I have been watching The Nightmare Before Christmas every October since I was nine years old. That's over two decades of Jack Skellington, Sally, and Halloween Town. The film is woven into who I am — into my love of autumn, of dark whimsy, of things that are beautiful and melancholy at the same time.
I've collected Funko Pops for years. I have a dedicated shelf. I have a system. And yet, for all that time, something was missing. My collection had no centrepiece. No anchor. No single figure that made someone walk into the room and immediately understand what the shelf was about.
Then I found the Light Up Super Pop Jack Skellington. And the shelf finally made sense.
The Problem With Standard Figures
I love standard Funko Pops. I have dozens of them. But there's a ceiling to what a 9cm figure can do on a shelf — they work beautifully as a collection, as a backdrop, as texture. What they can't do is command attention on their own. They need numbers to make an impact.
I'd been thinking for a while about getting a Super Pop — the larger format figures that stand around 18.5cm and are designed to be display centrepieces rather than shelf fillers. But I wanted it to be the right one. Not just any character. The character. The one that the whole shelf was quietly organised around, even if I'd never admitted it.
Jack Skellington. Obviously. Always Jack.
Finding This One
I'd seen standard Jack Skellington Super Pops before and they were good — but not quite right. And then I came across the Funko Pop! Super: The Nightmare Before Christmas – Jack Skellington Light Up, and I stopped completely.
Jack, at 18.5cm tall, holding dark purple candles that actually light up. A real, functioning glow emanating from the figure itself. Not a backlit box, not a separate lamp — the candles in his hands illuminate, casting that eerie, cosy Halloween Town warmth across whatever shelf he's standing on.
At £22.50 (down from £26), it was an immediate, unambiguous yes. I ordered it the same evening.
When He Arrived
The box alone is something. Funko's Super Pop packaging is designed to display as well as protect — the window front shows the figure in full, and the artwork around it is properly considered. I kept the box. Of course I kept the box.
Out of the box, Jack is even more impressive in person. The scale is exactly right — tall enough to command the shelf without overwhelming it, detailed enough to reward a close look. The pinstripe suit, the spiral hill curl of his body, that extraordinary skull face with its wide, melancholy eyes. And then I switched on the candles.
The purple glow is subtle and perfect. Not garish, not overpowering — just a soft, flickering warmth that makes the figure look genuinely alive. In a darkened room, it's genuinely atmospheric. My partner walked in, saw it glowing on the shelf, and said nothing for a moment. Then: “Okay. That's actually incredible.”
What It Did to the Shelf
I repositioned everything around him. Jack stands at the centre, slightly elevated on a small riser, candles glowing. The standard Pops — Sally, Zero, Oogie Boogie, the Mayor — are arranged around him like a scene. The shelf went from a collection of figures to a display. From a hobby to a statement.
Every person who's visited since has commented on it. Not just Nightmare Before Christmas fans — everyone. Because a glowing centrepiece figure at the heart of a well-arranged shelf is just visually compelling, regardless of whether you know the source material.
I switch the candles on every evening in October. In November I keep meaning to stop and somehow never quite do. Jack Skellington, it turns out, is a year-round resident on my shelf. Which feels entirely appropriate.
My Verdict
If you're a Nightmare Before Christmas fan, a Funko collector, or simply someone who wants a genuinely striking display piece that does something no standard figure can — the Light Up Super Pop Jack Skellington at £22.50 is one of the best purchases I've made for my collection. It's the centrepiece I didn't know I was building towards for twenty years.
Some figures you buy. Some figures complete something. This one completed something.
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