One of my favorite new things out of Hasbro lately has been their stab at bringing out helmets and roleplay items for collectors of their Marvel and Star Wars licenses. These strike a nice balance between being better than what’s usually found on the shelves in the toy aisles, and yet not so pricey as the higher end ones for the serious high rollers. As a kid, I would have killed for some of these, and now instead of commiting homicide, I just have to lay down a Benji. A while back I checked out the Stormtrooper helmet and was very impressed, now it’s time to tackle the Mandalorian helmet of Boba Fett!

These come in big cube-shaped boxes, fully enclosed, and covered with pictures of the item inside as well as some of the features. Inside the helmet comes wrapped in plastic and just about ready for display. Here you do have to attach the range finder, which makes a terrifyingly loud click when it’s attached. And if you want to make use of the electronics, you’ll need a small screwdriver and some batteries. Let’s have a look!

Straightaway, I think this helmet looks really nice. It was a far more challenging piece than the Stormtrooper helmet because it involved a more complex paint job, weathering, as well as some articulation. All of these things are a lot tougher to do on a limited budget, and as such I think Hasbro did a fine job. First, let’s talk about the visor. The initial solicitation pictures made me think the vertical part of the visor was too wide, but after looking at screenshots, I’m thinking it’s not too far off. The visor itself is made of smoked translucent plastic, which I feel should have been a bit darker on that vertical bit. I am displaying mine on a stand and it did tend to allow too much visibility through the visor. I’m sure Hasbro was worried about people being able to see out of it. I mean all they need is one drunken Cosplayer at a convention to go tumble down a flight of stairs in one of these and they’ve got a lawsuit on their hands. But, really you only need to see out of the horizontal part and some reinforced plastic behind the rest would have been welcome. It’s something that I fixed by attaching some black cloth behind it. Problem solved.

The base colors look quite good. It has a satiny matte finish, which doesn’t look too plastic. The QC on my helmet is also excellent. Granted, it’s supposed to look old and beaten up, but there aren’t any blemishes, scratches, or flubs that aren’t supposed to be there. At least I can’t see any. The construction also feels very solid. The helmet has a nice heft to it and while I wouldn’t want to drop it on a hard floor, it does feel quite durable and well put together. I’m sure this thing could take a beating if you are inclined to play rough with it.

Some nice details include the motion and sound sensors that run up the middle of each side, the cooling vents in the back, and the helmet diagnostic port, which is that little button on the right cheek.

The weathering was where this helmet was going to succeed or fail in winning me over and for the most part it succeeds. The helmet is littered with areas where the paint is meant to be chipped, worn, or just rubbed off completely. And of course, that iconic dent is present as well. Some of the weathering looks great, other areas look very fabricated. This is especially the case when you get in real close and examine it under studio lights. Again, at the price point we’re dealing with here, I wasn’t expecting a hand-painted masterpiece, but I’m sure that there are people out there with the skills to elevate the paint here into something truly spectacular. I’m not one of those people, but then I’m still pretty satisfied with how it turned out.

The interior of the helmet is also very detailed. The Stormtrooper helmet was basically unfinished inside, but here Hasbro has made an effort to keep the illusion of realism going by recreating what the actual helmet might look like inside. The sides are sculpted with all sorts of devices and instruments and there are padded cubes. There’s are adjustable straps so you can make it fit higher or lower, just like in Hasbro’s other helmets. As for wearing it? This one is actually very snug on me, which was surprising because the Stormtrooper helmet fit fine, as did most of the Marvel helmets I own. I’m not sure if it’s because I have a big head or because it isn’t compatible with my glasses. Either way, I bought this for display, not for wearing, so the fact that it isn’t terribly comfortable isn’t a big drawback for me.

And then there’s the rangefinder. I think that the stalk is probably a bit chunkier than it should be, but clearly Hasbro was looking for stability here, and that was probably a good decision. The arm is spring-loaded, so when you touch the side of the helmet it will cause the rangefinder to deploy and the LED lights on the holographic targeting display to activate and flash. The interior of the rangefinder also lights up, although I have a hard time seeing through it when I’m wearing the helmet. Too deactivate the lights, you just have to manually return the rangefinder to the up position.

With the rangefinder in the down position, you have to slide off the plsatic cover to reveal it. The clear plastic lense is sculpted with some detail and illuminates quite well. On the downside, this thing is positioned way too far to the side for me to comfortably look through it when I’m wearing the helmet. All in all, I think the electronics here are a cool extra, but they’re certainly not a selling point for me, and I would have been just as happy if they had left them out and dropped that price point a little bit.

I think Hasbro has carved out a pretty cool niche here, as I would often see those cheap plastic roleplay masks in the toy aisles and wish there was something better available without having to drop $300-500. If you’re of the same mind as me, these may be something you want to check out. At a little over $100, this helmet straddles the price point between toy and collectible quite nicely and the result is something that’s a whole lot of fun and looks pretty damn cool up on my shelf. Ultimately, my biggest nitpick is the opacity of the visor in the areas not needed for visibility and as I said, that was something that’s pretty easy to fix. I’m hoping that these are successful, although I rarely ever see them in stores, so I think they are still something of a specialty item. It would be cool to see Hasbro produce something like Sabine’s helmet from Rebels. In the meantime, I’ll eventually get around to looking at Luke’s X-Wing Pilot Helmet, as that one is sitting on the shelf just above this one!