Mar 4 2011

Lego Atlantis: Seabed Strider (#7977)

I promised myself I wasn’t going to dive into the Atlantis line unless it was an absolute last resort for my Lego fix. But right now the only set on the shelves that I’m really after is the Pharaoh’s Quest Pyramid and $100 just ain’t in my budget for Legos this week. [Next paycheck, though, it’s going to be a sure thing! -FF] Anyway, I was really jonesing pretty bad, so I caved in and picked up this little set to tide me over. Ha ha.. I said dive and tide and it’s an Atlantis set and it’s all about water and stuff.

Seabed Strider comes in a little box that boasts 105 pieces. The box contains two unnumbered baggies of bricks, an instruction booklet, and a small sticker sheet. The 105 pieces include parts for two minifigs, a pedastal holding the Golden Shield treasure, and the Strider vehicle. At over a hundred pieces, it may seem like a lot for such a small and inexpensive set, but keep in mind that a lot of these are really tiny pieces. That having been said, this was a surprisingly complex build for such a little set, possibly because the vehicle involves a number of articulated parts and a simple little transformation gimmick.

The minifigs consist of diver Axel Storm and the treasure guardian Hammerhead. Axel has some amazing painted detail on his body, including little gauges and stuff for his dive suit. He also has a set of oxygen tanks, flippers, and a dive helmet. The Hammerhead figure features a cool translucent red head that the rest of the head fits over for a pretty neat effect. He also comes with a trident weapon. These are the first minifigs from the Atlantis line I’ve actually seen and I’m fairly impressed by them.

The Seabed Strider is a cool two-legged mech. Axel doesn’t actually sit in it, but rather he holds the handlebars and floats along behind it. The minifig grips it tight enough so that he will hang there in mid air, making it seem like he’s actually underwater. The vehicle includes cips for the two included harpoons and two grabber arms, along with a couple of jewels to put in them. I like the red, black and gray coloring on this thing and the stickers go a long way to give it detail.

By folding back the legs and the feet and folding up two wings, the Strider converts into a little one-man sub, which is presumeably how the Strider travels to and from the surface or a larger mother ship. It’s not the most complex transformation, but it is a really cool little gimmick that certainly shows some thought went into the the design.

I’m actually kind of miffed that I like this set so much. I meant it strictly as a little fix to get me through another week or so until I can buy a proper set in one of the lines that I already collect. Up until now I was pretty indifferent on this Atlantis line, but now I’m rethinking whether I want to check out any more of these sets. I may have to sample some of the other small ones and see if the appeal still holds. Afterall, I’m running out of the sets that I do collect, so I’m going to need to branch out or just wait for the new 2011 Kingdoms and Pharaoh’s Quest stuff.

Mar 3 2011

Tron Legacy: Deluxe Black Guard by Spin Master

I’m at the halfway point looking at these Deluxe Tron figures from Spin Master. We’ve already looked at Sam Flynn and Rinzler, now it’s time to check out Clu’s faceless and ruthless soldiers of his Grid police state. It’s the Black Guard!

Once again, the figure comes on a big card that features a great deco, with the awesome looking Tron logo running up the side and a whole lot of weird warnings and information about the toy’s electronics on the back. The bubble shows off the figure very nicely and includes the cut out Try Me hole so you can light him up. It’s great for MOSC collectors or if you just want to see how the lights look when you’re deciding whether or not to buy him in the store.

By now, the overall design of these guys may be bleeding together a bit to the casual eye. Yes, they’re all dudes in black body suits and helmets, but the sculpting is most definitely unique on this figure and while some of the subtle texturing is hard to make out against the all black figure, you can definitely make it out under close inspection and the Black Guard does have some really distinctive elements to his design. I like the gas mask style components on his helmet, which is a little reminscent of the ones on the masks of the MPC Guards in the original Tron. He also has the little demolision charges sculpted into his legs. There’s not a lot of paint apps here, just some orange detail work scattered here and there and on the solar panels of his wings.

Yes, wings. The Black Guard also comes with his wings attached and deployed. These are the parachute-like devices used by The Guard when attacking The End of Line club. They can be removed in two pieces, and simply clip into holes on the figures’ back. Unfortunately one of the clips on mine seems to be missing. I don’t think it’s broken, it seems more like a QC issue with the mold. It will stay on fairly well, but it doesn’t lock in as solidly as the other one.

As with Rinzler, The Black Guard doesn’t feature any sound or Impulse Projection. Instead, the figure’s electronic gimmick is confined to the lights in his chest, activated by pressing the button under his left armpit. His lights are similar to Rinzler’s as they’re orange and basically scattered points, rather than the long strips seen on Clu and Sam Flynn. They are bright and clear, though, and look pretty good. In addition to the removable wings, The Black Guard comes with his Ident Disc and two Batons. The Disc can clip onto the figure’s back just like the other Deluxe figures, although you do need to remove the wings to clip it on and remove it. The two batons can be stored in sockets on his elbows.

I’ve really been digging all of these Deluxe figures, but I think the Black Guard here edges out the others as my favorite. Besides being the most distinctive sculpt, it’s obvious that Spin Master put a little extra love into him. As with the other Deluxe figures in the line, this guy runs about $14.99 and I’ve got no complaints about the price tag. With three down, that just leaves one to go. Next time we revisit the Tron toys, I’ll wrap up the Deluxes with Clu himself.

Mar 2 2011

Transformers Generations: Sergeant Kup by Hasbro

Oh yeah, new Transformers! Woo Hoo! It’s been a looong time since I’ve found any new Transformers hanging on the pegs. The lack of TF’s featured here certainly doesn’t mean I’m losing my adoration for this beloved line, but the new Generations figures just haven’t been showing up in my area until now. I’m still trying to find Tracks and Jazz, but when I was picking up groceries at Wally World this morning I found Kup and Scourge buried on peg. Today we’ll kick off my look at this pair with everybody’s favorite Autobot war vet curmudgeon, Kup.

It may have been a while, but the packaging for Generations hasn’t changed a bit. In fact the only real difference I notice is that the bubble is no longer cluttered up with stickers advertising The Hub network or whatever else Hasbro is schilling. Kup comes carded in his vehicle mode with his “musket” mounted next to him and there’s the ubiquitous bio blurb on the back. I really don’t have anything else to say about the packaging. It looks ok, and it’s easy to tear into. That’s really all I’m looking for here. I’m guessing Hasbro lost the trademark to Kup somewhere along the way, only instead of just slapping the word “Autobot” in front of his name, they went with “Sergeant.” I’m cool with that.

Of course, long time Transfans will remember that the original G1 Kup was a futuristic pickup truck and the Generations version springboards off of that concept pretty nicely. This version is certainly rooted in a more realistic design with a touch of retro thrown in, but I think the homage is still pretty well defined. This Kup has a more functional truck bed and rolls along nicely on his wheels. He also pegs together really well in his vehicle mode and allows for his rifle to be stored underneith, where the barrel peeks out the back to become one of his exhaust pipes. The toy is cast in a color very similar to the original Kup, and features very little else in the way of paint apps. All in all, it’s an attractive alt mode, perhaps blemished just a bit by the seaming along the doors and the curious fact that you can see where some of the parts of the toy were removed from the mold trees.

Kup’s robot mode is a homerun, which made me somewhat surprised about how easy his transformation is. With the exception of fiddling with his arms to get them just right, and the fact that his shoulders don’t really peg in to anything, he’s remarkably simple to get from truck to bot and back again. While Kup’s lower half may be at odds with the original character, not to mention sporting some enormous feet, from the waist up, it’s pretty amazing just how Hasbro’s designers were able to nail this toy’s faithful look. I’m particularly fond of how the head sculpt turned out, as it’s remarkably close to his animated G1 predecessor. Yes, the arms are a little fidgity, particularly with the way the wheels on his shoulders just seem to float, but they’re serviceable and they can hold his weapon just fine.

The Generations line has yet to really disappoint me, and that record holds strong with Kup here. He’s a fantastic looking figure that manages to take the original character design, tweak it here and there and create a marvelous update to a character I really loved as a kid and still do. I was never satisfied with the original Kup toy (but then the original G1 movie-based toys were never my favorites) and Kup really hasn’t head any loving since, so this updated figure was long overdue.

Mar 1 2011

Marvel Universe: Constrictor by Hasbro

I’m still working on catching up on all the Marvel Universe figures that I’ve added to my collection this past couple of weeks. Today, I thought we’d check out Frank Payne, aka. Constrictor. While I think Constrictor was a great character for Hasbro to add to the MU lineup, there’s really one main reason I wanted this figure as badly as I did and that’s because he spent some time as Deadpool’s roommate,[Somewhere back in the #40’s of Deadpool, Vol. 1 -FF] along with Absorbing Man’s wife, Titania, who actually turned out to be Copycat in disguise. Yeah, great stuff.

Constrictor comes on the almost standard MU card. He was actually a Runner-Up for the Fan’s Choice Figure, so there’s a little band saying so in the upper left hand corner and the border along the left side of the bubble is foil, making the package stand out a little from the other ones on the pegs. He was released among the waves stylized after The Dark Reign story arc, so the package has the HAMMER logo instead of SHIELD. Constrictor is nicely displayed in the bubble in a fairly passive stance with his tendrils hanging down at his sides. I really like the character art used here. It’s actually a lot more exciting than some of the images used on the cards of far more mainstream characters.

No doubt, Constrictor is a pretty distinctive looking character, and the figure certainly does his design justice. There isn’t a whole heck of a lot of sculpted detail on the body, as it mostly relies a generic body sculpt and paint apps. The paintwork is overall very good, except for one major flaw. There’s a big blue dot right on his belly, which is pretty unsightly. The head sculpt, however is really fantastic, especially the grimace on the exposed lower half of the face.

Apart from his figure stand and cache of documents, Constrictor doesn’t come with any accessories, but he does have his two Vibranium tendrils that are permanently attached to his wrists. They’re made of soft flexible plastic and honestly look like gummi worms. I don’t really mean that as a criticism, because they really do look great and while they aren’t poseable, they work fine in pretty much any pose you put him in.

Articulation is what we’ve come to expect from the MU male figures. You get ball joints in the neck, shoulders and hips, hinges in the elbows and double hinged knees, swivel cuts in the biceps and wrists, both swivels and hinges in the ankles, and that universal type joint in the torso.

I’m not sure whether this character was all that high on a lot of collector’s lists. Yeah, he was a Fan’s Choice runner-up, but I tend to find these selections rather dubious. He does have a sufficiently deep background to make him warrant a figure, but as I’ve already said, the the main reason I wanted him is because he was Deadpool’s roommate in a particularly entertaining story arc. As a figure, he doesn’t break any major ground in terms of sculpt, but he’s a solid representation of the character and well worth hunting down for the fans out there.

Feb 28 2011

Tron Legacy: Deluxe Rinzler by Spin Master

Back again for more Tron goodness. I’m continuing my way through the larger Deluxe figures and this time we’re looking at the Rinzler character. In the off chance someone reading this hasn’t seen the film yet, I’ll cut the intro short to avoid any massive spoilers about this guy. Suffice it to say he was the best warrior on The Grid and Clu’s number one henchman. So let’s just get to the figure.

The packaging is the same as the kind used for the Sam Flynn figure we looked at a little while ago. The card is pretty generic, but I love the deco and the huge Tron logo on the side. There’s an insert in the bubble that identifies the character. The bubble is pretty big and shows off the figure and his large array of accessories. Once again, there’s a Try Me hole cut out in the bubble so you can reach in and activate Rinzler’s electronic light feature. The back of the card shows a close up of the figure and his accessories and there’s a little blurb about the character, which is understandably vague so as not to contain spoilers.

There’s a good deal of sculpted detail in the figure, but since he’s virtually all black it isn’t all that easy to make it out, except under close inspection. The only paint apps include a few orange circles on his chest and a little bit of orange on his helmet and again on his gloves. Still, the figure is a pretty good match for the character’s design.

Rinzler’s articulation is the same as the Deluxe Sam Flynn figure, with one addition: His head has a ball joint. Obviously neck articulation had to be sacrificed for Sam (and Clu’s) impulse projection tech in the head, but Rinzler doesn’t have that so he can move his head around just fine. Other articulation includes ball joints in the shoulders and hips, swivels in the wrists and ankles, and hinges in the elbows and knees. Most of the expected points are certainly here, although the range of motion in the shoulders seems a tad limited, making it difficult to hold his Katana in both hands.

After looking at the Deluxe Sam figure, Rinzler’s electronics certainly seem sparse by comparison. There’s no impulse projected face and there’s no voice chip. In this case, it’s pretty understandable, though, since Rinzler hardly said anything through the entire film and you didn’t see his face until the very end. I suppose Spin Master could have had the figure make that creepy sound Rinzler made in he film, but it’s not here. What you do get are an array of small orange lights down the front of his torso. The lights are bright enough, but the whole effect is a little underwhelming and for some reason the lights reaked havoc with my shitty old camera.

As the biggest badass warrior on The Grid, RInzler comes with a lot of accessories. He has two identity discs, one of which can clip to his back. He has a fighting staff, a light katana, a set of light-chucks, and two batons, which attach to pegs on either leg. His hands are sculpted so he can hold pretty much any of these items in either hand.

I think Spin Master did a nice job with Rinzler. The sound chip I suggested would have been a nice addition, especially since he feels a little lacking in the electronics department when compared to Sam Flynn. Both figures are at the same price point, and yet there’s a lot less tech involved in this one. Still, he comes with a lot of goodies and the added neck articulation really helps. He’s a fun figure to play around with and he sure does look nice on the shelf.

Feb 27 2011

Masters of the Universe Classics: Shadow Beast by Mattel

It’s been a while since I’ve been back to look at any of the MOTUC figures. Mattel had several figures up for sale this month, including a re-release of Keldor, Bow from the She-Ra line and the figure we’re going to look at today: Shadow Beast. I’ll admit that Digital River’s ordering process is getting a little better and Matty seems to be genuinely upping the number of figures they produce. I was able to log in around 4pm and buy my figure without any problems at all. Shipping, on the other hand, has really taken a hit. Twelve dollars to ship a figure and it takes over a week to get it to my door? Here’s your next opportunity to fix, Matty.

Shadow Beast comes in a really big white mailer box. I guess if you bought Gygor you know what to expect, but I passed over the big Mellow Yellow Ape in favor of this guy, so I was suitably surprised by the size. Out of the mailer, the package is a large window box that is very much in keeping with the overall presentation of the smaller carded figures. A little patience can get him out of the box without mauling it, so the packaging is pretty collector friendly. I am glad, however, I’m not a MISB collector, because my Shadow Beast came with his massive club clanging around loose inside the box.

I’m really thrilled with the way this figure turned out. The head sculpt is superb and suitably menacing and I love the pupil-less red eyes and the horn that pokes up from the top of his head. We all know that Filmation original designs are off limites to Mattel and The Four Horseman, but this figure is pretty darn close to the design I remember from the cartoon. I’m guessing that’s because of the similarity between the cartoon version and the one in the comic. Either way, purists should be mighty happy with the way this guy looks. The paintwork isn’t as outlandish as Gygor, which may be good or bad, depending on how you see it. I like the traditional browns used here over the radioactive neon used on Gygor, but there’s no doubt that if you have both of these beasts on your shelf, Gygor is the one that’s going to stand out.

I wouldn’t say that Shadow Beast is super articulated, but he has a fair amount of poseability for what he is. His head is ball jointed, as are his shoulders. He has swivel cuts in his biceps and wrists and hinges in his elbows. His stubby little legs have swivels cuts at the hips, which give him a little bit of useful movement there, and allows you to put him in a really goofy seated position. Of course, if you already own Gygor than you know all of this.

Shadow Beast comes with one accessory: A honking big club! It really is massive and it’s sculpted to look like a tree limb (or trunk!) with leather straps wrapped around it for a grip and iron studs scattered around the head, because let’s face it, getting hit in the face with a tree isn’t bad enough, so you need to add iron studs to make your point. The figure can hold the club pretty well, although sometimes you need to jimmy it around in his hand so that he can get a good grip on it. His joints are also tight enough so that he can hold the club above his head, although I’m not sure how long that will be the case.

I’ll admit to being a little cautious about buying this figure. It’s sometimes hard enough for me to justify the $28 a pop for the regular MOTUCfigures and Shadow Beast set me back $41 with the shipping. Ultimately, I’m very happy with my decision to get him, although I am still glad that I just went with one of the two figures based on this body sculpt. Nothing against Gygor, he looks like a great figure and one of these days I may still pick him up, but the Shadow Beast fits in with my Masters of the Universe nostalgia much better. He’s a beautifully sculpted figure and I well deserved addition to my collection.

Feb 26 2011

Lego Prince of Persia: Battle of Alamut (#7573)

Hey, guess what? I still haven’t seen Disney’s Prince of Persia movie. I am a big fan of the Sands of Time game, but that’s about as far as my love for this license goes. Suffice it to say, I didn’t buy this set because of the movie or game tie-in, I bought it because it looked awesome and I thought it would fit in fairly well with my Kingdoms stuff in case the Lion and Dragon Knights ever want to bury the hatchet, join forces, and go on a Crusade. It didn’t hurt that I was able to pick up this set for half price either. At 821 pieces, this is the biggest Lego set I own and appropriately, it took me a good part of the evening to put it all together.

 

The box is not only huge, but it’s literally bowed out on the sides from all the parts crammed in there. It’s also pretty heavy, which is something I’m not used to with even the biggest Lego sets I’ve owned. I’ll attribute that to it being a building and a lot of those 821 pieces are honest to god bricks. The box includes two thick instruction books, a loose base piece that is small enough that it could have been put in the baggies, a single bagged camel, and seven numbered baggies of bricks. Nice! Nope, I didn’t leave out the stickers, there aren’t any! The first baggie builds the minifigs and the crossbow carriage, the second baggie builds the gate, the next two build the left and right walls, and the last three build the main building. There’s a little bit of repetition in the building steps but not much, and I have to say I found this set to be a really fun and satisfying build.

The set contains no less than seven minifigs, and that’s not including the camel! Once again, I didn’t see the movie, so I don’t know who any of these characters are, but they’re named on the box: Dastan the hero, Seso, Nizam, Giant Scimitar Hassasin, Razor Glove Hassasin and two Guards. This is about twice as many minifigs I ever got in one set so it took me a fairly long time just to match up their pieces and build them.

Once assembled, the fortress looks great. The architecture is fantastic, particurly on the main building, and I love the color choices for the bricks in the walls. My favorite thing about the fortress is its hinged and modular design. The left and right walls are hinged onto the gate, so you can place them at angles or even straight out to make the main wall look even bigger. When you close them up at 90 degree angles to the gate, they also peg into the main building to form a proper fortified castle, but if you’re going to play with it, you’re probably going to want to detach the walls and gate from the building to give you more access. If pressed, the only real complaint I can level against this set is that it could have been taller, as its highest point doesn’t quite reach that of the Prison Tower Rescue set.

I’m more of a displayer than a player, but I still can’t help but admire all the play features Lego designed into this set. The left wall has beams that slide in and out to give the invading forces something to climb on, while the right wall has a chunk that can be blown out of it. The crossbow doesn’t work too well, but I can usually knock it over using one of my catapults from the Kingdoms line. The main gate has opening doors, a rotating mini catapult with projectiles on either tower and a pair of barrels that can be tipped, spilling their flaming contents onto whoever breaches the gate. Cool!

If you’re looking for a really satisfying build and a set that’s lots of fun you can’t go wrong picking up this baby. It originally retailed for around eighty bucks, but with the Prince of Persia line being discontinued by Lego, these sets are starting to go on deep price cuts or outright clearance, so you can probably start to find it at a deal. Mine was $54.99, and for 821 pieces, that ain’t too shabby.

Feb 25 2011

Tron Legacy: Kevn Flynn’s Lightcycle by Spin Master

When Disney made the new Tron movie, it’s pretty obvious that they were trying to tug at the nostalgia strings for us old folks, as well as appeal to a new audience of young minds. Here’s a perfect example of that in toy form: Kevin Flynn’s lightcycle, patterned pretty closely after the CG models seen in the original film, the toy is also remarkably close to the pair of red and yellow Tomy Lightcycles I owned as a kid. Of course, those featured rip-sticks instead of LED lights and the white deco on this one isn’t quite as exciting, but let’s take a look and see how it turned out.

I can’t say enough good things about the packaging for the Tron: Legacy toys. The logo and art deco on the box captures the movie motif really well, and the window shows off the toy nicely. There’s a hole cut into the window, which allows you to hit the Try Me button and see the lights. The back shows photos of the 3 3/4″ figures in the line and illustrates that the cockpit opens and you can cram one of those figures into here. The packaging isn’t quite so elaborate as the one that houses Sam Flynn’s Lightcycle. You remember, the one I looked at a while ago, with the viewmaster-style gimmick in it? But this one looks just as good and certainly makes use of a better economy of space. The box is sort of collector friendly, although it’s easy to mangle when opening, because I sure did. If these things ever hit clearance, I could see myself buying another just to keep it in the box.

Once out of the package, the toy looks very close to the Lightcycle seen in the movie. It was designed by Kevin Flynn to be the “fastest thing on the grid,” despite its old age. I’m a little iffy on how he can keep this thing as a musem piece, parked in his living room like a common motorcycle, when the rest of the time they summon them forth when they use them and dispell them when finished, but I digress. Besides, I so wanted to see a Tron sequel on the big screen, I was willing to look past a lot of stuff to favor my enjoyment of the film and I’m prepared to do the same here as well. There isn’t a whole lot else to say about the toy. It stands up fine on its own and rolls along really well. It does feel a little small and insubstatial for the price, so, do any of the gimmicks save the day?

Well, the cockpit does open and theoretically you can put a figure in it. I don’t yet own the Kevin Flynn 3 3/4″ figure, but from what I hear he doesn’t fit in the cockpit very well because of his sculpted robe. Sam Flynn, on the other hand, does fit, but you really need to contort and mash him in there if you’re going to get the cockpit to close, and even then he doesn’t look like he’s piloting it, but rather like he was knocked unconcious and stuffed inside. The older Tomy Lightcycles held those figures much better than this one, and they only had five points of articulation.

How about them electronics? Unfortunately, I’m not all that impressed, especially when compared to Sam Flynn’s Lightcycle. First off, there’s no sound, which was pretty disappointing. Couldn’t they have just stuffed the other Lightcycle sound chip into this one? Secondly, the lights are confined to just the small area by the front wheel and it doesn’t stay lit for long. There’s a peg inside the cockpit, which is supposed to activate the lights when you put the figure in, but it’s hard to get him to keep contact with the peg, and even when he does, the lights just flicker on for a little while and go out. Sam Flynn’s Lightcycle lights up when you push it along a surface, this one doesn’t do that either.

If it sounds like I hate this toy, I really don’t. It’s a fine representation of what was in the film and it looks great on display, especially with one of the figures standing next to it. As a toy, however, most of the play gimmicks are iffy or broken, especially compared to how well the Sam Flynn Lightcycle toy performs. I thought both toys were in the same price point, but I could be mistaken. I did pay about ten dollars more for my Sam Flynn Lightcycle, but I think it’s because this one was on sale and pretty deeply discounted at $9.99. By the way, Spin Master, if you repaint this thing a couple three times in red, yellow and blue, I’ll buy all three of them. Just saying, is all.

Feb 24 2011

Star Wars Vintage Collection: Zam Wesell by Hasbro

I haven’t looked at a lot of Hasbro’s Vintage Collection Star Wars figures here, mainly because I can’t find any of the ones I want on the pegs and I’m not prepared to buy a whole case of them online. The pegs around my parts are clogged with the Prequel figures and while I was happy to get General Grievous carded this way as a curiosity, I don’t have a lot of interest in many of the other Prequel figures. Nonetheless, a good friend of mine knowing I was fond of the Zam Wesell character (or at least what she looked like), sent me along the loose figure, so I thought I’d check her out here.

It’s true I really liked the design of this character, although I like to forget that she was some kind of shapeshifting lizard. Besides the fact that she was one of the few chick bounty hunters in Star Wars, I liked the way she looked a bit like she was plucked out of a Sergio Leone film. The long duster and the rifle definitely have that Old West vibe going on. I’ve owned two of the previous incarnations (Preview and Saga), both of which were really well sculpted, but both suffered from some annoying pre-posing and poor articulation. I’m happy to say that this Vintage Collection version makes up for all the past sins and offers up what is likely to be the definitive figure of this character, at least as far as I’m concerned. Like I said, I don’t have the packaging, but chances are you won’t have a problem seeing what her card looks like if the Prequel figures are selling as poorly in your area as they are in mine. Just go down to Target or Walmart and check it out!

Zam’s outfit is very nicely detailed, especially whatever the hell those tubes are on the front of her chest. The belt is sculpted from soft plastic and includes a working holster for her pistol. Her duster is soft plastic, and while it doesn’t really get in the way of her articulation, she can’t really sit down with it. The human head sculpt won’t win any awards for its resemblance to the actress in Attack of the Clones, but at least it ain’t a f’ugly sculpt, as Hasbro is known to turn out some bad looking lady figures in this scale. Zam isn’t one of them, that is unless you slap on her lizard head. I guess the sculpting is ok, but it looks really stupid on top of her flesh tone neck. One other cool thing about Zam, both of her hands are sculpted to hold her weapons.

Zam’s articulation includes a ball jointed neck, ball joints in the shoulders, elbows, knees and ankles and regular rotating hip joints. She also has that universal joint in her torso. Yeah, we’ve seen better articulation in this scale, but only by a few points so Zam has nothing to be ashamed of in this department and you can certainly get some great poses out of her.

Zam comes with a nice little selection of weapons and accessories. Her weapons include a blaster pistol that fits into her holster and her sniper rifle. The paintwork on the rifle is particularly impressive for such a thin and fragile accessory. Her helmet is removable and works with the other three accessories. You get the visor thingy, the face mask that goes across her face and another sculpted version of it that just hangs off of one side. All of these pieces just peg right into the holes on either side of her helmet and stay in place pretty well.

I think Zam is a fair enough argument for putting some Prequel figures out in the Vintage Collection. The fake retconned packaging doesn’t appeal to me in the slightest, but in this case the figure inside is fantastic, so who am I to argue with the packaging. You can take it or leave it, and at $7.99, it’s not like we’re really paying extra for the packaging anyway. Plus, I don’t feel compelled to buy two of her and keep one carded like I’ve been doing with most of the Original Trilogy figures in this line.

Feb 23 2011

DC Universe Classics Wave 11: John Stewart, Katma Tui and Kilowog by Mattel

I’ve had Wave 11 of DCUC kicking around for a couple of months now and I’ve been meaning to get back to it. I completely missed this wave when it was in the stores and the assortment tends to go for ridiculous sums online so it’s been a long journey of watching and waiting before I was finally able to snag a set on Ebay for what turned out to be lower than what I paid for other waves. The assortment of figures is pretty solid, and while I usually like to save the best for last, I’m going to jump right in today and look at three of the main reasons I wanted the wave so badly.

Despite being released many waves ago, the packaging hasn’t changed all that much. The brand new cards are a little bigger and the shape of the bubble has changed, but the spirit of the card art is still there. The only thing that really catches my eye about these older cards is the lack of the pointless collector button peeping through the bottom of the card, as we’ve been getting these for a little while now. Both John Stewart and Katma Tui are packaged in slight action poses, but it doesn’t seem to have done their leg joints any harm.

Both John and Katma utilize pretty generic DCUC male and female body sculpts and rely mostly on paint apps for detail. Their uniforms are painted really well and there’s virtually no slop or bleeding on either of my figures. The head sculpts are excellent. John Stewart’s is based on his visage before he went all bald-and- goateed, which I like, and it leaves the option open for another version down the road. Katma has a pretty face and her short hair is sculpted well and doesn’t interfere with her neck articulation.

You get standard DCUC articulation on both figures, which includes ball joints in the neck and shoulders, universal movement in the hips, swivels in the biceps, thighs and wrists, and hinges in the elbows, knees, and ankles. They each swivel at the waist and feature the ab crunch hinge in the torsos.

John and Katma come with two ring constructs each. John Stewart comes with a gun and a punching fist and Katma comes with a sword and shield. All of them slip on over the figure’s fists and work pretty well and the gun has an added arm clip to help hold it in place. I really like Stewart’s gun the most, but they’re all pretty good.

And then there’s Kilowog, who stands just behind Darkseid as my favorite Collect & Connect figure to date. There were many times when I was tempted to buy him alone, but he’s so ridiculously expensive that it seemed a better value to just wait and build him by getting all the figures in the Wave. Now that I finally have him, all I can say is he’s huge and absolutely glorious in person. Most of the sculpted detail in the body goes into his muscles and like John and Katma, he relies on paint apps for the details of his uniform, although the sculpting on his power ring is really exceptionally well done. The head sculpt is also amazing, capturing not only a lot of detail, but a priceless expression that gives the figure tons of character.

As is usually the case with the C&C figures, Kilowog features a few less points of articulation than the smaller figures. What’s missing? Only the swivels cuts in his thighs, apart from that you still get a very poseable figure.

I will eventually get to looking at the rest of the figures in Wave 11, but these three were the main draw of this Wave for me, although I should add The Question to that group as well. I already mentioned that this assortment of figures tends to go pretty high on the secondary market, and with the Green Lantern movie looming, I doubt that’s going to change anytime soon. You can always pick up John Stewart and Katma Tui in the Walmart Exclusive 5-pack that’s on the shelves right now, but then you’ll still have to hunt down Kilowog, and finding him alone can be a tough and pricey prospect.