Tag Archives: the four horsemen

Nov 27 2023

Cosmic Legions (Gravenight): Mbyra Jmgyra by The Four Horsemen

Welcome back, Toyhounds! I’m back from my little Thanksgiving break and have completed the first lap of my personal marathon of crippling holiday depression! I hope you all had a peaceful and pleasant time, and I’m ready to get back to some toy talk. Last week I started looking at the new wave of Cosmic Legions with the random pick of Noveunn Leen. It was a strong start to the assortment and a fantastic figure! This time I’m selecting a specific figure, Mbyra Jmgyra, because in the Cosmic Legions narrative, she’s a fellow member of The Bleeder’s Guild and sometime partner of Noveunn.

I still haven’t decided whether or not to keep these boxes, but chances are they will eventually get downsized to the trash for lack of space. I like them better than the card and bubbles of Mythic Legions, but I’m still not crazy about the extras kept on the inside of the tray. It’s stylish and all, but it makes them difficult to get to. As for Mbyra, well thankfully I do written reviews and not videos so I don’t have to worry about pronouncing her name correctly, but I’m going with Embiera Jimgiera. She is classified as a member of the Scorrox race, which as we’ll see have some interesting characteristics. We’ll also see that I found much of this figure to be cool ideas in theory, but kind of problematic for the figure.

Mbyra is certainly a distinctive looking lady and I do love the overall design. She likes to show a lot of skin with her metallic green armor consisting of two shoulders pieces, an upper chest, forearm bracers, lower grieves, and some hanging plates around her brown belt. The armor is very cool and has an almost floral motif to its sculpting and pattern. It also has what look like jump jets located behind the knees, something we’ve seen on some of the wave one figures. Also pretty noteworthy is the long scorpion-like tail that hangs down from the back of Mbyra’s head and ends in a rather nasty looking sting. There sure are some imaginative beats on this body, but I can’t say I’m impressed with everything.

One of her more interesting features is her semi-transparent skin. Yeah, The Four Horsemen went with a heavily orange tinted, semi-transparent plastic for her arms, legs, hands, feet, and mid-riff. It was a surprise to me when I got the figure, as I didn’t really notice it in the solicitation photos. And to be honest, I’m not really sold on it. It makes for a nice, vibrant glow under the right light, but it comes off to me as cheap looking in the hand. I was worried about it creating problems with the joints, but to it’s credit that wasn’t the case. It does however make for some mangled fingers on the extra hands, which are super soft and bent. I did have problems with the shoulder pieces, they were ridiculously tough to get pegged in and yet the right one pops out at the slightest manipulation of the arm. Finally, the scorpion head-tail is a cool idea, but it’s a stagnant piece that relies on an added bump in the back to keep it in check and it severely curtails the articulation of the neck. It’s a shame this piece couldn’t have been jointed.

You get two head sculpts, with the tail and cheek piece being shared between them and it can be tough to get that whole shebang to slot around the head securely. Still, when it is done right, it’s neat how it isn’t readily noticeable as being a separate piece. The portrait has some nice things going for it, with the top of the head resembling a scorpion carapace and the side pieces influenced by their claws. It’s all cast in the same type of plastic as the body and the face is painted in an off-white with bright green eyes and red lips. It’s not as impressive a head sculpt to me as what we’ve seen in the past, but it’s different and certainly not bad. I will say that seeing the orange of the head framed by the green of the armor makes for quite a strikingly beautiful color combination.

The alternate head has an angry expression with her mouth showing off some pointy teeth and just an overall scowl on her face. It’s a very expressive alternative good for fierce battle poses. The open mouth isn’t as convincing as we’ve seen with some of the other figures in terms of depth, but it still looks good. This may be the one I go with the most for display. So, how about weapons? Are we going to see some new ones?

Sort of. Like Noveunn, the only new piece we get is a plug-in for the gauntlet and in this case it’s a curved blade. It’s actually a very cool addition and it looks right at home on the figure. I actually like it a lot more than Noveunn’s rocket. Pity we didn’t get two of them.

As for the rest, Mbyra favors the weapons issued with the Sphexxians from the first wave, so for starters you get the big alien blaster rifle. I absolutely love the sculpting and design of this piece and it fits the character really well, but I’m just convinced that it’s too big and ungainly to really work with the articulation style of these figures. It’s hard to get her to hold it all that convincingly. Also, what I think was supposed to be the trigger-finger right hand was mangled so badly because of the super soft plastic, I have to resort to her regular gripping hand to hold the rifle. At least she’s practicing proper trigger discipline. The deco for the weapon gives it a nice coppery sheen and really brings out all the detail in the sculpt. The power nodules are painted metallic purple.

The other weapon is the Electrostaff. I like this one a lot too, and once again I think it suits the character really well. The staff is painted to match the rifle and you get silver paint on the blades. Maybe it would have helped if TFH had included an energy effect part or something in this wave to help add a little something to a weapon we’ve already seen quite a few times. It’s worth mentioning that going All-In on this wave included a bonus accessory pack and I also got an extra bag of parts, both of which I may check out when I get through all the figures, but it’s a shame they couldn’t bundle some of those new pieces with the figures.

Obviously, I have a few issues with this figure, but that doesn’t mean I hate or even dislike Mbyra. She’s pretty cool and very distinctive, but I think she may be the weakest figure in the line so far. At least for me. The translucent plastic really does look decent under the right lighting, but in hand and on the shelf, it just doesn’t look that great to me, and I would have rather it just have been regular painted plastic for the skin. Working out even some basic articulation in the tail would have also gone a long way to make her more fun to play around with. The armor looks great, but having the shoulder piece falling out can be irritating. All in all, I’m still glad to have her. Next week, I’ll open another one in this wave and I’ll make it a random selection.

Oct 23 2023

Masque of the Red Death (Figura Obscura) by The Four Horsemen

It’s a week until Halloween, and I’m throwing FFZ into full on Horror mode to compliment the Thirty-One Days of Horror Review Reposts that I’ve been running on Twitter. In addition to this week’s usual three articles, I’ll be doing a couple extra for next weekend and of course one more on Halloween Day. And to kick things off, today I’m having a look at The Four Horsemen’s latest offering in their Figura Obscura subline. These one-off releases have been horror themed and I’ve skipped them all until this one, mainly because I’m a fan of Edgar Allan Poe and to a lesser extent a fan of the Vincent Price film based pretty loosely on Poe’s story, The Masque of the Red Death!

You get some damn fine premium packaging here. The figure comes in a window box with a heavy tri-fold cover that attaches to the sides with magnets. There’s some gorgeous character art on the front and the back has a parchment recounting a synopsis of the story the figure is based on. You also get a little booklet that reprints the entire short story, which is a great bonus and definitely worth a read this Halloween if you haven’t experienced it.

Remove the tri-fold and you get a standard window box with a window cut out on top to let some light in. The back of the tri-fold also has some excellent artwork to serve as a backdrop while displaying the figure, and I’ll include a shot of that at the end. The figure is positioned on the tray in rather tight quarters thanks to the Grandfather Clock taking up a good bit of the real estate in there. There’s a second tray nested underneath, which has a few more accessories. Everything is collector friendly and with a box this good, I plan on keeping it. Of course, the figure is scaled with TFH’s 6-inch Mythic Legions line and uses modular parts compatible with those figures, as well as Cosmic Legions if you fancy cobbling together a figure of SPACE DEATH!!!

Here is Death out of the box and ready to scare the willies out of you with a lesson on inescapable human fate and mortality. Softgoods is the name of the game here, which is definitely unusual for The Four Horsemen, who are generally regarded as some of the best sculptors in toyland. Although they seem to be embracing softgoods more and more in the upcoming releases of their other lines. Death is wrapped in layered robes with a hood that has two long flaps which hang down all the way to his feet. Besides the face the only exposed plastic is his arms and feet. I won’t be taking the robes off, and they aren’t meant to be removed, because what you get underneath is a pretty basic body.

The robes do look very nice, albeit a bit chunky in a few areas. It feels like there’s some underwire present, but it doesn’t really do a lot to hold the robes in any specific position. The two-tone red coloring looks very great and the tattered edges are a nice touch. The fully exposed right arm is textured and comes off as a mix of dead flesh and bone, while the feet are just nasty rotting skeletal feet. You get four sets of hands, which include fists, graspy hands, relaxed hands, and accessory holding hands. The robes are pretty forgiving when it comes to posing.

The head sculpt is pretty damn fantastic and suitably creepy. The mask itself is a mix of skeleton with some interesting arcane patterns sculpted into the forehead. The wax-like melting effect coming off of it is excellent. There are two different shades of red paint here, with the base of the mask being a darker speckled paint and the upper teeth and some of the sculpted accents in a much brighter gloss crimson. The lower jaw is left as a purplish-gray color to suggest it’s part of the actual head and not covered by the mask. It’s a nice touch as the masks usually worn to these parties typically only covered part of the face.

The mask is indeed removable, as it pegs in to the head on either side near the temples. If you’ve read the story, you know that removing it reveals nothingness. Just a lower jaw and a hollowed out crater where the rest of the face would be. There is some creepy sculpted detail lining the back. It’s a very cool and unsettling effect.

Death comes with a medieval-style dagger, which I believe is a new sculpt. I don’t recognize it from any of my Mythic Legions figures, although it will fit right in if you choose to give it to one of them. Technically, I think this would count as an accessory for Prince Prospero, but you get hands so that Death can hold it. Either way, I’m a sucker for a good medieval dagger, and this is a really beautifully sculpted piece.

The other rather large accessory is the Grandfather Clock and it is a real work of art. It stands taller than Death himself and is beautifully sculpted with some ornate carvings, particularly a raven motif up top and a gargoyle head down at the base. The clock requires some assembly out of the package, which is basically just attaching the top and the base. The front piece does come off, but nothing inside is articulated so there’s not much reason to remove it. It’s also held on by some extremely thin and delicate pegs, one of which was already broken in the package, although it still stays in place fine, I may wind up gluing the front piece on permanently. For a one-off piece, TFH really poured the love into this clock.

Finally, you get a rather large effect piece of pooled blood leaking out of the clock. This has some pegs that attach to the feet of the clock to hold it in place and it looks suitably creepy.

I really love how this figure turned out and it’s clear that TFH put a lot of thought and love into the design. Of all the Figura Obscura releases (Krampus and Headless Horsemen) this one feels the most like a personal passion project. Granted, it did not come cheap, as with shipping he clocked it at over $80. Don’t get me wrong, it’s easy to see where the money went, but I suspect a lot of it went into the one-time clock accessory which may be lost on some people looking at picking this up mainly for the figure and not for the story related trappings. All in all, this is definitely what I would consider an art piece, as opposed to a fun action figure. That certainly makes it rather unique and there’s nothing wrong with that!

Oct 4 2023

Cosmic Legions (Hvalkatar Book One): Sphexxian Prison Guard and Sphexxian Block Commander by The Four Horsemen

It’s been quite the trek getting through the first wave of eleven Cosmic Legions figures, but we’re finally here looking at the last two figures in this assortment. And they’re a couple of disgusting bugs! The Sphexxians hail from the planet, V’zapir and serve as a security force throughout the Cell Blocks of the Hvalkatar Prison. I was especially excited to get these because they remind me a bit of the Veloxi race from the old StarFlight game. If you get that deep cut, then congratulations, you’re probably old like me. Anyway, let’s jump in and see what we’ve got!

This is our last look at the packaging for this assortment and overall I still like it a lot. The window boxes feel more professional than what we’ve been seeing in Mythic Legions and while I still think the side tray of accessories is awkward, these are overall nicer to look at. You get blurbs on each of the side panels spotlighting the story of this first wave along with the specific character. These bugs require a bit more assembly than the previous figures we’ve seen with a lot of their bug parts having to be plugged into their bodies, which creates some bumpy times along the way. I’ll start with the Prison Guard…

This guy looks amazing, and it wasn’t until I got him in hand that I realized a lot of what we’re seeing on him is intended as armor. I initially thought they were going for an iridescent bug shell, but basically only the brown bits are supposed to be the actual bug. The metallic turquoise finish for the armor suit is gorgeous and has some purple and blue accents painted on the textured screen plates. The colors in most of this assortment have been off the charts, and I love that! The detail in the armor is pretty mind blowing and I had a great time just turning the figure over and over again in my hands to take it all in. The sculpted gear on the utility belt alone is way more than we get on most figures these days. The extra set of smaller arms are fully articulated, but these are unfortunately a huge pain in the ass. They were very tough to get pegged into the body and they tend to fall out a lot, so I try to position them out of the way and leave them alone. There’s yet another set of vestigial legs higher up in the chest, but these are static.

The semi-translucent wings plug into the back with pegged hinges, exactly how the wing pieces in Mythic Legions have worked, with all the advantages and disadvantages of that system. The attachment gives you the ability to swivel them and angle them, but the friction from the peg isn’t always enough to keep them in position so they drop quite a bit. And I suspect this will get worse the more they’re handled. There’s also no joint between each of the wings, so you can’t spread them. Apart from that these look really good. I love the serrated backs and the brown tint to the clear textured plastic, making them both beautiful and gross at the same time. I really love how you can see more of the bug anatomy through the back of the armor including the back of the thorax and the abdomen hanging down with a stinger attached.

The helmeted head is a work of art. The multi-faceted eyes are actually supposed to be part of the helmet and not the actual bug eyes, which was surprising to me. You do, however, get more bug parts like the antennae and pincers sticking out. The pincers stay in pretty well, but the antennae have a habit of dropping out, especially the one on the right. Since there’s no articulation on these, I may wind up gluing them in place.

The Prison Guard comes with one brand new weapon, a Sphexxian Blaster Rifle, which is an extremely cool design and it’s painted to look like scrimshaw, which I dig a lot. Unfortunately, the articulation and overall design of the figure doesn’t make really make him all that adept at wielding such a large weapon. I really couldn’t get him into a pose where he’s supporting the front of the weapon with his off-hand and when I tried I usually wound up knocking out the smaller arms leading to endless frustration. He can, however, hold it pretty well in his trigger finger hands, but it looks like too large a weapon to be fired one-handed. And while on the subject, this guy comes with five sets of hands, which seems really excessive, as I only wound up using two different sets for all the pictures in this review.

Next up is his Electrostaff, which we saw last time included with the TU5CC Engineer. I really like the look of this piece and I’d like to imagine it’s capable of shooting projectiles as well as for melee combat. The worn silver paint on the blades looks fantastic here and there’s a hint of purple to give it something of an eerie energy glow. All in all a great looking weapon to give to a guard.

And finally, he comes with a set of the arm blasters, which we’ve seen several times in this assortment. At first I thought these were an odd inclusion for the bugs, but now I can picture them flying around blasting the shit out of things with these and I wholeheartedly approve. OK, let’s move on to the Block Commander…

I won’t have to be as long winded here, because the Block Commander is basically a repaint of the Guard with a new head and all the same accessories. The armor is repainted a metallic orange with some metallic pink and silver hits on some of the plates. It looks good, but not as flashy as the Guard. It’s also a bit closer to the brown bug parts, so the contrast between the two isn’t as dramatic. Everything I said about the jointing pitfalls on the first figure apply here, although the smaller arms on this figure drop out even more frequently to the point of being irritating when I am posing him. The green tint given to the translucent parts iof the wings looks really nice.

The head is the only new bit of sculpting here, and it’s cool that we get to see what these guys look like without the mask. The fact that the compound eyes are part of the helmet and the bugs themselves only have tiny beady blue eyes is a cool subversion of my expectation. The rest of the sculpt is excellent with with some deep cuts between the carapace and even some little jutting horns. The antennae fit into this head better than on the Guard’s and I haven’t had any issues with them popping out.

The Blaster Rifle here is repainted in purple and while I think it looks good, I like the Guard’s version better. It brings out the detail in the sculpt a bit more and looks more exotic to me, as if the weapon is actually crafted from bone. Once again, it’s a cool design that the figure just cannot hold all that convincingly.

And you also get the arm blasters and the Electrostaff. The Sphexxians are gorgeous figures and extremely cool alien designs, but they do have more problems than any of the other figures in this assortment. Some of those problems may vary from figure to figure based on the varying tolerances, but some of them are just less than stellar design choices. For example, I would have happily sacrificed articulation in the smaller arms to have them not drop out whenever I mess around with the figure. None of these issues are catastrophic, but I’m going to call them out nonetheless. As for this line in general… For me, Cosmic Legions really has succeeded in taking the wonder and imagination of the Mythic Legions formula and moving it into outer space. I was pretty dubious about the prison backstory for the first assortment, but I can’t deny it served to deliver some great looking figures and imaginative characters. I’m looking forward to the next assortment, but now that I’m finished with this one maybe I can get back to some unfinished business I have with Mythic Legions!

Sep 18 2023

Cosmic Legions (Hvalkatar Book One): T.U.5.C.C. Science Officer, Sentry, and Engineer by The Four Horsemen

I’m nearing the home stretch with my reviews of the first wave of Cosmic Legions figures, which is probably the quickest I’ve ever gone through a wave of TFH figures. It’s nice to try to be current and timely every once and a while. If you’ve missed out on the previous reviews, check them out HERE. Otherwise, I’m blasting ahead with a look at the three members of the T.U.5.C.C. Faction!

What’s all that gibberish stand for? It’s a commerce alliance called The Traders Union of the Five Circles of Cosmerrium. And not only do they orchestrate inter-planetary trade, but they’re also the ones responsible for running Hvalkatar Prison and benefiting from the labors and research conducted there. That can’t be good! My original plan was to review the Science Officer and Sentry together since they share most of the same body, but I didn’t want to leave the Engineer out, so I threw her in here too. Let’s start with the Sentry!

The Sentries are basically the guards of Hvalkatar. I can’t remember if The Sentry and Science Officer were classified as Legion Builders, but I think they were because they were the cheapest figures in the assortment. If you’re not familiar, TFH’s Legion Builders are just a classification of figures with fewer paint apps geared more towards customization and troop building. I almost passed on this fella, because I thought he looked more like an artist proof than a finished release, but I’m glad I got him because even with the drab gray finish, he looks really good. There are parts here borrowed from Olek Thygar and some new bits to give the body a more enclosed and complete spacesuit. You get some silver paint on the belt buckle and chest piece, but that’s it. The flat gray brings out the sculpted detail rather nicely, and boy are there some beautiful details in this suit! I’m not a customizer, so mine is staying flat gray and that’s fine because I could certainly see a drab suit like this being issued to the rank-and-file. I do wish it had the TU5CC emblem (seen on Slogg) printed on the shoulder. The most I’d be willing to do is maybe stencil a white ID number on the shoulders instead.

You get two heads to choose from. There’s an exposed alien head that works well with the domed space helmet, and here we do get some more paint. The creature’s skin is ebony black with some faint white among the fissures. He has six bright orange eyes set in red circles. This helmet stays on a lot better than the one that came with Olek, but I’m still not too keen on the gap in the front, which would be a bit of a problem on a pressure suit like this. Still, otherwise it looks great.

The other head is a fully enclosed and form-fitting helmet, which can be worn under the space suit bubble, but I think that looks a bit redundant, so I prefer this one with the helmet and bubble off. The helmet is the same flat gray as the suit with an opaque yellow-orange shield. The narrative claims these Sentries are of varied races, but this helmet looks like it would be a perfect fit for the alien head included. I dig it!

The Sentry comes well armed, and if we start small and work our way up, then his wrist blasters come first. We’ve seen these before a couple of times and they simply peg right into the holes on his forearm bracers, presumably to look like they could be retracted and deployed. These are cast in black plastic and they look great with this suit.

Next up is his blaster rifle. Again, we’ve seen it before, so nothing new here. It’s cast in black to match the wrist blasters and he has two trigger finger hands, so he can wield it in either hand. You do get a second set of hands, but the only difference is in the way the wrist hinge is orientated. Also, I’ll note here that the Sentry does come with those clear rods to attach accessories to the ports on his suit, but nothing he comes with really works with the ports on the suit all that well. Although, I suppose you could store the blaster rifle across his butt.

Lastly, you get a sniper rifle, and if you haven’t picked up on the pattern yet, yes we’ve seen this before and yes it’s cast in black plastic this time. I said early on in these reviews that the only gripe I really had is the lack of variety in the accessories, and now that I’m more than halfway through the wave, nearly all the accessories are repeats. Just like before, there are sockets in this rifle so you can peg in those arm blasters to give it some more power. All in all, this is a nice looking figure, even if it does lack some of that gorgeous coloring we saw on previous releases. Next up… The Science Officer!

The Science Officer is billed as a sort of combination Lab Technician and Security Guard. He utilizes nearly the same body as the Sentry with the only differences being found in the belt and the chest piece. This one is cast almost entirely in white, although you do get a little light blue-green gradient here and there which gives him a bit more of a premium look than his drab gray cousin. Add to that the brilliant metallic blue chest piece and this guy really pops on the shelf despite not sporting a lot of paint operations.

You get even more vibrant color in the alien head, which is a deep pink and has metallic green eyed protruding from the side of his noggin. This is a really cool head design and I think he’d be right at home hanging out at the Cantina on Tatooine. What’s not cool is they couldn’t bother to throw in a dome for his helmet. I seriously though mine was just missing, but when I looked up the figure on the store site, it confirmed that he didn’t come with one and that’s kind of cheap and sucks. Why give him the lower helmet piece and not the dome?

The second head is a fully enclosed piece with a blue tinted visor, and again this one matches the contours of the alien head really well. I’m not sure how that visor piece would work, as it makes it look more like a robot head. But either way I dig it a lot. I’m really tempted to pick up a couple more of these guys to display with that head!

Moving on to accessories, The Science Officer does come with a new hologram piece for his arm and it’s a blue skull. Is he talking to the skull? Is the skull an artifact being displayed on his holographic projector? Don’t know. But it looks cool and it’s one of only two new accessories we’ll be seeing today that we haven’t seen before, so I’ll happily take it!

As for guns, we get the pistols we’ve seen a few times in previous reviews. This time they are painted with a snappy silver finish and they can be pegged into his hip armor for fast draw action. This is the best use of those clear attaching rods on any of these three figures. And just like The Sentry, you get two sets of trigger finger hands, with one set hinged up and down and the other side to side.

And here’s the blaster rifle that we literally just saw! It’s still an amazing sculpt and it looks damn good in the silver finish. For some reason I have problems getting this guy’s trigger finger into the guard, so for now he’ll just be practicing proper trigger discipline. Let’s move on to the third figure in this TU5CC trifecta… The Engineer!

Oh, it’s a lady! The Engineers are billed as keeping the mechanical operations on the prison running smoothly and also as personal attendants to Highwarden Slogg’s life support systems. She introduces a pretty fresh mix of parts, but like the other two we’re not getting a whole lot of paint applications here. The suit is all black with just a silver hit on the belt buckle and a bright red disk in the middle of her chest unit.

So, I really dig this head sculpt, mainly because it looks like an alien mask with the eyeholes concealed in the design. I’m not sure if that’s what they were going for, or why I think that’s so cool, but I just do. The bulbous crimson head sports one gold and black eye right in the middle of the forehead. Damn sexy if you’re into cyclops.

You also get a fully enclosed helmeted head, which like the others retains the shape of the alien head pretty closely. This is another great looking helmet, and again, I’m tempted to nab a couple more so I can put one one each side of Slogg.

As you’ve already seen, we get the pistols again, and she can peg them into her butt. The pistols, like all of her accessories are cast in a sort of greenish-gray and they still look good.

But wait… here’s a new one! You get an Electrostaff and it’s pretty big and impressive. No doubt a good weapon for skewering prisoners as they try to escape.

And finally, here are the arm blasters… again! Eh, I can’t complain. They look great on her. And I have to keep reminding myself that yes… Mythic Legions was just as bad about recycling weapons in the early waves. I don’t know, maybe it’s because these figures have been so wildly successful since then that I thought we might get a little more variety here. At least the overly recycled weapons are pretty damn cool looking and it’s not really something that’s detracting me from enjoying these.

And that’s it for the TU5CC forces so far! We’ll be getting more in future waves, and that excites me because despite not having the gorgeous coloring we saw on the previous releases, these figures are still loads of fun and look great. As I’ve mentioned a few times, I’d love to pick up some more of these to display with the helmeted heads, but I’m trying to control myself when it comes to army building and let’s face it, even as the “budget” figures of this line, these are still pricey on the second hand market, running about $45 a pop at certain online retailers. And while I’m a bit surprised that they’re still readily available, I doubt they’re likely to last long enough to go on sale. Anyway, I’ve got one more Cosmic Legions review to go, so get ready for some bugs!

Sep 1 2023

Cosmic Legions (Hvalkatar Book One): Highwarden Slogg by The Four Horsemen

Happy Friday all! You may have noticed that there was no content on Wednesday as i was hunkered down for the hurricane, but it passed us by leaving just a nasty taste of tropical storm force winds and lots of rain. But, I am back today and I’m continuing my look at the initial wave of Cosmic Legions figures! If you need to get caught up you can take a look at the two versions of Oleg Thygar, the four-armed brute, Kraggnar, and the femme fatales, Vorgga and Zeerian Spyre. Today I’m turning my attention to the big daddy of the wave: Highwarden Slogg. He is the biggest figure by far and he looks like one nasty piece of business.

As with the previous figures, Slogg comes in a very attractive window box, but this one differs in that it is absolutely huge, even dwarfing Kraggnar’s box to some extent. As his title states, Slogg is in command of Hvalkatar Prison and his little bio tells us that he is encased in a suit that keeps him alive by moisturizing and treating his epidermis, which was severely burned when he was just a young blob. Let’s get him out of the box and have a look at him!

And yes indeed, he is one hefty hunk of plastic. Slogg’s impressive size is more girth than length, with most of it in his rather unique support suit. Slogg’s lower arms and legs are exposed showing his rough green skin, which is just covered with ridges and fissures. Meanwhile his bulbous head resides under a frosted dome that keeps him moist and flavorful. But how about the detail on that suit! You can just about make out the orange onesie that all the gear and equipment is grafted onto. Otherwise it’s a mess of tubes, hoses, pipes, fixtures, straps, buckles, gauges, and even a pair of what… nipple canisters? Sorry, I don’t know what else to call them. The dingy colors of the suit’s equipment looks great next to the bright green of the skin and the orange of the undersuit. You also get some bright red, blue, and yellow buttons down there in his groinular region. Gosh, there’s so much to see!

Indeed, when I first got Slogg out of the box I had a great time just turning the figure over and over in my hands and examining all the little bits and bobs. I really like the alien lettering stenciled here and there. Also, I’m pretty sure that’s a pee port located right in between his legs, possibly with an evacuation nozzle stored below it that has to be attached for him to relieve himself. I don’t know, folks, but I’m having fun making it up as I go. He also has a TU5CC badge on his shoulder, which stands for Trader’s Union of the Five Circles of Cosmerrium. Yeah, that’s a mouthful and we’ll learn more about it in the next Cosmic Legions review!

The murky dome can be a bit tricky to get off, but trust me it does come off! Removing it gives you a better look at Slogg’s disgusting melon. He kind of looks like The Gillman from The Black Lagoon hit up Five Guys a few too many times. There are so many gross folds in his skin that lead to that flappy mess of a mouth. His beady eyes peer out from beneath bloated brows, or at least one peers out. His left eye looks like it’s seen better days. There’s a scar running down the middle of it and the pupil is gone. Boy do I love the paintwork on Slogg’s noggin. It matches the rest of his skin, but also has some absolutely gorgeous gradient work where it wavers between darker green in some places and almost yellow in others. This portrait is a goddamn work of art.

And if you like your green blobby space wardens a little more angry, T4H have you covered with a second head sculpt. And oh damn is he angry! This portrait has his mouth open showing his spikey teeth and even a bit of the insides in his disgusting maw. It’s an absolute crime that one of these heads has to sit in the box, so I may just wind up displaying it beside the figure on a riser or something.

Because Slogg has plenty of chonks, his articulation is a tad more limited, but most of that comes from the range of motion in what are most of the usual joints. Rotating hinges are the order of the day, and they’re found in his shoulders, elbows, wrists, and lower legs. His hips are ball jointed, he can swivel at the waist, and his giant head can rotate left and right. But yeah, you do have to pop his dome every time you want to change the direction of his head. The arms are great, but the legs are mostly for positioning so he can stand. Although he really doesn’t have a problem in that department. Slogg also comes with two sets of hands: One set of accessory holding and one set of fists.

And that accessory is what T4H call a Data Screen. This device has a cable that plugs into one of the two holes on his butt, depending on which hand you want him to hold it in. Now, this looks to me like it’s a multipurpose device used to check on the status of his suit, as it looks like a suit schematic is displayed on the screen. It’s kind of a burdensome device to carry around for suit diagnostics, so I’d like to think it serves a double purpose.

A weapon, maybe? Yeah it appears there are possible beam emitters on the front that reminds me of the weapon design from Space 1999. Maybe the orange nob controls the beam intensity or maybe it just regulates how moist his suit makes him. And because Slogg is such a huge bastard and uses up so much plastic, that’s all you get for accessories. Still, for a figure this big extra hands, an extra head, and that big device ain’t too shabby.

There’s no doubt that from the very first solicitation pictures, Slogg struck me as a stand out figure in the wave and now that he’s in hand he does not disappoint. The sculpted detail and imagination that went into this figure makes it an absolute work of art. I’m extremely curious to see how the pieces to this guy will play out in future releases. In a modular line like Cosmic Legions, I have to imagine that T4H considers parts recycling when designing figure components, especially with big and costly figures like this. But, it’s hard to imagine a figure this distinctive will be easy to repurpose. I guess we’ll find out!

Aug 16 2023

Cosmic Legions (Hvalkatar Book One): Vorgga and Zeerian Spyre by The Four Horsemen

I’m committing myself to getting through the first assortment of Cosmic Legions figures in a timely manner, so as not to create the backlog problem, I had with Mythic Legions. Heck, I still haven’t opened that last wave of Mythic Legions and I really want to get around to it sooner or later. As for Cosmic Legions, so far I’ve checked out Kraggnar and both versions of Olek Thygar. Today, I thought I’d tackle two of the ladies in the line with Vorgga and Zeerian Spyre!

As we saw last time, T4H have switched to using window boxes, which I like. The boxes are colorful, have dedicated character art, and blurbs about the story and character on the side panels. On the downside, the extras are all stored on a tray mounted inside the bubble. I’m not a fan of this, as they are a pain to get out and they leave a lot of open space on the trays. Just look at all that void in Zeerian’s packaging. It’s deceptive because she does come with a lot of goodies and I think the presentation would look better with them placed all around her. But, who knows if I’ll still have these boxes in a month or so, so it’s no big deal to me. Let’s start with Vorgga.

Vorgga looks like a badass, and that’s because she’s kind of a space special forces agent for the Interorbital Perimeter Guard. As such, she’s clad in a pretty cool suit of space armor. Her muscular arms are left exposed, she’s got shoulder pieces that peg into the back just like the Mythic Legions line uses, and a belt with lots of pouches, each with individually painted straps and buckles. The detail on the armor is quite nice, and most of it has a rounded and organic shape to it. She also has a rather large backpack, which is removable and works with her weapon, which we’ll see in a bit. The mix of teal and silver looks great on this figure and you also get some copper paint hits. I like the gradient colors on display in the boots, and there’s some brushed weathering on the shoulders.

You get two head sculpts to choose from, one with a breather mask and one without, both of which are quite beautiful. Vorgga has sculpted markings all over her face with a tan and red deco and various bright blue panels that match her blue pupiless eyes. Her skull is elongated in the back and terminates with a bound ponytail, and she has long pointed goblin-like ears. It’s a very distinctive looking portrait with some striking colors.

The head with the breather mask looks slightly angrier in the eyes and the lower half of the face and cheeks are encompassed by the mask, which looks absolutely phenomenal. As much as I dig the first head, I think I’ll be displaying her with this masked version most of the time.

Vorgga also has a rather distinctive tattoo printed on her upper left arm, which I think is a really cool touch.

Vorgga does not come with a lot of stuff, but she she goes for quality over quantity with an enormous heavy blaster. Yes, this is a slightly modified version of the jackhammer-like digging tool we saw bundled with Olek. This time it has a dual barrel on the front and a slot on the side to feed in what is either a charging cable or some kind of belt-fed ammo. The other end plugs into the bottom of the backpack, so I’d like to assume it’s just a big ass battery to power that gun.

The positioning of the wide ammo belt can sometimes be at odds with her legs, but it works OK most of the time. It’s possible that feeding it into the side would have worked better, but I’m no space weapon engineer, so who am I to nitpick the design? Either way she looks amazing when she’s wielding this thing and I can just imagine her clearing out entire corridors of rampaging alien scum.

Just like with the Olek figures, here you get a set of clear rod-like pegs that can fit into ports on the figure to secure things, but Vorgga really doesn’t have anything to secure to them. I don’t really see a use for the ones on her gauntlets, but you can use them on the backpack ports to attach the gun by pegging it into the slot for the ammo belt. I’m not sure if this was intended, but it works really well and despite the weapon’s big heft, she can take the weight just fine without toppling over.

Wow, do I love this figure! I dig the alien anatomy of her portrait and her armor is just gorgeous. A few more extras would have been nice, but there’s a lot of plastic in that heavy blaster, backpack and ammo belt, so I get it. At first I assumed Vorgga was meant to be some kind of security force for the prison, but having reviewed the narrative, I guess she was thrown into the GraveRing as well. Granted, I don’t hang too much on the narrative, I’m just here for the figures and I do hope we get some more Edgehounders like her in the line. Next up… let’s look at Zeerian Spyre!

Zeerian has one of the most intriguing backgrounds in the narrative. A disgruntled scientist, she fled her homeworld and joined up with a mysterious organization called The Mortal Thorn, which ultimately landed her in the prison. The base figure here is pretty simple compared to Vorgga, but she makes up for it with more gear and some softgoods. The bulk of the body is a smooth bodysuit with a sculpted tabard sort of piece running from the shoulders down the center of her torso and connecting with the belt. The suit is mostly gray with the tabard being very light brown. The belt has a big buckle and lots of pouches on the sides and back. Her gauntlets and boots are really cool in that they have an angular sci-fi look to their sculpt, but are painted brown to look a little more pedestrian. I really dig the pieces at the top back of the boots which look like some kind of jump jets. My only real gripe here is that the sockets and slot in her back are very exposed and unsightly, but we’ll see some fixes for that in a bit.

You get two head sculpts here, with the main difference being the hair style. One has the left side sculpted all tidy and brushed back while the right side is grown long and cascades over that side of her face. The portrait itself is pretty with some soft features. The blue skin tone looks good and the spots are nice as well. The second head has the bulk of the hair on the right side of down to just a single group of strands, allowing you to see more of her face.

You also get a breather mask, which unlike Vorgga’s is an actual accessory and can be used on either head, but I find it works best on the second one. It looks cool, but it’s only held on by friction and has a habit of sliding off from time to time.

And then there’s the softgoods poncho, which I have mixed feelings about. It’s a nicely tailored piece with a hood and a large emblem on the back. Probably the best thing about it is that it has wires running through all the edges so you have plenty of opportunities to shape it as you want it. I plan on exploring it’s potential some more, but for now I’m probably going to display the figure without it.

You may remember that Olek came with a hologram piece for his gauntlet, and Zeerian sees a return to that with a translucent purple ringed planet. I love this effect and I’d be interested in T4H selling just a pack of these in different colors and sculpts.

As for weapons, Zeerian comes with the same pair of pistols we saw with Olek. These are great sculpts, but one running gripe with me and this assortment of figures is the heavy reuse of accessories. At least they are cast in a new color. Once again you can use the clear peg rods to attach them to the ports on the figure, and I think these look pretty good positioned back just behind her hips. Zeerian only comes with two sets of hands and they are both trigger-finger hands. The only difference is in the hinge where one rocks forward and back and the other side to side.

Her main weapon is this banger of a sniper rifle, which can be pegged into her back using the clear rods or by using the sling. If you go with the pegs, it actually attaches in the holes that are normally used for these figures’ shoulder armor, but since Zeerian doesn’t come with any shoulders, it’s a good opportunity to use them for something. The rifle is massive, measuring longer than Zeerian is tall. It’s packed with detail in the sculpt and the stock even has a bit of a woodgrain to the sculpt. The sling has a working clasp and the scope can be removed.

It’s a little tough to get her to shoulder it because it’s such a long boi, but I think it works. I’m guessing this thing has some pretty impressive reach.

While Zeevian is definitely one of the less complex looking figures in this assortment, I really love how she turned out and I have had a great time playing around with her. I think she packs a lot of personality, and that’s saying something considering the rather unique makeup of this assortment’s characters.

With five figures down, I have so far been absolutely delighted by Cosmic Legions’ debut. While the DNA doesn’t stray far from what makes Mythic Legions so great, this line wasted no time in developing a personality all its own. I’m almost at the halfway mark, and next week I’m going to bust out this wave’s biggest brute of them all!

Aug 7 2023

Cosmic Legions (Hvalkatar Book One): Kraggnar by The Four Horsemen

Last week I kicked off my look at the first assortment of Cosmic Legions with Olek Thygar and I mentioned that I was shorted one figure in my shipment. Well, T4H customer service got on that pretty damn quick and sent out the missing figure. So, let’s bump him to the head of the line and check out Kraggnar!

Kraggnar is the second biggest figure in this assortment, so I was pretty excited to get him open and take a look. The packaging is the same style of window box we saw last time. You get a blurb about this series on the right side panel and a little bit about Kraggnar on the left, and it’s all collector friendly. Hailing from the planet Quarvum, Kraggnar is described as a builder and architect, and now a prisoner of Hvalkatar Prison. He has now been tossed into the gladiatorial battles in the Cell Block known as GraveRing.

And he is indeed a big boy. If you’re familiar with the Mythic Legions line, than this fella would qualify as an Ogre Class, so he outclasses the regular figures in both heft and height. Like Olek, Kraggnar has a very scaly reptilian-like body, which I’m sure will be put to dual purpose in Mythic Legions if it hasn’t been revealed already. Indeed, even the ports in the back where his second set of arms plug in will likely be used for wing inserts. Also like Olek, I am in love with the vibrant shades of color used on the skin here. In this case, it’s orange and it goes from light on his chest to darker as it gets to the extremities, where it becomes very deep and just pops beautifully. The scales feature an array of both deep and softer cuts and everything about this guy’s anatomy just looks superb.

Kraggnar sports a set of futuristic gladiatorial armor, which includes heavy forearm cuffs on all four of his arms, an x-shaped harness with a light blue stone in the middle, a belt with a furry loin cloth, and grieves on his lower legs. All of these pieces are colored in a rich metallic silver and feature some sculpted weathering. The arm cuffs and chest harness are all removable, while the belt and grieves are sculpted as part of the body. I also really dig the loops on the arm cuffs and the big ring on his back, suggesting that the guards have to chain this beast up every now and then.

You get two heads included with Kraggnar and while they are both excellent sculpts, the variation here is pretty minimal. The first head is a neutral expression, while the second has a slightly more prominent brow and gritted teeth, giving him a bit more fierce of an expression. The quality of both portraits is excellent with more of that lovely scaling to the skin. I really like his blue eyes, and there are some nasty looking gashes between them, which makes me wonder what creature scored such impressive hits on a combatant this imposing. I will likely keep the second head displayed on the figure nearly all the time, as I think it just has more personality.

There are no surprises here in the base articulation, although it’s worth pointing out that the second set of arms mirror the same articulation as the front set. You also get a pair of fists, and all six pairs of hands will work with either set of arms. The back arms stay put really well and the joints are capable of holding them up despite their considerable weight. Unfortunately the same can’t always be said for the hips and I have had this brute do the splits a few times because of the considerable weight of his upper body. But, he will stay upright if I don’t make the stance too wide.

If you happen to be adverse to your orange space ogres having two sets of arms, you can remove the rear set and insert the provided plugs to fill in the holes, but I can’t imagine why anyone would want to go this route.

Kraggnar comes with one weapon and it’s a giant space mace. I really love the design of this thing, as it almost looks like it’s just a repurposed component to some space ship or giant piece of machinery. The coils running through the center also suggest maybe it has some kind of electro-shock properties. The paint on it looks really good, and the weapon definitely suits the figure.

As the second biggest (and second most expensive) figure in this initial assortment, Kraggnar does not disappoint. He is an absolutely gorgeous figure both in terms of sculpt and coloring. He’s an imposing beast on the shelf, but so much fun to pick up and play with. I guess my only nitpick here is that I would have preferred TFH nix the back plugs and use that plastic for another set of hands or maybe another accessory, because there’s no way I’m ever going to display this brute without all four of his arms!

Jul 26 2023

Cosmic Legions (Hvalkatar: Book One): Olek Thygar (Hvalkater and GraveRing) by The Four Horsemen

It’s finally here! After almost two years since the preorder closed, the first wave of Cosmic Legions figures arrived and I’m ready to start digging in. For those unfamiliar, they are basically a sci-fi version of T4H’s wildly popular fantasy based Mythic Legions figures, which have been going strong for a little while now. I went All-In on this first wave, although T4H didn’t pack one of the figures in the box, and I’m trying to solve that issue with them now. Wouldn’t you know it, it had to be one of the expensive ones! Anyway, I’m starting off with what seems to be the main protagonist of the wave, Olek Thygar, because we got two versions of him in this initial assortment.

Here’s the packaging for both figures. T4H has finally transitioned from bubbles on cardbacks to full on window boxes. I like these better, but they are putting the accessories on a tray mounted inside the side of the bubble, which is kind of awkward to get to. The left side panel has a blurb about the line’s narrative and the right has a blurb about the character. I’m not going to get terribly deep into the fiction of this line, but Hvalkatar appears to be an intergalactic prison where Olek finds himself thrown into, and eventually I guess leads a revolt. GraveRing is a particularly nasty Cell Block where the prisoners are made to fight in gladiatorial combat between bouts of hard labor. So, the GraveRing version of Olek sees him as a gladiator and the other version has him in a spacesuit with weapons, so I’m guessing it’s after the revolt? I really don’t know. Like Mythic Legions, the narrative and character bios are there to take or leave… let’s just enjoy the figures! We’re going to start with the Hvalkatar version as it is the more complex figure with the most accessories.

There are a few different display options for this figure, but I’m starting him off in his full-on space suit with the dome helmet. The detail on this figure is just mind blowing and while most of the intricate detailing of the suit is sculpted as part of the body, T4H have added some separately sculpted pieces here and there to add to that complexity, making for an exquisite layered effect of depth and interlocking plates. The articulation style here is pretty much identical to what we’ve seen in Mythic Legions, and the figure is still built on a modular model. For customizers who want to mix and match, Cosmic is compatible with Mythic, but that sort of thing is beyond what I’ll be looking at here. I am happy to report that neither of these figures had any joint issues and they articulated fine right out of the box.

The boots and gloves hint at Olek’s alien anatomy with only three fingers on each hand and what appears to be two giant toes. There are peg holes located on the gauntlets and the front and back of the torso. These are part of a new play mechanic that runs throughout this line, and we’ll explore these a further in a bit. The coloring here is quite beautiful. The armored pieces of the base suit are matte black and gray with an orange undersuit, shown mostly in the pants. You get some more orange trim throughout and some gorgeous metallic blue trim as well. All the paint operations are sharp and clean.

The helmet is removable and you can even remove the orange-tinted dome separately. This brings me to one issue with the figure and that’s the helmet not locking securely to the figure. Not only does it leave a gap in a few spaces, but it seems to be designed to be held on by friction alone, which does not do the job at all. It’s not a critical problem, but considering how much thought and design T4H puts into these figures, this one seems like a really uncharacteristic oversight.

And that brings us to Olek’s portrait, which is absolutely beautiful. He has a gorgeous blue color with bright red piercing globes for eyes. The skin is heavily scaled with deep fissures and definitely has a dragonesque motif, particularly in the scaling on the neck. Olek also has a gold fixture placed on his forehead, which I suppose could be ornamental for his race or perhaps serve some kind of purpose. I really love the sculpted detail inside the helmet, and there are even some paint apps in there too.

You get a completely different style helmet as well, which is a lot more streamlined. This head also comes with a separate neck piece, which is completely enclosed extension of the space suit. The helmet is designed to be form fitted to Olek’s head and it gives the figure even more of an alien profile, which is pretty cool. You also don’t have to deal with the fit issues of the larger domed helmet. The orange shield is even removable so you can get a better look at the fully sculpted face under it. This neck piece is also useable with the regular head and can be incorporated into the dome helmet for what I think makes for a better overall look. If you like display options, this figure certainly has you covered! Let’s start checking out accessories and weapons!

One of the coolest little extras is this holographic readout that plugs into the peg hole on either of the gauntlets. Similar pieces will be a recurring theme in this wave and this one makes for a really neat effect. It’s cast in translucent plastic with green tint at the bottom and a frame around the green text panel.

And while we’re on the subject of those arm peg holes, Olek comes with a pair of pop-up blasters for them as well. I really dig these a lot!

Olek comes with a matched pair of pistols, and here’s where we can get into the other peg holes on the suit. The figures come with an assortment of translucent pegs (two short and two longer) and these clear cylinders can be placed into the ports to secure weapons to them. In this case, the pistols work pretty well attached to the peg holes on the back. I have yet to find a good use for the peg holes on the front of the suit, as those seem to be oddly placed to attach anything.

The pistols sport some excellent detail and are painted in a speckled gray finish. They work really well with the included trigger finger hands, and I guess I should point out here that Olek comes with two sets of trigger hands, one designed to hinge up and down and one side to side. If you want to beef these guns up, you can also plug the arm blasters into the peg holes on the sides.

Next up is his heavy blaster rifle, which again is intricately sculpted and finished to match the pistols. This has a scope, a non-removable magazine and looks totally bad ass. It also has a peg hole, but I haven’t found a really good place to attach it. Again, you can beef it up by adding one of the arm blasters to the side. I have to say, I am really digging the gun designs in this line so far.

The final accessory is a big one! It’s listed as an extra heavy blaster, but to me it looks like it’s a digging tool, like a jackhammer. I’d like to think this is a piece of equipment that the guards gave to the prisoners to go out and mine asteroids as it has a big chisel-like wedge at the end. Maybe Olek is using it as a weapon like Isaac Clarke in Dead Space. Either way, this is a gorgeous piece of kit with lots of sculpted detail and lots of paint hits to the shell and the various components. There’s a grip on the back and a grab bar on the front so he can hold it like a chain gun and use it to pulverize rock or prison guards. And that covers this version of Olek, let’s move on and check out the GraveRing version…

And here he is, stripped of his space suit and ready for gladiatorial prison combat. There isn’t as much to talk about here as with the previous figure. This version of Olek reuses the belt and legs from the space suit, as well as the arm bracers from the gauntlets. His feet, hands, and upper torso are all bare showing off that beautiful blue scaled skin, and I am absolutely in love with the gradients of blue used here, it’s just so gorgeous! I also really dig that Cardassian-like neck. And holy crap is the sculpting for his back scales just incredible. This version comes with several more pairs of hands than the last one, including relaxed hands and various types to hold accessories.

The head sculpt is partially resculpted and it’s kind of fun to speculate as to why. The gold fixture is missing and in its place is what looks like three more exposed eyes. It actually looks like the gold piece was ripped out and this is a wound left behind. His horns are also grown longer. Maybe his species normally cuts these and he left them to grow long for combat? Either way this is a beautiful portrait!

Now in terms of accessories, this version comes up really short when compared to the last version. You get a new hologram piece for his gauntlet, this time it looks like an image of a spaceship. It’s cast in translucent green plastic and has some very nice detail. I just really dig the way these hologram pieces look.

You get a staff, which is kind of plain looking and strikes me as a Mythic Legions throwback. I guess the guards don’t want the gladiators to have powerful weapons. Makes sense. This one does, however transform into a flail.

Well, not really, but it’s supposed to and you get the pieces to make it look like the top comes off and connects to another piece with a chain. It looks like it would come in handy for whacking opponents in the head or tripping them up so you can make the kill.

I remember really being on the fence about picking up both versions of Oleg, but in the end I’m glad I did. The first version is definitely the more interesting figure, but that’s to be expected because at $48 he sold for $11 more than the second version. Meanwhile, the second has it’s own charms with all that exposed blue scaly skin. So far, I dig the peg system for attaching weapons and accessories to the figures, as it gives me a nostalgic feel for the old Centurions line by Kenner. So far Cosmic Legions manages to secure its own identity, while still being planted firmly in the Mythic Legions system. Indeed, I think we’ve already seen a Dragon Man figure teased using parts from Olek and it will be interesting to see what other crossover T4H and customizers can do.

Jun 26 2022

Mythic Legions (Advent of Decay) Artemyss Silverchord by The Four Horsemen

Here we go, folks! It’s the final installment of Mythos Monday for a while, as after today I’ll be all caught up on showcasing the Mythic Legions figures in my collection! As I mentioned last week, I saved the two Deluxe figures for last, and that means today I’m checking out Artemyss Silverchord!

Artemyss comes in the same style packaging as the Deluxe Knight Builder we saw last week, but there isn’t nearly as much stuff crammed into this bubble. In fact, the main reason for the elongated tray was to accommodate her wings, which are nested in the bottom tray under the figure and other accessories. She does, however, have one of the coolest bios I’ve come across in the line. Artemyss’ parents were killed by vampyre assassins, and now she leads Xylona’s Flock as a noble warrior and paragon of virtue. Oh yeah, and Asterionn the Minotaur is her personal guardian! There are a couple of different display options for this figure, so let’s get started!

Artemyss makes use of an interesting mix of parts from Advent of Decay, basically borrowing some heavy armor from the female knights and some lighter armor from the elves. Her cuirass is the one first introduced on Gwendolyn Heavensbrand, finished with the same gold paint, but using some copper and purple to add color to the panels. Her belt, however, is different, with shorter hip armor and a purple stone front and center. Her upper arms and legs are the usual bare female limbs, but her legs are painted to resemble leggings. She has the lighter armor for her lower legs, with the knees painted gold to signify reinforced armor, and the rest brown to convey leather boots. She has the elven wrist bracers on her forearms, painted gold to match the rest of her armor, with brown inner sleeves.

Artemyss is one of the very few figures to not get shoulder armor of any kind, which makes sense, as it would interfere with her optional wings. She does have a cape, but since most capes in this line are designed to hang on the shoulder armor pegs, here it just has a neck hole. I like this method, since it can be worn over her bare shoulders, or folded back out of the way, or even shifted to cover her free arm when wielding a sword. The cape is green, but it’s a few shades shy from matching the green plastic sash that hangs down the front of Artemyss’ belt.

The head sculpt is all new, and I absolutely love it. It’s characterized by the elaborate clutch of braided hair that cascades down her back, complete with gold rings to hold weight them down. She also has an elaborate set of gravity-defying antlers protruding from her tiara. Seriously, for this thing to work, that tiara would have to be bolted to her head! But it looks so majestic and amazing, I’ll just chalk it up to magic! She has a beautiful face, with narrow, almond-shaped eyes, blue lipstick, and a heavy dose of purple eyeshadow. I particularly love how TFH sculpted the two braids that fall from in front of her pointed ears to frame her face.

As for accessories, Artemyss comes with two swords, one is the standard one-handed cruciform sword with a gold hilt and a silver blade. Chances are very good that this one will go to another one of my figures.

And that’s because she also comes with the elven short sword, and this one just suits her perfectly. Sadly, this sword doesn’t turn up very often, and I think I last encountered it when checking out Dorina Onoris. It’s an absolutely beautiful piece with an ornate gold hilt and a leaf-shaped blade.

Next up, Artemyss comes with a bow, quiver, and one loose arrow. The bow is a rather distinctive piece, sculpted to look like it’s crafted from antlers, with a green grip and gold bands to secure the string. This is a new accessory to me, and that’s saying something considering how many of these figures I’ve reveiwed over the years. The quiver is the same sculpt we’ve seen a bunch of times, painted brown with gold trim. These usually have a clip on them, but mine does not, but it can still be passed through the loop on the sword belt and worn on her back using the belt as a shoulder strap. The loose arrow is silver with purple fletching to match the ones sculpted in the quiver. She looks great holding the bow, but as I’ve said before, the articulation on these figures is not ideal for having them actually knock an arrow to shoot it.

And last, but not least, are her translucent pink wings. These attach to the holes usually used for the shoulder armor, or you can use one of the adapter pieces to tab it into the slot in the middle of her back. Because of her hair, I find the shoulder holes work better. And obviously, the cape needs to come off when using these. They attach via hinged pegs, so that gives them the ability to swivel and be angled forward and back. They were positioned in the box with the narrower parts on the top, but I prefer them on the bottom. They do make Artemyss a bit back-heavy, but she can still stand with them without the need for additional support. I find that they also remain pegged in more securely than some of the other, heavier wings.

Artemyss is an absolutely gorgeous figure, and I think she’s a fine addition to end on. The mix of parts here works perfectly to create a fresh new look, the unique head sculpt is beautiful, and the addition of the wings is just icing on the cake! And with that, it’s time to put Mythic Legions on the back burner until some new figures arrive. This trek has taken me through nearly 90 figures over the course of about six years! Keep in mind, I also have Cosmic Legions pre-orders in the pipe, so I’m looking forward to checking those out as well. Next week will see a return of Marvel Mondays so that I can wrap up some of the Marvel Legends waves I have waiting to be opened!

Jun 20 2022

Mythic Legions (Advent of Decay) Deluxe Knight Builder by The Four Horsemen

We’re in the home stretch now, folks! By my reckoning, I have only two more Mythic Legions releases to spotlight here before I’ve wrapped up with all the figures I currently own. And I saved the two Deluxe Sets I have for last! Today I’m checking out the Deluxe Knight Builder, which is kind of like a super-sized Legion Builder, only with the premium paint applications of a regular release, and a hefty assortment of accessories. There’s a lot of stuff to cover here, so let’s jump right in, because I’m going to go long today!

The packaging here is pretty unique, as the figure comes on a much wider card to accommodate the large tray packed full of goodies. Actually, there are two nested trays here, with two levels of weapons, heads, extra armor bits, and you even get a second torso. Obviously, the goal here is to give you as many different options as possible to create all sorts of variants, although both torsos are female, making use of the slighter build introduced in Advent of Decay. As a result, I’m just going to be assembling four different figures, based on the four different heads, to try to show off everything that’s included. Just about everything in the box has been seen before in previous reviews, except for one piece, which I’ll call out when we get to it!

I’m starting out with the Salade style helmet and no tabard for what is a really beautiful femme knight. As always, the armor sculpt here is exquisite, with every tiny rivet, strap, and interlocking plate lovingly recreated, along with the chainmail texturing exposed at the joints. You also get some stunning decorative relief work sculpted into some of the panels. The paint job gives the armor a clean, burnished silver finish, with a striking turquois used for some of the decorative panels. Add to that some gold edging and rivets, copper for the chainmail, and brown for the retaining straps, and you get what I think is one of the most gorgeous knights this line has produced.

I think I first encountered the Salade helmet when I reviewed the Advent of Decay Knight Legion Builders, and it hasn’t been used much, which is a shame because I’m a fan of both the helmet design and this sculpt. The swept back and narrow slit in the visor make it quite a distinctive piece of headgear, and the hammered look of the sculpt is just so damn great. I also went with the segmented lobster-tail style shoulder armor for this particular configuration, which I think looks perfect!

As for weapons, I gave her the simple one-handed cruciform sword, worn on her waist with the brown belt, and the circular, concave shield. The sword needs no discussion, as it was introduced in the original Kickstarter assortment and we’ve seen it dozens of times since. And yes, it’s still a favorite of mine! The shield has turned up a few times, mainly with some of the Gladiator-style figures like Calavius. The paint here is actually very similar to that appearance, but with the central boss left silver like the rest of the shield, as opposed to gold to match the decorative ring. I love the deco, but it would have been interesting to see the outer ring painted in the same metallic turquois!

And just to keep the distribution of weapons fair, here she is wielding the mace. This weapon has a large, bulbous studded head, perfect for bashing in even the most heavily armored brains. The shaft is sculpted with a wood grain pattern, although the whole weapon is painted in silver. The head is interchangeable, so we’ll see a variation on this mace in a little bit. This particular mace is another one of those weapons that has turned up here and there, but is not as often as others, so it’s a welcome addition! Let’s swap out the head and a few other parts, and check out the next variation!

Here’s another head, and I’ve also swapped out the plated groin armor with this leather scaled look. I actually don’t really like using this piece with this armor, I think it looks too low-rent, but I wanted to showcase it anyway. I’ve also moved the waist belt to become a shoulder strap to better carry the two-handed sword.

The Armet-A-Rondelle helmet, to give it its fancy name, is the one piece in this set that I believe is brand new. Or at lest, I don’t remember seeing it before. It’s a close fitting 15th Century style helmet, that’s characterized by the rondel plate at the back and base of the neck. You get some gold trim, and some lovely sculpted relief work around the visor. Like the Salade, I think this helmet goes really well with the figure.

Like the one-handed sword, this two-hander needs no introduction, as it’s been issued so many times to so many releases. It’s even been given the copper painted hilt, which has been seen before. I do like that the silver blade has been given a bit of a wash, to give it a slightly weathered look. All in all, this sword still looks great and remains one of my favorite accessories.

And, as long as we’re on the subject of over-used accessories, here’s the infamous spear introduced in the original Kickstarter assortment. OK, this is one accessory that I think it’s time to retire and sculpt a new one. This one looks a tad chunky, which works fine with the bulkier male knights, but looks a little off with the slighter builds introduced in Advent of Decay. This one has been painted silver and given a bit of a rust wash. Let’s change things up again, and this time we’ll swap the head and the whole torso!

Here is the tabard torso along with the tabard groin piece, introduced in Advent of Decay and seen at least a few times since. The plastic garment has a blue stripe flanked by a mustard color on each side, along with some gold trim. I think it looks pretty good with the existing color scheme on the armor. It also has a little spray on the bottom piece to make it look dirty. I’ve also swapped out the segmented shoulders for these curvy ones, which include the turquoise panels to match the rest of the armor perfectly.

The helmet is pretty familiar, as I first encountered it with back with Delphina, the female Templar in Advent of Decay. Indeed, I think we’ve seen it in this exact color scheme as well. I don’t have anything new to say about it, other than it just goes perfectly with this body, and it’s one of my favorite helmet designs, which somehow manages to look both noble and intimidating at the same time.

As far as weapons go, first, I’ve given her the chunky dagger, which is another callback to the original Kickstarter assortment, and one which hasn’t been turning up that often in the recent waves. I think it’s a great little piece, and it makes for an excellent main gauche when paired with the sword. I’ll also note, the hilt is painted to match that of the sword, which is always a plus in my book!

Next up is the flanged mace, which was swapped out for the spherical studded mace head. I tend to favor this one over the previous, as it has a vicious beauty to its design. I also love that each of the rivets in the head are painted gold.

And let’s bring in the second shield, which introduced in the original Kickstarter, but here given a spiffy new paintjob. The blue and white checkered deco has a nice sense of pageantry about it, and when you add the gold frame, it matches the armor pretty well. Like the tabard, the shield has a little bit of spray on it to give it a slightly dirty and worn look. I think the shield pairs really well with the flanged mace. OK, let’s do one more variant!

Here, I kept the body all the same, but added the final head, which is a sort of Burganet. This lovely form-fitting helmet has a ridged pate, bisected by a central crest, and a rather distinctive beaked visor. You get some piercings to help with breathing, two rather wide eye slits, and some painted rivets. You also get a choice of either a spike for the top, or blue plumage.

And lest you thought we were done showcasing the original Kickstarter weapons, here’s are friend the beefy battle axe. Just about everyone who was anyone got one of these in the initial assortment. The weapon includes pieces to customize it as either a double-headed axe, or to give it a single blade and a spike. Either one works fine for me! The grips are painted black, with the rest silver and given a light patina of rust.

And finally, here she is with the the shiny silver halberd. This is a weapon I’d like to see a little more often. It was introduced in Advent of Decay, but hasn’t turn up all that much since.

If you’re still with me, well congratulations, because this was easily the longest Mythos Monday Review I’ve ever done. The Deluxe Knight Builder set retailed for about $60 at pre-order, and as usual, I wish I had a little more money in the budget to have picked up two or three of these. With so many different weapons, four different heads, and two different bodies, there’s a lot of fun and variety to be had here. But Advent of Decay was a massive figure drop, and I didn’t have enough cash for all the figures I wanted, let alone enough to double up on treasures like this one. This is definitely one of those figures that should be up for order on Store Horsemen all the time, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a reissue with a new deco either!