Is the Warlord Essex General Worth the $9.00 USD?

Gees...I began rummaging through the Warlord stuff I got from the spousal "Ms. Claus" and my jaw dropped when I noticed the price tag on the Warlord ECW General Essex figure. $9.00 USD? This is GW pricing. This guy has no special magic powers, no extra power weapons, just a floppy hat, some "lobster armor" and a horse that wasn't quite inspiring. The figure was cast in a brittle metal with some cleaning points that had to be trimmed down on the horse as well as cleaning out the neck/reins area. This is not usually an issue but at $9.00 USD, I expect more quality.
I'm probably not going to purchase any more Warlord metal figures unless the price comes down about $4.00 USD to $5.00, the metal isn't the brittle stuff that won't last over time interacting with fat wargaming fingers, and could be purchased in a box set of generals as per their plastics.
I guarantee my Essex will look better than the gallery picture from Warlord. That is a perfect example of "wargaming standard". arrghh....at least they could have painted the damn miniature to look good. It's an omen folks! :)