The time of reckoning is coming! Super7’s ThunderTank is starting to show up in people’s hands. And I still have a lot of ThunderCats figures to try to review before that happens. So, I’m going to do my best to throw a lot of love at this line over the next few weeks. Will I be caught up by the time the tank arrives? Probably not. But I’ll try to close the gap as much as I can. Today I’m checking out a figure from Wave 4, and it is indeed the Snowman of Hook Mountain! *Snowmeow not included!

We’ve seen the packaging for these figures many times now, but it’s so nicely done, that I don’t mind taking more shots of another one. You get the sleeve with the red foil Eye of Thundera on the front and when you lift it off it reveals the window box. The window shows off the figure and just how much little excess room there is in there because he’s so hefty. The back panel has a nice bit of character art and a blurb about Snowman. I love the one line here that states, so matter of fact and irrefutably, Lion-O was able to tame Snowmeow because he is the Lord of all Cats. Cartoon logic, bitches! I really enjoy Snowman’s debut episode a lot. It starts out with a misunderstanding and Lion-O fighting him, but they end up as fast friends, making Snowman a formidable ThunderCat ally!

Protector of the Castle of the Snowmen, Standing member of The League of Third Earth… like his animated counterpart, Snowman is a big boy, measuring in at many chonks more than even the biggest ThunderCat! He has a dark blue, short-sleeve tunic over lighter blue sleeves and baggie trousers. His lower legs are covered in sculpted fur boots, and he’s got a mantle of more sculpted fur over his shoulders and covering most of his chest and back. His hands are bare, but he’s got some natural brown fur on the backs of his mighty meathooks! This is not one of the most complex character designs out there, but Super7 did a really nice job detailing all that gray fur. I also dig how the articulation cuts at the knees and ankles make it look like the boots are cinched and tied at those points.

When this figure was originally solicited, I seem to remember the plan was to have a regular head and helmeted head, but we wound up with one head and a removable helmet, and that made me happy. Sure, you could argue that the eyes would line up better with the eyeholes if the helmet had the exposed eyes as part of the sculpt, but what we got isn’t that bad, and I like to have the option to have him holding the helmet and not seeing a severed head in there. I love this helmet design, as it looks like a cross between an exaggerated knight’s helmet and a German WWI helmet with the one spike protruding from the top. The visor is massive and the silver paint looks quite nice!

Remove the helmet and you are treated to Snowman’s walrus-like visage. At least it reminds me of a walrus sans tusks and with a human nose. He’s got a wall of off-white facial hair surrounding his buried mouth with the rest of the head covered in brown fur, leaving only the skin around the nose and eyes bare. Oh yeah, he’s also got two adorable little ears jutting from his hair. If only they had hired on Wilfred Brimley to voice this guy! “Folks, I’d like to talk to you all about Thundrilliam…”

For articulation, Snowman has all the right points, but because of his bigger size, the range of motion is curtailed in some of them. There’s a ball joint under the chest, which allows him to rotate and lean back and forward a bit, with the ball joint in the neck fairing about as well. The arms do a pretty good job with rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, and hinged pegs for the hands. There are three sets of hands: Fists, Relaxed, and Accessory Holding. The legs have a great range of motion in the ball jointed hips, but the knees don’t bend back nearly as much as I would like, because of the sculpt. The ankles are good for flattening the feet on wider stances, but not a whole lot more. Snowman is still loads of fun to play with, but for a line that isn’t exactly super-articulated, he manages to offer a wee bit less.

As for accessories, Snowman comes with a lance, a spear, and a shield. Each of these are cast in chalky, somewhat transparent plastic to make them look like they’re fashioned in ice, and it’s a pretty nice effect, which I don’t seem to remember being the case on the LJN figure’s accessories. The lance even has a cool bubble effect in the handle, and this weapon is almost twice as tall as Snowman himself!

The spear and shield are my favorites of the three, as the spear is a lot easier for him to wield than the bulky jousting lance. The shield handle, however, is very tough to get into his hand, as the fingers are not very pliable. Still, he looks great holding them! I’ll likely leave it connected to that hand to risk having to deal with that tight grip again.

Snowman was one of the first inhabitants of Third Earth that left a lasting impression on me in the cartoon. His episode is fun and does a good job about teaching a life lesson. Naturally, I was excited to get a figure of him, and Super7’s does not disappoint. Is there any chance we might still get Snowmeow? Well, initially I thought the chances were slim since they didn’t come together. But, seeing as how Super7 packaged Mandora and her Electro-Charger separately, I think there’s still some hope. If Super7 is confident enough in selling some of the bigger toys, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the big snow cat show up.

It’s been about two months since I last visited with Super7’s Ultimate ThunderCats, and that’s just unacceptable. I’ve still got a bunch of figures from this line to check out, and the pre-orders for the newest wave has got me motivated to get caught up. So, let’s get this going with a look at Super7’s first foray into the fearsome Berserkers… It’s Captain Hammerhand!

Once again, this line’s packaging never fails to impress. Super7 has been sticking with the same glossy black sleeve over window box, which just oozes class. The sleeve features Mumm-Ra’s symbol, which Super7 has been using for all the baddies that have allied themselves with The Ever-Living Evil Lord. The spacious window gives you a look at the figure and all the goodies inside, and you get some nice character art and a little blurb about Hammerhand on the back. And may I say that this is one of the best character blurbs of all time, as it contains the phrase, “in search of delicious unicorns!” One of the many cool things about the ThunderCats was all the crazy villains that were introduced and often returned. The Berserkers were among my favorites!

Super7 has been adopting the animated style for their Ultimates line, and that’s certainly the case here with Hammerhand. I’m happy to have the cartoon-style, but props have to be given to how absolutely freaking creepy the old LJN figure was. He had a crack-addled rage face and unsettling proportions, but this version is the one I know best. It’s also worth noting that this is based on his later appearance, as he looked very different in his debut episode. Here, Hammerhand sports some bright yellow trousers with a booted right foot and a giant mechanical left foot. His wide belt features a skull and bones motif with some red to give an extra splash of color. He shows off his mighty six-pack of abs, and I don’t blame him because he is positively chiseled up in there. Looks like that unicorn meat is not a fatty food. His chest is encased in black armor, his left arm is mostly bare, with a bicep cuff and a black gauntlet, while his right hand is dominated by his titular hammer hand. This is just such a colorful, fun design and Super7 did a wonderful job realizing that in plastic form.

You get two heads to choose from, the first of which is just plain bad tempered. Hammerhand’s bushy beard and mustache spills out of his face and looks to be angry at the world. A flash of teeth and bottom lip are nestled in the middle of this mad face coif, and his noggin is capped with a yellow helmet and mis-matched horns. A nasal guard bisects his face, with a large patch covering his right eye and a single red peeper gazing out to the left.

The other option trades bad tempered for downright pissed off. His mouth is agape with rage and showing more teeth. I think this may be the head I display on him the most!

The hammer hand is suitably large and imposing, and like the heads, you get two versions of it to choose from. One has articulated fingers, while the other is just folded into a solid hammer. The difference is a little subtle, but the non-articulated hand does close up tighter than the other one is capable of. You also get a selection of left hands, including a fist, open hand, weapon holding hand, and another accessory holding hand.

For the weapon holding hand, Hammerhand comes with his trusty blunderbuss. I absolutely love this weapon design. There’s something about antique looking weapons with futuristic elements on them that just does it for me. The sculpted tape wrapped around the barrel is a nice touch too.

Hammerhand also comes with a couple of coin purses… or BOOTY, if you prefer! They’re nothing special, but a fun addition to round out the accessories.

I was thrilled to see Hammerhand introduced to the line so soon, and I sincerely hope we don’t have to wait too long to get some more Berserkers. For the time being, Hammerhand has been hanging out with his fellow Captain, Cracker, which I think look surprisingly good together, despite not being from the same faction. I’ve had tons of fun fiddling about with Hammerhand on my desk for weeks after he came out, and he’s definitely one of my favorite baddies released in this line so far!

It’s been a long road… getting from there to here. Oh wait. Wrong franchise. Still, the sentiment holds up. After two abandoned lines from Ban Dai and one abandoned line from Mattel, Super7 picked up the mantel, and has finally given us a complete team of original ThunderCats… well, provided you have the Mattel ThunderKittens… oh, and we’re still minus one Snarf. And just to add to the unbearable torture of waiting, Cheetara was even delayed in favor of some revisions. Well, she arrived a little while ago, and I finally had the time to sit down and spend some time with her!

There’s nothing left for me to say about the packaging, other than the fact that it looks great and has a very premium flavor to it. It’s rare that I ever keep boxes for figures in this scale, but I’ve been keeping all of these. That’s high praise, considering I can’t imagine ever not having these figures on display somewhere. I’ve been very anxious to get Cheetara for a lot of reasons. Her little segment from the ThunderCats intro alone may have sparked the jolt to my nether regions that kickstarted puberty for me. Sure, the intro is a universally gorgeous piece of animation, but I found Cheetara to be particularly arousing. And I’m not into furries. Honest! Well, before I make any more awkward confessions, let’s get Cheetara out of the box and have a look!

MEOW! Super7 has been doing a superb job bringing the animated versions of the ThunderCats to figure form, but they started out borrowing from Mattel’s molds, so it’s nice to see that with Tygra and now Cheetara, they are continuing the trend on their own. Granted, Cheetara’s character design isn’t overly complex, consisting of an orange leotard, gold rimmed boots, left arm bracer, and bangles on her right wrist, but it’s nonetheless beautifully translated here. They also did a wonderful job on her tush! The colors are also spot on for the animated look, and yes, if you’re looking for the LJN toy colors, I think that variant is up for pre-order now. I really dig how sharp the spots turned out on her right shoulder, as well as her ThunderCat emblem.

You get not one, not two, but three heads, which is pretty above and beyond if you ask me. I was a little worried with what we were going to get since I was never really thrilled with Pumyra’s head sculpt. But turns out I had nothing to fear, as the standard head is an excellent portrait. The yellow and black spotted coif is sculpted separately to offer a clean hair line around the scalp, and the little licks of hair here and there give it a naturally untamed look. Her facial markings, as well as the eyes and mouth are pretty sharp and all very evocative of the cartoon kitty.

The second head is pretty much the same, only with glow-in-the-dark eyes. It’s a cool bonus and the glowing eyes look pretty nice, but this head isn’t going to get much use by me.

The final head is for those action poses, with her hair blowing back, as she exercises her super speed ability. This wasn’t something I expected when I was imagining what Super7 would do with the figure, but now I couldn’t imagine the figure without it.

As for articulation, we know by now that these figures aren’t exactly super-articulated, but what they have is pretty serviceable and I’ve got few complaints. The arms have rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, and the wrists are on hinged pegs. There are rotating hinges up in the hips, and they are designed to be concealed pretty well unless you’re looking up and in between the legs. You also get rotating hinges in the knees, and both hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. There’s a ball joint under the chest and another in the neck. My only nitpick here is that I would have liked to see swivels at the tops of the boots.

In addition to the three portraits, Cheetara comes with four sets of hands! You get fists, grapple hands, accessory holding hands, and running (or karate chop!) hands.

Naturally, Cheetara comes with her trusty bo staff, or actually two versions of it. The first is in its retracted form, and this can be fitted into her arm bracer for easy storage. The second is the fully extended version, which she can wield in either, or both, of her accessory holding hands. Yup, it’s a pretty simple accessory, but the gold paint looks nice and she looks damn great holding it.

There’s also a flame effect part, which can be fitted onto the end. It looks fantastic, but it’s very heavy and it’s pretty hard to get a good pose with it where it isn’t bending the bo staff under the weight of its bulk.

You get a few more accessories, which are pretty much all fun little Easter Eggs from various episodes of the cartoon. First off is The Mirror of Truth. This ThunderCats artifact reveals the truth to whomever gazes into its reflection. It also kind of makes me want the team to be released as ThunderKittens.

Next up is the Magical Flute, and like the Mirror, this is another one of Thundera’s lost treasures. This artifact allows the player to control animals. I don’t dig this one as much as the Mirror, as it’s hard to get Cheetara to hold it like she’s actually playing it. But it’s still a cool bonus piece.

Finally, you get two versions of the ThunderCats communicator: One closed and one open. They both have strings. Honestly, I could take or leave these pieces. They aren’t particularly iconic to me, and they’ll probably spend most of their time back in the box.

It feels so great to finally have the core team of ThunderCats to proudly display on my shelf! And holy crap, do these cats look great together. I’ll concede that I was more than a little nervous when Cheetara was first delayed, as I had high expectations out of this figure. Well, now that she’s here, I’m very happy with what we got! Super7 took the time to do some much needed tweaks, and the final product turned out great! And now, with the core team complete, next time I revisit this line I’ll be checking out The Evil Mumm-Ra!!!

I just got notice that the next wave of Super7’s Ultimate ThunderCats has shipped, and that made me realize that I still had one figure left from the previous assortment to review here. This assortment consisted of Captain Cracker, Slithe, and the Elder of the ThunderCats himself… Jaga!

Once again, the figure comes in some super spiffy packaging, which includes a black outer slipcase with a beautiful red foil Eye of Thundera emblazoned on the front. The inner packaging is a window box with the ThunderCats logo and the character’s name on the front, and some character art and a little blurb about them on the back. Everything is collector friendly, which is a big plus in my book, although I will likely just be keeping the packaging for Mumm-Ra and Lion-O and pitching the rest.

Here’s Jaga out of the box and looking like he stepped right out of the screen into my living room and making me spit out my Fruit Loops. Super7 has been doing a great job nailing the simple animated styles on these figures, and Jaga is another fine example of that. His body is brown and off-white, with some bright blue boots, a pair of mismatched wrist bracers, and an unusual gold belt-undie combo, which reaches up to his neck and clips onto his blue cape, just under the bold ThunderCats emblem. And Jaga is looking pretty good for an old cat, as he’s positively ripped with muscles! The cape is plastic, but you get a bonus soft-goods cape, which we’ll check out at the end. Some of the paint lines could have been a little sharper on my figure, mostly where the brown and off-white patterns of his body meet. There’s nothing outrageously sloppy, but at the same time, there’s room for improvement.

You get a whopping three heads with this figure. The one that he has on in the package is your regular vanilla Jaga. It’s my guess that this will be the default for a lot of collectors out there, and it looks great. You get some sharp printing on the eyes, a well-sculpted beard, bold nose, and his skull cap helmet with a pike jutting up from the top.

The second head is old man Jaga, and I happen to like this one a lot too. He looks a little more gaunt, with his cheeks sucked in quite a bit. He lacks the vertical hashes under his eyes, and his eyes are a little narrower and lack a bit of the spark from the younger version. His eyebrows are less stylized, and his beard is a bit more bushy and unkept. He also looks like he might be just a wee bit tired of Lion-O’s shit. The helmet, on the other hand, is the same as the previous head. I may actually go with this one as my default display head, but I haven’t decided yet.

And finally, you get a head sans helmet, and this one looks great too. This is clearly meant to be the younger version, but now you can see his pointed ears, and his bald pate. I like the way his hair flares up with his ears. It’s a nice piece of work, but I don’t think this one will get a lot of display time, unless I wind up picking up a second Jaga figure to display it on.

Jaga comes with a few accessories, but two of them I’ve seen before. Sort of. You get the Sword of Omens in both the sleeping dagger version and its aroused sword form. In addition to his relaxed hands, Jaga comes with two additional pairs to help him interact with the swords: One has forward hinges, and the other the normal side-to-side hinges.

I have yet to receive my Super7 Ultimates Lion-O, so currently, I only have the sword that came with the original Matty Lion-O to compare this one to, and it is a completely new and vastly improved sculpt. The hilt is bigger and has sharper detail, as well as a much more pronounced and better painted Eye of Thundera. I also like how the cross-guard is curled in a little more to give you that proper Sight-Beyond-Sight configuration. The blade is longer, and has a central fuller instead of a diamond cross-section. The only thing I prefer about the Matty version is the silver paint on the blade, which I think looks a bit nicer.

You also get an effect part hand, depicting jaga clothing the ThunderCats team with the magic cloth. This is one of those really cool bonus accessories that I absolutely love, and yet will probably never actual use for display purposes.

Our last stop in the review is the soft-goods cape, which actually comes on the figure in the package. Both capes have pegs behind the ThunderCats emblem that plugs into the top of Jaga’s outfit. It works OK, but I would have appreciated a pet hole in the chest too, so it would anchor it down better. As it is, the peg can press against the figure’s chest and pop out, although it doesn’t happen all that frequently. The soft cape is beautifully tailored with some immaculate stitching and a pretty close match for the blue plastic used for the boots. It also has a wire to assist with some dynamic poses.

Jaga was a great choice for this wave, as he’s one of my favorite figures in the line from outside the core team. While there are some opportunities to clean up some of the paint lines, I still think that this figure turned out looking fabulous. The two additional heads add a lot of value to the package, and I was both surprised and delighted to see the improvements to The Sword of Omens. I’ll likely hand it over to Lion-O as his new default accessory. I should have the next litter of cats here by next week, and I can’t wait to start cracking into those!

Wow, it’s been about four years since I reviewed the last of Mattel’s ThunderCats Classics figures! These were offered through Matty Collector and only survived one wave before Matty shut things down and eventually passed the license off to Super7. Super7 stepped in by offering a redo of the first wave of figures with more accessories. They also adopted a made-to-pre-order business model, which means delivery is sloooooow. But now, a new wave with new characters has shipped and I’m excited to finally have new additions to this collection!

And who better to kick things off than with Slithe, Yesssss? As the de facto leader of The Evil Mutants from Plun-Darr, Slithe is without a doubt the most coveted release in this wave! Not only is he an important character, but he’s also one of the more unique character designs of the Mutants, and I was beyond curious to see how his figure would turn out. The packaging is super snazzy with a cover featuring the red foil insignia of Mumm-Ra The Ever Living. Lift the cover off to reveal the window box within. We can see the figure from the front and from the back some character art and a blurb about Slithe. Inside, the figure comes on a hefty tray with a second tray containing the accessories, nested under it.

Slithe is indeed a big boi, with a lot of satisfying heft to the figure. His stocky, hunched body is beautifully recreated here in what is a wonderful compromise between realistic detail and the simple nature of his cartoon counterpart. His green skin is textured with reptilian scales, along with smooth patches scattered throughout, and a smooth, light blue surface for the undercarriage of his tail and his chest. Personally, I would have liked that light blue to be closer to a greenish-gray, but I still think it looks good. He’s got a yellow sash tied around his waist, secured by a Y-shaped harness with two brown suspenders running up from the back, over his shoulders and joining together in the center of his chest at what looks like a steer’s head fixture. Below the yellow sash he has a shaggy brown skirt that covers the modesty of his lizard-goodies. His tail curls up behind him, and his hump is crested with dinosaur-like spikes. The sculpt and coloring on display here are both fantastic, and this figure not only looks great, but feels incredibly solid in hand!

Slithe’s ugly mug is positioned dead center of his hump and mounted on a dumbell-style arm, which allows it to look side to side as well as up and down and swivel, like a dog hearing a strange noise. The sculpted is packed with detail and personality. His headpiece looks like it’s a separate piece that’s attached to the figure. One eye is characteristically popped a little larger than the other and he offers a slightly pensive glance, as if wondering why their last plan to defeat the ThunderCats went tits up. The paint on the exposed fangs could have been a little tighter, but you have to get in pretty close to see any issues.

Slithe features a second head is a lot more expressive, with his one left eye squinting a lot more and his mouth slightly agape to show his disgusting mutant lizard tongue. It’s really a toss-up as to which head I will display him with the most, but I’m currently leaning toward this second one.

Other than the unusual neck articulation, everything else is pretty standard. You get rotating hinges in the shoulders, elbows, hips, and knees. The ankles are hinged and have generous lateral rockers. The wrists are on hinged pegs so they can be swapped out with the accessory holding hands. The tail will swivel, and he has what feels like a ball joint tucked under that waist sash. The joints work well and do a nice job of supporting his bulk, even if he isn’t resting on his tail. The balance on this figure is actually amazing for such an oddly shaped fellow!

You get three weapons with the figure. The first is this classic spiked mace. The shaft is a little bendy, but otherwise it’s a nice enough weapon.

Next up, you get an ax with a gnarled, rustic looking shaft, and a pretty well worn blade, full of nicks and dents and other battle damage. This is probably my favorite of the three, as it has loads of personality.

And finally, you get a cleaner ax with a spear head on the tip and a less worn blade. I like that the butt cap on the pole of this one matches the one on the mace.

Damn, this figure turned out great! And most importantly, I’m happy to see that the Ultimates fits in seamlessly with Matty’s Classics, as they are meant to. Yeah, it’s been a long road, and it goes without saying that collecting this line is not for those without resolve and patience. But the fact that it survived being cancelled to get handed off to such a skilled creator of action figures tells me that this line was meant to be. And having never had any ThunderCats figures as a kid, this line continuing is like a dream come true, and I’m happy to see it’s in good hands. It also makes me happy to see such high quality paint and quality control here, because I am pretty much All-In on their Silverhawks and G.I. JOE lines. I just hope I live long enough to actually get all these great figures in hand!