Funko Pop Directors Wishlist

It's April Fool's Day, and I'm in the mood for something frivolous. So I'm dusting off a post that I was going to bin, for being way too self-indulgent.

So, let's talk about Funko Pops. I don't like Funko Pops. I think they're weird looking, and I have no idea how they've become the omnipresent collectible in fandom spaces. However, their pervasiveness fascinates me. There are Pops for cereal box mascots, drag queens, the royal family, and SNL sketch characters. And then one day, I found the film director Pops.

Director Funko Pops that already exist include Alfred Hitchcock, Guillermo Del Toro, Taika Waititi (in his notorious Comic-Con pineapple outfit), and Werner Herzog (as his "Mandalorian" character). There are also Pops for Paul Feig, JJ Abrams, James Wan, Patti Jenkins, Ava DuVernay, Vince Gilligan, Jason Blum, Kevin Smith, and The Duffer Brothers. The best looking one is of JJ Abrams, because JJ Abrams happens to weirdly resemble a Funko Pop in real life.

Obviously, these are mostly popular franchise directors, chosen to be Pops because of their prominence in the current pop culture. They aren't being chosen by anyone weighing any of the actual merits of each director against each other. Buuuuuut, what if someone did? Which directors would I want to include if I were making a real cinephile's series of director Funko Pops?

So, here we go. Below, I've listed a dozen directors I think should be immortalized in bobblehead form, along with some haphazard notes. What are the criteria? There are no criteria aside from my own fandom. Heck, those listed below aren't even my favorite directors. They're my favorite directors as larger-than-life personalities, if that makes any sense. They're the directors who it seems the most fitting that there be Funko Pops for.

Stanley Kubrick - My favorite director. The perfectionist. The mastermind. The dude with the eyebrows. And he's got such a great, intense face. Along with Steven Spielberg, he was synonymous with what my understanding of a director was, when I was a kid. I tend to picture him as the somewhat disheveled, balding, bearded, bespectacled presence from the "Making 'The Shining'" doc. Maybe add a couple of the famous Kubrick boxes, and we're good.

Agnes Varda - I mean, she's practically Funko Pop shaped already, isn't she? The tiny Grandmother of the French New Wave, with her two toned pageboy and modernist style, is without question the greatest female film director who ever lived. And there's such a wealth of looks and outfits to choose from. She showed up to the Oscars a few years ago in silk Gucci pajamas, and dressed up in a potato costume to promote her 2003 art exhibition, Potatutopia.

David Lynch - I admit that 90% of the reason that Lynch is on the list is his hair. I almost put Jim Jarmusch in for the same reason. He's just got such a memorable look and demeanor, and he's the only proper American surrealist that we've got left in the mainstream. We can totally cheat and make the Pop of his "Twin Peaks" character, FBI agent Gordon Cole (and even better, if we can also get Agent Cooper, the Log Lady, and the Man From Another Place).

John Ford - Quite a few directors over the years sported eye patches: Fritz Lang, Raoul Walsh, and Nicholas Ray among others. Nobody wore one like John Ford, however, especially toward the end of his life. Maybe add the pipe and hat. Maybe just go for the full, decrepit, pajama-clad look from that famous photograph with Dennis Hopper and John Huston. Speaking of Huston, I'd like a Noah Cross Pop please. Or one of Professor Hora and his tortoise from "Momo."

Quentin Tarantino - Clearly Tarantino is notable enough in the film landscape that he should be on this list, but I wonder if there would be some trouble translating Tarantino's long face and pronounced jaw into Pop form. The lack of a mouth is really an issue here. I guess you could make the Pop of Mr. Brown from "Reservoir Dogs" or Jimmie Dimmick in "Pulp Fiction," but Tarantino is such a huge personality apart from his screen persona, it doesn't feel appropriate.

Wes Anderson - With his impeccably styled, immaculately detailed dollhouse sets and preppy costumes, there's no currently working director as visually distinct as Wes Anderson. He's also beloved by the fashion community, being the originator of many a hipster trend. His most iconic outfit is obviously the brown corduroy suit, also memorably worn by the Fantastic Mr. Fox. There also has to be mustard yellow and baby pink in the ensemble somewhere. And plaid.

Martin Scorsese - Leaving the Carl Frederickson jokes aside, Scorsese's another one who I can already see as a Funko Pop if I squint. Though he made his name in the '70s I find it impossible to picture him as anything other than a grandfatherly, silver-haired man in a suit, passionately championing his world cinema projects. He's also got a fantastic smile - which, alas, would be wasted on a Pop because they don't have mouths. The eyebrows, however, would translate fine.

Steven Spielberg - Yeah, this one is a no-brainer. Spielberg has already been caricatured and animated so many times over the years, his image is pretty well cemented in popular culture. Beard, glasses, baseball cap - just reference his appearance as "his Eminence" in the "Hooked on a Ceiling" short from "Animaniacs." Considering the modus operandi of the Funko folks, I'm surprised that this and George Lucas weren't the first director Pops that they came out with.

Akira Kurosawa - I was very tempted to put Hayao Miyazaki here, but when it comes to Japanese cinema, it has to be Akira Kurosawa. Fortunately he cuts a pretty memorable figure with his dark sunglasses, cap and coat. Chris Marker's "A.K." documentary, covering the production of "Ran," has some of the most memorable images of him in his later years. On the other hand, the old photos of a younger Kurosawa in a bucket hat never fail to make me smile.

Spike Lee - The glasses, the lids, the kicks - I mean, there should probably be a Mookie Pop, but it just wouldn't be the same. Yes, Spike Lee is on the list because he's (regrettably) still the only African-American filmmaker that most people can name. However, he's never failed to live up to the title or present anything but a persistently fascinating, uncompromising image. I leave it to Funko's legal counsel to determine how much NY Knicks gear he should be sporting.

Tim Burton - I mean, how could you not have a Tim Burton Funko Pop? He used to be the king of movies that generated Hot Topic tchotchkes, and put thinly disguised versions of himself in most of his films. Also, the persona is iconic - artsy '90s Goth weirdo with gravity-defying hair. And don't doubt that he was very savvy about exploiting that persona. Add some black-and-white spiral patterns and maybe a Skellington or Frankenweenie plushie, and we should be all good to go.

Orson Welles - There aren't too many early directors on this list, because frankly I'm not familiar with many of them. However, Welles was a lot like Hitchock, someone whose persona just kept growing and growing over time, and he stayed in the public consciousness for decades. The easiest approach would be to make a Pop of Charles Foster Kane from "Citizen Kane" or Harry Lime from "The Third Man." If you're feeling obscure, maybe go for the "Frozen Peas" era Welles.

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