CLONE PILOT ODD BALL

STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS (HASBRO)

“Clone Pilot Odd Ball, who received his nickname during advanced training, has participated in many significant missions in the Clone Wars. Odd Ball is a starfighter pilot trained in flying V-19 Torrent starfighters, ARC-170 fighters and other standard Republic fighters.”

When they first appeared in Attack of the Clones, the Clone Troopers were completely interchangeable and devoid of any distinct traits or personalities.  Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars expanded on them a little bit, but only a little.  Revenge of the Sith went further by giving a few of them names, but it was really just commanders, and, again, any personality or the like was largely absent.  When the second Clone Wars launched, its creators much more quickly went to work making the clones into actual characters.  In many cases, they were working with all-new characters, but they also went back and filled in a little more with the small handful of named clones we’d gotten in Sith as well.  Today’s focus, Clone Pilot Odd Ball began as little more than a cameo in RotS’s opening dogfight.  He didn’t get a *ton* to do in Clone Wars, but it was certainly more than he’d had previously.  And he also got a figure!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Clone Pilot Odd Ball was figure 11 in Hasbro’s Clone Wars tie-in line.  He was one of the four new figures in the line’s second assortment.  While he sports the name “Odd Ball”, his design is also just a fairly basic Clone Pilot, which allowed Hasbro the opportunity to do one of those, while still providing another named character for the line.  The figure stands 3 3/4 inches tall and he has 24 points of articulation.  Odd Ball was largely a re-use of the standard Clone Trooper body.  It makes sense, since they would have the same build and armor, and Odd Ball has minimal unique pieces on the armor.  It’s still a really good base as well, so it’s hard to really go wrong with a figure on this set-up.  His head is a modified version of the standard helmet sculpt, now with the extra pilot gear.  It wasn’t quite as show accurate as later helmet sculpts, but I think it still made for a nice translation.  In contrast to the prior standard clone, Odd Ball’s armor is without the heavy wash, making it look far cleaner.  It makes a good degree of sense, since you wouldn’t imagine that the guy in the ship would get nearly as dirty as the trooper on the ground.  The rest of the paint is basic, but covers all the bases, and he looks pretty sharp.  Odd Ball was packed with the smaller blaster rifle, as well as a rocket launcher and missile.  They were the same ones from the standard Clone, but without the silver detailing.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I don’t remember anything special about Odd Ball’s acquisition.  I remember seeing him a few times before actually getting him, and finally breaking when there were a few other Clones to go along.  He’s never really been one of my favorites from the line or anything, but he’s a solid by the numbers release, and he had a lot of appeal being a pretty basic pilot and all.