POE DAMERON

STAR WARS: ELITE SERIES (DISNEY)

Man, it’s hard to believe it’s been over a year since The Force Awakens product started hitting shelves.  This Friday, we’ll be seeing another midnight release, this time around for the products from Rogue One.  With Force Awakens, there was a lot of product being released in a relatively short span of time, so it was a little difficult to keep track of it all.  The main characters were available in a variety of scales, from a few different manufacturers.  Of course, I’ve looked at Hasbro’s 3 3/4-inch and 6-inch lines, but the Disney Store also got in on the action, offering a line of die cast figures (die cast is just all the rage right now).  The line more or less slipped under my radar.  I knew it existed, but wasn’t quite aware of the depth of the line until rather recently, which is why I’m only just now reviewing my first figure from the line, Poe Dameron.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Poe is from the second round of the Disney Store-exclusive Star Wars: Elite Series.  He was released to coincide with the movie’s release back in December, and was the last of the film’s three leads to make it into the line (Poe’s absence from the first series of so many of the lines is a bit odd, especially given how popular the character proved to be.  Perhaps Disney under-estimated his appeal).  The figure stands about 7 inches tall (placing him roughly in scale with most of NECA’s output, as a reference), and he has 16 points of articulation.  He’s also reeeallly heavy, thanks to all that metal.  His torso, pelvis, arms, and legs are all metal, with plastic being used for the head, hands, feet, belt/tubes, and a few of his joints.  Poe’s certainly constructed from a lot more metal than a lot of die cast items, which is actually pretty cool.  It results in the figure being a little less posable than I might like, but the sheer heft of this guy is pretty nifty, and you can still manage some decent poses.  As far as the sculpt goes, Poe’s overall not bad, but not without a few issues.  On a whole, the details seem a little soft.  I’m not sure if it’s the sculpt or the paint, but he’s got a certain animated feel too him.  I’m also not really a fan pf the left hand, which looks a little like it was replaced by an inflated latex glove, due to the weird, puffy absence of a palm.  Possibly the most notable issue is more a construction thing than anything.  In order to be properly assembled, Poe needs to have 9 visible screws on his back, apparently.  That seems a little excessive to me, but I could be wrong.  At the very least, they aren’t visible from the front.  Moving past those issues, I think Poe’s actually got a pretty decent sculpt.  In particular, the head, I feel, is a better Oscar Isaac than we’ve seen elsewhere.  It’s still not perfect (it would appear he’s the Harrison Ford of the new trio in that respect), but it looks pretty good.  Poe’s paint is alright, though it’s kind of basic in terms of color, and a little sloppy in more than a few areas.  It’s also quite thick.  Plus, I’ve already noticed one or two chips on mine, which is slightly frightening.  I’ll be interested to see how it holds up in the long run.  Poe included his small blaster, his helmet, and a display stand.  The blaster and the stand are both pretty cool, but the helmet is a slight letdown, due to the opaque nature of the visor, and the fact that Poe actually can’t wear it. 

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I got Poe from the Disney Store that was in the same mall as the Apple Store where I was buying my new computer.  I actually wasn’t aware that they had made a Poe in this line, so he was a nice surprise find.  He’s not a perfect figure but I think he might be my favorite Poe straight out of the box (my amalgamation of the two Black Series Poes is still my favorite overall, though).  Poe is still my favorite part of TFA, so it was really cool to find a new Poe to buy.