Tag Archives: marvel legends

Jul 16 2018

Marvel Legends (Lizard Wave): Spider-Punk by Hasbro

I hope you don’t have Marvel fatigue from last week’s Marvel Legends theme, because I’m headed into the new week with Marvel Monday, business as usual! And I’m also back to spinning the Wheel of Legends to pick another random figure to open up today from the towering pile of shame in the corner. This week, the wheel landed on Hobart Brown, aka Spider-Man from Earth-138! I couldn’t be happier with this result.

Ah, but Hasbro seems to know him best as Spider-Punk as that is indeed the name printed on the box. I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again: Hasbro must thank the heavens for Spider-Verse, as it gave them a deep well of Spider-Man variants to drop their bucket into, knowing damn well that idiots like me will fork over our hard earned money to buy them all! And they sure are going full guns with it. There was a time when I thought the now all but defunct 4-inch Marvel Universe line was the only hope I had to get characters like this one, but the 6-inch Legends line has exploded to the point where literally any character seems like fair game. Let’s rip open this package and check him out!

The bulk of Hobart’s costume is painted onto the buck, just like most Spider-Man figures. Here we get a beautiful combination of vibrant blue and red. The blue occupies most of the figure and forms a large spider emblem on the chest, while the red features the familiar web pattern. The paint on my figure looks great, but if unpainted pegs in the joints bother you, then you may be pissed to find that the elbow pegs on the interior of the arms have been left red. In a perfect world, I would have liked to see them match the surrounding blue, but this just isn’t something that I get all worked up about. You do get some original sculpting for the sneakers, which are white with red sides.

Of course, Spider-Punk also features his vest, which is sculpted in soft plastic and given a denim-like texture. The sleeves have been ripped off and there’s a patch sculpted on the back, as well as some stitch lines around it. The shoulders feature some silver spikes, and there are various red and white buttons sculpted onto the front flaps. Boy did Hasbro do a nice job on this one!

The head sculpt is pretty typical Spider-Man fare, unless you count those bitchin’ silver spikes that crown his head. The mask has nice, big eyes and the paint apps are all pretty crisp and clear.

Hobart features all the articulation I’m used to seeing in my Legends Spider-Man figures. The legs have ball joints at the hips, double hinges at the knees, and swivels at the thighs. The big difference here is that the lower leg swivels are in the ankles at the tops of the sneakers. The ankles also have hinges and lateral rockers. The arms feature rotating hinges in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps, double hinges in the elbows, and hinged pegs at the wrists. There’s a swivel in the waist, an ab-crunch hinge, and the neck is hinged and ball jointed.

Obviously, you can’t have Spider-Punk without his trusty guitar and it is a seriously fun accessory. The mostly white guitar features a few blue paint apps and a black shoulder strap. The upper strap on mine pulled off the guitar after just a few poses, but it was easy to glue back into place. I would have really liked some more paint on the guitar to bring out some of the detail, but it’s still pretty damn cool.

Even better, Hobart comes with two guitar-specific hands, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate Hasbro going through the trouble of sculpting these two hands that will probably never be used for anything ever again. The right hand is sculpted with a tiny pick between the fingers and the left is fingering chords.

You also get an extra left “thwippy” hand, which has a delicious double purpose here, as Hobart can use it to flash Dio’s two-fingered salute. ROCK ON!

Like a lot of the recent waves of Marvel Legends, Spider-Punk was tough for me to find at a decent price. He hasn’t turned up anywhere on the pegs in my neighborhood and he’s still selling for $30+ on Amazon. Luckily, I got in on a pre-order at one of the big online toy retailers, and while it cost me a few bucks more than he would in the store, I’m just happy to have him. This is a great example of just how much love Hasbro is willing to put into this line, and just how deep their willing to go when it comes to variants and characters. But most of all, this figure is just so damn fun to play with.

Jul 13 2018

Marvel Legends (Astonishing Ant-Man): Ant-Man and Stinger by Hasbro

Happy Friday, Toyhounds! I work a lot of weekends, so Fridays don’t always mean anything to me, but this time I have a three-day weekend lined up with nothing planned but to binge comics and video games while drinking lots and lots of alcohol! But before I can sign off, it’s time to wrap up this Marvel week with a look at another Legends boxed set. Hasbro knows to strike while the iron is hot and in this case that means getting some comic-inspired Ant-Man-themed figures out while the new movie is in the theaters. And I can’t praise Hasbro enough for being willing to mix so many comic characters in with the heavy hitters from the movies. Let’s take a look at Scott Lang as Ant-Man and his daughter Cassie as Stinger!

As with most Marvel Legends boxed sets these days, the figures come in a stylish window box, which offers a great look at the figures. You get the Astonishing Ant-Man logo on the bottom as well as the characters’ names, and some nice artwork on the side panels. The back of the box notes that the set is inspired by art in Astonishing Ant-Man #13 and there’s even a tiny shot of the cover as well. Let’s start off with Ant-Man…

Wow, this is a great looking costume and a great looking figure! The black and red deco looks sharp and the extra bits of metallic charcoal paint on the knees, belt, and collar really make the figure pop. Most of the original sculpting is found on the belt and collar and thanks to the use of this particular buck, Ant-Man has some unexpected shoulder crunches. It kind of sucks that we still don’t have a classic Hank Pym Ant-Man from this line, but getting Lang in this suit is quite possibly the next best thing.

The portrait here is also very well done. I really dig Scott’s smirk and the facial detail is sharp and well-defined. The chin guard is on soft plastic so it can be flipped up over his mouth, but it doesn’t really look like it’s meant to do that. You get a little of that swirly effect going on in the silver plastic used for his helmet, but all in all, I think the finish on the helmet here looks a lot better than what we got on the Scott Lang from Ant-Man and The Wasp. A little red paint on the eyes and ears, and those two antenna round out a great looking head sculpt.

Apart from those shoulder crunches, the rest of the articulation is right in line with what I’ve come to expect. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, double hinges in the elbows, and swivels in the biceps. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, double hinged at the knees, have swivels in the thighs and lower legs, and the ankles have both hinges and lateral rockers. There’s a swivel in the waist, an ab-crunch hinge, and the neck is both hinged and ball jointed. Unfortunately, this figure has serious problems with some loosey-goosey joints. Besides practically being a bobble-head, the ab-crunch is really loose too. It’s not enough to ruin the figure for me, but it does take what could have been nearly perfect and makes him flawed. Moving on to Stinger…

I’ll confess, I never thought we’d ever get a Cassie Lang figure, but here she is and she looks pretty good, just not quite as good as I had hoped. I really dig this purple and black costume, but the figure has some color matching issues that we’ve seen before. Hellcat comes instantly to mind. The lower torso doesn’t quite match the upper torso, and the paint used for the thighs doesn’t match the pieces where the legs are jointed to the hips. To make matters worse, the hinges in the shoulders aren’t painted to match the silver shoulder guards, they’re just left purple and it looks like a really bad oversight. Hell, even the image on the package shows them painted, but that’s why they always toss in that disclaimer that says, images may not match final product. I do really like the silver paint on her wrists and gloves.

Stinger uses upper wings that we’ve seen before, most notably with the comic version of Wasp. Of course, Wasp had four wings, Stinger only has two, but you can still see the holes where the smaller pair pegged in. These are cast in a very pale translucent blue and they look great. They attach with hinged pegs giving them a nice degree of articulation.

Like Ant-Man, Stinger’s head sculpt is fantastic. I love the design of the helmet and the silver finish looks good. I think they also did a really nice job on the lower half of the face. The above shot also shows the unfortunate black paint trail that’s on her neck and another black smudge on her right shoulder hinge. I have some confidence that these might come off, but the fact that they’re there at all is a shame.

In addition to the wing articulation, Cassie gets by with the usual articulation seen on the Legends ladies. That includes rotating hinges int he shoulders, elbows, and wrists. The legs are ball jointed with double hinges in the knees, swivels in the thighs and lower legs, and both hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. She has a ball joint under the chest and her neck is both hinged and ball jointed.

This is a solid set, that could have been great if it weren’t for some unfortunate QC issues. Between the loose joints on Scott and the inconsistent coloring and paint flubs on Cassie, these just fall short of my expectations. Don’t get me wrong, I was excited to get this set, and I’m certainly not sorry I picked it up, but I can’t help but feel this pair deserved a little better. And considering how great most of Hasbro’s Marvel Legends have been lately, problems like these tend to stand out even more.

Jul 11 2018

Marvel Studios “First Ten Years” Captain America and Crossbones by Hasbro

Even if I wasn’t gobsmacked by almost every Marvel movie that’s come out, I’d still have to respect what Marvel Studios (and Disney) has managed to accomplish with their cinematic universe. Ten years worth of movies all set in motion to culminate in a massive team up. It seems like a sure thing now, but if you go back to the beginning, to the original Iron Man film, nothing was guaranteed and crazy risks were taken. And now, in a market where a Goliath-like Disney is even pulling back on the reigns of the Star Wars franchise, Marvels flicks continue to put asses in the seats to the tune of about $12 Billion total. Hell, even Ant-Man and The Wasp opened with respectable numbers and beat the previous release. And if you think that $12 Billion is a lot of cheddar, now imagine how much the merchandising has raked in, because silly middle aged nerds like me buy toys!

And that brings me to my first two figures from Hasbro’s First Ten Years releases. These Marvel Legends figures are culled from the various films of the MCU and some of these figures are long overdue. Today I’m having a look at Cap and Crossbones from Captain America: Civil War. I’ve wanted a figure of the MCU’s Brock Rumlow as Crossbones ever since the movie was out. Hot Toys teased one and then decided against releasing him, but I’ll happily take Hasbro’s Legends version as a consolation prize. The figures come in a collector friendly window box with a Marvel Studios: The First Ten Years logo as well as Captain America: Civil War. The box here is also squared off at the edges, distinguishing it from the packaging used for the regular Legends two-packs and I like it a lot. It just looks spiffy and new. Let’s start with Captain America!

Do you enjoy buying a figure you already have to get one you don’t? Me neither. And that’s sort of the case here, so I’m not going to spend a lot of time with this figure. From the neck down, I can’t see any difference between this figure and the Civil War Cap that we got as part of the Giant-Man Wave. And I’m pretty sure that figure was just a repaint of the Cap from Age of Ultron. I said back then that I preferred the brighter blue on the AoU Cap over the darker costume here, but to be honest this one has grown on me quite a bit. I’ll spare you a run through of articulation as you can just link back to either of those reviews to get the lowdown.

That’s not to say this figure is entirely recycled. For starters, you get a pair of much improved heads. From straight on, I think the masked head is fantastic, but from the side, there’s some weird shit going on over the ears. There’s no hairline showing, so it kind of looks like he’s bald. The helmet is sculpted separately and it just doesn’t fit all that well, so you get some gaps around the back too.

There’s a similar thing going on with the unmasked head. When viewed from straight on I think it’s the best MCU Steve Rogers likeness we’ve seen in this scale. A profile view, however, shows that the hair is sculpted separately and it’s not a perfect fit. You get that same weird gap over the ears that doesn’t look natural and a gap around the sideburns where the hair doesn’t fit flush with the head. It’s kind of a shame because everything else here is done so damn well.

The shield is also different than the one that came with the previous Civil War Cap release. This one has a more vibrant and premium paint job and a segmented star in the center. It also features the realistic straps on the reverse side, which work much better than the hinge clip and peg affair we’ve seen so many times. The only disadvantage here is you can’t secure it to his back. All in all, this is a great figure and probably the best Legends MCU Cap Hasbro has released, so I’m not so bummed about having to buy this version again. OK, so enough about Cap, let’s get to the real reason I bought this set.

Crossbones’ screen time in Civil War was brief, but oh boy was it glorious. The rogue SHIELD agent’s scrap with Cap was a great way to kick things off and I loved his costume. I think the folks at Hasbro did too, because they sure poured the love into this figure. The detail on this guy is absolutely fantastic. The tactical vest is sculpted separately from soft plastic and worn over the buck with a white X scratched into it with what looks like pure rage. All of the straps and clasps are sculpted down to the finest details, as well as the various little pouches, and the texturing on his belt.

Other highlights include his Glock 17 pistol with molded holster on his right hip, which sadly is not removable…

The collection of magazines for various weapons slotted into molded open pouches on his right shoulder…

And on his left shoulder he has a brace of shotgun shells and what I believe are supposed to be tools for tuning up his hydraulic fists. One of them sure looks like a socket wrench. Whatever the case, the attention to detail is fantastic, and I’m especially impressed by the silver and brass paint hits here. Great work!

Rumlow comes with two heads, one masked and one without. The masked head is the one I’ll be using most of the time and it turned out quite nice. The white scratches on the mask that make up the skull motif are applied with the new half-tone printing techniques. What really impresses me here is the definition between the mask and what’s exposed through the eye-holes. It really looks like they sculpted a separate mask and attached it to the head. It’s not only the depth of sculpt that works so well here, but also the paint apps applied around the eyes showing the scar tissue.

The unmasked head is no slouch either. It’s not a perfect likeness to Frank Grillo, but he is supposed to be horribly scarred up. The hair is nicely sculpted and I really like the way the printing on his five o’clock shadow came out. I don’t know how much work it is to get likeness rights from someone like Grillo, but I think it’s really cool that Hasbro went the extra mile just to include the bonus head with this figure.

The articulation here is identical to Cap’s so I’m not going to run through all the details. I will, however, point out that the arm rigs are removable. These are sculpted in a fairly soft plastic, so the sculpted detail isn’t as sharp as it could have been, but there’s still plenty to appreciate in them. I especially like the DIY-stylings of the sculpted belts that are wrapped around them and holding them together.

Overall I’m very pleased with my first Marvel Studios: The First Ten Years set. Even though this tweaked version of Captain America turned out to be a welcome addition, I was in this set for Crossbones, and I am not disappointed. Quite the contrary, if this is the kind of effort Hasbro is putting into these First Ten Years figures, I’m pretty excited to pick up some more. I grabbed this one at Hasbrotoyshop for $40 and I think it was money well spent! Come back on Friday and I’ll wrap up this Marvel week with a look at Ant-Man and Stinger.

Jul 9 2018

Marvel Legends (Cull Obsidian Wave): The Wasp by Hasbro

I make it no secret that back when the MCU was still forming The Avengers, I was pretty pissed that Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne were not getting their due. But as things progressed, I realized that the MCU was doing its own thing and it was hard to argue with the results. And while we never really did get to see Hank and Janet in action beyond a quick missile-stopping scene, the duo of Scott Lang and Hope Van Dyne make for a pretty damn good substitute in the latest Marvel cinematic outing. Last week I checked out Ant-Man, now let’s take a look at The Wasp!

Yeah, Ant-Man and The Wasp was a damn good movie and just the right follow-up to the angst-ridden downer that was Infinity War. It was fun and an all around perfect mix of action and laughs. Unless you stay for that post-credit scene in which it kind of becomes a quite a downer as well, but I guess they had to tie it into Infinity War somehow. In any event, I doubt we’ll see any more figures from this movie, but that’s probably why they slid the incredible shrinking duo into the second Infinity War wave. But hey, I’m just glad we got these two.

Hope comes packaged with her helmet on and that’s where I’ll start. I really dig this costume a lot. It pays respects to the The Wasp’s modern comic appearances with the black and gold outfit, which has always been a pretty good look for her. A majority of the suit is textured to give it the same finish as the Ant-Man suit, and in addition to the gold pattern on the front of the torso, you also get some gold on the arms, bottoms of the knee guards, and some striping on the legs, along with some hits of red. The arms feature the cuffs, which presumably house her blasters and she comes with a pair of fists attached. From the back, Wasp features a removable backpack, which I’ll come back to when we add her wings. All in all, this looks to me like a more refined suit than Scott’s, and that’s exactly what it’s supposed to be.

The helmet sculpt is solid, although it’s cast in that same questionable gray plastic as Ant-Man’s helmet. I think this one turned out a little better, but I’m still not a fan of the swirly patterns in the plastic. If I can get another Wasp figure at a decent price I may actually wind up trying to paint it proper silver. The biggest win here are the eyes being visible through the yellow lenses in the mask. I love that they were able to make that work and it looks fantastic.

And you also get an alternate unmasked head, which is a pretty good likeness to Evangeline Lilly. As always, the new printing technique tends to break down when you get in real close, but in hand the lips and eyes look fantastic, as does the sculpted ponytail. Nice job!

The articulation is mostly good. My usual issue holds true for the Legends ladies and Hasbro’s choice of articulation for the arms. The rotating ball joints in the shoulders and elbows sounds fine, but the range of movement in the elbows is disappointing. I can barely get a full 90-degrees out of those elbows. The wrists are on hinged pegs, to allow the hands to be swapped from fists to flying hands with the fingers held tightly together. The legs have ball joints in the hips, double hinges in the knees, swivels in the thighs, and hinges in the ankles. It doesn’t feel like she’s got lateral rockers in the ankles, but if she does, mine just don’t want to move that way. Lastly, there’s a ball joint under the chest, and she has both a hinge and ball joint in the neck.

Deploying Wasp’s wings is as easy as pulling off the backpack and pegging in the wing assembly. I think the backpack is sculpted to make it look like the wings are retracted but still showing a bit. If that’s the case it’s not that convincing, mainly because of the color difference, but swapping out the backpacks works well enough. The wings are cast in a frosted translucent plastic, which makes for a nice effect, but can be a little tough to see against a white backdrop. I think it would have been cool if they could have worked some kind of shimmery effect in there.

There also isn’t as much range of motion in the wings as we saw in the comic-based Janet Van Dyne from a bunch of waves back. Still, the wings are a whole lot of fun. They sure look nice and they hold onto the figure quite securely.

With there now being no less than four MCU versions of Scott Lang in the Marvel Legends lineup, it’s great to finally see The Wasp in action on the big screen and have a figure as well. Hasbro did a solid job on this release and I’m interested to see what the future holds for Hope Van Dyne as the MCU continues to unfold. As a footnote… I got in a couple Marvel Legends boxed two-packs last week, so I’ve decided to go All Marvel, All Week! So I can have a look at those without interrupting my usual Marvel Mondays. So on Wednesday I’ll be checking out the Marvel Studios “First Ten Years” Captain America and Crossbones set, and then we’ll bring it on back home on Friday with a look at the Ant-Man and Stinger set.

Jul 2 2018

Marvel Legends (Cull Obsidian Wave): Ant-Man by Hasbro

Who’s ready for another Marvel movie, eh? Getting tired of them yet. I’m honestly not, although lately I’ve been a little more excited for the more peripheral films rather than the Avengers-centric stuff. Well, Ant-Man and The Wasp hits theaters this week and I’ve already got my tickets lined up for Thursday night and this is one that I’m really looking forward to. To celebrate, I’m putting the Wheel of Marvel Legends aside and casting randomness to the wind. Instead, I’m pulling out the eponymous stars of this flick for the next today and the next Marvel Monday. So today let’s have a look at Scott Lang in his new Ant-Man suit, and next Monday we’ll check out Hope Van Dyne in her Wasp costume.

Egads, how I love the font they used for the title of this flick. It’s so bold and exciting and goofy and comic booky. Putting it on the box is almost enough to make me save the package, but I need room for more toys, so that’s not going to happen. I’ll also toss out how much I dig the idea of combining figures of different MCU movies into one wave. In this case, the Cull Obsidian Wave is mixed with Infinity War and this pair from Ant-Man and The Wasp. I think it allows them to spread the love, and let’s face it… there’s usually enough MCU films making their rounds at around the same time so that wave sharing can still feel fresh. Scott Lang comes packaged unmasked, but I’m going to kick things off by looking at him with the helmet on, because I really need to get a running start to tackle that Paul Rudd head.

So, straight away I’ll say that I do prefer the Ant-Man costume from the original film over this one and the one that debuted in Civil War. This one feels even more streamlined than the last one and it’s not that I don’t like this one, I really do, but there was something extra cool about the more complex and less polished look of the original. The belt is a separate piece now, but there isn’t a whole lot of detail going on there. Most of the lines separating the red and black parts of the suit are part of the sculpt, which is always a big plus for me. You get the same mix of black, red, and silver as on the original, as well as that lovely texturing all over the suit. Overall, the coloring is nice and the paint application is pretty clean. There are a few lines where the silver could have been a wee bit sharper, but nothing terrible. And yes, there are some unpainted pegs in the knee and elbow hinges, so if that pisses you off… well, prepare to be pissed off, I guess.

Once again, I dig the old style helmet a lot more than this one, which is a lot more streamlined. The helmet sculpt looks solid enough, but maybe a little rough around the edges as I get in close. As many of you know I’m not a big fan of this swirly gray plastic Hasbro likes to use. It’s a shame that they couldn’t have painted the helmet with the same silver they use for the rest of the suit. Hell, even the stuff they used for Deathlok’s arms looked a lot better than this. Another shame is that they couldn’t have gone with sculpted eyes and tinted clear lenses for the mask. They did it for the Ant-Man BAF from Civil War and as we’ll see next week they did it for Wasp too. Moving on to the alternate head…

I swear to God I saw pictures of this head in pre-production that looked absolutely amazing, but this isn’t it. I’m not sure what happened between then and now, but I think the final head came out too elongated. Maybe it got pinched in the molding process. I mean, it’s definitely Paul Rudd, but it comes off looking more like a caricature of him and not so much a realistic portrait. Besides the fact that it looks elongated, I’m going to chalk a lot of it up to the expression they went with. The shit-eating smirk kind of fits the character, and it’s a nice attempt at endowing the figure with a lot of personality, but it just comes off as creepy and weird to me. I’m going to go with points for trying here, but I don’t think they quite hit the mark.

The articulation is everything I’ve come to expect from my Marvel Legends figures. The arms feature rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, double hinges in the elbows, and swivels in the biceps. It’s worth noting that the shoulder articulation is a tad more limited from the sculpt and even the elbows don’t bend as far as I would have liked. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have swivels in the thighs, double hinges in the knees, and the ankles have both hinges and lateral rockers. You get a swivel in the waist, an ab-crunch hinge under the chest and the head is both ball jointed and hinged. A bit better range of motion in the arms would have been appreciated, but not bad.

Scott Lang has been one of the most pleasant surprises for me in the MCU and I’m happy to see him getting a figure from each one of his appearances. The unmasked head is a bit of a hiccup, but I give them high marks for trying and I’ll still likely display the figure with it from time to time. And yes, I’m going to happily pick up the Marvel Studios: First 10 Years two-pack because it not only nets me a Civil War version of Lang in normal size, but it also comes with what looks like a better unmasked head. And also a figure of Yellowjacket, which is something I’ve wanted for a long, long time, especially since Hot Toys’ version never made it past prototype. Join me again next week, when I’ll have seen the flick and have a look at The Wasp!

Jun 25 2018

Marvel Legends (Sasquatch Wave): Deathlok by Hasbro

Well, folks, I spun the Wheel of Marvel Legends and it landed back in the Sasquatch Wave with Deathlok… and I couldn’t be happier! I seem to recall, back when I reviewed his Marvel Universe Infinite figure, that I confessed my love for characters that are mortally injured (or already dead) and saved by horrific cybernetic surgeries. It most certainly explains my man-crush on RoboCop and countless other comic, cartoon, and movie cyborgs. Of course Deathlok is pretty unique among them and it’s long past time that Hasbro gave him a modern Legends figure. The body horror is bad enough, but then waking up in the far-flung shitty future is just the icing on the cake that made Deathlok such a cool character to me. He also got some love in the Agents of SHIELD series and was one of the few things I liked about that show before I abandoned it. Still, it tickles me to know he’s officially part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

And Deathlok is figure in the Sasquatch Wave that may be to blame for Deadpool’s lack of accessories. Like Cable, Deathlok’s tray is absolutely packed. He’s a sizable figure to begin with, and then toss in the weapons and the BAF part and there’s not a lot of room left on that tray. I haven’t read anything with Deathlok in it since 2014, so I’m happy Hasbro went with the more classic look for the character. Also like Cable, this version just screams glorious 90’s comics to me and it’s virtually identical to the design they used for the excellent Marvel Universe Infinite figure from that same year.

And oh boy do I love this design! This Legends redo hits all the same great points as the smaller release and even takes advantage of the larger scale to give us a few extras, like the yellow pipe that comes out of his chest and connects to a control box on his belt and the working holster. There’s plenty of points of interest on this spiffy sculpt. The exposed cybernetics on the legs and right arm mimics the musculature of the human body with cut segmented lines and I’m always a sucker for those! Other staples of 90’s design? Kneepads? Check! Shoulder slabs? Check, check! Pouches? Check times infinity! Well, maybe not that many pouches, but he does have a brace of them running across his belt and they even stuck a couple more on his holster loop. I also really dig the raised American flag on the right side of his chest. The backpack has some nice cut lines and whatever the hell that is supposed to be in the middle. It’s also connected to those slabs of shoulder armor.

The coloring on this guy makes for a stunningly beautiful figure. You get the candy-apple red for the torso, boots, and left arm, with some lovely yellow accents to really make the deco pop. Surprisingly, the silver limbs appear to be cast in silver plastic, which is something that usually doesn’t look as good as Hasbro’s silver paint, but it sure gets the job done here. Throw in a little brown for the belt, wrist bracers, and knee pads to keep things grounded and you’ve got a feast for the eyes. Finally, the backpack and shoulder pads feature a perfect gun-metal finish.

And that brings us to the head sculpt and it’s a doozy! Deathlok features the classic half-zombie, half-machine look, with smooth silver cybernetic parts contrasting beautifully with the beef-jerky texturing of his rotten head. It’s a pretty damn grim portrait to be hanging in the kids toy aisle at Target, but I love it. You get a missing nose, puckered skin surrounding a down-turned mouth, and a really gross wash that looks a lot like rotting flesh. Hey, at least his right ear appears to have been well preserved! Meanwhile, the partial cybernetic parts are practically featureless and that really drives home the contrast between old meat and new tech. I’d be hard pressed to choose between this portrait and the one that Hasbro did for the 4-inch version, as they’re both excellent, although this larger noggin does allow for more detail.

Deathlok has articulation in spades, and while there’s a very slight gummy quality to his knee hinges, it’s not something I’m getting too upset over. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, swivels in the biceps, and double hinges in the elbows. I should point out that the muscle sculpting doesn’t allow for the degree of elbow flex that I’m used to seeing in my Legends figures, but I’ll give it a pass. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have double hinges in the knees, swivels at the thighs and tops of the boots, and both hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. The torso has a torso swivel, an ab-crunch hinge, and the neck is both hinged and ball jointed. Ever since I opened him, I’m having a hard time putting Deathlok down.

Deathlok comes with two weapons, the first is his pistol, which fits comfortably in the loop-style holster on his right hip and features quite a beefy design. It includes a scope mounted on what looks like a sliding rail, although it’s not articulated. There’s also a long magazine protruding from the grip, and no it’s not removable. In addition to various cut lines and details, the pistol has a bit of silver wash to make it look well weathered. I’m not usually a big fan of having just loops as holsters, but in this case the gun draws really easily, so this would be a good exception to my rule.

Secondly, Deathlok comes with this big mother of a three-barreled gatling gun and belt of ammunition that can slot into either the top or bottom. It’s an impressive looking piece of weaponry, but it can be a little awkward for him to hold, since there’s no obvious place for him to support it with his right hand. But maybe that was intentional, since he can wield it with just his one cybernetic arm, and he looks like a badass doing it. Oh yeah, it also looks like the shrouded part houses missiles. I can’t let Deadpool see this thing. He’ll just go nuts with rage and jealousy.

The Sasquatch Wave has been firing on all cylinders for me. Despite picking on Deadpool for his lack of accessories, every figure I’ve opened in this assortment so far has been something special. So when I say, Deathlok ranks high up there as one of my favorites in this wave, it’s really saying something. In fact, he’s probably tied with Cable as my favorites. This figure is a beautifully colored, features a fantastic sculpt, and some great weapons. You can usually judge how much I love a new figure by how long it gets to stay on my desk, and I gotta tell you, Deathlok is probably going to be here on the desk for quite a while.

Jun 18 2018

Marvel Legends (Sandman Wave): Spider-Man 2099 by Hasbro

It’s another Marvel Monday, folks, and this marks the beginning of the third and final week of my Trifecta of Hell Weeks at work. Don’t ask. Just don’t. Hopefully after this week I can relax for a short bit, but I have another one brewing on the horizon. But it’s all good because work pays for toys and video games and those are the things that keep me going. Besides, there’s nothing that helps assuage the dawning of a new week of horrors than opening up a new Marvel Legends figure. Of course, new is a relative term, because today I’m sticking with the Sandman Wave, which I believe was released last year, if not the year before it. OMG, I’M SO FAR BEHIND!!!

As someone who is taking a sabbatical from Marvel Comics these days (until they get better), this costume is totally unfamiliar to me. Indeed, the last time I encountered Miguel O’Hara in my funnybooks was when he appeared in the pages of Superior Spider-Man and Spider-Verse and on both occasions he was still wearing the old suit. As I understand it, this is Miguel’s contemporary look.

And if there’s one area where Marvel Comics and I don’t have a quarrel it’s with the new costume designs. Don’t get me wrong, I still prefer Miguel’s old look, but this is still a pretty spiffy update that I happen to like a lot. The dark blue and metallic red have been replaced with black, white, and… metallic red! The matte black and white contrasts beautifully with each other and the red gives the figure a nice, futuristic pop. The design on the chest is pretty busy and a very abstract re-imagining of the old costume’s skull emblem. but it also has more of a spider-legs flavor to it, which I like. Mmm… spider legs flavor. Miguel also has a few blue bars on his feet and shoulders.

Overall, the paint on my figure is pretty good. The white is bright and doesn’t suffer from any noticeable bleed through from the black plastic. The lines are also quite crisp, especially between the red and white. I did have a little smudge of red paint on my figure’s left shoulder hinge, but I was able to chip most of it off with my fingernail. I’m a little concerned that the paint will rub in the shoulder hinges, but then I don’t tend to repose my figures a lot, so I should be OK. I’ll note that the lower elbow pins are not painted to match the surrounding white, and while I know that really pisses off some collectors, I can’t say as it bothers me much.

Miguel’s makeover may have left out the web cape, but the blades on the forearms are still there. I like how they seem to protrude from the red striping. It would have been nice if Hasbro could have painted them metallic red to match better, but they still look neat.

The new mask is the one aspect of the costume that has the strongest connection to the older one. It retains that minimalist, and just a little creepy, futuristic flavor. I dig it a lot!

The articulation is right in line with other recent Spider-Man figures. And yes, as already mentioned, he has the additional shoulder crunches, which is always a treat. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, double hinges in the elbows, and swivels in the biceps. The legs have ball joints at the hips, swivels in the thighs and lower legs, double hinges in the knees, and both hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. The torso sports a swivel at the waist and an ab-crunch hinge below the chest, and the neck is both hinged and ball jointed. The joints on this guy feel great and he is loads of fun to play with.

For now, this version of Spider-Man 2099 is more like a concept figure to me. I doubt I’ll ever get around to reading this run of comics and who knows how long they’ll keep this look for him. With that being said, this figure was an absolute bitch for me to find. It seems like I’ve been saying that a lot lately. To this day I’ve never seen him at retail, and even my usual source for Marvel Legends, Amazon was selling him for upwards of $35. A friend of mine came across a second one in her neck of the woods and hooked me up, and for that I am eternally grateful. And now I only have two more figures to open before I can build my Sandman, but next week I’ll likely be flipping over to another wave, because the Wheel of Marvel Legends can be a fickle bitch.

Jun 11 2018

Marvel Legends (Sandman Wave): Jackal by Hasbro

After jumping ahead for a few weeks, I’m dialing it back to the Sandman Wave of Marvel Legends! This is probably the longest its ever taken me to review a wave, and since I’ve already looked at Ms. Marvel, Shocker, and Symbiot Suit Spidey, today’s review puts me about halfway toward the goal of finally building my Sandman BAF. Today I decided to open up Jackal, because… well, I had to eventually… I guess.

And yup, here he is. If nothing else, The Jackal can boast a long history. He’s been a part of Spider-Man in one way or another since before I started reading the comic, and that’s saying something, because I’m very old! With that being said, the character has never appealed all that much to me. His back story is pretty goddamned lame and the less said about The Clone Saga the better. And yet, I still can’t resist adding another Spidey villain to my shelf, so let’s open him up and have a look!

Well, in fairness this is a great looking figure. It’s based off the classic look for Miles Warren, As I understand these days The Jackal is wearing a suit and an Anubis mask. Anyway, the sculping here is quite good and features some great muscle tone and detailed fur covering most of the body. In fact, I’d say it’s almost too good. If you handed this figure to a non-fan, they’d just think he was some kind of monster. I think a few minor nods to this being a suit would have been damn cool. No, you really can’t tell it is in the comic art either, but maybe a little subtle stitching here and there. I guess I can pretend that the plastic seams on his legs are seams in the suit. Either way, in addition to the sculpted detail, there are some nice color variations in the chest and forearms, and both the claws and toenails are painted white. Wrap it all up with a pair of blue shorts and I’m very pleased with how this guy came out.

The head sculpt is also excellent. This is one of those portraits where you can tell they had fun with it. The contours of the face and the jawline are well defined, the sharp nose has a little crinkle in the bridge, and I love those Gremlins-esque ears. The pink inside even shows off some of the half-tone printing that Hasbro has been using lately. Finally, the piercing yellow eyes with dark outlines, and the full rictus grin of teeth both add to the wonderful personality on display here. This is some fantastic work.

I also really dig how big they made his claws. I mean, they aren’t like Anti-Venom huge, but they’re still some sizeable meat hooks that look even bigger because of his smallish body.

The articulation here is standard stuff with rotating hinges in the shoulders and wrists, and ball joints in hips, but the figure’s build does allow a wide range of motion in those double hinged elbows and knees. The ankles have both hinges and lateral rockers, there are swivels in the biceps, thighs, and waist, an ab-crunch hinge below the chest and both a hinge and ball joint in the neck. I think this figure would have really benefitted from the added shoulder crunches we usually get on the Spider-Man figures, but that might have been more than Hasbro wanted to invest in this character.

The Jackal is one of those figures that is all about the Universe building for me. I want as many characters on my Marvel shelves as possible, and yes that even includes the ones that I really don’t give a crap about. Maybe I’m being too hard on him. Maybe I should re-read some of the books he’s in, just not any of that Clone Saga crap. Either way, Jackal is a damn fine figure and the great thing about a line like Marvel Legends is that while I may not be excited about this one, I’m sure there are fans out there jumping for joy. And I’ve been on the other side of that situation plenty of times, so I say Good on you, Jackal fans. Enjoy!

Jun 4 2018

Marvel Legends (Sasquatch Wave): Cable by Hasbro

Hello, Toyhounds, and welcome to another installment of Marvel Monday. The day where I try to ease the pain of the worst day of the week by opening up a new Marvel Legends figure. I know, I’m supposed to be randomizing my Marvel Legends reviews, but this time I’m sticking with the Sasquatch Wave because after lamenting Deadpool’s lack of accessories last week, now I think I found where they all went. Let’s take a look at Cable!

Of course, the politics of business are keeping us from getting figures based on Deadpool 2, but that hasn’t stopped Hasbro from cashing in with another wave of comic-inspired Deadpool figures. You may remember that we got a more modern version of Cable back in the Juggernaut Wave, but now Hasbro’s coming at us with a more classic version and I couldn’t be happier!

Cable may be from the future, but this figure looks like he jumped straight out of the comic panels of the past! The same pages that I used to flip through in college while waiting for class to start. Ah, the 90’s! I was an adult off on my own for the first time and yet clinging to the youth I left behind me with comics. As you can see, Cable is a beast of a figure, thanks in part to the large buck, but even more so to the ridiculously (I mean that in a good way) bulky gear that’s strapped to him. Most of that stuff is on his torso, but that doesn’t mean Hasbro skimped on him below the belt. The boots alone feature some wonderful attention to detail from the sculpted laces, and all the little lines of stitching to the thick treaded soles. Cable’s trousers also include sculpted knee pads and of course a brace of pouches strapped to each of his thighs. They even sculpted in his back pockets.

Cable sports a heavy-duty belt with a great weathered leather look to it, and guess what? More pouches!!! They come in all different sizes, flanking the manly and industrial looking belt-buckle. His blue shirt is dominated by the two gigantic shoulder pads and straps. The shoulder pads are sculpted in brown plastic and have a padded look, while the straps themselves are green with more pouches front and back. Seriously, how does he even get to those ones on his back? His right shoulder pad features a strap of grenade rounds, each painted gold, and the left strap has a row of brown leather pouches that look like they’re probably for extra magazines. If he were a videogame boss, these would be the targets to aim for! His hands feature large gauntlets and his mechanical left arm has a nice coat of metallic silver paint.

The portrait here is killer. Cable features a shock of white hair, which is molded separately from the head to give it that extra little bit of dimension. His teeth are clenched in his best patented Cable Battle Grimace™ his right eye is pupil-less and scarred and his left eye has an effect part to show it shining. I was not sure how well that eye piece was going to work for me in person, but now that I have the figure, I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. It’s just perfect. Of course, Cable is also sporting the giant communication device attached to the left side of his head and he also has the high padded collar with that giant X-branded travel pillow hanging off of it.

Now, as it is there’s enough extra plastic and tooling here to put a strain on the cost of this wave, but I haven’t even got to the extras yet, and as I said earlier, this is probably where all of Deadpool’s guns went. For starters, Cable comes with his stupid-big pulse rifle. This thing is so obnoxious and ridiculous that he can’t even fit the stock against the inside of his shoulder. I mean, this figure ain’t no wimp and the gun is still too big for him. Keep in mind, that isn’t a complaint, because this gun is a celebration of everything that was EXTREME about 90’s comics.

So, yeah… the pulse rifle is just a big hunk of sci-fi killing hardware. It’s cast in a dark blue plastic and has some nice detailing on it, as well as some sculpted scrapes. The hand grip and trigger guard look almost comically small compared to the rest of the weapon, and the shoulder stock is just a massive slab of plastic. It also has a hole on the side so it can peg onto Cable’s back for carrying.

If the Giga-Pulse Rifle is a little too overstated for your tastes, Cable comes with two smaller weapons, both of which are designed with a nice sci-fi flare, but still manage to keep a bit of realistic flavor. The first is kind of like a gatling-handgun. It’s not a petite gun by any means, but he can wield it a lot more comfortably than the rifle.

The next weapon in Cable’s arsenal is a double-barreled handgun. I really dig the design on this one, as the back half looks a bit like the old 19th century black powder pistols. I’m not sure if Hasbro got these ideas from any particular comic, but if they’re original designs my hats off to them, because they’re both pretty cool. Cable also has a loop on his belt that works like a cross-draw holster for this gun, but it’s the most awkward holster I’ve ever seen. Maybe it’s not the holster, but just how bulky Cable is with all his gear. It looks like it would be hard to draw the weapon when the shit hits the fan. Still, at least with this holster, the back peg for the rifle and one free gun hand, Cable is capable of carrying all his weapons at once. Which brings me to one nitpick. I really wish they had given him a gun-holding left hand instead of the open hand.

Oh yeah… the articulation here holds no surprises. The arms have rotating hinges at the shoulders and wrists, double-hinged elbows, and swivels in the biceps. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have double-hinged knees, and swivels in the thighs and tops of the boots. The ankles have both hinges and lateral rockers. The torso has a waist swivel and an ab crunch hinge, while the neck is both hinged and ball jointed. Of course, despite all the usual points, Cable’s bulk and extra gear makes him a little less agile than your average Legends figure. Indeed, he feels more like a Masters of the Universe figure, but I still find him to be loads of fun to play with.

Next to Domino, Cable was my most anticipated figure in this wave and I have to say he does not disappoint. The sculpt is fantastic and the weapons are plentiful. Sorry, Deadpool, but it looks like Cable got all your extras. Now, I will admit that I would have been just as happy if Hasbro had given us his blue-and-yellow costume, like we got in the 4-inch Marvel Universe line, but here’s hoping that Hasbro delivers that one at some point down the road. In the meantime, I promise next week to detour out of the Sasquatch Wave and hit one of the others that I’m woefully behind on.

May 28 2018

Marvel Legends (Sasquatch Wave): Deadpool by Hasbro

It’s a crazy summer for movies. It seemed like Infinity War was just pushed out by Deadpool 2, and now it’s already getting brushed aside with the release of Solo last week, but I’m still riding high from the great time that El-Poolio’s sequel delivered and I’m anxious to see it again while it’s in theaters. Alas, because of toy-movie-comic-business-politics, Hasbro won’t be including any Deadpool 2 movie-based figures in the Legends line, but we did get a wave of Deadpool-inspired comic book figures and today I’m here to check out the chimichanga-muchin-mo-fo himself, Deadpool. Who? DEADPOOL!!! Can I hear it one more time? Nope, we did that last time. I’m not doing it again. We actually get two versions of the Merc With A Mouth in this wave, both X-Force and regular flavor, and today I’m checking out Redpool.

What the shit-balls is this? Look at how empty the tray is! The last Legends Deadpool came so packed with extras that they couldn’t even fit a BAF part in there. And they didn’t bother with one here either. Yeah, I know, it’s because he’s Deadpool and everyone is going to buy him anyway, but at least the last time I didn’t miss it amidst all the cool accessories. When I first saw this package, I practically did a double-take because the tray is so vacant. I almost thought one of those scalper assholes raided the cookie jar and took all his weapons. Cripes, what a bummer. I wonder if the figure is any good?

Lucikly the figure itself is excellent. The Juggernaut Wave Deadpool (see link above) gave us a more modern take, whereas this version takes us back a bit. Everything about it looks more clean and classic. Gone are the armor pieces on the arms and legs in in their place we get a more streamlined bodysuit, with a red-and-black mix that favors the red. The bulk of the costume is achieved through black paint and some beautiful red plastic that looks like it popped straight out of the comic panels. You also get a good deal of added parts, which include black cuffs for the wrists and ankles, a ring of pouches on his right thigh, a ring of pouches on his belt, a shoulder strap, and the rig of crossed scabbards to store his swords on his back.

I will concede that the added pieces could have used some colors. The belt pouches are left red, which does give him a more streamlined look, but I think these would have been better brown, as would the pouches on his thigh. They did, however, do a nice job painting in the emblem on his beltbuckle, and the buckles on his shoulder rig are neatly painted silver, so it’s not like Hasbro didn’t try. The sculpted detail on these pieces is quite nice, as all the pouches have their little flaps and buttons, and the shoulder straps are studded with tiny sculpted rivets. Again, this is a great looking figure, and I’ll concede that my minor gripes with the coloring of his gear is just my personal preference.

While the last Deadpool came with two heads, masked and unmasked, I’ve already established that this package includes the bare minimum, so we gotta make due with just the one masked head. Hasbro went with a much more serious, kick-ass expression here, and that works for me. The black eye cut-outs are actually part of the sculpt, and there’s some nice wrinkling inbetween the eyes to show Deadpool is not happy about something. Instead of the comical one eye-popped, this Deadpool is kind of squinting as if he’s about to issue a serious beatdown. Or maybe he’s mad because someone took away all his guns.

Deadpool features the lateral shoulder crunches in the torso, which was a very pleasant surprise. Otherwise, the articulation is pretty standard stuff for a modern Legends figure. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have swivels in both the thighs and lower legs, double-hinges in the knees, and both hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. The arms have rotating hinges at the shoulders and wrists, double-hinges in the elbows, and swivels in the biceps. The torso has an ab-crunch hinge, a swivel at the waist, and the head is both ball jointed and hinged. This is very fun figure to play around with, and I imagine he’ll be hanging out on my desk for quite a while.

Here’s a shot of Deadpool not holding the pistol that he does not come with in his right hand, which is clearly sculpted to hold a gun, and even has a trigger finger for said gun. In case you missed it earlier, there’s no gun. It is absolutely impossible for me to overstate how ridiculous it is that Hasbro couldn’t have taken one of the dozens of pistols they’ve used for this line and tossed it into this goddamn package. Yes, I have plenty of guns that I can give him, but the omission of a simple handgun just reeks of cheapness and penny-pinching. I mean, OK, so a full arsenal of guns didn’t cost out? Fine, whatever. Give him a goddamn pistol!!! Legends is rarely stingy on the accessories, so on those few occasions when they are, it stands out like a sore thumb.

Deadpool does at least come with his swords, but I can’t say as I’m all that happy with these. I’m certainly no expert on Japanese swords, and I’ll grant you that Deadpool’s swords have changed a bit over the years, but I’m not a fan of these shorter straight blades. The long katanas we got with the last Deadpool were more to my liking.

I’m not going to harp on it too much, because they fit well in the scabbard and they did a nice job sculpting and painting the hilts. The blades are left bare gray plastic and would have certainly benefited from some metalic silver paint, but whatever. He’s definitely fun to pose with them in his hands, but ultimately they still feel a bit underwhelming to me.

And so, I’m in a weird place with this figure. The figure itself is excellent and loads of fun, but I’ll say it again for the umpteenth time: I’m beyond disappointed by the lack of extras. I’ll admit that Hasbro went above and beyond with the Deadpool from the Juggernaut Wave, and they can’t do that with every figure, but there’s a chasm between what we got with that figure and what we got with this one. In the end, I’m probably going to go back and take the weapons away from the 2012 X-Force Deadpool (since that figure has not aged well, and he’s getting replaced in this wave anyway), and give those guns to this figure. It’s not like I don’t have enough extra armaments for him, but it’s the principle of the matter.