Monthly Archives: August 2024

Aug 7 2024

Marvel Legends (Void Wave) Namorita by Hasbro

Yeah, I’ve been letting Marvel Legends start trickling back into the regular rotation around these parts. Obviously, I haven’t stopped collecting entirely, but I’m buying very few figures at full retail anymore, and skipping waves where I’m just not that interested. I’m also trying to win out over my OCD by embracing reviewing figures here and there as it strikes my fancy, and not necessarily caring whether it’s in any order or wave. With that having been said, Namorita from The Void Wave has been kicking around my desk for a long while, I thought I’d throw her some love.

I’ll concede that this Void Wave is a pretty strong assortment and I wouldn’t mind completing the BAF, but I’m not really interested in all of these figures. I already checked out Crystar from this wave, and I was able to track down Power Princess, which wasn’t easy. Justice and Vision look good, but I don’t really need another Black Panther or Namor. Either way, Namorita comes with The Void’s torso, which makes sense as she’s easily the smallest figure in this wave. Maybe someday I’ll make use of it, or maybe I won’t.

Obviously, Namorita has had a lot of changes to her appearance throughout the decades, mostly written off as biological changes from her cloning process… or emotional stress… or maybe both. I tend to lean toward the more classic look for this character, but I can see why Hasbro chose this one. It’s kind of an important version of her… something to do with a bus and a lot of dead kids and a little thing called Marvel’s Civil War. The body uses very little original sculpting and gets by with paint to convey her costume. You do get the sculpted wings on her ankles, some sculpting for her gloves, and I believe the female bare feet are new. Her skin uses a pale matte blue plastic, which looks very nice, especially alongside the high gloss red and white used for her one-piece swimsuit. The gloves are also painted red and she has some sharp white tattoo-like patterns printed on her arms and legs. She’s a colorful and pretty figure, no doubt, but it would have been nice to get some sculpted lines for her suit.

The head sculpt is solid, but pretty dour. She’s got a petite, perfectly sculpted nose and her hair is swept to the side to expose one pointed ear. The eye brows are actually part of the sculpt and not just painted on, and the lips and eyes are both printed very nicely, as are the white markings. You even get a bit of color in her cheeks. The white hair is sculpted separately from the head, making a sharp hairline and it dynamically sweeps to the side, which both favors articulation to the right, but hinders it to the left. I would have liked a more neutral expression or, even better, a second head with more relaxed hair, but I suppose the existing hair does have an appropriate floaty-ness about it like she’s underwater.

Namorita features a fully pinless body, which has been creeping into the line for a while now. But, since I don’t review as many Legends these days, it’s still kind of new to me, especially when we’re still seeing figures turn up with pins. I don’t think I’ll ever grow tired of appreciating seeing the ladies get double-hinged elbows and bicep swivels in these new figures. It’s always a treat, even if Namorita didn’t get swivels in the lower legs. She does come with an extra set of fist hands, but Hasbro couldn’t even bother to make them match the fingerless gloves on her regular hands.

Namorita looks really good for a figure that makes very little use of original sculpting, and I like her a lot. There’s nothing groundbreaking here, but she’s colorful and pretty fun to play around with. Plus, I can add her to my Night Thrasher, Speedball, and Firestar and assemble me some New Warriors, if I can track down which tote those other figures are in. If I get caught up on the other lines that I’m more actively collecting, I’ll try to work Power Princess into one of these weeks soon, and I’ll be keeping an eye on the rest of this wave to get discounted on Amazon.

Aug 5 2024

G. I. JOE Classified (Tiger Force): Wreckage and Tiger Paw ATV by Hasbro

A couple weeks back I checked out the Walmart Exclusive Night Force Night Pursuit Cycle, a repaint of the RAM Cycle, and Night Force Shockwave. I mentioned that I’m not really collecting the Night Force and Tiger Force variants, but in a moment of weakness I not only grabbed that one, but also preordered Target’s Tiger Force repaint of the Cobra Ferret ATV with Wreckage. I’m hoping that this will be a couple of isolated incidents, but only time will tell! In this case, I was mainly driven by the desire to give the JOEs their own ATV and to get a pretty cool homage to one of those Toys R Us Exclusive 5-packs from the early 00’s.

You get the same style box as we saw with the Cobra Ferret. It’s nearly fully enclosed, but does have a window to show off the figure, as well as the Tiger Force logo, and some fantastic renders of the toy in action. If you have the Cobra Ferret, you know exactly what to expect inside the box in terms of assembly requirements. It all goes together easy and the only thing to watch out for is lining those tread patterns up right. The extra parts and accessories come in tissue bags inside a cardboard footlocker, and it’s neat that we get to keep seeing these every now and then, despite the return to window boxes for the figures. Let’s start with Wreckage!

Dillon Moreno, aka. Wreckage is a demolitions and jungle warfare expert and was first introduced as part of a 2003 TRU Exclusive Tiger Force 5-pack. Back then he was a straight repaint of Firefly and here he looks to be a straight repaint of Classified’s Firefly 2.0. And holy shit is this guy cool looking! I’m not usually a big fan of the Tiger Force decos, but it sure looks awesome here, probably because the tiger stripes aren’t bright yellow and rather subdued. The fatigues are mostly black and the stripes are sort of a copper-brown. Like Firefly, this guy has a ton of gear strapped to him, including a chest harness, belt and two leg rigs, all of which are cast in a coppery-brown similar to the striping. The boots and gloves match the gear, and you get some orange paint applications for his turtleneck as well as some additional hits like the knife sheath on his right arm, pouches on his body rig, and explosive charges on his leg. His left shoulder has a crisp Tiger Force logo printed on it, and there’s some silver for the various zippers.

The head features a full mask with a cutout for the eyes. He’s got some dark shading around his peepers and some pretty creepy graphics to mimic a skull for the rest of his face. When I checked out Night Force Shockwave, I commented about how he looked like some kind of maniac, and that goes double for Wreckage here.

The VAMP/Night Pursuit Cycle helmet makes yet another appearance. It seems like Hasbro really wants to get their money’s worth out of it. Still, it fits in well with his set and the repaint looks cool. I love the sculpt, especially the mounted camera, and we get some nice touches of character here with the angry teeth art on the sides and the kill marks scored out above the visor.

The backpack is the same as Firefly 2.0’s and that includes the mines that peg into the sides and the detonator that plugs into the back. I thought I got short-changed the detonator, which is why it’s not pictured, but I did eventually find it in one of the bags. The backpack still has the tab on the bottom for Firefly’s RC car delivery system, but the car is not included here. I dig the design and sculpt of this backpack a lot, and it certainly makes sense to repurpose it here for Wreckage.

For weapons, you get a combat knife, an automatic pistol, and a sub-machine gun. The magazine can be removed from the SMG and there’s one suppressor to share between the SMG and pistol. There’s a peg on the backpack to stow the SMG, allowing Wreckage to carry all of his weapons and leave both hands free to drive the Tiger Paw… so let’s check out his ride!

As expected, the Tiger Paw is a straight re-deco of the Ferret with all the ostentatious flare of the Tiger Force design. The frame and seat are black, the back half of the body is yellow, gradually becomes orange in the middle, and ends up white at the front. There’s black tiger striping in the middle and a tiger face motif stenciled on the front. The wheels are now bright orange. Some of the lettering carries over, like the Caution on the exhaust pipes and Cobra is replaced with ATV on the wheels, and there’s a Tiger Force logo behind the seat.

The removable cannon has a red receiver and black barrel, the steering column and instrument panel are red with black handlebars, and the front turret is red. All of the red parts are brighter and flashier than what we saw on the Ferret. The side missiles appear to be identical to what we got with the Ferret and they’re still gummy and have a tendency to get knocked off. Still, all in all this is as great a toy as it was the first time. It’s fun to roll into battle and the independent suspension is impressive.

And Wreckage looks damn good driving it, especially with the helmet as it tends to match the ATV deco more than his fatigues does. Obviously there’s still room for two on the Tiger Paw, and conveniently I do own one other Tiger Force figure and that’s Recondo, so at least Wreckage won’t have to go on sorties alone.

If I had my choice, I would have preferred getting a more traditional military green recolor of the Ferret for the JOEs. I’m just not that big a fan of the Tiger Force decos and this ATV hasn’t changed my mind about it. I am, however, still glad I picked it up, particularly because Wreckage turned out so good. It’s awesome to get a Classified version of him and he brings back some nostalgic memories of hunting new GI JOE figures at Toys R Us every Friday after work. Who knows? Maybe if the Tiger Force RAM Cycle drops in price any more, I’ll pick that up to have a matched set.

Aug 2 2024

Cover Girls of the DC Universe (J. Scott Campbell) Wonder Woman by McFarlane/DC Direct

The DC Cover Girls line has been going on for quite a while. I reviewed my first statue from this series over ten years ago! The line was mostly produced by DC Collectibles, but when McFarlane took over the license they began releasing some here and there in partnership with DC Direct. I’m not going to pretend to know how the licensing works and who’s actually producing these now, but Both McFarlane’s and DC Direct’s names appear on the box. Recently, McFarlane announced a trio of these ladies inspired by the art of J. Scott Campbell, so you know I was instantly on board! They’ve already released Catwoman, Zatanna is coming soon, and today we’re checking out Wonder Woman.

The mostly white box is similar to what we saw last time, and has remained more or less the same throughout the series run. You get some shots of the statue, a notation of the artist, and the size is roughly the same as the Catwoman statue, with both ladies measuring about 10-inches tall. That puts these a bit taller than the older DC Collectibles offerings. Inside the box, the statue comes encased in two Styrofoam trays and you get a collector card. Assembly requires attaching her right arm at the bicep band via a magnet, and plugging her right foot into the base, which was an easy fit. Let’s get her out of the box and all set up!

Oh yeah, that’s the stuff! As we saw with Catwoman, the composition is a little bit of museum pose with a hint of action. Wonder Woman stands with a slight lean to her right hip and a turn to her left ankle. Her coiled golden lasso is held firm in her right hand, while her left arm is drawn up to effortlessly deflect a projectile headed right for her face. Her one-piece outfit has a very modern vibe from the golden belt up, and things get a little more traditional below, with some abbreviated skirt flaps hanging down front and back.

All the details of the outfit are incorporated as part of the sculpt, which helps make for some clean paint lines. The red part of her corset has panel lining and is painted with a rich, glossy red, while framed top and bottom with the same quality of gold paint. All this conspires to produce a beautiful new-car-style finish to this part of the costume. The high-heeled boots are painted in red matte with some dark shading, white stripes running up the center from toe to top, and gold bands around the top edges. You get two shades of blue around her pelvic region with a darker blue making up the panties and a paler shade for the skirt pieces. And, of course, both are speckled with white stars. Her arm bracers are painted in silver and gold, and her bicep ring is gold. These pieces have a duller metallic finish than the corset, but still look nice. Finally, the skin tone is very warm and even with some pink added to the knees and elbows. All in all, the sculpted detail and colors here are very well done, especially for a statue in this price range.

The portrait is quite lovely and does a solid job evoking the JSC style. Diana is sporting some dreamy, heavy eyelids, a narrow and sharp nose, and her lips are slightly parted, revealing a flash of white teeth. The painted facial features are clean, particularly the eye liner and pupils. The flowing hair has some blue shading to evoke that classic comic book panel coloring, and I really dig the way it bunches up to her right, swirling in a flurry of defensive action. The portrait is rounded out by her gold tiara with a central red star.

The coiled lasso also contorts a bit from her defensive maneuver, with one end curling up into the air. The paint on mystical rope looks good, but I would have liked to have seen a little bit of sculpted detail to the braid. What we got gives it a bit of a simple, animated look, which is fine, but a bit at odds with the detail in her corset. Still, not bad!

The bullet defecting on her wrist bracer is done with a bit of translucent plastic colored in red and orange. It’s not spectacular, but it gets the job done. It would have been cool to have an actual bullet sculpted in there, or perhaps being deflected away.

The base is a raised black disk with beveled edges and a gold stripe. The face has a Wonder Woman logo flanked by stars. I like the way this is stylized and it adds some nice flavor to the base, much in the same way they did with Catwoman’s. On the flipside you get the hand numbered limitation underneath. Mine is 590 out of 945. The limitation is a lot smaller on these than it was in the old days, when 5200 was the magic number.

Like Catwoman, Wonder Woman retails at $139 which, if you count for inflation, is probably pretty close to what the older Cover Girls sold for. I included a shot of her with the Stanley Artgerm Lau piece from 2016. I still enjoy to display that one and it’s fun to see how the series has evolved over nearly a decade. As for the new ones, well, I really like both of these JSC efforts, with Wonder Woman edging out Catwoman as the favorite of the two. From a design standpoint, I think there was just more to work with than this one, and the final release came a lot closer to what was solicited. They do look nice paired together, but I have Catwoman displayed with some other Catwoman pieces and Diana here will be going to my Wonder Woman display. Still, I’m excited to see how the trio will look when Zatanna joins up!