, the quality of Kinder Egg animals is getting better.