Monthly Archives: January 2023

Jan 6 2023

Star Wars Black Series: Figrin D’an by Hasbro

I know, I just checked out Jazwares Millennium Falcon a couple days ago, but I guess I’m in a Star Wars mood this week, so let’s return to A Galaxy Far, Far Away one more time before heading into the weekend. As someone who has been frequently complaining that we still don’t have Black Series Hammerhead, Snaggletooth, or a number of other Cantina Aliens yet, I was a little bitter to see Figrin D’an jump to the head of the line and make an appearance. But then I reasoned it out that Hasbro knew they could make collectors buy the same figure six or seven times and it all made perfect sense.

I was actually thinking about skipping this figure, because it’s not terribly exciting for a $20+ purchase, and I knew I wasn’t going to buy the whole band. But then Figgy started turning up at a few online retailers for $9.99 and I decided to go for it. Luckily, the retailer I bought it from had a three-figure limit, so they stepped in where my better sense would have failed me. So, yes the figure in the package is billed as the lead performer of the Modal Nodes, Figrin D’an, but he comes with three different instruments, and apparently all Bith look alike, so you can use him as several different members if you buy more than one.

Here’s Fiery Figgy out of the box, and while he look pretty good, he’s still a pretty bland figure with just a black tunic, black boots, and gray trousers to make up his costume. The only thing really distinctive here are his big Bith hands and his bulbous Bith head. But, hey, that’s not the figure’s fault as it’s still a pretty good representation of the character. A lot of the Cantina aliens were just about giving people monster heads and monster hands. It was pretty casual. Hell, even Greedo was wearing high heels most of the time. You get some sculpted rumples and wrinkles in the tunic and pants and some seams, but not a lot else noteworthy… heh, see what I did there?

The head sculpt is decent enough, albeit maybe a little soft. When we were kids, my brother and I used to call these guys Hiney Heads and that made us giggle because their heads looked like butts. It kinda still makes me giggle. Keep in mind, it was quite a bit later until any of us knew that these guys had names and that their race had a name. We sure as hell didn’t know their music was called Jizz, which is a shame because that would have made us giggle too. I do think the paint job for the portrait could have been better. Maybe a little bit of a wash or some shading? I mean, the costume was simple enough, they could have done something special with the head, but like the rest of the figure, it’s perfectly passable. It even has a little hole in its maw to stick the various instruments into.

The articulation is solid enough. You get rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, with hinged pegs in the hands. The legs have ball joints in the hips, rotating hinges in the knees, swivels in the thighs, and hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. There’s a ball joint under the chest and the neck is ball jointed as well. All they did was stand there and sway in the movie, so this level of articulation has them more than well covered. Except for the elbows, which definitely could have used better than a 90-degree bend to work better with their instruments.

As mentioned earlier, you get three different instruments, the first of which is the kloo horn, which I believe is what Figrin D’ar played…

Next up is the fanfar…

And finally, the fizzz. Each of these instruments vary in detail with the fanfar and kloo horn having the most and the fizzz having the least, but they all seem to be good representations of the on screen versions. Each has its own challenge when it comes to getting the Bith to hold it so that the mouth piece is actually sticking into the tiny mouth hole, which should be evident in some of the pictures. Double hinged elbows would have sure helped in this department, as well as maybe getting a set of hands specifically made for each instrument. Considering the simplicity of the figure, I don’t think one of those two improvements would be asking too much.

I’m happy to have some Bith musicians, but the cynical side of me says that these are just more evidence of Hasbro trying to stretch figure molds to the max. Yes, it’s a new sculpt, but it’s basically a musical troop builder, which is just one step better than the endless carbonized and credit series repaints that Hasbro has been pouring into this line. Now, if you want to get the remaining instruments to complete your band, you have to buy the Deluxe Nalan Cheel figure, which is a Hasbro Pulse exclusive and comes with the three larger instruments but runs close to $40. You will then need to buy at least two more Figrins in order to display one band member with each instrument, BUT… I believe there were two kloo horn players, and a little research tells me that there was an eighth member that wasn’t playing, but I think he was dressed different so I won’t count him. So, by my reckoning that would be a total of six Figins and one Nalan to complete the band. I haven’t decided to take that plunge yet, especially since Figgy is back up to $20 at most retailers. Maybe, if he drops to ten again, I’d consider it, but until then my Cantina band will remain a trio.

Jan 4 2023

Star Wars Micro Galaxy Squadron Millennium Falcon by Jazwares

Perhaps one of the biggest toy surprises of 2022 was a company other than Hasbro or Mattel getting the license to produce Star Wars ships. And yet Jazwares came out of the gates swinging with their Micro Galaxy Squadron series. It was a line I did not want to get into, because I already have so many Star Wars toys, but in the end, I had to give it a try with the X-Wing and TIE Fighter, and after that all bets were off. Today I’m checking out what I believe is the biggest release in the line so far. It’s the fastest hunk of junk in the Galaxy… The Millennium Falcon!

The packaging for this line continues to be rather gorgeous with lots of snazzy foil and a huge window to show off the toy. You also get a good look at the four micro figures that are included and the package announces that there are motion activated lights and sounds. Alas, there’s no Try Me button, because there are no batteries included, so you’ll need some AAA’s and a screwdriver to enjoy the electronics. The packaging is collector friendly, although you do have to pop on the top gun and radar dish and pop them off again to return the ship to the box.

As outstanding as this ship looked in the box, I have to say that it’s even better in hand, and it’s the perfect size for whooshing around the room. Let’s face it, it can be a little difficult to do that with Hasbro’s Legacy Falcon or even the old Kenner release for that matter. I am extremely impressed by the amount of detail in the sculpt and there is indeed a lot of it to take in. There are panel lines, vents, wires, hoses, and even exposed patches of the ship’s inner workings. Jazwares clearly does not use the smaller scale of this line as an excuse to skimp on the details, and that’s a big part of what makes these ships so special. In addition to the detailed sculpt, you also get some wonderful weathering, as well as some orange trim here and there, and the iconic scorch marks trailing behind the top vents. The only possible call out I have regarding the ship’s design is that it shares the oversized cockpit that most toy versions of the Falcon have had, and for the same reason: To allow it to fit figures.

The top side of the Falcon has an articulated radar dish and the main cannon, which can swivel. The cannon mount is transparent plastic, as is the canopy for the cockpit. There are two buttons concealed under two of the circular vents, which activate the electronics. One makes the sounds of the cannon firing, while the other makes engine noises and lights up the engine strip on the back of the ship. Once this is activated, whooshing the Falcon around will make different flying noises, all of which sound great. The undercarriage of the ship has five folding landing gear for the ship to rest on and a sculpted cannon that does not turn. The boarding ramp can also be lowered. Before getting inside the ship, let’s take a quick look at the figures!

The Falcon comes with Han Solo, Chewbacca, Obi-Wan, and Princess Leia. It’s a good assortment, but obvious exclusions are farmboy Luke and C-3PO. I’m hoping Jazwares will include them in a future release of the Landspeeder. The sculpts on these 1-inch figures continue to impress me, and while the paint is overall really good for figures of this tiny size, my Leia has some brown splatter on her forehead. Still, the detail is exceptional, with the only surprising thing being that they didn’t paint Chewie’s bandoleer strap.

What really blows me away is that you can fit all four figures into the cockpit area. It’s worth noting that even the 3 3/4-inch Kenner Falcon only seated two. There’s also a crazy amount of detail inside the cockpit and even some nice linework sculpted on the inside of the hatch. I would have liked some darker gray paint on the interior of the cockpit, which is a similar nitpick that I had with the X-Wing and Slave-1, but what we got still looks great.

The top of the ship opens up to reveal a pretty good amount of space inside. Points of interest include the circular seating around the Dejarik table, a cargo area, and the removable deck plate that reveals the smuggling compartment. Here again, the detail is really off the charts. All the grating in the deck plating has been recreated, as well as the various cargo containers.

Like the original Kenner Falcon, the top cannon gunning station is in the middle of the ship. Here you can remove the gunning station and place a figure inside!

As mentioned earlier, the boarding ramp can be lowered, but the figures are a bit too big to enter through there. Even with such tiny figures, some accommodations had to be made, and that’s understandable.

Boy, do I love this ship! While the Falcon is scaled for 1-inch figures just like the previous releases, that doesn’t really make the ships scale all that well together. In fact, I’d say the relative scale is probably about the same as we got in the 3 3/4-inch lines. The Hot Wheels fighters would work a little better with this Falcon, but they’d still be a bit large. But, with that being said, the Falcon is another great release for Jazwares’ fleet. At the original MSRP of about $45, it does seem like this line is getting rather pricey, but the good news is that this Corellian freighter has already been deeply discounted and you should be able to find it for closer to $25, which is a real steal for what you’re getting! It looks outstanding, has some well designed play areas, and the electronics are a nice bonus. Now, if only Jazwares would release the Ebon Hawk, I could die a happy collector!

Jan 2 2023

Marvel Legends (King in Black): Knull & Venom by Hasbro

If you read yesterday’s post than you know that Marvel Mondays are living on borrowed time. I’m planning on phasing them out in a couple of months and will try to get through as much of my backlog as possible before the end. After that whatever is left will just get tossed into the usual daily rotation of whatever strikes my fancy. And boy is today a perfect example of why I’m trying to ween myself off my Marvel Legends habit.

It’s safe to say that King in Black didn’t grab me when I tried to give it a go, and that’s no big surprise since I’m definitely not a fan of Donny Cates as a writer. And yet at some point during the Holidays, this set got discounted enough to get me to buy it. I was mostly drawn in by the Venom figure, but Knull looked like an interesting figure too, and so here we are. I’m positive booze was involved. It usually is. The set comes in Hasbro’s plastic-free packaging with the figures and accessories wrapped in tissue paper. Let’s start with Venom…

Venom comes out of the box sans wings, so we might as well start there! It seems like a while since we last saw a regular Venom as part of The Absorbing Man Wave, but we’ve had a number of different Symbiotes since. This fellow isn’t anywhere near as beefy as the Space Venom BAF, but he’s still pretty sizeable with a lot of upper body bulk and borderline scrawny legs. Still, overall I like the proportions here, especially once we get the wings attached. And speaking of those wings, you can see the sockets in the back where they will get connected. I would have liked to see a couple of filler pieces for those, but oh well. The black finish on this figure has a nice sheen to it, and I really like the fact that it isn’t all smooth, but rather rippled in places, especially up near the shoulders. It’s like a crinkled trash bag look and it’s really creepy. So much better than just painting a muscled buck black and calling it a Symbiote! As for the white markings, I don’t think I’ve seen an instance of white painted over black on a Legends figure that looked this clean and fresh. There’s a wee bit of bleed through on the backs of the hands, it isn’t perfect, but overall it’s a very nice job. I also love his disgusting alien feet.

You get two head sculpts with the figure and both are quite good. The standard portrait has his rictus grin and white inkblot eyes, while the other option has his mouth open and his tongue lashing out. The second head adds a lot of red to the mix and the way the jaw line extends all the way up the sides of his head is just awesome. I’m really torn on which one I’m going to display him with the most. Tongue head definitely goes for the biggest impact, but there’s something marvelously creepy about the more subdued head.

The articulation here is pretty standard, with double hinges in both the elbows and knees, rotating hinges in the shoulders, pegged hinges in the wrists, ball joints in the hips, swivels in the biceps and thighs, ball jointed neck, and hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. The biggest departure is the use of a ball joint under the chest instead of the usual ab crunch hinge, and it works fine. You also get two pairs of hands, which include fists and grabby hands.

And then you get these absolutely majestic wings! They have a black framework with red flaps in-between and some tattered holes throughout. The red only shows on the interior of the wings, whereas the backs are all black. The wings attach to the back via pegged hinges, and they also have hinges at the midpoint of each wing. Those mid hinges don’t really do a lot, as the sculpt makes them separate if you try to close them up too much. I’m almost convinced they were added just so that the wings could be disassembled for the box, rather than for actual useful articulation. I am, however, really impressed at how well the connections to the body support their weight, as I have not had them droop at all while posing him. They do of course make him extremely back heavy, as they are some pretty substantial plastic appendages. With all that being said, I was able to get some decent poses out of him without the use of a stand.

Sure, the whole, “Oh look, now all Symbiotes can just sprout dragon wings” seems like a stupid marketing ploy to sell action figures, and sure enough it worked well on me. I just love the way this guy looks, and I sure didn’t need to be a fan of the comic to want to add him to the collection. OK, let’s move on to Knull.

To me Knull was just the other figure that came in the box, but when I got him out I was kind of smitten by how much he looks like he could stand in as a Kain figure from my beloved Legacy of Kain video games. I know NECA made one a while back, but I only wound up getting Raziel and not Kain. Yeah, you can tell how much affinity I have for this character by the fact that I’m going off on a tangent about the Legacy of Kain games, but it really is an uncanny resemblance. And the figure certainly ain’t bad. He’s big enough that it feels like he could have been a BAF, but most of his size is in his height rather than bulk. The armor sculpt is well done with some pitting, and I like that his chest emblem is sculpted and not just painted on. I also think they did an exceptionally nice job with the tattered edges of the skirt and the sinewy texture in his upper legs. I wish they had done a little something with the paint to vary things up a bit between the armor plating and the sculpted cloth.

As with Venom, you get two head sculpts for Knull, one is just plain perturbed, while the other is a maniacal grimace. The highly stylized and exaggerated contours of his face definitely up his creepy appearance, and there’s some absolutely fantastic detail in the lines of definition in his face. The dramatically blown hair is sculpted separately from the head to give him a sharp hairline, but it’s too bad that he has a seam running across the top of the hair. The second head dials up the creep factor quite a bit with his toothy grin and adding even more severity to his facial features. I also dig the red beady eyes. This sculpt is a spectacular piece of work!

Knull comes with the Necrosword, which is big and beefy weapon. It’s black, almost amorphous body has an organic flavor to it and there are gross red tendrils all over it that resemble a circulatory system. It’s a shame that it’s cast in very soft plastic and I had to put some work into unbending mine, but it eventually straightened out pretty well.

In the end, I have no regrets at having picked up this set. I don’t have to necessarily have any attachment to the source material for me to appreciate a pair of outstanding figures, and these two are indeed that. The set originally retailed at around $69, which is right about in line with Hasbro’s ever increasing prices. I think I wound up getting this set on sale for about $52, which certainly makes it a lot more palatable. Both figures are decently sized, but it’s the sheer enormity of Venom’s wings that adds the most value here, and thereby probably justifies the price.

Jan 1 2023

Happy New Year! …FFZ in 2023!

Well, I want to start out by wishing the sincerest of Happy New Years to everyone who continues to stop by this silly little Toy Blog! 2022 was all about getting back into form after a couple of personally devastating years of loss for me, and while I missed a day of scheduled content here and there, I was more or less consistent a majority of the time. Last year marked the 12th anniversary of doing this stuff, and it was nice to finish the year with the most visits, views, likes, and follows that I have seen since I started it all. I’m not going to bore everyone with a best and worst list this year, instead I’ll just bore everyone with some general collecting and blog talk! I don’t usually set out with any new plans or objectives each year, but 2023 may be a little different, as I’m going to be tightening up some of my collecting habits and, by association, what I write about.

The main theme I’ll be going for in 2023 will be working through backlog and cutting down on buying some of the toy lines that have gotten out of control. The biggest of those is Marvel Legends. That may be a surprise to some, since I devote nearly every Monday to it, but if you’ve been reading between the lines this year, than maybe it’s not so surprising. Since the line returned, my collection has ballooned to a ridiculous number of figures, and I have to admit that at times keeping up with the releases has seemed more like a chore than an act of passion. A couple of years ago, I managed to break the cycle of being a completist, and that showed me that I could skip figures now and then and still sleep at night. The truth is that as 2023 begins, I find myself with very little interest in future MCU projects. I’ve only enjoyed a couple of the movies since Avengers: Endgame and couldn’t make it through nearly any of the Disney+ shows. I just don’t feel like the tone and quality is there any longer, but I have some fleeting hopes for a few, like Guardians 3 and the new Ant-Man. As for the comics, well with a few exceptions, I haven’t enjoyed a new release Marvel book in over a decade, for really the same reason. The quality of characters and storytelling just isn’t there. Add to that Hasbro’s crazy price hikes and declining QC on the figures, and it seems like the perfect time for me and Legends to part ways. So, I’m not putting Marvel Legends as entirely off limits, but I hope to make my selection standards a lot more rigorous and purchases will be few and far between.

I’m going to take a similar stand with the Star Wars Black Series, and this is something that I’ve already started to put into practice. Hasbro has been choking this line with carbonized, credit series, and holiday repaints, none of which I’m interested in. And even the anniversary releases for Return of the Jedi are nearly all repacks on vintage style cards, when I could easily come up with a wave of six or eight brand new figures that should have been released as part of the anniversary. At this point, I’m mainly interested in Original Trilogy characters that we haven’t seen yet, and I think Hasbro really squandered the ROTJ anniversary by not giving us more new releases from that film. If Hasbro starts to deliver on more OT characters, it could be a busy year for me buying Black Series, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. I loved Andor, but it’s not the kind of show that makes me want to buy a lot of figures from it, and we’ll see what else we get from The Mandalorian.

As for Transformers, it looks like Hasbro is interested in pursuing updates to a lot of The Unicron Trilogy figures, and that’s something that just doesn’t interest me a lot. I’m glad they’re doing it, because there are a lot of collectors who grew up with those lines, and I think it’s probably time for them to give the Generation One stuff a rest. I will say, that if they do more Armada updates, I’d be interested in looking at those. I’m also not at all interested in any toys from the Rise of the Beasts movie. Right now I’m keen to complete my Legacy Stunticons, I’d like to see them finish off the Insecticons, and then we’ll see what happens, but I suspect I’ll be passing on a lot of this franchise next year.

I’m curious to see what my Sixth-Scale collecting will be like next year, since a lot of my past purchases in that area has come from the MCU and I’m off that train. Although, I may pick up Mantis to go with my Guardians of the Galaxy collection and I do still have Green Goblin on pre-order. Otherwise, the only two Hot Toys I have on pre-order are Doc Brown from Back to the Future and the K2SO from Rogue One. I am all-in on the Clint Eastwood Legacy Collection, I have a number of EXO-6’s Star Trek figures on pre-order, and I’m hoping one day Big Chief may actually ship the Roger Delgado Master from Doctor Who. And I’m always up for considering any of the original concept figures that TBLeague puts out.

What am I excited for in 2023? I’m certainly interested in seeing my Super7 pre-orders start rolling in. I’m still in love with their ThunderCats line and I’m excited to get the Thunder Tank, and the new figures coming in that line. I’m a bit apprehensive about the final product shots for the Silverhawks, but I’m reserving judgement until they’re in hand. And obviously, I can’t wait until they’re Sunbow style GI JOEs start rolling in. I’m still actively collecting Mattel’s Masters of the Universe Origins, but sticking to just a few figures from the Masterverse line and I’m still all over G.I. JOE Classified, which has proven to be one of the consistently best toy lines of 2022 for me. I’m morbidly curious about Hasbro’s Indiana Jones line, and I’ll be buying it, but I don’t expect it to last long, and I have a feeling that new movie is going to be a train wreck. And of course, I’m very much looking forward to The Four Horsemen shipping Cosmic Legions, as well as the rest of the Mythic Legions pre-orders, although I’m even starting to get a little more selective on the Mythic Legions releases, because that collection is growing way out of control.

So, what’s all of this mean for FFZ this year? Well, Marvel Mondays will be going away sometime after First Quarter. I’m going to keep it going for at least a month or so to get through the last waves I bought, and then I’ll probably just throw the remaining Marvel Legends figures I look at into the normal rotation and phase out any dedicated days this year. Maybe I’ll shoot for getting rid of it by March. Apart from that, I’m going to try to do an even mix of old and new. There’s stuff that’s been kicking around here waiting to be opened for a while, and it always seems to get pushed back by the newer stuff. FFZ has never been about being first in on a review, but at the same time I’m often excited to talk about new purchases. So, you may see some really old stuff pop up from time to time, and I hope that interests some people out there.

And that’s all I’ve got! Thanks again for all your support, kind words, and valued criticism, and we’ll see what the new year brings!

By figurefanzero
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