After meandering about with some one-offs, multipacks, and a statue, I’m headed back into opening a new wave of Marvel Legends. Well, not really a new wave, but new to me. Counting today, there are only three Marvel Mondays left in the year, so I doubt I’ll get through all these figures before the end, but let’s see how far we can get. I’m kicking off The Controller Wave with a look at Madame Hydra, a do-over of a character that was released all the way back in Wave 2, about ten years ago!
Here’s the packaging, and it’s nice to see this window, because I’ve had some bad luck with Hasbro’s new fully enclosed boxed figures. But more on that at a later date. Here we get Madame Hydra surrounded by her accessories and a big chonky leg for The Controller BAF. Let’s tear this box open and dig right in.
So, straightaway, this isn’t a huge departure from the character design we saw in the first release. She’s still wearing the green body suit, but here her boots are painted on as a brighter green, instead of a metallic olive. I approve of the color change, as it really makes this figure pop! Her gloves are painted instead of sculpted, which is a bit of a step down, although you do get a sculpted ring around the biceps where they end. I do miss the zipper and pull on the previous figure’s top, as its absence here also feels like a little bit of a downgrade. Although, if you’re looking for a cleaner comic look, this one may be the favorite. The proportions here look a lot better, although that’s pretty much all thanks to the legs, which are less spindly and no longer have those terrible looking ball joint hips.
The sculpted belt is all new, and cast in bright green to match the boots. It’s a criss-crossed double-gun belt with a functional holster on each hip. The buckles and snaps are painted gold, and there’s a really nice Hydra insignia stamped in gold on each holster. I really dig this belt!
The portrait on the first release was a huge bone of contention with collectors, as being really angular and ugly. This one is technically an improvement as it has a much more traditional rounded face, but there’s something about it that’s just not selling it to me. The mouth seems a bit weird, like it’s too close to the nose. That may be caused by the heavy handed green lipstick. The eyes are OK, and have some decent green eyeshadow. The hair is very chunky and is sculpted so as to partially cover the right part of her face. It looks fine, but it’s a real pain when trying to get her to turn her head. To be honest, I was never too bothered by the previous portrait, as it certainly looked villainous, albeit downright ugly. I’d say this one is still an improvement, but maybe not as much as I would have hoped.
Even after ten years, the articulation here is pretty much the same as what we saw in Madame Hydra V1. In fact, the only real difference is the previously mentioned hips. I’ll forever be thankful Hasbro jettisoned that design, even though it doesn’t make a huge difference in range of motion, the current hip joints are easier to work with and look so much better. This Madame Hydra seems to have a little bit more range of motion in the elbows, but since they’re still rotating hinges, she can only manage about a 90-degree bend. Otherwise the figure sports some pretty solid articulation, even if it hasn’t changed much over the course of a decade.
Madame Hydra comes with two sets of hands: Fists and gun-toting hands, and she also comes with a pair of matched Lugar-style pistols. These are amazing little guns, with some excellent detail in the sculpts and some beautifully painted grips, which have something like a snakeskin pattern. The previous figure came with a similar pistol design, but it was really oversized. She also came with a rifle, while this new release does not.
In the end, I do like this figure a lot better than the first release of Madame Hydra, and I’ll certainly be retiring my old figure in favor of this one. The few gripes I have here are pretty little nit-picks and the good far outweighs the bad. And yes, Wave 2 Madame Hydra did have to surrender her rifle to this new version, because she won’t be needing it while she’s rattling around at the bottom of a storage tote in the back of a closet. This was a solid figure to start out the wave with, and if the rest of the assortment can keep it going, I should be in for a treat!
While this is the first time these are appearing here on FFZ, I have been collecting the Retro Carded Fantastic Four figures since they first started hitting the toy aisles. But, since I originally set out to collect these mint-on-card, I haven’t actually reviewed any. Well, now that these are turning up on the cheap at some online retailers, I have been buying doubles to open. I don’t know that I’ll get a complete second set, but for now I thought I’d open up two of the baddies of the assortment: Psycho-Man and The High Evolutionary!
Oh, I do love me this packaging! You get the beautiful Fantastic Four logo at the top with the team depicted just below the 4. The large bubble showcases the figure and also has some personalized character art at the bottom of the bubble. The card is made of decently hefty stock, so as not to easily bend or tear, making them perfect for mint-on-card collectors. I got this set from Amazon and even with their firm belief in using zero packing materials whenever possible, they arrived in great shape. The cards also featire both a J-hook and a balanced bottom surface, so these beauties are at home either hanging on the wall or standing on a shelf. Let’s start with Psycho-Man!
Encased in his suit of armor, the microscopic Psycho-Man features a deliciously distinctive character design that manages to be retro and yet still pretty fresh. The white suit consists of heavy rumpled leggings and stocky boots, which look like they’re straight off an Apollo Astronaut. These are encased in a framework of metallic green rods and rings. His torso is clad in a white sculpted tunic, with a partial green-paneled belt, a green gorget, and green gloves that run all the way up to his armpits! The simple deco looks amazing thanks to the beautiful metallic green paint contrasting with the bright white. It’s all so delightfully Kirby, no wonder I freaking love it! Alas, there’s a little bit of rubbing on the green paint at the bottom back of my figure’s tunic, but better there than in the front, I guess.
When it comes to Psycho-Man’s portrait, it’s hard not to be reminded of one of Kirby’s major DC creations, and I am of course referring to Darkseid. I think it’s the way the face is nestled in that hood, and the harsh contours of the face. The gold brings the only reprieve from all that green and white, with almost circuit-like lines protruding down his forehead. The two pupil-less white eyes gaze straight through my soul, and he looks decidedly displeased. It’s wonderful!
Despite the chonks of his armored suit, Psycho-Man sports the usual Legends articulation. Granted, you don’t have quite the same range of motion in the elbows and knees as you might with the leaner figures, but it’s still not bad. The tunic does impede the hip articulation ever so slightly, but the framework on his legs do not, which is pretty impressive. It’s worth noting that some of the joints are built on hinged pegs, which I found a bit odd. Maybe he was originally designed to be a Build-A-Figure.
You get one accessory with Psycho-Man, and that’s his Control Box. It’s a pretty simple sculpt, but a nice looking piece of kit, with the emotions, HATE, DOUBT, and FEAR clearly labeled on it. His right hand is sort of designed to hold it, but it’s a little snug. OK, let’s move on to The High Evolutionary!
Another banger of a Kirby villain with a batshit crazy past, The High Evolutionary really transcends The Fantastic Four, but it’s still nice to get him in this style packaging. Wyndham comes sporting his silver exo-suit, which is characterized by tight horizontal ribbing and some fine muscle tone. He has bright crimson gauntlets and boots, and a matching tunic and sash with a wide and spiffy belt, all decked out in silver studs and some pointed shoulders to look extra imposing. I do like the subtle variety found in the matte plastic used for the tunic and the glossy stuff used for the boots, but I’m not fond of the creases we get from the molding process with this particular plastic. Still, overall this guy looks great!
The head sculpt is solid, but is ultimately let down by the quality of this plastic. It does have a nice glossy sheen, but it doesn’t hold the sculpted details very well. As a result all those lovely panel lines just end up looking rather soft. We also get some more of the molding creases. On the plus side, the yellow eyes look decent, and I love the silver painted panels on the top of his head and the cut-outs in his mohawk. The close ups hot here also shows off some of those unfortunate creases in the tunic’s plastic. It’s certainly not as bad to the naked eye when you’re just holding the figure in hand, but it still somewhat mars what would otherwise be a gorgeous figure.
And as long as I’m piling on the criticism of the plastic, the jointing in the knees and elbows here is kind of mushy. Otherwise, the articulation is solid, and the slits on the sides of the sash help to not inhibit the hip articulation too badly. Herb does not come with any accessories, but he does have an extra pair of hands, giving him one set of fists and one set of open relaxed hands. He actually comes out of the package with one of each equipped.
I really dig both of these figures a lot! The coloring on this pair is gorgeous, and I’m very excited to add them to my Legends lineup. I think Psycho-Man comes out on top among the two, and that’s partly because I love his design so much and partly because Hasbro did such a fine job with it. It may sound like I came down pretty heard on The High Evolutionary, but even with his flaws, he’s not a bad figure, and one that I have had on my Legends Wanted List for a long while now. Both of these fellas are available right now for pretty cheap through some of the big online retailers, and I’m glad I was able to get doubles to open!
Welcome to another Marvel Monday! I’m still meandering about and having a look at some one-offs and multipacks before starting in on a new wave of Marvel Legends. This week, I thought I’d keep the X-Men love rolling along with a look at the Deluxe Mojo release. So grab your favorite carbonated beverage, have a seat, and whatever you do, don’t touch that dial! We don’t want to tank the ratings!
I love Mojo! Or to be more accurate, I love all the backstory that surrounds him and the Mojoverse. It’s just the kind of batshit crazy sci-fi and on-the-nose satire that I love to find in my funnybooks! So naturally I was excited to the Grand Poobah of The Spineless Ones drop into the new Marvel Legends! This is the regular retail release of Mojo, but it was preceded by a multipack, which I believe Hasbro was calling an SDCC Exclusive. That set came with Longshot, Dazzler, and a Baby Wolverine. I was close to pulling the trigger on that release, but the Dazzler looked a lot like the retro-packaged release I already have, the Wolvie wasn’t really impressive, and I decided to just gamble on Longshot getting a release later on down the road, because… C’MON, HASBRO, YOU HAVE TO!!! Honestly, if it had included Spiral, I probably would have jumped at it, but now we know we’re getting her as a retro-carded release. Anyway… Mojo comes in a fully enclosed box with all his pieces wrapped in tissue paper. Yes, there is assembly required on this one, making me wonder if he wasn’t originally designed to be a BAF, like the old Toybiz version. The upper body and belly come in two pieces, the chair is three pieces, and you get two heads, two cables, and two sets of hands. Actually, a couple of the pieces are pretty large, so I doubt it really would have worked as a Build-A-Figure. Well, let’s slap this slug together and see what he’s all about!
First impressions? Mojo is a big, satisfying figure, but the sculpt is a mixed bag and Mojo himself looks really bland and in desperate need of more paint apps. Where’s the sickly slime? Where are the bumps and pustules? It’s just a lot of smooth skin. Couldn’t even paint them nipples, Hasbro? All in all, the deco is so simple, he looks more like an animated version. Actually scratch that, because I re-watched Mojoverse from the X-Men animated series while I was opening him, and the cartoon version really had more detail than this figure. The deco comes up especially short when compared to the delightfully gross look of the old Toybiz Legends release. You get a little bit of reddish shading around the bottom edge where his body meets the chair, and a little more around the shoulders and elbows, but that’s really it. What a shame!
The chair, on the other hand features some pretty nice detail, even if it is mostly just left as bare gray plastic. A little wash would have been nice, but all we get is some blue and red paint hits for some of the simulated lights I really dig the exposed nest of wires at the back of the chair, and the rather gross machine elements that intrude their way into Mojo’s flesh on the sides. It’s also cool how his skin is pressed in where the clamps secure him to the chair. The chair rests on four clear plastic bumps to give it the illusion that the spider legs are holding it up. Each of the legs are articulated with rotating hinges where they meet the body and at two other points, but they clearly aren’t up to the task of supporting the weight of Mojo and the chair. And that’s fine, the effect still looks good. You also get two grabber arms coming out of the front with the same rotating hinges to pose them. One has a partially closed claw, which is good for grabbing onto X-Men arms and legs, while the other is open. The hoses that connect to the back of the chair and into Mojo’s shoulders hold fairly well, but they did pop out a few times when I was posing him. The scorpion-like tail that arches up over the chair with its brace of weapons is rigid and not poseable.
The two portraits are pretty good. I especially like the detail in the cybernetic hair and all the little probes and wires coming down to hold his eyes open. This first head is my favorite of the two, as it has his mouth open and his tongue licking out between his agape jaws. It’s an excellent sculpt, and while the paint here is a little better than the rest of the body, I still feel like it needed more. There’s a splash of gloss around the mouth to give it a bit of slimy look, but the figure needed a lot more of that to keep it from looking so flat. The tongue and teeth really could have used a gloss coat too. The few scattered pimples on his neck, just serve to remind me how little else there is in the way of body detail.
The second head just features a big toothy, dementated grin. It’s still an excellent sculpt, but let down a little by the sloppy paint lines between gums and teeth. Everything else here is just as good as the first head, but I doubt I’ll display this one much at all. The other one is just so much more dynamic and expressive. I should note that I found it exceedingly difficult to get this head onto the ball joint. I had to use a lot of force to get it on, which is all the more reason for me not to swap them out very often.
Mojo’s articulation includes rotating hinges in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps. double hinges in the elbows, and pegged hinges in the wrists. You get two sets of hands, one are sort of open-grabby hands, the other set includes a right pointing hand, and a somewhat closed grasp that can be used to hold a figure. The upper body is on a ball jointed stalk, and the neck is set on a kind of dog bone ball joint. He attaches to the chair via three pegs, a strong central one and two smaller ones, so he is incapable of turning his body in the chair. Overall, I have no gripes with the articulation. He can do pretty much everything I want him to.
In the end, I like this figure a lot, but I don’t love it. At $55, there’s a lot of plastic here, two excellent portraits, and a lot of good articulation. But the paint apps are severely lacking. I’m totally fine with the chair, but Mojo himself needed some more detail in the body. Ideally, I would have liked to see more sculpted detail, but I really think that a decent paint job alone could have remedied the blandness that I’m seeing. It’s worth noting that the SDCC Exclusive got a bit more paint on the body, and that would really piss me off if it wasn’t executed in such a half-assed manner. The SDCC deco basically just amounts to some gray spots, and I’m it’s kind of a toss up to me, whether it actually looks better or worse than this retail release. In terms of larger Deluxe figures, this one is passable, but not nearly as impressive as the MODOK release.
I’m between waves of Marvel Legends, and I’ve given more than enough time to HasLab Galactus, so I thought I’d knock out a look at some of the multi-packs and one-off Legends releases populating my backlog. I do have a couple of new waves to get to soon, as I did finally decide to complete The Controller Wave and The Bonebreaker Wave, so I’ll likely be jumping into one of those in December. Today, let’s have a look at this wonderful Excalibur three-pack, featuring Meggan, Shadowcat and Captain Britain… oh, and Lockheed too!
I was pretty damn excited when this set got revealed, but it finally shipped and arrived right before I was preparing to move, so it got lost in the shuffle, and I found it in a box after I was moved and unpacking. So, don’t misconstrue the fact that I’m only getting around to opening it now as any kind of disinterest. Indeed, I remember talking in the Comments Section of the last Legends Captain Britain review about how cool it would be to finally get Meggan in this line. And holy shit, that was almost six years ago! The window box is colorful and shows off the figure well, even if some of the character art doesn’t reflect the actual versions of the costumes in the box. Either way, the presentation looks so good, I will be returning to the package for display after I’m done! Let’s start with Captain Britain!
Rule Britannia! As mentioned, we last saw Captain Britain in Legends as part of the Abomination Wave back in 2017. It was a different costume, and I’m still a bit torn on which one I dig more. These are both excellent figures, but I’m leaning toward the earlier release just a bit. This costume is a bit cleaner and simpler, with the red, white, and blue pattern confined to his upper body and terminating to all white at the gauntlets and down to the knees. The bold red X on the chest looks nice and sharp, and his blue boots have some cool sculpted flares where they meet the knees. The paint quality here is excellent, but you do get the mismatched red pins showing on the inside of his elbow joints, which is a big bummer to a lot of collectors, but I can’t get too worked up about it.
There are two heads to choose from, with the main difference being the beard. The mask here is more of a hood and cowl, rather than the helmet that we got on the last Brian Braddock figure, and while I find the previous style more familiar, I actually like the look of this hood quite a bit, especially the rather prominent chin guard, and the way his facial features can be seen through the top of the mask. It definitely gave the sculptor a little more to work with. All in all, this is a great portrait!
The bearded head has some issues with the beard itself, where the paint looks like it was rubbed off on the mustache. It also looks like he has crumbs in the beard. It’s definitely a QC fail, but luckily I don’t have any attachment to the bearded Braddock. I’m guessing this is a modern thing, maybe from X-Men Gold? This head will not be getting a lot of display time.
As with his last release, Brian is built on one of the larger Legends bucks, making him an absolute bruiser. You get all the usual points of articulation, and the joints are all solid and strong, making him loads of fun to pose and play with. He also comes with two sets of hands, which include fists and his sword holding hands. And that leads us to…
Excalibur! This is a really nicely sculpted sword with some inlay patterns in the blade, a ribbed black grip, and a disk pommel. I would have really liked to see the blade painted silver to give it a little extra pop, but the bare gray plastic works well enough. The grip is extended to allow for two-handed use, but I think it looks just fine in one hand. OK, let’s move on to Meggan!
Even six years ago, Legends was turning out a lot of varied characters, but I don’t think I ever really expected Meggan to get the figure treatment, but all bets have been off long since then, and now I don’t think character is truly off the table! I dig the more mystical flavor of her powers and I’m always going to love a fellow Doctor Who fan! Meggan uses a pretty standard female buck and gets by with paint for her costume details. The hunter green bodysuit with black deco looks great, and the paint lines are even used to complete the bare shoulder look. Likewise, we get paintwork extending the her anklecuffs down the tops of her feet and between her toes. I think the bare feet are new sculpts, as I can only remember seeing some male figures sans shoes.
The portrait just oozes character… and hair! I think this is the first Marvel Legends figure to actually have dimples, which is a worthwhile achievement for Meggan. Overall, I like her smile and the way it even translates to her eyes, but I suppose a case could be made that the expression straddles that line between delighted and crazy. The flowing copious coif of hair isn’t quite enough to make Medusa jealous, but there is a lot of it. Luckily it hovers up off the shoulders a bit so as not to impede the neck articulation too badly at all. The hair is also positioned so as to showcase her cute pointed ears.
Meggan has the standard female Legends articulation, which means we trade bicep swivels and double hinged elbows for rotating hinges in the elbows. It’s never a good trade, but it is what it is. She does not have any accessories, but she does come with two sets of hands, which includes fists and the mystical spell-slinging splayed-finger hands that we have seen many times over, and they work well with her character. All in all, the joints here feel good, and while her hair is composed of a great deal of plastic, I was surprised at how little difficulty was involved in getting her to stand up… at least in neutral postures. Moving on to our last stop… it’s Shadowcat!
We last saw Kitty Pryde in Legends way back in 2016 as part of the absolutely smashing Juggernaut Wave and wearing her traditional black and yellow X-Men suit. Here we get her as Shadowcat in her Excalibur garb, or at least a fairly close approximation of it. The costume is mostly vibrant blue, with a slightly lighter shade of blue used for her tights and sash. We get some new sculpting here in the poofy-sleeved top, complete with stylish popped collar. We’ve certainly seen the belt sash more than a few times, but it works pretty well for the costume. One thing i am glad to see here is that Shadowcat is a little more reasonably sized than her Kitty Pryde release, which was rather tall.
I am very pleased with the portrait here! She’s pretty and is offering a beaming smile, as if she’s about to tell the readers that some of the content of this issue may be offensive to natives of Alpha Centauri. The mask is part of the face sculpt, which is always nice as it adds a little depth. The hair could have been a bit more curly, but I’m really nitpicking now. The hair rides a little bit over her shoulders, but it still gets in the way of neck articulation a little bit.
Shadowcat’s articulation is right in line with Meggan’s, and yup that means that we get the rotating hinges in the elbows instead of the better articulation that the dudes get. Hasbro appears to be chainging this up a bit with some recent releases, and I’m hoping that they will eventually phase out their terrible practice of articulation discrimination. You get the same two styles of hands here as we saw with Meggan, so fists and splayed finger hands.
Shadowcat comes with Lockheed, and he’s a cool little sculpt cast in soft plastic. The tail is coiled a bit, and I assume that’s intended to wrap around her neck so he can sit on her shoulder, just like the Kitty Pryde figure. Unfortunately, Shadowcat has more hair and less shoulder, so it doesn’t work quite as well. Still, there are some fun ways to display the two.
Wow, is this a wonderful little set! I remember pre-ordering this one the moment it went live, and it’s one of those instances where it paid off. The set sold quite well, and while you can still get a number of the other X-Men multipacks at or below retail, this one seems to be only available now at higher prices on the second-hand market, or sellers are piecing out the individual figures. Yes, there are some costume inconsistencies, but I’m still thrilled to have this trio on my shelf! I am a bit surprised and disappointed that we haven’t had Rachel Summers turn up in a wave since this release, but here’s hoping that happens sooner rather than later.
It took some doing, but I was able to set something up where I could adequately photograph something as big as HasLab’s latest Big Boi and so, having checked out the three Heralds that came with him last week, I’m going to try to tackle Galactus himself. And yes, I realize that I’ve now dedicated three different posts to this guy, so if you’re getting Galactus fatigue, I can promise you this should be the last time. But, hey… It was a long wait to get this guy in hand, and he was stupid expensive, so just humor me this one last time! If you aren’t familiar with the concept of HasLab, it’s basically Hasbro’s own version of Kickstarter. They propose a toy that could not comfortably be sold at retail due to size and price, and if they get enough backers, the project goes through. I have only supported three of these so far. The Mandalorian Razor Crest was the first, and I received that a little while ago. Galactus was the second, and the third is the GI JOE Classified HISS Tank, which will hopefully arrive sometime next year. As a method of selling toys, HasLab has been somewhat polarizing among collectors, with some embracing the idea and others crying that it will invoke the end of reasonably priced toys. As for me? Well, I back what I like and let everyone else enjoy what I don’t. The process has been pretty hit-and-miss for Hasbro, with a number of their projects not reaching their respective goals. Anyway… I’ve shown the box a couple times already, so let’s just jump in and look at the figure!
Measuring in at nearly three feet tall, Galactus comes out of the box mostly assembled. All you have to do is attach the two spires onto his head. These pieces do not appear to be designed to come off again, and I’m not willing to risk trying it, so if I want to put him back in his box, I would have to deep-six the styrofoam tray insert. Also, if you want to enjoy the light show, you’ll need to have a screwdriver handy and install four AAA batteries: Two into a compartment hidden under the top of his helmet, and two more into the compartment hidden at the base of his neck. Yup, even with a $400 price tag, Hasbro couldn’t toss in four generic AAA batteries. I’m of the opinion that they should have not only included the batteries, but probably a screwdriver as well. My first impression of the figure was that it felt very much like an upscaled version of Hasbro’s Masterwork Galactus from the Marvel Universe line… that is until I put the two together and realized just how much more detailed and complex this new version is. Everything about this guy is taken to the next level, and I am mighty pleased with what we got! The sculpt is suitably detailed with some of Galactus’ costume cast in softer plastic and layered onto the figure. Much of the coloring is achieved through colored plastic, but we do get some nice light blue paint hits, which sort of resemble illuminated points that match the actual lights.
I did not back HasLab’s Sentinel figure, but from what I’ve seen it had some issues with the articulation holding up the figure’s bulk. I’m very happy to see that Hasbro addressed those issues with Galactus, as he has some crazy strong ratchets in his knees and hips to keep him upright, and even his ankles are impressively up to the task. I’ve had him standing on display in various poses for over a week now and haven’t had any issues with him toppling over or flopping. I can’t say I’m happy that Sentinel backers had to take the bullet on this issue, but I’m still glad to see the lesson was learned by Hasbro and improvements were made. Remarkably, most of Galactus’ articulation mirrors that of a regular Marvel Legends BAF, and that includes double-hinges in the elbows and knees, full rotating hinges in the shoulders, swivels in the biceps, and up in the thighs, and hinges in the ankles. It’s hard to see what’s going on up there in the torso, but I’m going to guess he has a ball joint in the waist and an ab crunch further up, but whatever the case, the torso articulation seems mostly for adjusting his balance, rather than dynamic posing. The separation of the electronics between the head and torso, means that his neck is articulated, but mostly to turn left and right. I was pretty sure his skirt would inhibit the range of motion in his hips, but it really doesn’t, and the fact that his harness is soft plastic, it doesn’t hurt his torso articulation too badly either. You also get fully articulated fingers, as well as rotating hinges in the wrists. I was sure he didn’t have lateral rockers in the ankles, but eventually I discovered them while playing around with him. The chest and shoulder piece does inhibit his shoulder range a bit, but it’s nothing that really irked me while playing with him.
The head sculpt is dominated by Galactus’ rather elaborate helmet and I am extremely pleased with the way it came out. There’s a lot going on and it looks absolutely smashing! You get three different face plates, which are cast in a soft, rubbery plastic and can be swapped out pretty easily, by just grabbing the nose and giving it a wiggle. The softer plastic works well to give it more of a fleshy appearance, especially when contrasted with the hard plastic of his helmet. I really dig the way the eyes are done, as they are recessed and behind clear plastic lenses. This was probably done to facilitate the lights, but even when not lit, it makes the eyes look so mysterious and more realistic. The default face is a wonderful sculpt, featuring a dour expression, with some excellent detail paid to the lines in the face and texturing of the lips.
The second face is definitely more expressive, and it may be my favorite of the three plates. The sculpting on the exposed teeth is just beyond fantastic, and the snarl really suits him. I’m debating whether or not this one will be the one I primarily display on the figure. This one is definitely the creepier of the two regular faces, but the first one feels more in character to me, and there’s something about the calmer face that makes Galactus seem all the more sinister. Luckily, they are easy to swap out, so I can do it as the mood strikes me!
The final face plate is the half-skull look, which is probably the most impressive sculpt of the three, and it looks like pure nightmare fuel when attached. Still, not really the look I want to go for most of the time, so this one will not be utilized a lot. Yeah, that’s a shame because of the beautiful work that went into it, but it’s not like I’m going to buy an extra Big Boi Galactus just to show off another face. I may be crazy when it comes to toys, but not that crazy! Before checking out the final portrait option, let’s check out the electronics…
Straightaway, it is disappointing to report that Galactus has lights but no sound. Sure, I knew this going in, but I think that somewhere along the way I had forgotten it. I honestly don’t see why they couldn’t have just taken the sound clips from Masterworks Galactus and put them in the big guy, because those are excellent. But at least it gives me reason to keep Galactus Jr. in the collection. Even some kind of start up sound would have been cool. But, with that being said, at least I can report that the lights are beautiful! You get a blue light up effect in the center of his chest, center of his back, the eyes, the helmet, and the two ear pieces and they are all bright enough to show up even in a bright studio environment. They will even pulse from time to time. As someone who is seldom impressed by lights in toys, I have to say that this really looks great. It’s a shame Hasbro couldn’t have included a motion sensor, but that’s no big deal, because activating them is as simple as pressing the circle on his chest. But, not having a mode where the lights will stay on is a strange omission. Indeed, you can’t even seem to turn them off manually, but rather have to wait for the timer to run out.
Oh yeah… Remember that time Doctor Doom transferred his mind into Galactus? Well, you get a Doctor Doom head to sort of recreate that! For me, this really teeters between being unbelievably cool and something I could have done without. I guess I’d need to know what the alternative pack-in could have been if we didn’t get the Doom Head. The sculpt on the mask is pretty good, but the exposed skin inside the eyeholes isn’t terribly convincing. I also don’t like the gaps between the neck and the hood. There are no light features with this head, but the chest and back lights can still be activated with Doom Head attached. All in all, it’s fine, but I can’t see myself ever displaying it on the figure. I’ll likely try to find something that will work as a stand and display it somewhere nearby.
I already checked out the Heralds last week, but here are some shots of them interacting with their Master. As mentioned last time, both Silver Surfer and Nova have effect bases that fit into Galactus’ hands and they work really well at keeping them put for long-term display. Surfer’s connecting part is pretty self-explanatory, whereas Nova’s was a little tougher to figure out and even now I’m not sure I’m using it correctly. Morg doesn’t have anything like that, but I’ll probably just put him at Galactus’ feet along with Cosmic Ghost Rider, Terrax, and Herald Thor.
And before wrapping things up, here are a few comparison shots of Masterwork Galactus with Haslab Galactus. I still like the Masterwork figure a lot, but I can’t deny it looks a little rough and dated compared to the new HasLab Hotness.
Was Haslab Galactus worth the wait and money? For me, the answer is an unequivocal YES! Sure, there are a few things to nitpick here, but not a single one of them has hindered my enjoyment of this toy. This is a gorgeous figure that looks amazing on display and he appears to be extremely well made. I’m not going to lie, at $400, I think his price tag probably should have clocked in at around $50-75 less. It is a direct-to-consumer deal, and while Hasbro still had to throw some money at Disney for licensing, they didn’t have to give retailers a cut, and since these were made to order, there was less risk involved with sell-through. I don’t pretend to know all the economics behind this operation, but I do know when it comes to a giant Galactus figure, my financial judgement cannot be trusted. Hasbro named a price, and I said said, “Let’s do it!” I’m actually looking forward to displaying Mezco’s One:12 Fantastic Four when they finally ship.
It’s Halloween afternoon, and I had hoped to have some special spooky content for today, but that figure in question did not arrive in time, and so we’ll have to raincheck him until later in the week. Instead, we’ll press on with Marvel Monday but still look at something special by tackling the three Heralds of Galactus that came with the HasLab Galactus release! I mean, this set was scary expensive, so that’s sort of in the Halloween spirit. I showed a brief look at Silver Surfer, Frankie Raye, and Morg when I did the unboxing and first impressions last week, and I’ve since had a little time to play around with them. I suppose you can consider this Part I of the overall Galactus Review, because I’m shooting on getting a better look at the Big Guy for next week’s Marvel Monday!
In case you missed it last time, here’s a look at the box, and how the regular sized figures come inside it. They are each resting on a very large clear plastic tray with their accessories and extra bits beside them. Given the cost of this set, a big part of me wishes Hasbro had actually given them individual boxes, but that would have probably made the box even bigger, so I’ll let that slide. Let’s just start from the top and work our way down!
The Silver Surfer was previously released in Marvel Legends as a Walgreens Exclusive. It was a figure that I never did find in the stores, and one that goes for all the monies now. Since I don’t own it, I can’t make a direct comparison, but based on pictures, this one appears to use the same body but has a new head sculpt. And yeah, that kind of makes this bundled figure feel a little less special. Granted, how could they not include him in the box? Even Masterworks Galactus came with a 3 3/4-inch Silver Surfer! Obviously there’s not a whole lot to talk about here, as he’s a generic buck painted all in silver. Ah, but what a beautiful coat of silver he is! The paint on this guy really feels premium and looks great. I also appreciate that they used the extra-articulated body with the lateral crunches in the shoulders.
The new head sculpt looks good, but I do not think it looks as good as the pictures I’ve seen of the Walgreens release. The expression here looks a little more dour, and whether that’s good or not is down to just personal preference, but I think the definition in the face is a lot softer on this version. I would have really liked to get that other head in the box as well.
You get the exact same three sets of hands with this figure as came with the Walgreens release. That includes fists, flat karate chop hands, and splayed fingers that look good for flinging the cosmic powers, or just balancing on his board. Honestly, I don’t think the flat, closed finger hands are necessary. I do, however, really like the effect part he comes with. The purple plastic looks really nice. Of course, it’s something else that we’ve seen before. Many, many times before.
The board is simple and effective. It has a single peg, which holds the figure fairly well. You also get an effect part that doubles as a stand. This piece grips the board snugly and can be stood on its own, or attached to Galactus’ left hand, which we’ll see next week. I like this figure a lot, but it’ll still just be a consolation prize for me not getting the Walgreens release. Maybe someone who has both can tell me otherwise, but I think this is the inferior of the two, albeit still being a decent figure. Moving on to Frankie Raye…
The Human Torch! Nova! Frankie is a most welcome addition to the Marvel Legends line up… so much so that it might have been a bit unfair of Hasbro to lock her away behind this paywall. Like Silver Surfer, Raye gets by with a single colored buck, this time a brilliant gold and it looks marvelous! The body doesn’t feature the same level of muscular detail as Surfer, but it still looks great, and I was very happy to see the double-hinges in the elbows and swivels in the biceps, as opposed to just putting rotating hinges in the elbows.
I absolutely love the head sculpt here, especially the amazing flaming coif, which spreads out behind her. The translucent mix of orange and red plastic really catches the light well, and makes for quite the spectacle.
You get three sets of hands with Frankie, and these include splayed finger hands, fists, and accessory holding hands. And, yes, the accessory holding hands feel unnecessary, since she doesn’t come with anything to hold.
Like surfer, Raye comes with an effect-stand, which is designed to fit into Galactus’ hand, but it also serves as a pretty good base all on its own. There’s a sculpted footprint and peg inside this geyser of plastic flame, to keep her attached with the flames snaking around one of her legs. I love it! OK… Let’s wrap this up with Morg!
Morg The Executioner has the most original sculpting of the three and as such it’s probably no coincidence that he comes with the least extras, and that means no effect parts and no extra hands. You can easily see the give and take with each figure when it comes to cost to produce. The sculpting here, however, is superb. I love the way they sculpted his craggy red flesh, and the spikes protruding from his shoulders and the biceps. His armor is also awesome, with the sleek and organic curves of his wrist bracers and knee guards, which flare out beautifully. The segmented, spiked leg armor looks pretty bitchin too! This is an epic looking figure!
The portrait is excellent! Just look at that fiendish, toothy grin and beady read eyes! But easily my favorite thing here is the way they sculpted his long, flowing white hair.
It’s somewhat ironic that Morg doesn’t come with any extra hands, because Hasbro couldn’t even get the two he does come with right. MY MORG HAS TWO RIGHT HANDS!!! Yeah, you’d think for how much this little package costs, the highly paid toyologists at Hasbro Labs could get a simple left and right hand correct. Hell, I have over 300 Marvel Legends in my collection and not one of them came with two of the same hand. Very disappointing!
Morg does, however, come with his trusty ax, and it’s OK, but nothing special. I do try to keep him away from Nova when he’s holding it. And I suppose since he does have two right hands, that makes him ambidextrous.
And that’s the three Heralds of Galactus. They’re all fine figures, even double-righty Morg is still plenty cool. I stand by what I said about Silver Surfer probably being the lesser of the two when it comes to the Walgreen’s Exclusive release. But seeing as I don’t have that one, I’m happy to have this one in the collection. In the end, I’m going to give Frankie the nod as my favorite of the three. I’m going to do my darndest to get a proper review of Galactus together for the next Marvel Monday and we can look at all these figures together!
If you follow me on Twitter, than you may be aware of what a harrowing three days it was to get HasLab Galactus home. He was supposed to be delivered last Saturday and since there was a signature required, I hung out all morning and all afternoon waiting, only to find that Fed Ex didn’t bother knocking or ringing the bell, but rather just stuck a Sorry We MissedYou note on the door some time around 2pm. Now, that driver must have been a goddam ninja, because I was walking past the front door in anticipation probably five times an hour, and my front door is mostly glass. And there’s no way he could have pulled that off dragging the huge ass Galactus box to the door, so I suspect he just left it on the truck. I grant you 100 points for stealth, Fed Ex Man, and take back 1,000 points for DO YOUR JOB YOU LAZY F*CK!!! Since I wasn’t going to be home the next day to sign, I diverted it to a local hold location where it was supposed to be delivered by end of day. Two days later, I was able to pick it up. And thankfully it just about fit in my backseat. Anyway, here’s the giant box!
The HasLab Campaign ended in August of 2021, so it’s been a little over a year of waiting, which all things considered wasn’t too bad at all. I’m shooting today’s content in my office, guerilla style, because I have no proper staging area that will fit this behemoth and no way to properly light it either. Eventually I hope to fix up a work around for that, but until then, this isn’t really a proper review, but more of an unboxing and first impressions. I do really like how the box turned out. The artwork is both colorful and beautiful. I especially like the mural on the back panel. The front panel not only shows Galactus but also Silver Surfer, Morg, and Frankie Raye. It really feels like we’ve been building toward this, given that the very first wave of modern Marvel Legends featured Terrax as a Build-A-Figure!
Open the box and out comes a giant slab of styrofoam! The big guy slumbers under tissue paper covers, which are wrapped at the bottom to make two adorable booties! Also visible on this side are his two alternate face plates and the full-on Doctor Doom alternate head. The blades of his headpiece are positioned to the right, as are the three Heralds, each with some accessories. The only assembly required is to attach the blades on his head, and sadly it feels like they aren’t meant to come out again, so while the package is collector friendly, Galactus probably isn’t going back into his styrofoam bed again.
You get one slip of instructions, and that’s just to show you how to install the batteries. Yup, $400 and batteries aren’t included. Sons of bitches! I don’t have a fresh set, so I’ll have to pick some up to test out the electronics.
And here he is perched on his very own table! Aesthetically, the body strikes me as being very similar to the Masterworks Galactus and I’ll do some comparison shots when I do a proper review. I’m very pleased with the overall detail and heft of this beast. I also appreciate how heavy his feet are, giving him a nice low center of gravity and making him feel sturdy and balanced. I did not opt in for the Haslab Sentinel, but as I understand it, that figure had some loose legs, which seems to have been corrected here with some decent ratchets.
The head sculpt is phenomenal, with the stock face plate being appropriately dour. He definitely looks hangry. The face plate is soft and rubbery, so you can easily swap it out without having to dismantle any part of the head.
The other two plates include skull face and exposed teeth. These are both pretty terrifying. I’ll likely swap these out for display every couple of weeks or so, but right now I’m leaning with the snarling teeth as my default. I neglected to snap the Doom head, but I’ll leave that for the proper review.
The fingers are all fully articulated, so Galactus is capable of balling up his hands in fists as well as making all sorts of unsavory gestures. I’ve only just started to explore the rest of the articulation and he’s got some great range of motion in the arms. I’m interested to see whether he’ll be able to hold any kind of action poses from the waist down.
Silver Surfer has an effect part which allows him to perch on Galactus’ hand and this is incredibly well designed. The board slides into the top and the bottom is contoured to snugly fit around the open hand. I’ll confess, I am considering displaying him with my 3 3/4-inch Marvel Universe Silver Surfer to give the big guy an even more impressive scale by comparison, but this works so well, I may have to go with this for the regular display.
Frankie also has an effect part that works with Galactus’ hand, this time the right. This piece is a little less intuitive than the other, so I’ll need to experiment with it some more.
And Morg doesn’t get any effect part, but he does get his axe.
By all respects it looks like Hasbro really knocked it out of the park with Galactus. Even the wait didn’t seem that long. This is only my second experience with HasLab, the first being the Razor Crest, but I’m very pleased with the whole experience. Well, not the Fed Ex part, but that’s not Hasbro’s fault. I’ll have to pick up some batteries to power him up and check out the electronics. As of now, I’m planning to check out the three Heralds this coming Monday, and maybe by the following Monday I can get something rigged up to do some better pictures of the Big Boi and give him his due.
It’s another Marvel Monday and I am at the tail end of opening the Spider-Man themed Armadillo Wave! So, let’s put this wave to bed today with a look at the last packaged figure, Miles Morales, and then we’ll cobble together the Armadillo BAF and check him out!
Miles is a GamerVerse figure, and we’ve seen this style of packaging deco before. It has a spiffy white top to set it apart from the regular comic and MCU releases. I believe Miles here is from the follow-up or pseudo-sequel or something to do with the PS4 Spider-Man game. God, I sound so freaking old when talking about video games now. That’s probably because I’ve been spending more time on my Atari consoles than my PS4. And I STILL have not played the PS4 Spider-Man game, but it’s over there on the shelf, waiting to be unwrapped, installed, update my system, update the game, than download the patch, and by then I realize my controller isn’t charged and I go back to playing Dreamcast or NES or anything else that’s more plug-and-play and doesn’t require a 30 hour investment in time. But hey… let’s look open Miles!
Well, this is without a doubt, the best Spidey suit we got in this wave. That may seem like a back-handed compliment, but I really do like this design a lot and Hasbro did a nice job giving it the figure treatment. There’s some very cool texturing on the suit, as well as some sculpted panel lining which makes it feel like it would be right at home as an MCU version. Even the detail on the gloves is excellent! The crimson deco on the chest, back, and shoulders really pops against the black suit and all of it is incorporated into the sculpt. The texturing is bound to mess with the paint application a bit, but here we didn’t do too badly.
You get two head sculpts here, one masked and one unmasked. The masked head is very good with some fairly sharp webbing. There’s a little slop around the white eye lenses of the mask, but you have to punch in pretty close to see it.
The unmasked head is also solid, with just a few things holding it back. I really dig the facial features and I’d say this could work just as well as a comic figure as a video game figure. On the downside, I could have done without the mold line running across the top of the hair. I definitely prefer when Hasbro casts the hair separately and attaches it to the head as opposed to the head and hair being all one piece. Also, the head sits really weird on the neck, like it’s jutting forward too much. It looks a lot better when viewed from dead on and neither of these things are enough to really ruin the figure for me.
The articulation is identical to the previous two Spider-Man figures in this wave, so I won’t go through it all. But, are we going to talk hands again? You betcha! If you’ve checked out my other reviews of this assortment, you know it’s all been about the hands. And Miles FINALLY gives us the crawling hands with the splayed fingers that should have been included with the Integrated Suit Spidey. He also comes with fists and thwippy hands, as well as one more set…
Translucent glowy electro hands! I’m guessing these are supposed to convey his Venom Strike ability in the game? Again, I haven’t played the it, but it sure looks like these are representing a bio-electrical discharge of some sort. I freaking love these! They look really cool on the figure and make for a nice contrast against the black suit.
I didn’t have a lot of interest in Miles going in to this review, but he’s definitely one of the better figures in this assortment. The suit looks great and he’s fun to mess around with. He also gives me the last BAF part I need, so let’s move on to Armadillo.
Armadillo is built from a total of six pieces, scattered across the wave. Technically seven, if you count his removable back piece, but that came attached to the back and not separately. With seven figures in the assortment, you could have skipped the Integrated Suit Spidey and still got all the pieces. Personally, I would have rather skipped Black & Gold Suit Spidey, but I imagine Hasbro was well aware of that. Putting him together is the standard formula of popping the arms, legs, and head into the torso and everything was a pretty easy fit.
I can’t say I’m a huge fan of Armadillo is a character. His back story and motivations are about as cliche as you can get. BUT, I sure do love the way he looks and I absolutely love this figure! He really is a perfect candidate for BAF treatment, as he’s big and burly, and his armored shell pieces look fantastic. The way his armor plates are sculpted give the figure a lot of depth, and these are are textred very nicely. He’s also sporting some vicious looking claws on his fingers and toes. You get all the usual articulation with these beefy BAFs, and while he may not have a great range of motion in those elbows, everything else is pretty good. Speaking of elbows, the right elbow on my figure is seized, which means this big boi is going to have to take a boil bath in a big pot!
And how about that head sculpt! Clearly, this is not the kind of Armadillo that gets bounced off your front bumper at 2am. I love the way the armadillo plates form a helmet leaving only his face exposed. The expression is pure nightmare fuel, with those soulless white eyes and the wall of gritting teeth. Every line and crease in his anger-stricken face is chiseled to perfection. And herein is one of the things that makes Marvel Legends so much fun. Hasbro can take a character I’m not even really vested in and still make me excited to own that character as an action figure.
Ultimately, I’m a bit lukewarm on this wave. I didn’t like any of the two Spidey Suits from No Way Home, and while the Black & Gold figure is pure garbage, the Integrated Suit figure isn’t that bad. Morlun was kind of OK and MCU Doctor Strange is probably the best version of MCU Strange we’ve had yet. Shriek is a great figure, but not the version I wanted, and while I would have rather had younger J. Jonah from the Raimi Spider-Man films, I’ll happily take this one instead. And in the end, I will say that collecting this wave was well worth it to get the Armadillo BAF, because he’s great and I got most of these figures on deep discount anyway. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but there we are! On the next few Marvel Mondays I’m going to be checking out some boxed sets and stand alones, before jumping into another Wave.
Today I’m checking out the penultimate figure in the Marvel Legends Armadillo Wave, and I very nearly skipped it. Since I’m pulling back on Marvel Legends, I have been asking myself, why bother reviewing an entire wave if you aren’t buying everything anymore anyway? But in the end, I decided that if I bought all the figures in a wave, I might as well check them all out here. And that brings us to Black & Gold Suit Spider-Man.
There was a lot of speculation about this suit when it was first revealed. It seemed to have mystical glyphs imprinted in the material and the gauntlets had a certain Strange-ness about them, if ya know what I mean. A lot of these details can be seen in Hot Toys’ Sixth-Scale version. But in the end it was all a big nothing, and it turned out to be just the regular suit turned inside out because Peter Parker got paint on it. Yeah. I kind of wish they had the balls to just put Inside Out Suit on the package. Black & Gold Suit just sounds like he’s trying to make a fashion statement.
Just to recap, all the way back to my review of the Integrated Suit, I really didn’t like that design, but the figure came close to selling it to me. You could say the same about this suit and the Hot Toys figure, but in the case of this Legends figure, well, it’s just a load of crap that makes a bad design look even worse. The black suit with gold webbing might have worked for me if the webbing was consistent throughout, and it didn’t have those red bits on the sleeves. Now, this comes down to a design inconsistency, where the Hot Toys figure shows some beautifully intricate gold on the forearms, which I presume is the exposed circuitry inside the suit when it’s worn normally. Here you just get the out of place red bits that look terrible. Why the difference? Who knows? Who cares!
The paint on the head is really bad. At least the gold webbing on the rest of the figure is fairly well done. It has a nice gold leaf finish and most of the lines are pretty sharp. The gold webbing on the head looks like it was done with a crayon before slapping the figure into the box. There’s also a lot of sloppy spray around the white eye lenses. Yuck!
You get all the usual articulation in the modern Spidey bucks, and that includes the lateral butterfly joints on the shoulders. It may be ugly, but it’s still a pretty fun figure to play around with.
Hey, let’s talk hands… because I have to gripe about hands in EVERY review throughout this wave. Nope, still no crawling hands, but you do get thwippy hands and fists. No wait… not fists. Accessory holding hands. WHAT?? WHY??? Is it so he can hold on to the webbing he doesn’t come with and swing? How is it possible they made the hand selection EVEN WORSE?!?
Wow, do I hate this figure. In all honesty, the inside out suit gag in No Way Home was kind of funny and a very Peter Parker thing to have to do. Almost as bad as having to throw on a Fantastic Four suit and run home barefoot with a bag on your head. But this figure is just trash. Hot Toys is proof positive that something could be done with the design to make an attractive figure, and yes, I do understand that we’re talking about a big difference in cost between that one and this one. But even for what it is, this figure just looks sloppy and half-assed. Next week, I’ll wrap up the boxed figures with Miles Morales, and we’ll check out the Armadillo Build-A-Figure!
Well, I’m back from Hurricane Hiatus and ready for action! My last week and a half has consisted of extremes. I’ve been cleaning up the Hurricane’s mess in the yard as well as getting some projects done around the house, all while working a few extra hours at my day job to help out. Conversely, whatever downtime I’ve had has just been spent loafing in front of the TV or a video game console and decompressing from all the stress these situations bring on. Add to that the fact that my Internet has gone out three more times since the Hurricane, and working on anything related to this blog just seemed like an exercise in futility. But, now that I’m back I am planning on a full slate of reviews for this week! So, let’s kick it off and take a look at a multiverse-hopping vampire, eh?
I know Morlun best from the Spider-Verse comic, which was probably one of the last Marvel full-story runs that I read to completion. By 2014, I was already getting disgruntled by a lot of the shit they were shoveling out, but I actually liked Spider-Verse quite a bit, especially as an extension of Superior Spider-Man. I’ve generally been a big fan of Dan Slott’s writing, but the more I learned about what a toxic asshole he has been to fans, the less I wanted to patronize his work. Anyway, let’s get Morlun out of the box, he looks hungry for some Spider-Totems!
It’s surprising to me that it took this long to get us one of the Inheritors in Legends, but I guess Hasbro has been busy feasting at the smorgasbord of seemingly infinite Spider-Man variants that Spider-Verse served up. The Multiverse has been like a license to print action figure money, and there are still a lot of holes to fill! Morlun’s upper body looks to borrow some tooling from the Gents of the Hellfire Club, with the lower half utilizing the business suit parts we’ve seen most recently with J. Jonah. There’s enough mixing and matching and reworking here to make it seem at least somewhat fresh, albeit an odd mix of vintage and modern wardrobe.
I like the sculpting on his cravate, especially with the broach set dead center, and the crimson stone in the broach mixed with the aqua blue of the cravate add some nice color to all the black of his suit. The silver vest is pretty snappy, but the paint application is a little uneven on my figure. It’s noting terrible, but if Hasbro is going to keep raising the prices of these figures, they’re going to need to up the QC along with it. And I’ll have more to say on that before I’m done.
You get two head sculpts with this figure, and both have their ups and downs. The big difference between the two is the first has a bit of a wicked smile, while the second he’s bearing his teeth in a rather malevolent grimace. I think the sculpts are fine on both, but they both suffer from some really unsightly mold lines, both across the hair and along the edges of the face. It almost looks like the face is attached like a mask. There’s also some absolutely horrendous mold flashing around the jawline and the seams I just mentioned. I don’t know what happened here, but it’s really unfortunate. The paintwork on the second head’s teeth is really pretty sloppy and basic. We’ve seen a lot better.
Articulation is standard stuff here, but the jointing in the legs is super mushy, which is always disappointing. You get only one set of hands, and since the subject of hands has been a running joke for me in this Wave, why stop it now? In this case, I really like Morlun’s huge hands, even if it meant Hasbro probably had to melt down the pair of crawling hands I wanted to get with Integrated Suit figure to get the plastic to make Morlun’s giant meat hooks. They look especially creepy with the large cuffs giving the figure’s arms some uncanny and unsettling disproportions. I also dig that Hasbro both sculpted and painted the little suckers in his hands.
Morlun has been a long time coming to the Legends toyline and now that he’s here, I’d say he’d be pretty good if it weren’t for a number of nagging issues. Hasbro has pretty much raised the price of their licensed 6-inch figures to $28 across the board, and in light of the timing here, the QC issues with this figure are not a good look. With some mushy joints, some spotty paint, terrible molding issues, and a lot of recycled parts, Morlun has enough problems to keep him from being a decent figure at $20, let alone almost $30. It’s odd, considering how much time and money I have invested in Marvel Legends at this point, that Hasbro is serving up the excuses to let this line go and focus my resources elsewhere.
FigureFan Zero 