Tag Archives: hasbro

Jul 23 2012

Avengers: “Cosmic Spear” Loki by Hasbro

For such a huge and wonderful movie, the Avengers didn’t have a lot of staying power in the toy aisles around here. The bulk of the stuff has already been supplanted by Amazing Spider-Man and the few pegs that are left for the Avengers 3 ¾” figures are choked up by Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America figures, because some retailers have merged the SKU’s on the four lines (Yes, if you haven’t guessed already, I’m in the retail biz). As a result, I’ve been relegated to ordering the rest of what I want online. Yesterday, I got a package from Toys R Us with a couple of the 3 ¾” Avengers, and today we’re going to check out Loki. I’m sort of excited, since I never picked up any of the previous versions of Loki in this scale.

We’ve seen the packaging for the Avengers line here before, and we shall see it again. I don’t have much new to say, except I’m still digging on it. It’s attractive and serviceable. There’s a “Try Me” cut out so you can see the pathetic oversized weapon in action, but I can’t seriously imagine pressing that button will sway anyone’s opinion in favor of buying this figure. The back panel shows off a big photo of the figure, as well as some of the other figures in the assortment, and you also get a little blurb about Loki.

Out of the package, I’m pretty impressed with the sculpt of the figure. The head sculpt isn’t exactly a dead-on likeness, but it’s still a nice sculpt, complete with helmet and his trademark horns. The body depicts him wearing his full Asgardian armor, which is actually layered with some soft rubber pieces hanging off his torso and then his cape on top of that, hanging off his shoulders. The layering gives a nice depth and complexities to the already solid and detailed sculpt. The bulk of the figure is black, with gold paint apps for his armor pieces, and some green fringe, and a green cape. The cape is sculpted so that it’s blowing a bit off to the side. It isn’t terribly intrusive, but I really do wish it were removable.The paint apps on my figure are clean and precise. The gold paint is particularly nice and vibrant, and the whole deco really makes the figure stand out nicely on the shelf.

Loki’s articulation is pretty limited compared to Hasbro’s past Marvel movie figures. He has a ball jointed neck; His arms are ball jointed at the shoulders and again at the elbows; His legs are ball jointed at the hips and again at the knees. He has no torso articulation at all, and he’s also lacking wrist and ankle articulation. It’s not ideal, and if articulation is a major factor for you, you’re probably better off going with one of the Loki’s from the Thor line. On the other hand, the joints on this guy are solid and he stands very well on his own.

You get two accessories with Loki, one of which being the shitty oversized gimmick weapon called the “Cosmic Spear” It’s basically an overcomplicated pole axe with two stubby little blades that come  out of the sides when you push the shaft up. I’ve seen worse… at least it isn’t a missile launcher, but I really have no need for it so into the Tote of Forgotten Gimmicky Oversized Weapons it goes. One day, I shall bury that tote in the backyard and teach the future generations never to dig there. Of course, the good accessory is his Chitauri Staff, which featured so prominently in the movie. It’s a pretty nice likeness of this distinctive weapon. On the downside, only one of Loki’s hands is sculpted to hold it, the other is a fist, so he can’t hold it in both hands, like I’d like him to.

No real surprises here. In the end, Loki is a fantastic looking figure with articulation issues. I’m happy to have him on my shelf beside my Marvel movie figures, and I think kids could have a lot of fun with him, but if you’re a collector into posing your figures, he’s likely to disappoint. I tend to display my figures in a standing position and take them down every now and again to fiddle about with them, so the articulation doesn’t really bother me too much. Either way, the real reason to buy him is to get the Chitauri Staff.

Jul 16 2012

Marvel Legends Wave 2: Piledriver by Hasbro

My last trip to Wally World to stock up on beers and frozen dinners netted me a nice surprise in the toy aisle. Not only did they finally restock Marvel Legends, but they restocked it with a case containing all the variants that I was missing from Wave 2. I only grabbed the ones that were new characters, namely Piledriver (variant of Thunderball) and Madam Viper (variant of Madam Masque). Today we’re going to check out Piledriver and we’ll take a look at Viper in the not too distant future.

Ah, the packaging… I still love this packaging. The local Walmart hasn’t had any Legends figures for a couple of months, but once they restocked, my eyes were immediately drawn to the pegs where these big bad babies were hanging. The top of the card features both Thunderball and Piledriver, allowing the card to work with either of the variant figures. The sticker on the bubble reads “Marvel’s Wrecking Crew” but oddly enough neither character’s name actually appears on the package anywhere. Did I notice that when I looked at Thunderball? Feel free to nip back and have a look. Anyway, I’ve gone on and on about the ML packages enough in the past, so I’ll save any further gushing for when Wave 3 finally comes out. For now, let’s just move on and look at the figure.

 

As mentioned, PIledriver is a variant of Thunderball, and that means he’s absolutely huge. He uses the exact same body as his fellow teammate, with nothing re-sculpted or changed aside from the paint. His pants are painted reddish brown, his shirt is white with a blue wash, and his gloves and boots and belt are blue. I wasn’t a big fan of the blue wash when it was used on Madam Masque, but here it doesn’t offend me quite as much. All in all, it works quite well, but I honestly do wish that Hasbro had retooled his hands, or at least one of them, into fists, but I’ll get back to that when we talk accessories.

Naturally, the head sculpt is entirely new and, while it seems like I’m saying throwing this compliment out there a lot where Marvel Legends are concerned, it’s absolutely fantastic. He wears the same style hood as Thunderball, exposing his tuft of blonde hair, but it’s his facial expression that really wins it over for me. Hasbro really has a knack for deranged looking faces in this line, and Piledriver just looks like he’s inviting you in for a beat down and that he’s going to thoroughly enjoy it. He’s just dripping with character.

As expected, articulation is identical to Thunderball. The head is ball jointed and features the additional hinge. The arms have ball joints in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps and gloves, and hinged elbows. The legs are ball jointed in the hips, swivels in the thighs, double hinges in the knees, hinged ankles, and hinges in his feet. He can swivel at the waist and he has the usual ab crunch hinge in the torso.

Ok, so accessories. You get two very small parts for the Arnim Zola Build-A-Figure: His remote control and his ESP box. If you’ve already picked up all the regular versions of these figures, you have little need of these items, although I think it’s nice to have a spare remote because my Zola likes to plunge off the shelf and sooner or later my cat is going to make off with the remote and hide in the network of tunnels that he has hollowed out under my apartment. You also get the exact same ball and chain that came with Thunderball. Granted, this doesn’t make a lot of sense, but I’m not going to quarrel with getting a second one of these, as it’s an awesome accessory and Thunderball can wield one in each hand. On the downside, including this accessory gave Hasbro an excuse not to give Piledriver fists.

As far as variants go, Piledriver isn’t a terribly ambitious figure. He’s just a repaint with a head swap. If you’ve followed any of Hasbro’s SDCC coverage, you may have seen that they have a lot more extreme makeovers for future releases to become two different characters. With all that being said, I do really dig this figure. Once I get past the lack of changes in the hands, it works fine the way it is and Hasbro certainly didn’t cheap out when sculpting the new head. If this is the only cost effective way to get these kinds of figures, I’m all for it. Now I just want me a ML Wrecker. Come on, Hasbro, don’t leave us hanging.

Jul 11 2012

Marvel Spider-Man: “Power Charge” Rhino

With the pegs full of figures based on the new Amazing Spider-Man film, you might be surprised to see me dredging up this odd line that’s been pegwarming toy aisles for what seems like ages now. Sure, you’ve seen it, it’s the line with a thousand different versions of Spidey in all those mission armors that you’ve never seen him wear… ever! Amazingly, I actually covered a figure in this line before, it was“Toxic Blast” Venom, which I picked up because I desperately wanted a Venom figure for my Marvel Universe shelf and it fit the bill. The same is sort of the case here. I actually got this figure off of Ebay because it was bundled with my Avengers Black Widow at a pretty low price. And just like Venom, this Rhino figure fills a hole in my Spider-Man Marvel Universe rogue gallery. Let’s see what he’s all about…

The packaging is pretty solid. The red and blue deco matches Spidey’s color theme and there’s a nice illustration of him in the upper left hand corner of the card shooting web right at your face. The card also makes a big deal about the trading card game cards included in the package. The bubble inserts have some passable illustrations of Rhino. The “Power Charge” moniker may have you envisioning some horrible gimmicky abomination that is destined to ruin the figure. Let me guess, I pull him back and he zips forward? He shoots out of some launcher? Nope. Truth is apart from the trading card game, this figure is completely free of any kind of gimmicky weapons or other nonsense. There isn’t even a stupid, oversized missile launcher in here!

And it’s a good thing too, because if there were, there’d be no room for the figure. While he’s still scaled for the 3 ¾” line, Rhino is one big mamma-jamma. He’s on par with the larger MU figures like Apocalypse and Thanos. He’s also a downright fantastic sculpt. The texturing and little details on this guy are great. His skin looks like bonafide leathery rhino hide, and his armor is worn and pitted. The head sculpt is no slouch either, as this guy has one of the most maniacal looking mugs in the Marvel line up since Constrictor or Bullseye. Overall, this sculpt is better than most figures we’ve seen in the MU line, which makes me wonder why it was wasted in this goofy kid-orientated side show.

Rhino has six pieces of armor that fit over his shoulders, fists, and legs. They’re held on in the package by those tiny invisible rubber bands, and you may be better leaving them on because the armor doesn’t stay on all too well. I wound up blue-tacking mine, and I may eventually just glue them in place. I do like the armor, particularly the spiked shoulder pieces. On the other hand, the figure looks just fine without the added armor too, so it’s no big deal if you choose to leave it off.

On the downside, Rhino is missing a few points of articulation that sets him apart from the MU figures. His arms feature ball joints in his shoulders and elbows, and swivels in the biceps, no worries there. His legs are ball jointed in the hips, but there’s no knee or ankle articulation. His head can turn side to side, but there’s no articulation in the torso at all. The lack of knee articulation hurts the figure the most, but you can still get some decent poses out of him, so I’m not complaining too much.

I’ve never seen this guy in the stores, but that’s probably because I just never bother to look at these Spider-Man figures. Had I known it existed, I surely would have grabbed him up. As it happened, he was tossed in with my Black Widow for what turned out to be about $12 each shipped. Considering the price Black Widow goes for, I basically considered this figure to be a freebie, but even at twelve bucks, I feel vindicated. With rumors that Marvel Universe is ending next year, I’m getting more and more worried about which characters may never make it onto my display shelf, so if I need to rob from some other lines, I’m more than happy to do so.

Jul 9 2012

Avengers: “Grapple Blast” Black Widow by Hasbro

If you’re on the hunt for Avengers figures, than chances are you know just how impossible this one is to find. Then again, considering there are none in my area, maybe they’re turning up everywhere else. Indeed, you may live in that Shangri-La where the pegs are crammed with Black Widows and Hawkeyes and dogs shit ice cream cones made out of solid gold. Nonetheless, the Avengers pegs here are still packed full of the initial wave of non-Avengers versions of Iron Man, Thor, and Cap, one of the dumbest moves I’ve seen Hasbro make, and believe me the list is a long one. I soon decided I would go the Ebay route, but quickly discovered that this little Scar-Jo is going for a shitload of money. Finally, I was lucky enough to get her bundled with another Marvel figure for what broke down to about twelve bucks each. So, let’s take a look…

It’s been a little while since we saw the Avengers packaging here, but that’s not my fault. Again, Hasbro, I want to buy your figures, but you fucked up the assortments and padded them out with lesser articulated versions of figures that I already have, so you’re not making it easy. Anyway, the figure comes in a big bubble mostly dominated by Black Widow’s ridiculous weapon. She’s holding one of her pistols and the other is mounted beside her head. The card art is pretty nice, and overall this is a serviceable and fairly attractive presentation, even if she and Hawkeye are excluded from the card art.

Out of the package and I am instantly impressed with the work Hasbro did on this figure. We could probably go back and forth on whether or not this is a great likeness of Scarlett Johansson, I happen to think it’s a very solid effort for a 3 ¾” figure. Either way, it’s hard to deny that his is one attractive lady. The face and hair are both sculpted beautifully and the paintwork is precise and truly impressive for this line. Hasbro, your Marvel Universe ladies in this scale have been a mixed bag when it comes to their faces, but guys, you hit this one right out of the ballpark!

In keeping with her on screen appearance, Black Widow’s costume is pretty low key. She’s nearly all black with just some blue-grey piping to break up the monochrome look. She still has her comic-style wrist bangles, only in black instead of yellow or grey, but the ankle bangles were nixed for the screen costume in place of slightly bulkier boots. She sports a plunging neckline, fingerless gloves, and a belt with two functional holsters that hangs loose on her hips. My only gripe with this sculpt is that her left hand isn’t really configured to hold her pistol, so I tend to keep that one in the holster. Apart from that, this is a great looking figure, which would probably even find a good home in any GI Joe collection.

Black Widow’s articulation is a nice surprise considering how many cut backs there are in the other figures. You get a ball jointed neck, ball jointed shoulders and elbows, and swivels in the wrists. Her legs are ball jointed at the hips, have swivel cuts in the thighs, double hinged knees, and hinges in the ankles. The biggest stumbling point here is the lack of articulation in the waist or torso. Bottom line, not perfect, but she has a heck of a lot more articulation than the MU version of Black Widow and that figure was from before Hasbro started making these cuts.

Of course, this figure is called “Grapple Blast” Black Widow, which gives some insight into the horribly shitty giant weapon that comes with her. I generally have little patience for any of Hasbro’s oversized weapons, but this one is so particularly vile and useless that I can’t even see the point. Bits fell off of it when I tried to load it and I happily pitched it into the garbage the moment I was finished photographing it. No, Grapple Blast, you don’t even get to go into the forgotten tub of useless oversized Hasbro weapons. It’s right in the trash for you! Considering there’s probably almost as much plastic in that useless weapon than the figure itself, I really need to question Hasbro’s priorities when it comes to cutting costs on these figures. Oh yeah, she also comes with a pair of tiny automatic pistols.

I had pretty high hopes for this Black Widow, and I’m happy to say that the figure mostly surpasses my expectations. The sculpt is excellent and the articulation is better than most of the other Avengers figures in this scale. If only she were able to properly hold her pistol in her left hand, I’d say she was nearly perfect. Sure, I had to pay a bit of a premium for her, but given most of the Buy It Now prices on Ebay, I could have been beaten up a lot worse. Truth is, I wasn’t prepared to drop thirty bucks on her, and so I was really worried I was never going to get her into my collection. And with my pre-order for Hot Toys’ Black Widow secured, I can finally rest easy knowing I’m covered. I still need to track down the 3 3/4” Hawkeye, but he seems to be dropping in price on the secondary market, so if I can’t find him on the pegs, I’ll bite the bullet and get him online.

Jul 2 2012

Transformers Prime: Knock Out by Hasbro

Yeah, yeah… so here’s the real reason I was staying away from TF:Prime figures, because I knew I couldn’t just buy a couple to check them out. The floodgates are opened and I couldn’t escape my last visit to the toy aisle without picking up another one. It didn’t help that there was yet another Decepticon car on the pegs and ya’ll know by now that I can’t resist Decepticon cars. This time we’re going to look at Knock Out. I thought he was the Decepticon doctor in the show, but based on the cardback, he seems to be more of the weapons outfitter. I guess I need to watch the show more.

Yay, I have an in-package shot! I’m still really digging on this presentation. The luxuriously oversized card features an awesome deco and really sweet character art. This is packaging that makes me want to buy a toy. Knock Out comes mounted under the bubble in his vehicle mode, and as always, we’ll start there.

 

Ok, I’m not a big fan of the colors here. It seems to be show accurate, so I’m not faulting it there, but I’m just not crazy about how they look on the toy. The two-tone matte purple and bare red plastic just don’t work at all for me, and the extra splash of silver on the sides isn’t helping. It’s hard to lay that aside, but once I do, I can certainly appreciate the sculpt of the car mode. It’s a sleek sportscar with clear windows and clear headlights and in general it just has a nice shape and feel to it, color notwithstanding. Knock Out has a weapons socket on each side just above and in front of his rear wheels, so you can mount his spear onto either side.

Transforming Knock Out was an overly fidgety affair my first time out and his crotch piece popped off the figure and had to be recovered from my cat’s lair under the desk. Besides the personal peril of having to venture into my cat’s treasure larder to retrieve the piece, I just hate when bits pop off my Transformers. It wasn’t broken and easily replaced, but it’s the principle of the matter that just upsets me. Anyway, let’s check out Knock Out’s robot mode.

Ok, not bad. Unfortunately the colors really don’t change, but they look a bit more forgivable on a robot than on a sportscar. Despite the fidgety transformation, there are some clever things going on here. I like the way the bumper wraps around and locks into place to become his waist. It’s actually mis-transformed on the back of the package. The arm designs are also pretty clever, although the windows interfere with the articulation a bit. The upper torso configuration is what’s tricky. You really have to get it just right or the whole thing doesn’t work. The head sculpt is really well done. I like his douchebag smirk that for some reason makes me associate this character with a reinvention of G1 Swindle.

I’m not a fan of Knock Out’s battle spear. It’s hinged and can also split apart to form two smaller “battle spikes” but he can’t hold it very well, which makes it a bit of a waste. He has a pair of sockets on his back so you can store it there, but I don’t think it looks very good on his back. All in all, I would have preferred a nice gun.

If I seem to be coming away from this figure with a “meh” attitude, it’s probably only because Ratchet and The Vehicon set some incredibly high standards and I really don’t dig the coloring on him. Knock Out is a perfectly solid figure, and this is a case where I’m really excited to see Hasbro do a repaint of this one. I think a better paint job can do wonders to smooth over the few rough points about this figure. All in all, he’s still a solid pick up and I’d still come away recommending him. And besides, he’s a Decepticon car, and that almost always gets a pass in my book.

Jun 18 2012

Transformers Prime: Ratchet by Hasbro

It’s time for more Prime! This time, we’re taking a look at one of the Autobots and also my favorite character from the show. Or at least the episodes that I’ve actually watched. Yep, it’s Ratchet. Not only do I love the way he’s portrayed (he’s crotchety and acts like everything is an imposition and a bother), but you can’t deny the greatness of Jeffrey Combs who provides his voice and personality. It also doesn’t hurt that G1 Ratchet always had a special place in my heart after he became the last Autobot standing back in the original Marvel comic. Suffice it to say, I was pretty happy to get this figure and to see if it does his TV counterpart justice.                 

What? No package shot. Here’s what happened. My computer died last week and while I’m up and running with a brand new setup, I haven’t had time to recover the files off the old computer’s hard drive. That means not only am I having to re-write this feature (and about three others), but the in-package shot of Ratchet is currently inaccessible. You can reference the general package design by looking back at the Vehicon feature from last week. Ratchet’s character art is fantastic and the bio blurb is downright disturbing, as it generally suggests that his intimate knowledge of anatomy makes him great at killing and dispensing pain. Wow! Pretty dark stuff for the back of a toy packet.

In his vehicle mode Ratchet is an ambulance. What? Crazy, I know. His general configuration is a bit more like a utility truck from the Bayformer movie-verse than most Ratchets from the past. The sculpt is pretty solid and there’s a lot of little panel lines and details. Unfortunately, there’s also a lot of jigsaw puzzle seaming on the sides. Remember Classics Ratchet? Well, it’s not quite that bad, but it is close. The deco also feels somewhat unfinished. Ratchet is molded in white plastic, with some red paintwork on his front end and the roof of his cabin. There’s also some red striping. It’s pretty basic ambulance colors, but its missing the lettering you usually find on an EMT vehicle. Like I said, the deco just feels unfinished.

Ratchet’s ambulance mode has two sets of ports for his blade weapons. You can plug them into his front bumper for some pretty vicious ramming action, or you can plug them into his roof. Not real sure what purpose that serves.

Transforming Ratchet felt a little involved the first time, but once I saw where everything goes it’s actually pretty easy. He is a bit of a shell former, but most of the ambulance kibble forms the backs of his legs and a backpack that isn’t too prominent or intrusive. No, Ratchet has one outstanding looking robot mode. He’s not only very faithful to his onscreen counterpart, but he’s also just a generally clean, balanced and proportional design. What’s more most everything clips or tabs in very nicely to make a figure that is every bit as solid as he is great looking. It doesn’t hurt that Ratchet’s deco fares much better in his robot mode than ambulance. He’s still primarily white, but there’s a better use of the red paint. Oh yeah, in robot mode, Ratchet can wield those blades like crazy little daggers, one in each hand.

No doubt, Ratchet is an amazing figure. Yes, his ambulance mode is somewhat lackluster. It is by no means terrible, but the seaming on the sides can be an eyesore and I really wish Hasbro had tampo’ed some lettering onto him to make him more polished and convincing. This guy really feels like some of the coloring was nixed to keep costs down. On the other hand, once you get him into robot mode, he makes up for every one of his shortcomings as an ambulance. Of course, I may be a little biased because I tend to display my Transformers in bot form.

Jun 13 2012

Transformers Prime: Vehicon by Hasbro

Ok, its come to this. I was pretty determined not to pick up any of the Transformers Prime toys for a number of reasons. Its true I’m pretty lukewarm on the show. I can watch it and enjoy it, but I don’t seek it out and therefore have only seen a handful of episodes. But let’s face it, if I only bought Transformers from shows I enjoyed, I wouldn’t have the dozen or so totes full of them that I do. No, the main reason was one of discipline. My Transformers collection has grown so out of control over the years that I can’t even display most of it and so I decided to limit myself just to buying the Classics/Universe 2.0/Generations themed figures. I’ll also admit to not being a huge fan of the overly stylized Transformer designs, but that never stopped me from buying a buttload of TF: Animated figures. Anywho, with things being so slow and no new Avengers figures showing up at the local retailers, I caved in this last weekend and bought a couple of TF: Prime Deluxes, The Vehicon and Ratchet. We’ll check out the first one today: The Vehicon!

I gotta say, I really dig this packaging. Sure, its a simple bubble on cardback, but the deco is gorgeous and really jumps off the peg at me. You get an extended card at the top with the series logo, a nice piece of personalized character artwork and a giant Decepticon logo with lightning shooting across it. Holy hell! The bubble has an insert showing the figure’s name and allegiance and has the “Robots in Disguise” monikor, which distinguishes it from the rarer and superior figures most of will never see “First Edition” versions of the line. Its best not to get me started on that nonsense. The figure is carded in his vehicle form with his “Snap On Blaster Cannon” mounted beside him.
The back panel of the card shows a shot of the figure in both modes and has a little bio blurb that is not only better than what we usually get, but better than it has any right to be, considering who this character is. You see, the Vehicons are the cannon fodder of the show, similar to the Vehicons in Beast Machines or the drones in the Fall of Cybertron game. They’re there to be blowed up and get the slag beaten out of them. That having been said, the bio gives them a lot of personality. But enough preamble. Let’s rip this guy open and check him out. We’ll start with the vehicle mode.
Awww yeah. That’s what I’m talking about. I’m pretty sure I’ve expressed my irrational love for Decepticon cars before, so straight away The Vehicon is tugging at my heart strings. Plus, I love this car mode! Ok, it is somewhat smallish and yeah, it is seriously lacking in the paint apps department, just some little bits of purple accent, but the design is killer.  The wedge-shaped wall of a front end makes it look like it was built for ramming Autobot fools off the road. The rear spoiler fins give it a bit of a Batmobile look and the tranlucent plastic on the windows and front headlamps make me happy. There are sockets just above the rear wheelwells on either side that let you plug the Vehicon’s gun into. Its a shame Hasbro couldn’t have engineered some flip-up guns into this thing somewhere. Anyway, I love it.
The Vehicon is a bit of a shellformer, but his transformation is clever enough to make me easily forgive this sometimes lazy method of design. The entire top of the car from the back to the windshield splits and folds up into his legs. The result is you have no real car shell kibble, only a sleek and sexy looking Decepticon badass.
And badass he is! He’s got that lean and spindly look many of the TF:Prime robot designs feature, although he still remains very well proportioned. What’s really cool, though, is that despite being largely a shellformer, its tough to see where it all goes, thanks to the clever design of his legs. The only real car kibble lands on his shoulders and sides of his legs, and these pieces look strategically placed as armor. The head sculpt is great. It took me a while to place it, but it definitely has a little Battlestar Galactica modern Cylon thing going for it. I’m also a big fan of the little exposed part of bare metal on his chest with a Decepticon logo and a piece of clear plastic laid over it. Very nice! The Vehicon’s robot mode features more of a purple and black deco make for classic Decepticon colors. He and Skywarp could definitely hang out.
Articulation is, in a word, solid. He’s got balljoints in his neck, shoulders, and hips. His elbows feature a weird combo balljoint and hinge. His knees and wrists are also hinged. You can get some nice poses out of him. At first I wasn’t sure about his funky arm construction, but I’m growing to like it.
As a Deluxe, The Vehicon ran me $12.88 at Walmart. Yes, Hasbro has been scaling down their Deluxes and Voyagers and while this guy can still hang in scale with other Deluxes he does look diminished. We also seem to be getting less in the way of paint apps. Even with all that in mind, I think the price is pretty reasonable here. Its only about three bucks more than your average 3 3/4″ figure and let’s face it, this toy required a lot more engineering and careful tooling than a Spider-Man or Star Wars figure. No, the price is fine, and I was actually surprised to be able to find him on the pegs, since he is a very highly sought after figure and I’m sure some collectors are army building them. The final point here is that my initial foray into the TF: Prime toys has been a positive one. I’m very anxious to rip open Ratchet and check him out next week.
Jun 11 2012

GI JOE Retaliation: Cobra Trooper by Hasbro

As promised, its Monday and I’m back with another look at Hasbro’s tenuous and poorly timed launch of the Retaliation figures. I’m still not prepared to say whether or not you’ll be seeing any more of these figures featured here. Cobra Commander and this Trooper were the only two that jumped out at me, but if things don’t liven up around here in the toy aisles, I may be buying more of these out of sheer desparation. While Cobra Commander was a “must buy” for me, I just picked up Cobra Trooper so I’d have someone to stand beside him. I wasn’t completely sold on this guy when I saw him on the peg, so let’s see if he can win me over.

The packaging. Oh, god, the packaging. I ragged on it pretty good last time, so let’s just say it looks rushed and amateurish and leave it at that. The bubble shows off the figure very nicely and the insert has the figure’s name on it and shows a picture of the included parachute in action. Flip the card over and you’ve got a couple shots of the figure as well as three others in the line. There’s a pointless little blurb on the Cobtra Trooper and a couple points emphasizing that working parachute again. Let’s rip this guy open and see what we’ve got.
The obvious first impression is that this isn’t a traditional Cobra Trooper, but that’s fine, since this is a movie product. He comes sculpted with grey fatigues, a removable helmet, and removable webgear with a functional holster for his sidearm. The removable helmet is a very nice touch and it stays on surprisingly well. The removable webgear is now pretty standard fare for GI Joes, but in this case it allows you to swap it out and turn him into a paratrooper, which we’ll get to later. The sculpting on the webgear is exceptional. You can see all the texturing in the belts, the sculpted grenades, the clasps and pouches. Its very nice work.  The headsculpt consists of a mask and visor that looks a tad like paintball gear and covers every bit of the trooper’s face. I kind of like it. Its rather sinister.
Its on the coloring of the figure, where things break down for me a bit. The grey fatigues that comprise most of the figure’s body look great, but they really don’t feel like Cobra to me. The blue helmet and webgear help a bit, but I would have preferred blue fatigues, blue helmet, and black webgear. He has a nice Cobra emblem tampo on his helmet and his chest, but you can’t really see the one on his chest when he’s wearing the webgear. All of my issues with the coloring on the figure come from my personal conceptions on what a Cobra Trooper should look like. If I toss that aside, I think the colors on the figure work great for a military trooper.
The Cobra Troopers articulation is the same as what we saw with Cobra Commander. He has a ball jointed neck. His arms feature ball jointed shoulders, ball jointed elbows, and swivel wrists. His legs are ball jointed at the hips and hinged at the knees. Lastly, he can swivel just under his abdomin. Again, considering how upset collectors are over the cuts in articulation, this guy still has plenty of poseability. Sure, what’s missing sucks, but it is what it is.
You get some solid accessories with this figure. His weapons include a tiny little automatic pistol, which fits snugly into his holster. You also get a rather unusual looking assault rifle with some kind of canister coming off the stock. And then there’s the parachute. To work the parachute you swap out his webgear and clip the nylon cords onto the top straps of the webgear. It looks and works pretty great. I am particuarly impressed with the quality of the parachute. The material and cords are nice and heavy duty and the Cobra emblem printed on it is really cool. And yes, it works pretty well. I chucked him up into the air and it opened just fine.
Kudos, Hasbro. You were indeed able to win me over with this figure. I still would have preferred a more conventional Cobra paintjob, but what’s here works fine. Its a good design, a good sculpt, solid weapons, and the ability to convert him to a paratrooper is a really nice bonus. I’m not going to go army building this guy like I have in the past with the Vipers and the Crimson Guards, but I could see myself picking up one more just to display him as both regular trooper and paratrooper. He’s a solid figure and I’m really glad I picked him up.
Jun 6 2012

GI JOE Retaliation: Cobra Commander by Hasbro

So the movie’s been delayed until next year, what about the toys? Well chances are if you’ve been in an action figure aisle, you noticed that the first run of the Retaliation toys are out. Hasbro opted to sell through what was shipped, but seeing as the other option was a economically crippling recall that would even further piss off their retail partners, it was really the only thing they could do. Future waves of the toys will be held back for the movie release next year. I already went on record about how underwhelmed I am with this line, but when I went hunting for new Avengers figures this morning I found that the pegs are still crammed with the same three non-movie versions of Iron Man, Cap and Thor, so I opted to pick up the only two Retaliation figures that I had much interest in. Today we’ll take a look at Cobra Commander.

There’s the packaging and oh lord is it terrible. Sure its a standard and perfectly functional Hasbro card and bubble, which displays the figure pretty well. There’s an insert that personalizes the package with the figure’s name and a shot of the figure deploying his token stupidly oversized and gimmicky weapon. Take note, my Cobra Commander is blue, but there appears to be a running change with a black variant.
The cardback is an atrocity. It really looks like Hasbro had someone in their art department hammer this out while on lunch. The logo and shots of Roadblock and Snake Eyes are poorly formated and look like they were clipped out of a magazine, whereas the orange yellow deco of the card makes the figure blend in with the knock-off military figures on the pegs next to it. The back of the card has a throwaway blurb about the character, but no file card. It shows the figure in three different poses, holding each of his weapons and there are shots of three other figures in the assortment off to the side. What’s with the Japanese lettering on the back? I’ll let y’all ponder that while I open my figure and then burn the packaging and bury the ashes in the backyard.
Out of the package, Cobra Commander is one very, very cool looking figure. Obviously, it helps when the toy is based on a good looking movie design and that appears to be the case here. If you like your Cobra Commander as a take charge, in the thick of things, terrorist leader, this version should really appeal to you, because he’s outfitted for action, rather than sitting on the throne. The head sculpt is extremely detailed and a nice evolution of his chrome faceplate design of old with the faceplate centered in what is made to look like a Cobra’s jaws. There’s a tiny sculpted Cobra on the top of the helmet and he has sculpted Cobra emblems on his kneepads. The rest of the figure is a pretty simple but effective sculpt.
His belt and bandolier strap are removable, which is a good thing. I like having the option of him wearing it, but I think its a little too bulky to make him look like a dignified leader. If Cobra Commander goes into battle, I’m sure he’ll be flanked by troops to carry his shit, so he shouldn’t need this many pouches. On the downside, the nice gold braid that loops around his right arm is part of the gear belt, so if you take it off, the braid goes with it.
The coloring on the figure is ok. I would have preferred a paler shade of blue, but what’s here is still good and I like the way it contrasts with the slightly glossier black of the boots and gloves. The Cobra Emblem tampo on his chest looks great. I definitely would have preferred his helmet be blue like his uniform, but its still plenty cool as it is.
Articulation? For all the bitching I have to say, the articulation here is not at all bad. You get a ball jointed neck. The arms are ball jointed at the shoulders, and again at the elbows. The wrists do swivel. The legs are ball jointed at the hips and feature hinged knees. He can swivel at the waist. Yeah, the lack of double hinges in the knees, and any articulation in the ankles will upset a lot of people. On the flipside, I was actually surprised that the wrists had swivels. What’s here is lacking, but its definitely not the stone age level of poseability a lot of collectors feared.
As far as accessories go, Cobra Commander comes with a simple assault carbine and a pistol. The pistol fits into the aforementioned leg holster. Both are decent sculpts and cast in pale grey plastic.  Of course, you also get the usual throwaway oversized gimmick weapon. In this case its a Cobra staff that shoots a giant missile. As a weapon its ridiculous, but I’m sure a lot of collectors could find a way to work it into their displays as decor for the Cobra Temple, Cobra Throneroom, or Cobra Smoking Lounge.
Cobra Commander cost me just under $9 at Walmart. That’s about right for figures these days and while he doesn’t come with the plethora of accessories and articulation that Joe fans have been getting these past couple of years, he’s still an excellent figure. Apart from the packaging, nothing about this figure feels cheap or scaled back to me. Still, I wouldn’t take this as praise for the line as a whole. I looked at all the figures today and Cobra Commander was the only one I was tempted to pick up. Roadblock actually looks good, but I can’t get past that big gunpart molded right into his hand. I wasn’t even too keen on the Cobra Trooper, but I bought him anyway and we’ll check him out on Monday.
May 25 2012

GI JOE Retaliation Delayed…

Ok, so within about a month of its planned release, GI JOE: Retaliation has been inexplicably and bewilderingly pushed back to March of next year. Nine months delay for a movie that was supposed to be done and ready to go. The official reason: So it can be given the 3D treatment to improve overseas numbers. My initial two reactions? 1. Bullshit! 2. What about the toys?

Now, I don’t usually cover news here, but it seemed like I would be remiss if I didn’t weigh in on the whole GI JOE: Retaliation A-Bomb that Paramount and Hasbro dropped this week. Granted, you don’t see a lot of GI JOE figures covered on FigureFan these days, and that’s mostly because I’ve managed to convince myself that the 25th Anniversary figures are my definitive versions of these characters and while I concede that the figures (not necessarily the vehicles)coming out since has been in many ways superior, the designs just don’t do it for me. My days of buying 20 different versions of these characters are over. That having been said, I’ll pick up a figure or vehicle here and there if it strikes my fancy. I still need to pick up that blasted Sky Striker.

The way I see it, there’s three ways to attack this mess. One, how will it impact the movie. Two, how will it impact the toys. Three, how does it impact me. I’ll take the last one first.
It really doesn’t impact on me. I was planning on seeing the movie, and believe me when I say that’s high praise. I didn’t like the first one, and I don’t actually go to see movies unless I really want to see them extremely badly. I don’t enjoy the theater-going experience and for the price of a ticket and a coke, I can own the damn thing on Blu-Ray when its released. That having been said, I was going to see it, but I’m not heartbroken that I have to wait. I’d just as soon go see Avengers again. I have the same “Meh” reaction to the toys, which leads me back to Point Two…

I really wasn’t interested in the Retaliation toys. I will probably pick up a few Cobra figures, but that’s it. The designs of the figures don’t do a lot for me and I think the vehicles look terrible. Nonetheless, I still think that this decision to delay the movie will be disastrous for the toyline and pretty damaging to the toy brand as a whole. And let’s face it, GI JOE hasn’t been a particularly strong presence on the toyshelves in quite a while. The brand really needed this push to keep it alive so that retailers could recognize it as a viable, marketable toyline. We still don’t know what Hasbro will do vis-a-vis future waves, but the initial run of these toys are already in retailer stockrooms, and Hasbro is giving them the go ahead to break the street date.

This is a no-win situation for Hasbro. They’ve already seriously fucked over the retailers that bought these toys with the expectation of a multi-million dollar movie tie-in, which they see as advertising the brand. On those grounds alone, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some sort of opening for litigation here. If Hasbro holds back the rest of the toys for next year, they’re going to generate a lot of bad blood among their retail partners. Case in point: For a while now, Walmarts in my area stopped selling Joes altogether and only made an exception for the Rise of Cobra movie. If they made a similar exception for Retaliation only to have the movie delayed, its doubtful the retailer is ever going to have confidence in the line again.

As for the movie itself? Marketing budgets are figured carefully into the cost of movies and Paramount has already blown that budget on this one, not least of which a very pricey Super Bowl spot. All of that money is as good as flushed down the toilet. If Paramount is going to start the marketing juggernaut up again next year, its going to seriously cut into the film’s profits, but how can they not? And can that really expect to be reclaimed by making the movie 3D for foreign markets? Hey, these decisions were made by people who do this sort of shit for a living. I’m just a hack with a keyboard, so what do I know? But it all leads me back to my initial thought that the 3D excuse is bullshit.