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December, 2018:

Review – Marvel Legends – First Ten Years – Ant-Man (Ant-Man and Yellowjacket)

Unlike Thor, Ant-Man did get a dedicated wave during the time of his movie.  It just, only had one movie figure in it, Ant-Man, and the rest of the wave was Ant-Man themed comic characters, sort of, the 3 villains of the wave weren’s Ant-Man villains.  the Build a Figure was AoE Ultron, though in the comics Hank Pym built Ultron, not Tony Stark.  Anyway, the point is, there wasn’t a Yellowjacket figure, comic or otherwise.  Marvel has seriously shied away from doing figures of the movie villains for whatever reason.  This set remedies that problem.

It also remedies another problem.  The MCU Ant-Man figure we got for the first movie had a horribly inaccurate head.  It was based on some pre-production art or something, because the head had a visible human mouth and the breather unit was attached to the chin.  In the movie, Paul Rudd’s face isn’t visible while he is in the suit.  The head for this set is more accurate to the movie’s design.  There is also an unmasked Paul Rudd head as well.  It’s different than the one from the recent Ant-Man and the Wasp version, with the goofy smirk.  Unfortunately, the heads are not cross compatible, they use entirely different pegs.  I have no idea why Hasbro hasn’t standardized the head pegs.  It seems like it could only be a win for the on the production side, since it would mean easier parts reuse, and it would mean for easier head swaps for people who buy the figures.

Aside from the heads, the An-Man is essentially identical to the original release.  The red parts have a bit of extra texturing to them, but it’s the same sculpt otherwise.  Including the slightly weird hands.  The better Ant-Man is nice, but the real winner of this set is Yellowjacket.  It’s nice to see Hasbro finally pushing a lot of the villains from the MCU out, because they all had some really nice designs and having someone for the hero to fight is always good.

The figure itself is pretty much what you’d expect.  It’s similar to the Ant-Man in that it’s a little stiff and clunky in design, but a lot of the MCU figures fall into this bucket, it fits with the “realistic” look and style though, so it’s not a huge problem.  The fun part is his backpack and the pair of stingers hanging off of it.  There are several extra joints to let them pose in several different ways, though it kind of feels like there could be a few more joints to make it perfect.  It holds to his back well though and does the job.  He generally looks pretty menacing and matches the movie design well.  The upper stinger pylon things don’t have any joints though, which is kind of a bummer.  He also doesn’t have an unmasked Corey Stoll head, which is kind of a bummer, though I don’t recall him ever wearing the suit without the helmet either.

The set also includes a set of micro sized Ant-Man and Yellowjacket figures.  They are the same ones included with the original Ant-Man release with marginally better paint.  It’s a nice extra bit but nothing super amazing.  The mini figures don’t even really stand on their own or anything.

So, unlike the Thor and Sif set, this set has a much broader appeal.  Ant-Man is a much more well received film than the Thor movies and the re-release figure is a definite improvement over it’s original release, so it feels like less of toss aside item than the Thor.  Yellowjacket is also a nice figure with a little more play value than Sif.  It’s a good set overall.

Review – Transformers – Masterpiece Sunstreaker (MP-39)

I don’t really collect Masterpiece Transformers, not on any sort of large scale.  I have a few, the original MP-01 and MP-05 Optimus and Megatron.  Though both of those are in the old larger scale of Transformers.  I use MP-08 Grimlock as my “Classics Grimlock”, because it’s a nice looking toy and his bulk makes him nice and imposing next to mainline sized toys.  Sunstreaker is more of a personal indulgence.  When he was announced, he looked really nice, and when a reissue of his brother Sideswipe was announced to go with him, I definitely wanted the pair.

So, I just want to cut to the chase a bit on this guy, this is a really damn nice Transformer.  He looked fantastic in the promotional photos and he lives up to that in every way.  The robot mode is very slick, very poseable, and very solid.  The whole transformation does an excellent job of collapsing everything together and removing any dangling vehicle kibble.  The result is a very nice representation of Sunstreaker as he appears on the show.

The Transformation may actually be the downside of this figure, if you aren’t really into complex transformations, it’s definitely a plus if you are,  There are a ridiculous number of little flippy and sliding parts that all come apart and come together to make this robot.  Everything about his backpack has to collapse together just right to make it all conform into the proper shape.  The front windshield of the car is supposed to fold up into the backpack but it pops off easily and honestly, I prefer to just pull it off and put it aside because I worry that its going to break while putting the backpack together.

There is so much more about this figure that makes it exceptional though, even by Masterpiece Transformer levels.  There are extra joints in his shoulders, that allow him to hold his gun with two hands.  The vehicle itself has some nice surprises as well.  Despite already being a complex puzzle of joints and panels to build the robot, the vehicle goes even farther and is able to convert between a standard stock Lamborghini Countach, and the tricked out super car that Sideswipe was on the show.  This is more than just a panel flip on the back, it’s a panel flip, and some roll over parts and even a second set of taillights that flip up over the stock tail lights.

He’s also loaded with fun accessories.  Aside from a pair of guns, he also includes a small Chip Chase figure in his wheelchair, several alternative face plates, and an alien mask from Hoist Goes to Hollywood.  I don’t know if it’s a widespread issue, but I did have a problem with his smaller gun.  The clip holding it together pretty much broke immediately.  It still holds itself together as a gun, but it doesn’t transform anymore.

Overall, Masterpiece Sunstreaker is just a really fantastic transformer.  He’s not even a particularly big name character in G1, so it’s not real clear why he deserved such a great treatment.

DX-9 K1 Freeman (Overwatch Bastion)

So, even before Goodsmile announced they were doing Overwatch figures of any kind, a company known for 3rd party Transformers, DX-9 put out a transforming 3rd Party Bastion.  Or as it’s officially know, K1 Freeman.  So, a little background, “3rd Party” is a term used often in the Transformers community to refer to a slew of toys and companies that produce unofficial, unlicensed Transformers figures.  There are, I believe, similar operations in other toylines, but Transformers is definitely the biggest market for these toys.  They aren’t straight bootlegs, like you might find at a flee market, where some company produces a replica of of an official toy and sells it for cheap.  These are heavily engineered and often expensive figures, released without the official sanction of the company holding the IP.  They also often get goofy names like “K1 Freeman”.  Bastion, being sort of a Transformer, got the 3rd Party treatment.

I waited on picking this one up for a while, until the official Figma figures were announced.  I seriously doubt Figma ever puts out any of the larger characters, though I’d be happy to be wrong.  I have even less faith that Figma will ever put out a transforming Bastion.  So Freeman is the next best thing.  The main thing that feels off about him is the default skin, which I had honestly forgot what it even looked like, because no one uses it in game.

He does the job pretty dang well.  There is some limitation on the articulation, especially on the gun arm, but it’s mostly pretty good.  Bastion isn’t exactly a ninja or anything, he’s a big heavy military robot that turns into a tank.  Being the product of a 3rd Party Transformers company, he also has all three of Bastion’s modes.  Granted, none of Bastion’s transformations are particularly complex.  For the turret, he pretty much drops to his knees, fold up the arms, and extend the barrel on the back.

The tank involves some parts swapping, though there isn’t really any other way to handle those giant treads.  The Gatling turret swaps for a tank barrel and the legs slide off and get replaced by the tank treads.  The treads are actually functional, which is cool, but rubber on toys tends to not really last, so I imagine over time, they will likely end up falling apart.  The parts forming kind of sucks, but it’s slick and easy so it works.

The best part, Freeman scales very nicely with the official Figma characters.  He might be a tad oversized, but it works, and it’s not a lot if he is.  He also includes a little version of Ganymede, his little parrot friend.  Ganymede has a little peg that lets him peg onto a fee places on the figure.

Overall, Freeman is a pretty nice representation of Bastion.  He’s gotten pretty affordable on eBay as well.  The whole thing is very solidly built and has some nice heft to it as well, nothing flimsy here.  The real X factor is what Hasbro does with it’s recently announced Overwatch line.  They are more likely to release Bastion than Figma, but who knows if it will transform at all.  I suspect it would at best turn into a turret and not a tank.

Review – Marvel Legends – First Ten Years – Thor the Dark World (Thor and Lady Sif)

For the ten year anniversary of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Hasbro is putting out a special sub line of Marvel Legends celebrating the event.  These figures all come in special boxes that create a little mural when combined along the edges, and all are themed around different movies from the MCU so far.  Its sort of the Marvel Legends equivalent to the Transformers Studio Series line.  They are also using it as a chance to catch up on characters who may have been missed over the years in the previous lines.  This particular set is for the second Thor movie, Thor: The Dark World.  In case you forgot which one that was, since its often thought of as one of if not the worst movies in the MCU so far, its the one where Thor has to rescue Natalie Portman from an infection of Aether, and stop the evil Dark Elf Malekith from using it to destroy the Nine Realms.

This set includes Thor and Lady Sif.  I’m going to start with Thor, since he’s kind of the boring figure of the set.  We’ve gotten several Thor figures over the years, and several releases of this particular Thor, more or less before.  It’s not a bad figure really, and the beefed up paint jobs that the Ten Years line is getting really help bring out the niceness of the sculpt versus the previous releases.

The main weaknesses aren’t anything new.  The long plastic cape kind of hinder a lot of more dynamic poses and the long hair is a little thick and weird looking.  It’s probably the nicest version of this early style Thor we’re ever going to get in Marvel Legends though, so it’s not a complete loss or anything.  His only accessory is his hammer.

Moving on, there’s Lady Sif.  Lady Sif is a character whom a lot of fans have been wanting a figure of for a while.  She was fairly prominent in the first two Thor films and has appeared in a couple of episodes of Agents of SHIELD as one of the few connecting threads between the TV and Movie world.  She never showed up in Ragnarok so she wasn’t wiped out by Hela.  It’s possible she could even return for Avengers 4 I suppose.

In the MCU, Sif is just sort of, one of Thor’s friends.  In the comics, she is sometimes his girlfriend.  In Norse Mythology, Sif is the wife of Thor.  The fact that she hasn’t been included in previous lines is kind of a good thing really, she’s being released now, while Hasbro is at a nice peak for paint and sculpt.  Also, it’s not like the first two Thor Movies really had dedicated waves.  Almost all of the MCU films have gotten some sort of pretty dedicated wave except the Thor films.  Thor pretty much just gets figures for Avengers films.

The sculpt on this figure is pretty great too.  The head looks like Jamie Alexander.  The armor and weapons is full of neat little etching and detailing.  The paint work is is very nice as well.  Like I said, it’s kind of a  plus that she is just now getting a figure. She also has a ton of accessories.  She has her little shield, and three swords.  Two of the swords are identical, one of the two can peg into the larger one and create a larger javelin sort of weapon.  I do have a bit of a nit picky complaint on the swords.  There is nowhere to store the swords on her person.  There aren’t even any loose belts to let you fake it by wedging the sword under the belt.

Is the two pack worth it?  I suppose it depends on some things.  How much do you want a Lady Sif?  How many versions of the old Thor design do you already have?  It’s been discounted down already so getting it cheaper than the usual 2 pack price isn’t too hard.  It’s a nice set, but it’s mostly the Lady Sif figure.