My sincerest apologies for calling out sick on Tuesday, but I’ve had a bad case of the crud since the weekend and it’s only now starting to lift. Five days at work with this shit didn’t leave me enough strength to do anything when I got home, other than try to sleep and I couldn’t do much of that either. So I spent a great deal of time mired on the sofa with the fever sweats and bingeing on anime blu-rays. Anywho… Since I planned on opening another one of Super7’s Masters Classics figures on Tuesday, I figured I’d just roll that review over to today. And so, while the Cold & Flu meds are still pumping through my veins and buoying me to action, lets open up Fang-Or! And then it’s back to bed for me!

Once again we see that Super7 is preserving every drop of wholesome goodness that was Matty’s MOTUC packaging. As one of the Snake Men, Fang-Or was probably the one figure that was most influential in getting me to pre-order this wave. I just cannot resist me some Snake Men! And according to his tagline, Fang-Or is a “Freakishly Fanged Snake Men Warrior!” Lets ponder on that one for a moment. Fang-Or’s snake features are so extreme that even the Snake Men consider him a freak. That’s hardcore! There’s a bio on the back, but more and more these things are reading like Mad Libs to me, as they just seem to drop a lot of names and places and events, many of which don’t mean anything to me anyway. But that’s cool. I don’t need a backstory to make me appreciate this guy…

Because just look at him! In fact, you might say this is a case of love at first bite! Sorry, that pun was the Nyquil-Sudafed-Jameson-Unisom cocktail talking. It won’t happen again. Sure, Fang-Or’s gimmick, just having really long fangs, might not be all that original, but when it comes down to pure aesthetics, I love every bit of this figure’s design. Fang-Or’s body makes use of the segmented arms and legs we saw with King Hsss, and uses a rather pleasing olive green plastic for his skin color. I dig the decision to use these parts because it sets him apart from the rest of the Snake Men Warriors, giving him a rather distinctive look.

Fang-Or also sports a great looking set of brown and gold armor, consisting of a vest, belt, arm bracers, and grieves. The arm and leg armor features ornately sculpted gold fixtures reinforcing what I imagine is intended as leather. The grieves even have the detailed hinges and clasps that are supposed to be holding them in place. The vest has gold trim around the edges and sculpted rivets, each neatly painted gold, and a pair of green snakes running around the arm holes, over the shoulders and meeting under the neck. But the real showpiece here is the wide belt, which includes a huge ouroboros medallion in the center with a snake icon in the center. The belt has a leather-like texture, gold-painted studs, and it’s worn over the traditional Eternian furry diaper. The brown and gold and olive green deco blend together really well on this figure, and there’s even some coppery colored paint on the armor to spice things up. Overall, the quality of the paint application is pretty good. My figure has a stray gold fleck on his vest, and there’s a little bit of brown on his right thigh, but nothing I’m going to want to call the QC police over.

Fang-Or features the standard articulation that we’ve seen in Matty’s MOTUC figures, and that’s actually a little disappointing. The other two figures in this wave added hinges to the wrists, but Fang-Or here missed out on that little upgrade. I guess it’s not a deal-breaker for me, since 99.9% of my Masters Classics collection doesn’t have them either, but it would have been nice to know that all the Super7 figures were going to include the hinged wrists and not just some. Another thing about Fang-Or that disappoints is how loose his ab crunch hinge is. It’ll hold itself upright just fine, but it still feels like a figure that’s been played with a lot, even though it came straight from the package. Hawke had similar issues, and I’m hoping that Super7 gets some of these wrinkles ironed out by the time the next wave hits.

Fang=Or includes two heads and comes packaged showcasing his elongated fangs. The sculpted scaled noggin features a distinctively saurian shape with some pupiless yellow eyes and a wide stretched mouth. There’s some great detail inside the mouth and around the tongue, and the giant hangs are impressive indeed.

The alternative head has the shorter fangs. According to the bio, Fang-Or can “project” his fangs like knives and then grow new ones. I hope that means he shoots them out of his mouth, because I’d hate to think he snaps them off and throws them, because that just gives me the willies. Either way, this head features all the same great sculpting as the other, but it’s a little less awkward because of the normal sized fangs. I really like both heads a lot, but chances are I’m going to display this guy with the big ones, since that’s what he’s all about. At least, that’s the head I chose to use for the pictures throughout most of this review.

Fang-Or comes with a nice collection of accessories, although I’ll note here that I found his lack of serpent staff like a big omission. It’s become a tradition to get some kind of snake-related staff with these guys and I was surprised they didn’t work something up for Fang-Or as well. But that’s not to say what’s here isn’t great. For starters, he has this rather exotic and totally bitchin’ sword. This thing looks like it’s part falchion, part sickle, and all business. It’s got a silver painted blade with a black guard and pommel, and a brown ribbed grip. There’s even a saw-back sculpted on the back near the hilt. I don’t know how practical this design is, but it looks wicked and unique and I really dig it.

How about a set of tools? Fang-Or’s bio mentions that he’s fascinated by technology and that he learned all about tinkering on machines from Snake Man-At-Arms. As such, he comes with three of his favorite tools: A screwdriver, a hammer, and a pipe-wrench. Naturally, each of these tools is snake-themed, with snake head style implements (well, except for the screwdriver) and rattler-style handles. The gold paint on these looks especially nice. Pity they didn’t give him a toolbelt or something to tuck them into. These tools are not only super swanky, but it’s probably pretty convenient to have tools personalized like this, so that if someone tries to borrow them and not return them Fang-Or can always prove that they’re his.

Finally, Fang-Or comes with this adorable little winged serpent. It’s a simple static plastic figure, but the paint and sculpting are both nice. I have no idea if this is pulled from some particular piece of the MOTU fiction, but I’m very happy to have it. In fact, I can think of several different toy lines in my collection that would love to borrow it.

Fang-Or is a fantastic figure who definitely ranks way up there as one of my new favorites in the entire collection. I love the coloring, I love the personality in his head, and I particularly love all the fine detail work in his armor. He’s definitely my favorite figure in this assortment so far, and he may even be in the running as my favorite Snake Man, and that’s saying a lot, because I love each and every one of these loony bastards quite a bit. Yes, the lose hinge in the chest is troubling, and probably something we should not have to be dealing with at this stage of the game, but everything else about this figure is so good, it’s hard for me to get too upset over it. And that’s three down and one to go… Next week I’ll open up the final figure in this wave and add to the ranks of my Evil Space Mutants!