Monthly Archives: July 2024

Jul 31 2024

Transformers Legacy United: Chop Shop, Barrage, and Malleus Minotaurus by Hasbro

If you hadn’t noticed, Hasbro Transformers reviews have been drying up here. This is only my second for this year, and there were only about half a dozen or so last year. I still love Transformers, I’m still waiting for Beachcomber and Swoop, but otherwise I’ve got most of what I wanted out of the official Hasbro stuff and I can’t think of much shown at SDCC that interested me. Still, every now and then something comes out that entices me, like this boxed set of updates to two of the four Deluxe Insecticons. These guys were originally rolled out in the 1985 catalog and I was both appalled and obsessed with them. On the one hand, they didn’t look anything like my beloved Insecticons, I think they were recycled Bandai toys, and they never appeared in the cartoon. On the other hand, they looked so unique that I couldn’t help but want them. Although, to be fair, I wanted every Transformers figure when I was a kid! Well, I don’t remember ever seeing them in any stores and so it was not meant to be.

The figures come in a fully enclosed box with a small Weapon Master type guy called Malleus Minotaurus… seriously, WTF Hasbro? I hate this box. The character art looks good, but it feels like the Transformers logo should be running down the opposite side. As it is, it makes the box look like it’s upside down when it’s not. Also, look at all the qualifiers… Transformers Legacy United Doom’N Destruction Collection. The Transformers branding has become a confusing mess to me and I honestly have no idea what line is what anymore. But enough of my old-man griping… Let’s start with Barrage and his bug mode first.

Like his G1 predecessor, Barrage’s alt mode is a rhino beetle. The figure is a repaint and remold of Legacy Bombshell, a figure that I have yet to find so I gave up and dropped a preorder. It’s a decent looking alt mode, but since most of the rework is done around the head, the Bombshell similarities stand out as pretty obvious. On the other hand, I do kind of like how this brings the character more into line with the original Insecticons, making them a little more cohesive when displayed together on the shelf. The head horn comes up from the bottom and I think it should be on top, but I’m no bugologist. And in fairness, I’m pretty sure the original toy did that too. I do like the coloring here. The green and yellow plastic looks great together, and there’s a bit of white and red thrown into for added pop. The sonic rifle can plug into either hole on his pack to give him some extra firepower in bug mode, and it’s a repaint of the weapon that came with Bombshell.

Transformation is very similar to what I’ve seen of Bombshell, but Barrage flips the chest to the back and uses the head horn to fill in the new chest, all while not jutting out as awkwardly far as the chest on the G1 Barrage. And all this sure goes a long way to make this robot mode look new and distinctive. The new bug legs can remain pegged into the arms, and I like to angle them back a bit to keep them out of the way. The coloring here remains pretty similar as the beetle, but now he’s showing more yellow. I dig the way the red bug eyes land just under his chest for an extra splash of color, and he has a Decepticon emblem square in the middle of his chest. The back fills out pretty well, but here’s where it’s really obvious that he’s a close cousin to Bombshell. Either way, this is an excellent homage to the original toy’s robot mode.

The head sculpt is pretty cool, borrowing the general beats of the G1 figure, but giving it a full makeover. The yellow face is angular with a dominant mouth plate, two big red eyes and a red panel on the forehead. That panel kind of looks like a third eye from a distance. He also has the green V-shaped antenna coming up from behind, but refined to be not as exaggerated as the original toy. I’d like to think that this is what the Sunbow design would have looked like if Barrage ever showed up in the cartoon.

As I noted earlier, the weapon is a recolor of Bombshell’s, but we’ll still go ahead and call it his sonic rifle. The side pieces can come off and you can customize it a little bit. It’s not really a good match for the G1 figure’s weapon, but I’m not upset over that. I do wish he had come with a sword, like the original did. Lets’ move on to Chop Shop!

Chop Shop’s bug mode is a stag beetle and while Barrage was a shake up of Legacy Bombshell, Chop Shop makes use of Shrapnel. And I gotta say, I think the homage works really well here. New additions include the extra pair of legs that plug into each side, newly sculpted pincers to match the original toy, and a new head, which can be seen in bug mode as two little antenna like appendages. Like Barrage, the reuse is really obvious here, but with the few changes and the brown and orange recolor, I think he looks great, even if he isn’t quite as striking as the original toy. Chop Shop comes with two guns, which is a recolor of one of the Shrapnel’s, and these can be plugged into his back for a super-bug assault mode!

While Barrage’s transformation changed a few things up over Bombshell, Chop Shop’s transformation is identical to Shrapnel and the resulting figure is a lot more similar too. There’s no clever swap of back for front on the torso, apart from the deco, the only changes here are the bug legs that are pegged into the arms, the pincers, and the head. Now, that’s not to say that this doesn’t look great, because I think it does, but the resulting robot looks a lot less like his G1 predecessor than Barrage does, and the Shrapnel chest is really obvious. The deco remains very close to the bug mode with a little more orange showing.

The new head is excellent, and a perfect update to the G1 toy. The rounded dome and angled red eyes give him a sinister visage. There’s some orange paint on his vocalizer box, as well as the twin antenna that sweep down to form open pipes on the sides of his cheeks.

In addition to the twin guns, which I already showed plugged into his bug mode, Chop Shop also comes with a recolor of Shrapnel’s gun. None of these are a great fit for the G1 toy’s weapon, but once again, I’m OK with that. He also doesn’t come with a sword. I would have been fine with Hasbro tossing in recolors of the same sword mold for either, especially compared to what I’m going to look at next.

It’s Malleus Minotaurus, and he feels like the design team was sitting around saying, “What else we got to throw in this box to get it to the right price point?” He’s a re-color of the Battle Master Smashdown, and that’s being generous because he’s just gray plastic with a little blue for his eyes and forehead emblem. As his name suggests, his robot mode is minotaur-themed with a bull-like head. He transforms into a hammer, hence the malleus part of his name. Hey, at least Hasbro is teaching kids The Latin! As a kid, I probably would have loved this concept, but as an adult collector, I don’t have much use for him and the idea of a robot transforming into something that robots hit other robots with is just a bit too goofy for me. He does come with two semi-translucent blue energy effect pieces to attach to the front and back of the hammer’s head.

Both Barrage and Chop Shop turned out great, although Barrage gets the nod for being the more reworked of the two. I love how they managed to flip the torso to give him a new chest, and it makes me wonder if that was planned from the start or just a really clever retrofit. And while Chop Shop doesn’t get any new engineering, I’m happy with how much they re-sculpted for this figure. In either case, I wouldn’t have guessed that the regular Insecticon molds could be tweaked to work this well as the Deluxes. Will we get a second set with Venom and Ransack? Well, I guess we did get a Kickback repaint as Ransack in one of those Buzzworthy sets, but I’d like to see Hasbro try again and give us Venom too. And wouldn’t you know it… My Bombshell arrived just in time to miss getting in the group picture, but I’ll probably get around to giving him a proper review in the near future and we’ll get them all together then!

Jul 29 2024

Batman (1966 Retro Series): Joker, Penguin & Riddler by McFarlane

Late last year I started digging into McFarlane’s Retro 66 Batman line by checking out Boxing Batman and Riddler, as well as The Dynamic Duo and The Batmobile. And since then, I’ve let this line fall to the wayside and it’s long past time I get back to looking at some of these figures again. I’ve waxed nostalgic in those previous reviews with my love for the TV series, so I won’t go through it again here. I would imagine that people who didn’t grow up with it don’t know quite what to make of it’s goofiness. You kind of just had to be there. Nonetheless, I’ve been sitting on a lot of these figures and vehicles for a while, so today I’m going to serve up a look at a triple trifecta of terrors in the form of Joker, The Penguin, and The Riddler!

As we saw last time, these figures come on colorful generic cardbacks with bubbles that showcase each figure quite nicely. Beside the figures are the accessories, which in this case all amount to just the fighting exposition balloons that you can clip onto their wrists. I don’t hate these, but I would have rather we got something else in terms of accessories. We certainly didn’t need them with every damn figure. Either way, take a good look because we’ve already seen what these are all about and I won’t be showcasing them much in the review. These packages are not collector friendly, so let’s get to tearing. I’ll start with Joker, move on to Penguin, and I’ll just touch on Riddler a little bit since I already checked out the Boxing version. Also, I’ll be staging these figures in McFarlane’s Villains Lair playset, which I may or may not come back to review in the future.

Cesar Romero will always be the first person that comes to mind when I think about The Joker, although I can happily acknowledge that we’ve certainly had some great versions and performances since. Here, Joker comes wearing his rather iconic pink suit. There’s some nice layering here to the sculpt with the jacket and waist coat worn over the sculpted green shirt and cravat. I also love how the coat tails hang down the back in the old-timey style. There’s some sculpted detail in the jacket, including lapels, a chest pocket, and buttons, but only the buttons on the waist coat are painted black. He’s got black shoes and the gloves are painted purple and feature some decent detail to the stitching.

The head sculpt is excellent and sports a solid likeness of Romero. My only nitpick is that they didn’t sculpt his mustache, which they used to just paint over with the clown makeup, but that’s a minor thing. The green hair is sculpted separately from the head, giving it an immaculate hairline. I love that they sculpted him in the middle of an open mouth laugh, and the printing for the makeup, eyes, and eyebrows is all sharp. McFarlane isn’t always known for great likenesses, but they definitely nailed it here.

The retro-style nature of these figures comes in the limited articulation, but that’s not to say it’s simple 5-POA. You actually get rotating hinges in the knees, shoulders, elbows, and wrists, a swivel in the waist and a ball joint in the neck. The most archaic and limiting thing here is the T-crotch, which offers no lateral movement, and the complete lack of articulation in the ankles. It’s also worth noting that Joker’s coat tails keep him from sitting down. There’s still fun to be had with here, but the limitations can be frustrating, especially if you’re used to McFarlane’s DC Multiverse offerings. And if you want to pose them in anything like an action pose, stands are recommended.

Need I say it? When I think about The Penguin, the image in my mind will always be Burgess Meredith. You have to understand that I was almost 20 years old by the time anyone else had portrayed these villainous roles as live action characters. And talk about perfect casting, Burgess was a master at his craft in being over the top sinister. Here he is sculpted in his tuxedo with an open coat and a white, untucked shirt. He’s got white spats sculpted onto his black shoes and white gloves. The outfit is rounded out by a pink bow tie. Because bow ties are cool… QUACK! The sculpted details on his white shirt are pretty soft, but it is textured, so that’s something. They got his portly dimensions down perfectly too.

As for the head sculpt, this isn’t the slam dunk that we got with The Joker, but it’s still very good. The paint and facial printing is decent and I like that the monocle is a separate piece of clear plastic attached over the eye. The smile looks good, and yes, it’s a shame we couldn’t get his cigarette holder poking out of there, but I’m guessing that was prohibited by Warner Bros. The purple top hat is sculpted separately from the head and permanently attached.

The articulation is the same as we saw with The Joker, but for some reason Penguin doesn’t have peg holes in his feet, so that’s annoying. And he’s another character with coat tails, so he can’t sit down. McFarlane really should have considered that when they put out a playset for these figures that centered around a table and chairs! Also, it’s pretty unforgivable that he didn’t come with his umbrella. How do you release The Penguin without his umbrella??? They did include one in the Villains Lair playset, and I’ve included that with the figure in the above shot. Neither of his hands are sculpted to hold it, but you can hook it around his wrist.

Finally, three’s Frank Gorshin as The Riddler, and yup… he’ll always be MY Riddler, but he hasn’t exactly had a lot of competition since. This is essentially the same figure we saw as a Boxing variant, only sans the sculpted trunks and boxing gloves. The rest of the costume is identical and looks good. I liked when Riddler wore the suit and bowler hat, but I think this tended to be the more iconic look for him in the show. The question marks are crisply printed against the green body suit, and I love that they sculpted his loafers. He does have peg holes in the feet and since there’s no coat tails, he can actually sit down… finally someone can!

This is definitely the weakest head sculpt of the three. It’s a passable likeness, but the sculpt is rather soft and it’s not a terribly iconic expression. The hair is sculpted as part of the head, but the mask is separate, so that adds some nice depth to the portrait there. Maybe part of the problem here is that Gorshin doesn’t have as many over the top characteristics to pin the sculpt to, but in the end I think it’s serviceable for the scope and price point of line.

These figures retailed for about $17.99 each, which isn’t bad for the scale and quality, and I think most of them have been reissued since the original releases. In my experience these could be tough to find in the wild, because the pegs were often clogged up with some of the less desirable variants. I really enjoy these figures and I respect the commitment that McFarlane has made to keeping this line going. It’s undoubtedly a niche market, being retro-style figures based off a show from the 1960’s and that makes it all the more impressive that the line has been so expansive. Obviously, these aren’t going to be everyone’s cup of tea, but I’m thrilled to have these villains on my shelf and inhabiting their lair. But we’re not done with the villainy yet. Next week I’ll be back with four more baddies to join the cabal. Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel!

Jul 26 2024

Masters of the Universe Origins (Cartoon Series): Stratos and Mer-Man by Mattel

Mattel’s been busy pumping out the Cartoon versions of their MOTU Origins line, and I’m getting closer to being all caught up. After today I’ll be only one wave of figures behind, and the Cartoon Series first vehicle, The Collector has arrived as well! And today we’re taking to the skies and the seas of Eternia with a look at Stratos and Mer-Man!

I’ve said it before, and I’ll keep on saying it: I love this packaging so much! The cards are so colorful, the cartoon logo and the figures against the castle backdrop looks so good! There’s a rainbow colored “Cartoon” collection logo on the bubbles, reminiscent of the Filmation logo, and every figure comes bundled with a mini comic behind the tray. It kills me to tear into these, but my figures are in there, and I want them out! Let’s start with Mer-Man!

The toon version of Skeletor’s fishy minion shares a lot in common with the vintage-style figure, but everything gets smoothed over and simplified for that slick animated look. But before getting to any of that, just look at the colors! The blue and yellow plastic is a one-two pleasure punch to my peepers, making for such a beautifully striking deco. He’d look right at home standing side-by-side with the 90’s X-Men! The little bit of orange thrown in for the fur diaper and around the eyes just ups the ante. I also really love that these figures make use of so much colored plastic over paint. Unlike the vintage-style figure, toony Mer-Man sports yellow gauntlets and boots, his belt is simplified and his chest armor has some simulated muscles, that look like abs running all the way up to his neck. Finally, you get a little bit of fishy flare in his webbed shoulders. I love it!

The head sculpt is a complete rework from the vintage style, giving him the exaggerated fins on the sides of his head and a very fishy looking mouth. His eyes have puffy orange borders and he’s got those delightful Simpsons-style eyeballs. I used to love watching them pop in the cartoon when something unexpected happened to him. It’s sometimes hard for me to pick a favorite between vintage and cartoon styles, but I’ll always love Mer-Man’s Filmation look over the vintage style. I just think that head worked better for a skunk man than it did a fish man.

Mer-Man comes with two accessories, his trident and the Pearl of Power, both of which were seen in the episode City Beneath the Sea. And boy is that a cracking episode! I’m not just saying that because it starts out with Prince Adam blindfolded and playing what is clearly a sex-fiend game of drunk hide-and-seek with a couple of palace whores. Afterwards, He-Man and Man-At-Arms investigate missing ships only to find out that Mer-Man has seized control of Aquatica, captured their Princess, and hypnotized the people with his Pearl of Power. The pearl looks really nice and Mer-Man’s left hand is sculpted perfectly to hold it.

The Trident is pretty simple, but it matches what he had in the cartoon perfectly. Sure, I prefer the more ornate sword that came with the vintage figure, but I can always loan that out to him if I want to… Moving on to Stratos!

As a character, Stratos is not top of my list of favorites in the cartoon, but I’m going all in on this line, so I was content to pick him up, and with the figure in hand I’m glad I did. The figure is not as flashy and colorful as Mer-Man, but I was surprised at how well the body’s mostly gray deco pops with those splashes of red and blue. The cartoon design switches the vintage deco up with the harness going from red to blue and the wings from blue to red, meanwhile the belt stays red and the fur diaper stays blue. Toony Stratos also nixes the sculpted fur around the gray lower legs and feet and gives him red boots, the tops of which are the same sculpt as Mer-Man’s. Of course, we get a lot of the usual smoothing and simplification to evoke that animated look. Stratos’ sculpted chest hair is gone, the harness lacks all detail. The jetpack looks great and the wings still have the sculpted feather detail, but are streamlined in their shape. The Cartoon Series proportions also look really great on this guy!

The head sculpt is a lot more robust than what we got in the vintage-style figure. The helmet is larger, the goggles are smoothed out, and the beard is fuller and more majestic. I also think he looks a lot more human than simian here. I also like his broad smile.

Stratos comes with only one accessory and of course it’s the Staff of Avion. That makes two tridents in this wave! I don’t know how many times this thing was seen in the cartoon, but it was specifically called out in the episode, The Reign of the Monster. Apparently he only got it out once a year to do a fireworks display, although the episode does have him using it as a weapon to shoot energy blasts. It’s a decent looking accessory cast in gold plastic with angled prongs on the end.

I really dig how Mattel is releasing these figures in waves of two at a time, with one hero and one villain, and this wave is definitely another solid pair for the collection. I’m not the biggest Stratos fan around, but his figure looks good, and I find that I’m warming up to him as a character more and more. Mer-Man, on the other hand, is a key addition to Skeletor’s core minions and I just can’t get enough of the great colors! I picked these up for $17.99 a piece, which ain’t bad considering it’s hard to get figures in this scale for under $20 these days. Next up will be Evil-Lyn and Webstor!

Jul 24 2024

G. I. JOE Classified (Night Force): Shockwave and Night Pursuit Cycle by Hasbro

I drew the line a little while ago and pledged that I wouldn’t be picking up any Night Force or Tiger Force stuff. Classified is extensive enough without buying a lot of repaints. Also, I’m generally not a fan of the Tiger Force deco, while the Night Force stuff is more appealing to me. Well, I kind of reneged on that pledge twice now, as I preordered both this Night Force set, and the Tiger Force version of the Ferret. Yup, my willpower ain’t that strong! This set includes a repaint of the RAM Cycle as well as a repaint of Jason Faria, aka. Shockwave with some mix and match accessories. It’s also a Walmart Exclusive, which I was able to get online, because that’s the only way I get any store exclusives these days.

The packaging is simple, yet impressive. The toys come in a big window box with everything laid out in the tray. The accessory count looks to be pretty high, and while I don’t recognize everything, I’m willing to bet that there is nothing in this box that isn’t recycled from a previous release. Everything is collector friendly, and this may be one of those sets that I choose to display in the box, rather than have two RAM Cycles on the shelf. But we’ll see. Let’s start with Shockwave, and I’ll spend more time with him than I will the bike, because he’s totally new to me.

Shockwave is one of a very small number of mainline release Classified figures that I skipped when he went up for preorder. I have nothing against the SWAT specialist, but the original Real American Hero figure was released in 1989 when I was long out of my kid phase of buying GI JOEs and about ten years away from entering my adult phase of buying GI JOEs. I also think the Classified figure was part of a rather large flurry of releases, and I wanted to make some responsible decisions and maybe pick him up later. That never happened, and so here we are. This version is a straight repaint of that first release with a lot of gray, black and some green in place of the blue. His cargo trousers are printed with digital urban camo and he has a rather robust tactical vest with a quilted chest, angled knife sheath, a brace of what I think are shotgun shells, and lots and lots of pouches. The regular release had two submachine gun holsters, whereas this one has a single holster on his right thigh for a pistol. He does, however, retain the second knife sheath on his lower left leg. The coloring is a lot more subdued here than the original blue, but I dig it. The only thing I’m not crazy about is how the vest prevents him from putting his arms down all the way. As a result he can look a little silly trying to adopt natural standing poses.

The head features the balaclava repainted to all black and the removable cap is redone in gray digital camo to match his trousers. I’m not a fan of the eye printing here, he looks like some kind of coked-out maniac and I think it’s more suited to a Cobra figure than a JOE.

You also get a recycled helmet, which I believe we last saw released with the VAMP. I didn’t have much use for this with Clutch, but I do really like it on Shocker when he’s on the Night Pursuit Cycle.

Shockwave borrows from some of Firefly 1.0’s kit, namely his backpack and drone. I don’t mind this too much, since I retired that figure after Firefly 2.0 came along. The backpack is a great sculpt, here cast in gray instead of black. There are all sorts of pouches holding sculpted tools, many of which are painted silver. The drone can nest on top of the backpack and inside the pack is a compartment that stores the drone’s remote control unit, which I thought was a really cool idea. The drone has some articulation in the legs, the VTOL fans are static, and there’s some red paint for his large camera eye. I think this is some worthwhile recycling, but there is a tab and a socket on the backpack, which doesn’t work with any of Shockwave’s gear, and that’s awkward. I may actually give those accessories to Shockwave, since Firefly 1.0 won’t be needing them at the bottom of that tote he lives in. Let’s move on to weapon role call!

For the cutlery, Shockwave comes with two knives, which fit in the previously mentioned sheaths. These have black handles and silver blades. The one that fits in his chest sheath is a fairly standard combat style knife while the boot knife has a gut-hook. Maybe, I don’t want to know why he carries that. The gut-hook knife is one of the few accessories here that came with the first release of Shockwave. These are fine, but the boot sheath doesn’t stay on his leg very well and slides down.

As for the smaller guns, Shockwave has an automatic pistol that he stows in the holster on his right leg and a submachine gun, which I believe is the same that came with regular Shockwave, who actually had a pair of these. Both weapons are cast in black plastic and have some excellent sculpted detail. The submachine gun has an extended magazine, which is not removable, however, the suppressor can be removed.

Next up on the pew-pew chain is the double barreled AR, which sounds batshit crazy, but I believe it’s based on an Israeli design. I love the detail in this sculpt and the green magazine is removable. There’s also a hinged foregrip, and it too is cast in green plastic. As someone who has to slum it with my boring old single-barrel AR, I’d love to give one of these a whirl just for the experience.

Onto the biggest gun, or at least the biggest that isn’t meant to mount on the cycle. This looks like the JOEs answer to the SIG 338 Light Machine Gun and it is a beautifully sculpted accessory. This rifle has a detachable box magazine, cast in green plastic and a grab bar on the top. The exposed rounds feeding from the mag into the receiver are individually painted in gold and banded with green. Hasbro really put together an interesting arsenal for this guy and I love it all. Unfortunately, he has nowhere to carry most of it, which is partly due to him recycling the old backpack. It’s a shame, because I really like my JOEs to be able to carry all their gear. OK, let’s move on to the Night Pursuit Cycle!

Wow! For what could have been a quick-and-dirty repaint, Hasbro poured some serious love into this new deco. The dark matte gray plastic replaces the green of the original, and there are lots of new tampos all over the place, including the Night Force logo, the eagle on the gas tank, and “Covert Special Task Force” printed on the chain gun’s casing. You get some tan paint added to the seat, handle bar wraps, and to the sculpted wrap on the exhaust pipes, which is pretty damn cool, because I don’t think I even noticed that detail on the original, where it was left black. Finally, there are some gorgeous copper highlights to the vents, shocks, and wheels, which may not be ideal for a stealthy night vehicle, but they look so nice, it’s easy for me to not nitpick the logic there. Of course, as with the first release, the chaingun can be removed from the housing and wielded by a figure, and there’s a drop down kickstand to stabilize the bike with the weapon sidecar detached.

I think Shockwave pairs really well with the bike, and with the helmet on, he looks totally bad-ass. The colors of his fatigues compliment the Night Pursuit Cycles deco very well. For me, nothing will ever replace how iconic the Classified RAM looks as an homage to the vintage toy, but I have to admit, that the deco here is quite striking and most certainly holds its own.

I’ll admit, I didn’t think I’d be nearly as excited with this set as I wound up being. Shockwave is a cool figure, even with his odd mix-and-match assortment of accessories. I also think that there’s enough changes here to make him work as a Night Force strike team army builder, if you already own the regular Shockwave. The helmet and fairly generic fatigues goes a long way to giving him that troop builder vibe. And because of that, I may still pick up the regular version. As for the bike, Hasbro went above and beyond kitting out the deco with new markings and making it feel like just another quick-and-easy cash grab on an existing mold. And while the nostalgia of the regular RAM Cycle will always win out for me, I could easily see collectors preferring this snazzy new bike. This set retailed for $55, which seems to be the going price for these smaller vehicle and figure combos, but at the time I’m writing this, the set is discounted to $42, and that seems like a real steal!

Jul 22 2024

Star Wars Black Series (Return of the Jedi): Rebel Commando by Hasbro

What’s this? A Star Wars figure review on FFZ? Will wonders never cease! I’ve been pretty vocal about how I’ve all but stopped collecting Star Wars figures. I have no interest in the current stream of content Disney is producing, and instead of giving us the figures we’re missing from the Original Trilogy, they seem all-in on the new stuff peppered by Prequel stuff here and there. It seems like a bad business move to me, but then again it may all be baked into the licensing agreement. I haven’t looked at any Hasbro Star Wars figures this year, and only two last year, and that’s literally all I’ve been buying. The Endor Rebel Commando looked really good, but Hasbro released him at a ludicrous $35 and I wasn’t willing to bite at that price. Luckily he went on sale as part of Amazon’s Prime Days and I finally picked up a couple.

This figure was part of Hasbro’s woefully disappointing 40th Anniversary offerings for Return of the Jedi, which featured just a few new figures and a whole bunch of repacks on vintage style cards. And much to my amazement, not a single one of Jabba’s Skiff Guards among them. I think the figures look great on the oversized vintage-style cards, but Amazon mangled both of mine pretty badly. Not a problem, since I always planned on opening them anyway. I’d say it’s about a 50-50 chance as to whether or not I get a carded figure from Amazon in good shape or not, and I always take that into account when buying from them. Anyway, the card has the familiar photo of the Rebel Commando crouched and ready for action beside the Imperial Bunker and the back of the card has the usual cross-sell promotion showing other figures in the assortment.

The Rebel’s commando strike team had some variations in their gear, with many wearing camo ponchos or jackets. Based on the outfit here, this figure seems to be referencing Nik Sant as he lacks the extra layer of camo. The figure sports a sculpted gray long sleeve shirt with a soft plastic vest worn over it and very short sleeves sculpted as part of the arms and matching up quite well. The legs are sculpted with cargo-style trousers featuring a camo finish and the high boots have sculpted laces. The belt is cast in soft plastic and worn by the figure. It includes a number of sculpted pouches and a tube, maybe for a scope? There’s also a bandoleer hanging off the right shoulder with some sculpted bits of gear on it, all of which is painted in a very nice silver metal finish. This figure looks amazing, especially for a troop builder, and I love how layered all the gear looks. The DNA here feels more akin to the GI JOE Classified line than Star Wars Black, and I mean that as the highest of compliments.

The backpack is worn by the figure with actual shoulder straps, and it’s something that’s pretty unusual for any of Hasbro’s 6-inch lines. The straps fit the figure well with the pack hanging low on the back. It’s cast in brown plastic and has lots of sculpted rumples and wrinkles, as well as stitching and fasteners for the flaps. There’s a crinkled hose running up the one side and some painted fixtures as well. It would have been cool to also get the hard pack that some of the Commandos wore, especially considering the price point on this figure. The figure’s articulation is overall pretty good with the downside being rotating hinges in the elbows and knees, instead of double hinges. Also, the ankle hinge doesn’t allow for the foot to bend up very far. I also wish they had painted that camo further up the knee joint.

Like the Hoth Trooper, the Commando comes with two interchangeable face plates, but the Endor faces are not compatible with the Hoth figure, as the design is slightly different. The faces pull out and plug in similar to what we tend to see on a Figma or Figuart. The sculpt of the helmet and chin strap does a beautiful job of concealing the feature and if I didn’t know, I probably couldn’t tell that the face was designed to come off at all. They are, however, extremely difficult to get off and I had to resort to getting a jeweler’s screwdriver into the gap and popping it out. But since I have one figure for each face, I doubt I’ll ever swap them again. Unlike the Hoth figure, there is no storage in the backpack for the extra face.

The sculpting on these heads is superb, and I think these portraits are among some of the best we’ve had tout of the Black Series. The facial features are crisp and well defined, the paint for Sant’s beard is sharp and even, and the printing on the younger portrait’s blue eyes is beautiful. There’s also some wonderful, and very subtle shading for the hair growth on his chin. The helmets look great and include silver brushing for weathering. This is better work than Hasbro has done on portraits for some of the main characters.

The trooper comes with two weapons: A DH-17 Blaster and what I believe was the A280C rifle. The DH-17 is an extremely detailed sculpt and cast all in black plastic. It fits perfectly in the right trigger hand, and while it can still be held easily in the left, there’s no trigger finger on that hand. Sadly, there’s no holster for the weapon, which may have been by design to remain screen accurate, but it’s still a shame, because I like my soldiers to be able to carry all their weapons and gear.

The A280C rifle is also a fantastic sculpt that’s just packed with detail, including a rather complex scope. The barrel is quite thin and probably susceptible to bending if not stored right. Nonetheless, both arrived in the tray as straight as an arrow. It’s a shame that Hasbro didn’t give this rifle a carry strap, as it would have at least allowed these guys to sling the rifles and carry their blasters. I mean, even the vintage Kenner figure’s rifle had a shoulder strap!

The Rebel Commando is an absolutely fantastic figure, but this is exactly the kind of figure we should be getting from Black Series at the regular $25 price point, and not as an inflated special releases. And the fact that he’s a troop builder makes the higher price tag all the more vexing. Between a lot of sub-par figures, the focus on the releases from the newer series, and my general malaise about Star Wars these days, I was compelled to send a message and take a pass. But, when Prime had him at $15, I was happy to get two for less than the price of one. At the time I’m writing this, he’s gone up to $20, but I think that’s still a pretty good price for the figure, and it’s even tempting me to pick up one more.

Jul 19 2024

Ultra Street Fighter II: M. Bison by Jada Toys

Last year, Jada Toys, one of the kings of diecast cars, came out of nowhere and started shipping some absolutely incredible action figures based on Capcom’s timeless Street Fighter videogame franchise. So far, I’ve checked out Ryu and Chun-Li, and now that some new challengers hit my doorstep, I’m ready for more! Apologies to Ken and Fei Long, who have been waiting for their turn in the spotlight, but M. Bison and Dhalsim arrived and I’m bumping them to the head of the line. Today let’s go with the villainous M. Bison!

I absolutely adore the package design Jada came up with for this line! You get a cardboard arcade cabinet motif with a large window displaying the figure from the knees up, so unfortunately if you buy your figures based on feet, you’ll be going in blind! And are also a very peculiar person! There’s some character art on the bottom and a life bar recreated up top. The packaging here is collector friendly, but you do need to show a modicum of care when opening it from the bottom flaps and sliding out the tray. I rarely keep action figure boxes these days, but I have been hanging onto all of these.

Out of the box, Bison is showing off all the great stuff that made me fall in love with this line at the start. A lot of the coloring is in the plastic, which I think tends to look more vibrant and minimizes paint issues. The red suit is covered in a very fine woven texture with some scrapes and cuts add here and there. There’s a sculpted blue collar, which continues to run down the center of the tunic where it tucks under a thin black belt and gold buckle. His forearms and lower legs are armored and these have a very nice silver finish with some spray to show a rust-like weathering. I’m hard pressed to remember the last time I saw a faux metal finish this nice on a retail action figure in this price range. Of course, Bison is a chonky boi, and the musculature and proportions here look great.

Bison’s black cape is cloth with a wire running around the edges to make it posable. The cape itself actually feels a bit leather-like. And I’ve gotta ask, how often do you see this kind of stuff in mass market figures these days? The cape is attached to his shoulder armor by gold fixtures. It’s also removable by snapping off the shoulder plates and replacing them with a second pair. It would have been easier for Jada to just do snaps, but this way you can nix the cape and still have clean looking shoulder pieces. Swapping them out is easy enough and they seem to stay on pretty well. The armor pieces are attached around the shoulder articulation with rings and can shift back and forward to keep from hindering the range of motion there. With the cape gone, comes the only gripe I have with this figure and that’s the unpainted hinges in the back of his knees where the red stands out against the black of the boots. Now, I’ll likely be displaying him with the cape a lot of the time, which will cover this, but it’s worth pointing out all the same.

You get two heads to choose from: One neutral and one showing his fighty face! Both feature his military-style officer’s cap and it has the same texture as the suit. The sculpted crests are painted gold and when you punch in close, there’s a little unevenness to the paint, mostly on the first head. The facial features are very well sculpted right down to the cleft chin. The angry face is definitely the one I’ll be going with most of the time, as it just oozes character.

As with the previous figures in the line, the articulation here is simply fantastic. I won’t run through all the points here, as I’ve done it for the previous figures. Suffice it to say the articulation is extremely fun to work with and the joints are all smooth as butter. He has a pretty good balance, thanks in part to his big boots and like the previous figures he can hold a high kick pose without any support. Bison comes with a pair of fists and a pair of grapple hands.

Finally, you get an effect part to represent his Psycho Power attack. This piece is cast in translucent purple plastic and fits right over either of his fists. The shading in the purple looks really nice.

I may have said this in my other reviews of this line: These figures feel more like imports to me than figures designed for the US market. The design is so polished, the quality so good, and they are just so ridiculously fun to have in hand. And when you factor in the $25 price point and the fact that Jada is still pretty new at this sort of thing, the line becomes all the more impressive to me. And with all of the preview pictures that have been showing up at conventions, it looks like Jada is in this one for the long haul. Jada is absolutely killing it here, and I’m excited to get back and check out Dhalism in the near future!

Jul 17 2024

Marvel Legends: Hawkeye and Sky-Cycle by Hasbro

While I have picked up a newly released figure here and there, I mostly continue to play the cheapskate with Marvel Legends, and bottom feed the sales and clearance. Most of the times it pays off, and when it doesn’t, I’m not too worried about missing a figure or even an entire wave here and there. I have boxes and boxes of these figures and I’m happy to pull back on adding to them. Nonetheless, I definitely wanted this classic Hawkeye with Sky-Cycle when it was first released, but most of the figure and vehicle combos have lingered on the shelves, and this one was no different. It has since turned up at Ollie’s for really cheap, but that place is filthy and disgusting and I hate going there, so I was willing to pay $4 more online and have it shipped to me for free.

Hawkeye and his ride come in a fully enclosed box with a mostly white deco. Until now, the closest thing I have to a classic Hawkeye in this line is the one way back in 2015 in The Allfather Wave, and that was a modern look based loosely on his classic costume. We did get a retro-carded one back in 2018, which I feel was closer, but I never did pick that one up, so this one definitely fills a hole in my Avengers line up. There’s some nice shots of the figure and vehicle on the box and everything here is collector friendly.

Straightaway, I absolutely love the colors here. The purple and bright blue look smashing together, especially when you add the metallic finish to the shoulder piece. The sleeveless bodysuit is achieved mostly with colored plastic, but you do get cuts in the chest to allow the straps to lie almost flush in the channels, which is really cool. The buccaneer boots are cast in purple and are left smooth with just a bit of rumpling, as opposed to the textured finish of the previously mentioned releases. The bicep bands and wrist bracers appear to be recolored and lifted from the retro-carded figure, but the belt and chest harness are new, with the scale-mail shoulder piece reaching all the way up his neck. There’s a shoulder strap with painted buckle across his chest and his sash is made up of a printed cloth piece that hangs down below the belt, front and back. I feel as if this is the first time we’ve had softgoods on a Marvel Legends, so that’s certainly something. I don’t expect it to be the start of a trend, though, as it was likely just implemented here so he could ride the Sky-Cycle.

The head sculpt is good, and I’m pretty sure this is brand new. It has the pointy extensions to the eye mask, which the previous versions did not have. The raised “H” is still present on his forehead. The sculpted lines around the eye mask are well done, making it look like something actually worn by the figure. His ears are exposed and you get a strong jaw and a pretty pronounced chin and nose. The printing for the eyes and lip shading are on point.

Hawkeye is built on a pinless body with pretty standard articulation, and the slighter build definitely fits him well. There are lateral crunches in the shoulders and you get leg swivels in both the thighs and above the boots. Unfortunately, the jointing on my figure is a tad gummy, particularly in the elbows and knees. It’s not enough to ruin the figure for me, but it is disappointing. The figure includes both fists and accessory holding hands.

As for accessories, Hawkeye comes with his bow, quiver, and a single loose arrow. The quiver is the same one we got with the previous Hawkeyes I’ve mentioned, and I’m sure we’ve seen it at least one time before that. It’s a complex and modern design and I wish we got something more simple and traditional. The bow, on the other hand, is very simple, lending itself more to his classic look. It’s yellow with a black painted grip and a terrible, chonky plastic string. The arrow is mostly gray plastic with red painted fletching and a knob on the back to help the figure hold it. He can sort of pose as if he’s knocking the arrow, but with the string being plastic, he can’t draw it very well, so it doesn’t really work for an action pose. Let’s move over to the Sky-Cycle.

This vehicle requires just a slight bit of assembly, as you have to snap the bottom onto the body and the windshield onto the front. There’s also a semi-translucent stand that connects to the bottom with a ball joint and socket. This stand is the same design we’ve seen Hasbro using with Star Wars Speeder Bikes and whatnot. As far as Marvel Legends vehicles go, this is way simpler than any of the motorcycles or scooters we’ve seen, as there’s no moving parts. It does look really good and there’s some nice sculpted detail, even on the bottom where you can see the two VTOL engines. It’s mostly all cast in a gunmetal gray, but you do get some brown for the seat and black for the thruster cones on back. There is also some paint on the instrument panel between the handlebars.

I think this is a nice little set, until you factor in the original MSRP of $50, which is just nuts! Even if you grant that these figures are going for $25 these days, I can’t come up with $25 for the Sky-Cycle. It’s got no moving parts, virtually no paint, and it doesn’t come close to other vehicle-figure bundles that we’ve seen retail for less. It’s no wonder the price has been slashed everywhere, including Hasbro Pulse, where it’s down to half price. I picked it up for $25 with free shipping, and I’m pretty happy about that, because I’ve been watching it for a while now. I do wish Hawkeye got a new quiver and a bow with an actual string, but other than that I think he turned out really well.

Jul 15 2024

G. I. JOE Ultimates: Cobra Troopers by Super7

Super7’s various Ultimates line are becoming a weekly fixture around these parts, and that’s because I collect three of these lines and S7 has been pumping them out pretty hot and heavy. Right now ThunderCats and GI JOE are battling for slots every week so I can get current and get back to Silverhawks. Today I’m headed back into Wave 3 of the GI JOE Ultimates to have a look at the Cobra Troopers. And if you want to get caught up, I’ve already checked out both Scarlett and Storm Shadow from this assortment!

Ah, the good old days, when these figures came with slipcovers! These were phased out in the following wave, and at this point S7 had already changed the snazzy glossy finish on the cardboard to dull matte. The presentation is still nice, with the blue camo, bold red Cobra emblem, dogtag style name plate and the weathering made to look like paint rubbed off of steel. But, these will continue to die a death of a thousand cost cuts until we get just the window box. As we’re about to see, the Cobra Trooper comes with parts to make two variants of the same figure, so naturally I picked up two.

There’s just something about the Sunbow cartoon Cobra Troops that I love so much. These guys were pretty buff and badass looking, even if they were a bunch of clowns who were prone to getting taken out by having their heads knocked together like a couple of coconuts. The uniforms take inspiration from the RAH designs, but they’ve been streamlined for a super clean toony look. The fatigues here are recreated as smooth and without much in the way of tailored detail, although they do each have a pouch on their right legs. The belts include shoulder straps and two more pouches on the hips. The shoulder rigs are executed in the Y-back style. There are black and white hexagonal knee pads, and the boots have some white buckles on the sides. Finally, a bold Cobra emblem is emblazoned on the front of the shirts. Like I said, these guys are clean and simple and perfectly evoke the animated look.

There are two different heads with each figure, and these are varied by fair skin and tan skin, so you can have a little bit of variety in your troops if you decide to army build. Unlike most of S7’s Ultimates, the head swap here is done at the base of the neck so that you get the skin color change all the way down to the uniform collar. The helmet and face mask designs are identical, but there is a little variety in the painted facial features. The lighter skinned trooper has blonde eyebrows, while the tan has black, but neither are showing any hair under the helmets. I really like how they handled this variation and I wouldn’t be opposed to picking up a couple more if they reissued the figure with yet another two head designs.

By now you should all know the deal with the articulation here. It’s serviceable, but some of the joints lack the range in motion that most collectors would have preferred. I will say that the rotating hinges in the elbows feel like they have a tiny bit more range than some other figures in the line, as they can easily do a 90-degree bend. It’s still not ideal, but I’ve learned to accept what we got here and still have fun with it. All of the joints on these guys worked great straight out of the box. You do get several pairs of hands, and each set is duplicated in both the light and tan skin to go with whichever head you choose. The hands include fists, trigger hands, and loose grip hands. I would have liked a pair of relaxed or karate chop hands, but in fairness, they were duplicating each set and that’s a lot of hands! Let’s move on to accessories, and we’ll start with the weapons!

First off, each Trooper comes with a laser pistol and I really dig this design. IT’s boxy in the receiver with a site at the end of the barrels. It looks serviceable and fairly realistic, as opposed to some of the more wackier pistols we’ve seen in this line. The detail is really sharp and I really like the blue-gray finish, which is repeated for all the guns included with these guys.

And here’s my all time favorite of Cobra’s arsenal: The laser submachine gun! These have no stocks and a scope mounted up top. There’s a magazine type attachment in front of the trigger guard, which in this case I assume is a battery pack, since they fired lasers in the cartoon. There’s just enough detail here to look good without compromising the simplicity of the toon aesthetic. These are the guns that I’ll be displaying with these guys all the time.

Finally for the guns, you get a large rifle, and these tend more toward realism than the usual cartoon weapons. These have skeletal stocks, a very detailed receiver, complex scopes, and even carry straps. These designs are based off the weapon included with the original Real American Hero Cobra soldier

And finally, you get the bitchin’ laser whip from the original Mini-Series. These have tube shaped, lightsaber-like hilts with some painted controls and the bright blue whips are cast in a soft rubbery plastic. I’m not sure if the whips are designed to be removed from the hilts or not. I gave it a little tug and it didn’t come out, so I’m not going to risk it.

In addition to all that firepower, you get a couple of pieces of equipment. First up, the Cobra Trooper comes with a walkie-talkie so he can talk to his chums. We have had a few walkies in this line so far, but I think this is a new sculpt. It’s got a circular screen mesh speaker and a frequency display on the top, along with an antenna. There’s a hand designed to hold it, and it can be a bit tricky to get it in there, but once I got it, it worked fine.

And the final accessory is a briefcase bomb! The blue briefcase has four tiny feet to rest on and a gray carry handle. Open it up and it reveals a very toony looking bomb inside with some different colored wires and a digital screen showing the timer.

Oh boy, do I dig these guys! While I loved each and every one of my RAH figures, I can remember wishing my Cobra Troops looked more like the cartoon, although in fairness I only ever had one Cobra and one Cobra Officer. Super7 did a great job nailing the animated look and the weapons and accessories are all great. I’m keeping a close eye on these to go on sale, but I haven’t decided what that magic number is that will make me go crazy and get a bunch more. It would be cool to see these reissued with two more variant heads and maybe an H-back for the shoulder straps. I’d also love to see S7 give us some female Cobra Troopers as well.

Jul 12 2024

ThunderCats Ultimates: Captain Shiner by Super7

Even as I push my way through my look at ThunderCats Ultimates Wave 8 and try to get current, Wave 9 has already arrived! Fortunately, I only picked up half of that assortment so it doesn’t set me back quite so far, but I’m still doing all I can to get caught up with ThunderCats, so I can get back into Silverhawks. If you’re just joining me, I’ve already had a look at WilyKit and Hachiman from this wave, and today I’m checking out the nefarious Captain Shiner!

As we saw last time, we are no longer getting the sleeves on these boxes, which is disappointing, but has also convinced me to not keep these packages any longer. That’s not me being petty, just looking for any excuse I can get to get rid of empty boxes and conserve space. Nonetheless, the window box shows off the figure quite nicely and you get some character art and a blurb about him on the back. We first encountered the spacefaring mercenary, Captain Shiner, in the episode Sword in a Hole where he acquires the Sword of Omens for Mumm-Ra and throws it into what appears to be a Black Hole. This was a stand out episode to me when I was a kid, because I can remember honestly wondering how the hell they were ever going to get the sword back.. and in about twenty minutes, no less! By the end of the episode it seems like Shiner going to be another one of those adversary-turned-ally situations, like Hachiman or Snowman of Hook Mountain, but nope when we see him again in the ThunderCats, Ho! mini-series, he’s still an asshole!

Shiner always struck me as being based off an old 19th Century Austrian army officer, and I dig that! I mean, why not? We’ve had pirates and samurai and ninjas. Third Earth is just a melting pot for historical analogies. His uniform is not the most exciting thing around, as it’s mainly a gray suit with red striping on the trousers and an orange baldric across his chest. He does, however, have some really snazzy space boots and the purple and blue go a long way to make his coloring more interesting. What’s also interesting is Shiner comes out of the box with static arms that are sculpted crossed over his chest. I’m not usually a big fan of swapping out parts to make up for shortcomings in articulation, but I have to admit it looks good here, even if it is a dirty cheat.

Of course, you can pop the crossed arms piece off at the shoulders and give him his regular articulated arms and these work just as you might expect, with rotating hinges at the shoulders and elbows, swivels in the biceps and hinged pegs for the wrists. You get three pairs of hands, which include fists, accessory gripping hands, a relaxed right hand and a pointing left hand. The hands seem rather undersized to me, especially the tiny fists, which I found kind of weird and off-putting. The rest of the articulation is standard Super7 Ultimates stuff, although my figure’s right hip can be problematic. Sometimes it feels like it locks up and I have to fiddle with it to get it to move again. I’m not sure what’s goin on up there, but heat doesn’t seem to help and I just have to be patient and careful with it.

You get three different heads to choose from. These include a somewhat passive expression, an evil smile expression, and a maniacal laughter head. The later two are very expressive and all three are excellent likenesses for the character. The face is so lumpy and weird, and just full of personality. The monocle in his left eye is a permanent fixture, cast in a smoked translucent plastic so you can still see his painted eye behind it. The cord is attached to the monocle and plugs into the orange sash, so you have to unplug it every time you change the head. It’s not a big deal and it pegs in fairly easily, but if you turn the head too far, particularly to his left it will tend to pull out.

Shiner comes with three accessories, the first of which comes from his first appearance and it’s the captured Sword of Omens. This represents the sword in its dagger form with the Eye of Thundera wrapped up to contain its power. It’s actually the second time we got a Sword of Omens with the Eye wrapped up, the first one came with Pumm-Ra. And kudos to S7 for doing an entirely new sculpt for this accessory.

Next up, you get an energy pistol. I can’t remember if we saw these in his first episode, but I know his crew carried these in ThunderCats, Ho! As far as laser gun designs go, this one is pretty low effort and the accessory reflects that. There’s no real detail on it at all, just a painted orange screen for the energy emitter.

And finally, you get a set of shackles, which I presume are supposed to be one of the sets used to chain up the captive ThunderCats, in ThunderCats, Ho! This accessory is very well done with an actual chain and the cuffs can open and close. They are a bit big, even on the dudes, but fun nonetheless.

Captain Shiner is a solid enough figure, and yet this one leaves me a little underwhelmed. Maybe it’s because his outfit design is rather simple, but then I think the head sculpts make up for it. Maybe it’s because he feels rather light on the accessories, but that’s probably because of the crossed arms piece taking up a chunk of the extras budget. And sure, that looks good as a display option, but where do we draw the line between just substituting parts instead of making the articulation work better. The tiny hands do bother me quite a bit, and the wonky right hip joint is a nuisance. Part of me wonders if I should have waited for Shiner to turn up on discount, but then I didn’t want to risk not having him in my collection. Really good figures often get a week or so playtime on my desk for me to have fun messing around with before going up on display, but that won’t be the case for Shiner. Although he does look good on the shelf!

Jul 10 2024

DC Multiverse (Collector Edition): Starfire by McFarlane

A little while back I checked out my first Collector Edition figure from McFarlane’s DC Multiverse series. I liked the figure well enough, but questioned why it was billed as a premium Collector Edition release with a ten dollar price increase. In the end I came away deciding that I was going to be very selective with which characters I buy in this sub-line, and so far there haven’t been many. I did, however, preorder this Rebirth version of Starfire, mainly because she looked great and I wanted her on my Teen Titans shelf. All I can say is Todd must know what he’s doing, because this figure sold out fast, although it has been recently coming back up for preorder. So, is this irresistible Princess of Tamaran worth it? Let’s find out.

Kori comes in a window box very similar to all the other DC Multiverse figures on the market, from the black deco on the box to the blue tray behind the figure. The big difference here is the foil lettering running beside the window exclaiming this to be a Collector Edition release. Also, instead of being sealed to the blue backer tray, the collector card is front and center, held in a special display stand. It’s almost collector friendly, but you do have to tear the stand off the backer tray to get it. And instead of the typical black disk figure stand you get a translucent flight stand that needs to be snapped together.

I’ll always be partial to Starfire’s space bikinis, but in the last decade or so Kori’s outfits have become less revealing. Why can’t we have nice things any more, DC? The Rebirth costume is similar to her 2015 Amanda Conner look, but they even had to cover up her midriff. At least we get a flash of shoulders and thighs. And with that out of my system, I actually still like this outfit quite a bit. The purple and lavender of the deco compliment each other nicely and pay respects to the older costume colors, while also contrasting well with her orange skin. A lot of the costume details here are achieved with paint, but you do get some sculped flourishes, like the raised disks above her thighs, the rumpled knee guards, and the green stone in the center of her chest. There are sculpted lines at the tops of her boots and ends of her sleeves, and she’s sporting some elegant high heels. Unfortunately, the paint lines between the purple and lavendar on her one-piece are just sprayed on, and I would have liked to see those a lot sharper. That’s why sculpted lines in these costumes are always the best, albeit not the cheapest, way to go.

The portrait here is quite solid, with maybe just a hint of Jennifer Aniston in there. Kori has a pretty strong jawline, but I still think she comes across as pretty. The lips and eyebrows are perfectly painted, there’s some nice gradient work in her skin tone, and the painted eyes are absolutely gorgeous. They have a haunting glow that could legitimately be mistaken for some kind of light piping and that’s impressive. I might have liked a little smile, as the expression is very somber, but I still dig it a lot. The hair sculpt is also well done, as it snakes down her back and almost down to her knees. The strands around her face are a little chonky, but I still think it works fine, and the coloring gradually goes from red at the top to orange at the end of her copious coif.

The articulation here is mostly what we’re used to seeing out of the DC Multiverse ladies, which is good. Although I will say that I absolutely hate the ball-style wrists. Not only are they kind of ugly, but they are extremely fragile. I’ve had one come apart on me once. It’s easy to pop it back together, but it’s a really bad design. Ironically, I usually complain about the balls in the ankles, but here they actually look OK, and haven’t given me any problems. As expected, the balance on this figure isn’t great, as her high heels and heavy hair does make her a challenge to stand. Kori does not come with any extra hands, so you’re stuck with just the fists and frankly that’s inexcusable for a Collector Edition figure that costs $10 more than the main line. I really wanted some relaxed hands for her, and maybe some power projecting hands as well.

Starfire does come with two power effect parts, which slip onto her fists. These are cast in a bright neon yellow and they look really nice. On the other hand, they fit very loosely on her tiny fists, so I’m pretty sure these are maybe recycled from another figure. Normally, I don’t have a big problem with that, but when they don’t fit the figure, Todd, you probably shouldn’t use them.

I am happy that we got the flight stand. I know these aren’t popular with some collectors, as they can feel a bit flimsy. If McFarlane were selling these separately I would agree, but as a pack-in accessory I like them a lot. We see them every now and then in the main line, so I think bundling one in with Collector Edition flyers should be essential. You also get the collector card stand, which is the one stand out extra in these premium releases, but certainly not worth the extra ten bucks. Todd is infamous for packing in collector cards that don’t match the figure. Here, the suit is pretty close, but the hair isn’t.

Starfire is a great looking figure and I’m happy to have her with my Titans, but I have the same problems here as when I reviewed the Collector Edition Green Lantern… the money doesn’t add up. In this case, with flimsy wrists, no extra hands, recycled effect parts, and some sprayed paint lines, it’s hard to see how this is a premium figure. She’d be a solid release for the regular line, but I’m just not seeing where my extra ten bucks went. I’ve said it before, I think Todd is just stacking this premium line with regular figures of characters that they think are in demand enough to sell at the higher price point. And I’d say it’s probably working, because I rarely see these go on clearance, so either the demand is there or they aren’t producing as many.