And here we go with the last figure in the Marvel Legends Age of Ultron 4-pack. On a positive note, a Marvel Cinematic Universe Hawkeye in Legends scale was high on my want list. On the downside, I regret going from left to right in my coverage of this set because now I have to finish on a down note. AoU Hawkeye… you got some issues.

Yes, this is a repaint and partial re-sculpt of the Walmart Exclusive figure that came out alongside the first Avengers film. The biggest differences are a new head, a more muted shade of red paint on his tunic, and while the space for it is still there, the SHIELD emblem tampo is no longer present. Finally, the shoulder strap running across the chest of the Avengers figure has been removed. Granted, Hawkeye spend part of Age of Ultron wearing something very similar to his first Avenger’s costume, so the reuse here isn’t unwarranted, but it would have been nice to get him in the brand new costume. As it stands, the texture and detail on the costume is pretty solid, although those ball hips are pretty f’ugly.

With that having been said, right off the bat, something feels off about Clint and I’m going to say it’s the proportions. I can’t quite put my finger on it, because if I put him next to Dr. Banner, they’re almost the same height and their legs and torsos are pretty much even. And yet Hawkeye’s legs look really short and his torso looks really long. It seems to be an optical illusion, but every time I look at the figure I can’t un-see it.

The new portrait features Clint without his glasses. I like that. Including the glasses on the old figure seemed like a lazy way out. The new head features a passable likeness, that would probably be a lot better with some decent paint to bring it out. Unfortunately, my Clint’s peepers are a little wonky. Hawkeye? More like Walleye… amiright?

Hawkeye comes with two accessories: His bow and quiver and both are the same pieces that came with the WM Exclusive Avengers figure. Unfortunately, that means the quiver isn’t movie accurate, as he wore a rectangular one in AoU and not this drum-style quiver. Yeah, I get it, Hasbro was able to release this set by cutting some costs. I’m still going to mention it, though. The bow is on par with the last Legends Hawkeye figure that I got and I probably would have been a lot happier with it if I hadn’t just opened DC Icons Green Arrow a couple of weeks ago. That figure featured a real string on the bow and removable arrows in the quiver. After playing around with that ensemble of archery accessories, this one just leaves me flat.

The articulation here looks good on paper, but I do have a few issues with it in practice. Those hips are the terrible rotating hinges that make me work harder to get all the movement out of them. The hinges in the elbows are super mushy and one of the hinges on my figure’s right elbow doesn’t want to sit properly. I have to squeeze the two halves together every time I work the elbow to keep it from wanting to pop out. Otherwise here’s the run down: The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, bicep swivels, and double hinge elbows. The legs have rotating hinges in the hips, swivels in the thighs, double hinge knees, and both hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. There’s a ball joint in the chest and ball joint and hinge in the neck.

I don’t think this is a terrible figure, but it did turn out to be the weakest one in the box for me. Although, granted the fact that I never got the Walmart Exclusive from the first Avengers film makes him a little more welcome. There’s some good stuff going on here, but the proportions still look off to me and a screen accurate quiver would have been nice. At the end of the day, I’m glad to have him to at least round out my Age of Ultron team. And thanks to Toy Fair we know we’re getting an MCU Scarlet Witch. Still no sign of Quicksilver, though. Next week, I’m going to take a break from Legends and we’ll check out the Hot Toys version of Age of Ultron Hawkeye.

It’s week three of my look at the Marvel Legends Age of Ultron boxed set and that means we’re moving into the final half. I know my maths! Continuing onward from left to right in the box, we come to Bruce Banner, a very welcome figure indeed as this is the first time we’re getting the character in the Legends scale. That may not sound to exciting to some, but Mark Ruffalo as Banner was one of the many high points of the Avengers films for me. As far as I’m concerned he deserved a Legends figure as much as any of them.

And yes… it’s a guy in a suit! Banner appears to be built off the same buck Hasbro used for Agent Coulson from the Agents of Shield 3-pack and the recent Chameleon figure. Other than a fresh coat of paint the biggest difference here is the shirt, which is sculpted with an open collar and no necktie. Of course, the shirt does reflect the MCU Banner’s predilection for purple shirts (instead of pants), which is cool because I enjoy that not so subtle comic nod.

There are just a few blemishes worth mentioning on this guy. Firstly, the coat on my figure is scuffed on the front making it look more like worn leather than cloth. On the back there are some extra glossy patches that look like it was touched by greasy fingers. I swear it wasn’t me! I can’t be sure whether that’s on all figures or I just got luck of the draw. Secondly, I’m not a fan of these feet. They look too long from the front and super weird from the back. They also make it hell to get him to stand. To make matters worse, the peg holes in the heels are so shallow, I don’t even know why they bothered.

The portrait here is a decent likeness. It maybe leans more toward charicature than realism, but I’m sure I could identify him if someone handed me the figure. If a skilled person were to have at this head with some paint, it could probably be so much more than it is.

The articulation here is a lot better than one might expect from a guy who spends his days in a lab doing science. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists. You get double hinges in the elbows and knees. There are swivel cuts in the biceps and thighs. The hips are ball jointed and the ankles have hinges and lateral rockers. There’s a swivel in the waist, an ab crunch hinge in the torso, and both a ball joint and hinge in the neck.
Sadly, Banner doesn’t come with any accessories. Some science stuff would have been cool. Maybe a laptop, a tablet, Loki’s sceptre, or anything. But hey, at least we got the figure.

If today’s feature seems a little abrupt, it’s because I honestly don’t have a lot to say about Dr. Banner here. Don’t take that to mean I don’t dig him, because I most certainly do. And while I’ve liked all three figures from this set that I’ve looked at so far, Banner and Thor each made buying it worthwhile because they’ve filled some painfully vacant holes on my MCU Legends shelves. And Black Widow was no slouch either. So yes, Banner makes this set so far three for three. With only one figure left, is this set going to go four for four? We’ll find out next Monday and see if Hawkeye hits the mark. That’s archery humor.

Last Monday I checked out Thor from the Age of Ultron Marvel Legends 4-pack and today I’m moving on to Black Widow. While Hasbro has been under attack lately for a perceived slight on female action figures, truth be told the Legends line has been producing its fair share of femme fatales. Yes, you can argue that even after being in a slew of MCU movies, this is only the second such release of Natasha in the current Legends line, but then again this is also the first time we’re getting Legends MCU versions of the boys in this box too. What’s my point? I dunno. Let’s look at the figure.,,

Widow’s costume didn’t change too much from Avengers 1 to Avengers 2, but the AoU version is still my least favorite. I don’t hate it, but at the same time I’m just not a big fan of the added light effects for her widow’s sting. That all having been said, I was expecting a straight repaint from this figure and was surprised to see that wasn’t the case. Instead, she’s a kitbash between Winter Soldier Widow and the Maria Hill that came in the Agents of Shield 3-pack. As a result, the two Black Widow figures look very similar upon a cursory glance, but under scrutiny, there’s a fair amount of difference. The biggest changes are in that taught little tummy era. The WS version had her Widow emblem sculpted into the middle of the zipper and there was texturing on the suit itself. Here the suit is smooth and the widow emblem is gone and it’s all just zipper.

The belt is the other easily notable change. Previously, the belt was part of the buck. Now it’s a separate piece, attached to the holsters, and just sort of floats with the articulation. Also, the widow emblem resurfaces here on the belt buckle. Everything else is more or less the same. The flat circles are still on the shoulders where the SHIELD patches were on the previous figure, but now they’re just left blank. Also, the finger-less gloves from the WS version are now full gloves. And yes, the biggest bummer about the figure hasn’t been fixed, her Glocks are still sculpted into the holsters and are not removable. BOO!

The head sculpts on the two Widows are very close. Keep in mind, WS Widow came with two portraits, one from the first Avengers and one from Winter Soldier, and I’m comparing with the Avengers head because the hair is the same shorter style. And while the two heads are fairly close, the head on the AOU version is still notably better. The eyes are sharper, the contours of the face are a little better, and the lips a little fuller. She also lost the odd spray-on tan that the previous figure had. It’s actually quite a nice likeness for this scale and price point.

Articulation here is identical to the previous Widow, but it’s been a while, so let’s run it through. The legs feature ball joint in the hips, double hinges in the knees and ankles with both hinges and rockers. There are swivels in the thighs, but the holsters impede that movement a bit. The arms feature rotating hinges in the shoulders, elbows, and wrists. Yes, the wrists are still pegged in, so if you want to swap the hands out with the previous Natasha… go for it! Lastly, you get ball joints in the torso and the neck. Of course, it helps to have a figure stand handy, as those tiny feet don’t support her that well in action poses. Normally my clear NECA stands work fairly well for Legends, but in this case the pegs were too loose, and I had to dig out some of my Legends hexagon stands.

Widow comes with her pair of taser batons. I really don’t like these, either in execution or concept. As accessproes. they’re just crappy little pieces of plastic painted blue at the ends. They’re very bendy and they don’t look like anything. Also, since she comes with gun hands (and remember, no guns!) she can’t even hold them well. It doesn’t matter. The widow sting shouldn’t require batons and these babies are going to the Tote of Forgotten Accessories.

I was not expecting a lot out of this figure and she actually surprised me. Sure, it’s just a kitbash with some new paint effects, but the figure works surprisingly well and getting an improved head sculpt was a nice treat. And while I’m still not a big fan of the added light effects to the costume, I’ll admit the paint used for them looks rather striking on the figure. I can now retire the Avengers head on my older Widow and pop the Winter Soldier head back on it. So far this set is a solid two for two… next Monday, I’ll move on to Bruce Banner!

I’m officially between waves of Marvel Legends, so before embarking on another one, I thought I’d spend some time running through this boxed set of four figures that Hasbro released based on the Avengers: Age of Ultron movie. I’m pretty sure this set was an Exclusive, but I’m not sure who had it. I never saw it in the wild, but I spent a lot of time hovering over the BUY-IT button on Amazon at the original price of eighty bucks. Fortunately, I hesitated and in this case it paid off, because shortly after the holdays, I snagged it for half that. Ten bucks a pop for Legends figures that I need to complete my teams? I’ll do that all day long!

The figures come in a nice, long window box with a deco very similar to what we saw with the Agents of Shield 3-pack. The set includes the Age of Ultron versions of Thor, Black Widow, Bruce Banner, and Hawkeye. Considering that we already got single boxed versions of AoU Captain America, Hulk, and Iron Man, this set neatly ties up most of the loose ends by rounding out the core team. Yeah, we’re still missing Scarlet Witch, Vision, and Quicksilver, but I’m pretty sure we can forget about them ever happening. I’m going to cover one figure each Marvel Monday throughout February and I guess we’ll just run left to right, so let’s start with Thor.

Ahhh, it’s damn nice to see this guy’s Cinematic Universe version finally getting a proper Legends release. Previously, the only 6-inch scale movie version of The God of Thunder that I own was the Walmart Exclusive figure based off his original movie and featured here way back in the beginning of 2012. It was a passable figure at the time, but times have changed, and he was also a little too small to really work with the Legends figures. This new version is an improvement on just about every level. Yeah, truth be told, I prefer the design of the armor that Thor wore in his first movie and in The Avengers, but I still dig this look plenty.

Here you get the darker and bare-armed look that was first introduced in his second film and carried over into Age of Ultron. The sculpt of the outfit is beautifully executed here and it’s layered on in some places to give the armor a lot of credibility. Details include the tiny sculpted rivits and panel lines to the cross-thatch pattern of the exposed chainmail on his thighs. The contours of the boots are beautifully done and the silver, pale gold, black, and a little blue make for a striking deco, especially when framed against the vibrant red cape. The plastic cape is textured and looks great. The one thing I do like better about this costume is the prounounced set of discs that secure his cape to his shoulders. On the downside, the cape is rigid and unforgiving and since it’s plugged into his back, you can’t really pull it away from the figure. This means that the cape puts a major dampener on a lot of potentially great action poses.

The portrait is leaps and bounds better than Hasbro’s previous effort. Depending on the angle, I’d say it runs from a passable likeness to a pretty good one. The short beard is particularly well done. The hair looks great, but like the cape, it’s at odds with the articulation. Getting the head to turn side to side works fine, but there’s no upward movement, which nixes a lot of options for decent flying poses.

So, speaking of articulation, Thor’s got plenty of great points. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps, double hinges in the elbows, and rotating hinges again in the wrists. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have swivels in the thighs, double hinges in the knees, and the ankles have hinges and lateral rockers. There’s a ball joint in the torso that offers a beautiful range of motion, and you get the ball joint in the neck, which thanks to the hair, might as well have just been a swivel. It’s a shame that the cape and hair work against what is some pretty decent engineering, but that’s sadly the case here.

Thor features a nice version of Mjolnir, with sculpted wrap on the handle and a lanyard. Hasbro has done quite a few of these in the 6-inch scale and they’ve all been pretty good. This one is no different. He can hold it just fine in either hand.

I’ve got to say, this first figure alone goes a long way to justifying me buying this set. Even if it’s all down hill from here (and from a cursory glance I have no reason to believe it will be), I’ll have something to show for my forty bucks. The hitherto absense of movie Thor in the Legends line made no sense to me. In fact, not having all of the movie characters in Legends makes no sense to me. Hasbro makes 6-inch Marvel figures. Disney makes Marvel movies that rake in tons of cash. Why would you not want to capitalize more on that? Don’t get me wrong, I’m thrilled to see comic inspired characters like Batroc the Leaper and Hellcat on the pegs, but waiting this long to get Thor and still not having a MCU Scarlet Witch, Vision, or Quicksilver? That’s just madness. Ah well, next Monday, we’ll keep this train rolling with a look at Age of Ultron Black Widow!