EMMA FROST, JEAN GREY, SEBASTIAN SHAW, & DONALD PIERCE

MARVEL LEGENDS (HASBRO)

There’s been a slowdown on my Legends buying more recently, largely because there’s been a bit of a slowdown on Legends to buy recently.  There’s a bunch of stuff upcoming, of course, but in the mean time I’m continuing to fall back on some of my older un-reviewed stock.  I’m jumping over to the X-Men side of things, specifically focussing in on their early ’80s run, which is really where it’s at for me when it comes to X-Men.  During “The Dark Phoenix Saga,” Claremont and Byrne introduced a new group of “evil” mutants, the Hellfire Club, inspired by an episode of The Avengers (no, not those ones), which grew into a whole big thing, which is sort of humorous given that the group is really more of a footnote in the actual story that introduced them, as it quickly evolves to more cosmic levels then the Club can really muster.  Still, they’ve been a pretty recurrent bunch of characters, and they got their toy due in the form of a boxed set a few years ago, which I’m reviewing today!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

The Hellfire Club were a Pulse Con-exclusive Marvel Legends boxed set, offered up in 2020.  They were clearly intended to be that year’s San Diego Comic Con set, but the con got cancelled because of the pandemic, and Hasbro switched it to a fully online model.  They also offered up a Hellfire Club Guard army builder at the same time, but he was a separate item, not officially bundled with the rest of them.

EMMA FROST

Emma Frost, the White Queen, is no stranger to Marvel Legends, though until recently she *was* a stranger to *good* Marvel Legends, with her debut in the line, as part of Hasbro’s very first series of Legends no less, being one of the very worst figures Legends has ever spawned.  Her classic costume, which is admittedly rather on the risque side, has only been done in Minimate form before this, which certainly contributed to her being the biggest pull of thus here set.  The figure stands 6 1/4 inches tall and she has 27 points of articulation.  Emma got a lot of new parts, for her torso, upper arms, and cape, as well as re-using the alternate head from her Walgreens figure, and filling in the rest with the TRU Storm body.  It does unfortunately mean that she’s got visible pins on the knees, which is sort of a bummer, and also that her legs are a bit prone to warping and generally making it hard to keep her standing.  It was not easy keeping her standing for the photos here, I tell ya.  The new pieces are generally pretty nice, though.  The corset piece certainly does what it’s supposed to, and looks the part, and does so in a way that’s sharply sculpted, and reasonably well proportioned.  I do like that all of the elements of her outfit barring the boots have proper raised edges sculpted, so we’re not just relying on paint for the break.  Even the boots break at a joint line, so it’s still the same general concept.  The Walgreens head, which I hadn’t looked at before, is certainly a solid sculpt, though maybe a more generic than Byrne depicted her.  I’m not crazy about the cape, which is very thick and heavy, and virtually makes her unposeable.  It’s good for standing there and not much else, it seems.  Her paint work is pretty minimal, since the sculpt has so many separate pieces, but what’s there is decent.  My figure’s just a touch wall-eyed, but generally things look good.  Emma is without any accessories.  Not even an extra set of hands.  That’s definitely weak.

JEAN GREY

This is the second time Jean Grey as the Black Queen has gotten the Legends treatment, following the TRU-exclusive that repainted the first Legends Emma, and made her a surprisingly less awful figure.  Like that one, this one is again re-using parts from Emma, namely the Emma I just reviewed.  She gets herself a new head, collar, and cape in order to differentiate her.  The head is really nicely done, and is consistent with the other Jeans in the line in terms of her face, while also giving her that slightly off expression that seems ever-so-not-Jean.  The cape on this one is more dynamic than Emma’s, allowing for more actual posing.  Unfortunately, the legs on mine are even more wobbly then Emma, so he really has a hard time standing.  Since her construction is very similar to Emma, a lot of her coloring works the same way too, with minimal actual paint.  What’s there is generally good, but there’s some slop around her waistline.  While Emma had no accessories, Jean gets three pairs of hands (open gesture, fists, and gripping), a whip (re-used from Black Cat), and an alternate head to allow her to be Selene, her replacement in the role of Black Queen.  Technically, Selene’s outfit was different than Jean’s (and, by extension, Emma’s), but it’s close enough, and it’s just nice to actually get the extras after Emma was totally lacking.

SEBASTIAN SHAW

Sebastian Shaw is the Black King, and the de facto leader of the group.  He was also played by Kevin Bacon in First Class.  How many degrees of separation does that put him at?  Any?  I don’t know exactly how those rules work.  He’s also no relation to the actor who plays old Anakin Skywalker in Return of the Jedi.  While Shaw got a Minimate for First Class, this is the first, and to date only, time his comics counterpart’s gotten figure treatment.  The figure stands about 6 1/4 inches tall and he has 32 points of articulation.  His mold was largely new, designed to be shared with the other members of the Club.  I looked at it originally for Wyngarde.  It’s a pretty decent sculpt, but it admittedly feels a little skinny for Shaw.  I feel like he should have just a touch more presence.  He gets a unique head sculpt, which is a respectable recreation of his usual look.  This one feels more in line with the Byrne design, so I’m happy about that.  His paint work is a little more involved that the women, with a decent amount of accent work on the vest, which is quite cool.  The buttons are a little sloppy on mine, as are the edges of the cuffs, but he looks okay overall.  He’s packed with two sets of hands (relaxed and fists), the Beast’s book (which still has its scientific formulas), and Magneto’s helmet.  The helmet is the one from the Amazon set, so it’s still got the peg that would have gone into the head, meaning no one else can actually wear it, but it’s cool for holding.

DONALD PIERCE

Donald Pierce, the White Bishop, is noteworthy for being a non-mutant member of the Club.  Instead, he’s just a cyborg.  He was in Logan, but I don’t really wanna talk about it.  In the comics, he left the Club and spent a lot of his time with the Reavers, a larger group of cyborgs.  He’s a cool concept, but I feel like they lost the thread on him a while back.  This is his only time getting a figure.  He’s using the same body as Shaw, just with a new head.  It’s a more modern version of the character, with a face that’s too squared off and full to be John Byrne’s Donald Sutherland-inspired take on the character.  It still works well enough, though, and I think it reads okay as the character.  His color work is more earthy tones than Shaw’s, which differentiates them nicely from each other.  The application’s a little cleaner on Pierce than it was on Shaw as well.  He’s packed with an alternate set of robotic hands (courtesy of Doom), Domino’s blaster style guns, and Wolverine’s mask.  The alternate hands work alright for the cyborg bit, I guess, but I can’t help but wish for a comic-accurate set of torn up arms showing off the cybernetics.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I didn’t actually get this set from Pulse Con, for a multitude of reasons.  I wound up getting it loose, and in two different parts, in fact.  I lucked into the two Queens fairly early on, when they were in a short market lull, allowing me to not donate my whole arm and leg to the purchase, and then I got the other two later down the line, when they’d firmly become the “cheap” ones.  The Queens, even with the standing and posing issues, are certainly the stronger half of the set.  The guys aren’t bad, just sort of okay.  Largely, I think they’re probably hampered by me having gotten Wyngarde first, and just generally liking Wyngarde more as a character.  I do hope to some day track down a guard or two, and I’m intrigued to see if they ever get around to making Leland.  I guess we’ll just see.

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