Battle of the Elvis Bobbleheads

I chose that title because it sounds so good, but there is no real battle of Elvis bobbleheads.  That has been convincingly won by this new guy:

Royal Bobbles 68 Special Elvis

I call him “Black Leather Elvis” because there is no other name on the box.  Instead, there is a lengthy article about the ’68 Special, so maybe that’s what he should be called: “68 Special Elvis.”  I like Black Leather better.  This is no toy.  It’s a limited edition collectible from Royal Bobbles.

I received an email a few days ago from Rick Schwarz, their Social Media & Marketing Analyst.  I guess ElvisBlog is media, and it’s been analyzed and declared worthy.  I love this part of Rick’s email:

Now I wouldn’t expect you to review some stupid bobblehead of Elvis that looks absolutely ridiculous.  Lord knows there are plenty of those out there.

I was intrigued by the reference to plenty of stupid Elvis bobbleheads out there that look absolutely ridiculous.  I Googled to look for some ugly Elvis bobbleheads, but there aren’t any.  The worst I found was this:

Wacky Wobbler 68 Special

But, this really isn’t so bad for an inexpensive toy.  Funko makes their Wacky Wobblers out of hollow PVC plastic.  They are mass-produced by a high-speed plastic injection molding process, chunked out by the thousands.  But still, not bad for $12, or so.

I also ran into this guy on a few sites.

NECA 1968 Special

At first glance, this looked pretty good.  The body pose is great and the face is very good, except for one thing.  The bottom of the head has a short cut-off neck coming down.  Then, the thin neck from the body goes up into the big neck.  This one does not work for me.  I can’t avoid noticing the points sticking down from his jowls. It doesn’t really matter because this design by NECA has been discontinued for several years, and is no longer available.  I couldn’t find any sites selling it.

Naturally, these three companies also have an Aloha jumpsuit model.  The new champ, Royal Bobbles, has a wonderful one:

Royal Bobbles Aloha Elvis

This bobblehead stands almost nine inches tall and is surprisingly heavy.  I call it Aloha Jumpsuit Elvis.  Warren Royal, head man of the company, refers to it as the “Aloha From Hawaii” model, but that name is nowhere on the box.

Here is what Mr. Royal says about its quality:

They are hand-molded, hand-cast, then hand-painted, hand-polished, individually hand-checked for quality, and then hand-packed.   The result is that our pieces are much heavier, much more finely detailed, and of much higher quality.

Wow, that’s a lot of hands.

If you check the individual stones on the back and side of the Elvis “Aloha From Hawaii” model, you will see the remarkable detail that went into painstakingly painting each tiny little stone by hand. Some of the details are so tiny that the artists had to use a brush with only one bristle.

I looked at the back of this model with a magnifying glass, and he is right.  This is a serious, quality product, so the $30 price tag seems very reasonable.

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We looked at the FUNKO Black Leather Elvis above.  Here is their Aloha From Hawaii Elvis:   This stands about 6” tall, and the cape is a nice touch.  It looks stiff with the legs straight and joined together.

Funco Wacky Wobbler Aloha Elvis

And the discontinued NECO line also included an Aloha Elvis:

NECO Jumpsuit Elvis

This is about 7” tall.  I love the legs and torso, and the detail on the jumpsuit is excellent.  And the face is even better than their Black Leather Elvis, but it’s still got the two necks.

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Here’s the three Elvis bobbleheads side-by-side showing their relative height’s fairly accurately:

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So, if you are going to be at ElvisWeek this year, Warren Royal and his crew will be there with their two Elvis Bobbleheads.  Drop by and check out the outstanding quality of one of these:

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I think the Black Leather Elvis looks best in side view, so this is how I display my Royal Bobbles:

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