BO-KATAN KRYZE

STAR WARS: THE BLACK SERIES (HASBRO)

“A gifted warrior, Bo-Katan Kryze is a legendary Mandalorian. She refused to align with the Empire’s occupation of Mandalore.”

One of the very short list of characters who have pulled the trifecta of Clone Wars, Rebels, and The Mandalorian appearances (while still remaining absent from the movies proper), is Katee Sackoff’s Bo-Katan Kryze.  Despite being a rather prominent character across three different Star Wars series, Bo-Katan has, up until recently, been without any action figure coverage.  I suppose an argument could be made that it’s because she’s just the worst, but that’s, admittedly, not a universal opinion.  Also, not my opinion, really, though I do get the argument.  Whatever the case, it’s her appearance on The Mandalorian that finally got her the toy coverage, going straight for the Black Series offering, which I’m taking a look at today.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Bo-Katan Kryze is Figure 10 in the Mandalorian sub-line of Star Wars: The Black Series.  She’s the final figure in the latest assortment of the line, as well as the only Mandalorian figure included.  She’s patterned specifically on her appearance on the show (or at the very least a very close to final version of the show’s design), but it’s worth noting that her other appearances aren’t terribly far removed from this one, so she can sort of pull triple duty, if you’re looking for her to fill out your Clone Wars or Rebels shelves as well.  The figure stands just under 6 inches tall and she has 27 points of articulation.  Her articulation is pretty well standard for a modern Star Wars release, which is to say it’s quite good.  In particular, I was quite impressed by the range of motion on her hips, especially with that belt and holster set-up there.  Her sculpt is an all-new affair, which isn’t too surprising.  As I touched on up above, she’s definitely based on her appearance in The Mandalorian‘s second season, but there are some minor design elements that point to her being based the designs for her outfit for the show, rather than the physical prop suit.  It’s still very close, though. and it’s more of how the parts all fit together than it is the actual individual parts.  Underneath of her removable helmet (complete with articulated range finder; I’m glad that’s become standard) is a fully-formed head sculpt, which sports a rather decent likeness of Katee Sackoff, on the face, at least.  The hair’s a different story; it’s styling is slightly off for the show, though it’s possible that owes more to making the helmet sit a bit better than it is an actual misinterpretation of the design from the show.  It means that she works better with the helmet on than off, but it’s not a terrible look either way.  More so than the sculpt, the paint work on this figure shows some of that not-quite-final source material it was working from; she winds up with generally a more muted color scheme than she had in the show.  Her blues should definitely be brighter, and some of the accents should be a little darker.  But, as with the sculpt, it’s not like it’s incredibly far off.  The base coloring is still there, and she’s even got some decent accenting on the armor, to wear it in a bit.  Bo-Katan is packed with her aforementioned helmet, her jetpack, and a pair of matching blaster pistols (borrowed from Sabine).  It’s not a ton, but it’s a good match for the character and what she needs.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

My re-watch of The Clone Wars and Rebels definitely left me hoping to see Bo-Katan show up in figure form at some juncture.  Her re-appearance on The Mandalorian, as frustrating a character as she may have been to some of the viewership, just really pushed it for me.  She’s definitely prominent enough to deserve figure treatment, and I definitely dig the character’s design enough to want that figure.  The end result is a pretty strong one.  She’s not without flaws, but she’s still pretty solid, and I’m glad to have her.

Thanks to my sponsors at All Time Toys for setting me up with this figure for review.  If you’re looking for Black Series, or other toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.