Category Archives: Reviews

#1638: Rocket & Teen Groot

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ROCKET & TEEN GROOT

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

Remember last week when I looked at Star-Lord, and I did the whole thing about the Guardians of the Galaxy being part of the line?  Well, here’s the follow-up, Rocket and Groot, the inseparable pair, who make up the token Guardians slot of the deluxe assortment.  So, let’s see how they turned out!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

This pair makes up the second half of the first deluxe series of Avengers: Infinity War figures.  Unlike Hulk, it’s not that either of them is really larger than a standard figure, but more the two-pack aspect that makes them deluxe.

ROCKET

Rocket’s look is essentially unchanged from his Guardians Vol. 2 look (which was itself pretty much the same as his look from the end of the first film).  The figure stands about 3 inches tall and the has 7 points of articulation.  The sizing of this figure is much smaller, so it made more sense to do the two-pack thing for him.  His sculpt is decent enough.  Obviously, not quite as impressive as the recent Legends figure, but certainly superior to the Vol. 1 version.  No elbow joints, but at least this one can actually move his legs.  That’s certainly a plus in my book.  The level of detailing could perhaps be a touch sharper, and it’s hard to make out any sort of expression on his face, but for the style of the line, it’s a pretty solid sculpt.  His paintwork is probably the most nuanced of the figures I’ve looked at so far from the line, especially on the face, which features a number of variations in the coloring of his fur.  The work on his jumpsuit and armor plates is a little fuzzy around the edges, but it isn’t terrible.  Rocket is packed with a rather large gun, which, unfortunately, he can’t really hold that well.  He also has the Power Stone, which is the first repeated stone we’ve gotten (having been also included with Black Widow).

TEEN GROOT

Groot is possibly one of the most changed characters for Infinity War, having aged to adolescence over the course of the Vol. 2 stinger scenes.  This is our first Teen Groot figure.  The figure is 5 1/2 inches tall and has the same 11 points of articulation as most of the other figures in this line.  His sculpt is once again all-new, and it’s probably my favorite of the sculpts from the basic line.  What I really like about it is how well it can slip in with a set-up of Legends figures, should you be so inclined.  The level of detail is still a little simpler, but it’s really not that far off.  He definitely has some similarities to the Build-A-Figure Groot, which was one of my favorite sculpts of the time.  I quite like Teen Groots sulky expression, which perfectly encapsulates what we’ve seen of him so far.  Like Rocket, Groot’s paintwork is more nuanced than the others in the line.  There’s some darker accent work, as well as a little bit of green, since he’s a plant and all.  It’s perhaps not as subtle as I’d like, but it’s still much better than just getting a straight brown.  Teen Groot has no accessories of his own, but with Rocket and all of his extras, it’s not like this pack is particularly light.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

This set, along with Widow, is what really sold me on the whole line.  Sure, there’s a Legends set with these two in the pipeline, but without them being available right now, and with Groot being the only of the Guardians to be notably different, this set certainly has quite a bit of appeal.

#1637: Hulk

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THE HULK

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

Alright, after a short intermission and a quick word from our sponsors at…Kenner and DC Direct (coincidentally both dead companies, it should be noted), I’m diving back into the world of Avengers: Infinity War!  As I noted last week, Hasbro has two different main lines of product tying into the film, but there’s even some further division within those particular lines.  The basic line has its standard assortment, of course, but there’s also a complementary deluxe assortment, handling some of the more oddly-sized characters.  From that assortment, I’ll be looking at main Avengers member The Incredible Hulk!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Hulk is one of two items in the first deluxe series of Avengers: Infinity War figures.  He’s based on Hulk’s newest look from Infinity War, which doesn’t appear to be all the different from the one he was sporting in Age of Ultron.  The sweatpants are a little shorter this time; that’s about it.  The figure stands about 6 1/2 inches tall and he has 11 points of articulation.  He’s a bit on the small side for a proper MCU Hulk, who should probably have another inch or so of height to him, with bulk to match.  That said, he’s visibly taller than the others in the line, which is the most important thing when dealing with a Hulk figure.  The sculpt is decent enough I suppose.  As with a few others in this line, it reminds me of a Legends sculpt, specifically the Age of Ultron Hulk from 2015.  It was far from a perfect sculpt, but I think the issues of simplicity and lack of texturing are far less of an issue in the context of this line.  The paint on Hulk is fairly simple stuff, and it’s mostly pretty good.  The only real issue I have is with the eyes, which just sort of seem to be a little downshifted from where they should be.  It’s entirely possible that this is limited to my figure, though.  The accessories in this line so far have been rather connected to the characters they were included with.  Cap gets his shield, Thor gets his hammer, Widow gets her baton, etc.  Hulk?  Hulk gets his unforgettable weapon, the ol’ chunk of cement with a piece of girder sticking out of it.  You know, that thing that Hulk is never seen without?  Okay, yeah, it’s not exactly essential.  It’s largely just here to have something for the included Infinity Stone (the Soul Stone, for those keeping score; now I’ve got a complete set!) to be attached to.  There are certainly worse extras, and, if I’m totally honest, I like this extra more than Iron Man’s cannon.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I grabbed Hulk at the same time as Cap and Star-Lord, from a somewhat out of my way Toys R Us I’d stopped by.  He’s an alright figure.  Nothing amazing to write home about, but a reasonable figure nonetheless.  And, without a Legends figure on the market at the moment, he’s your best bet for a new Hulk figure.

#1636: Johnny Quick

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JOHNNY QUICK

CRIME SYNDICATE (DC DIRECT)

The Crime Syndicate is a fairly simple concept.  They’re just an evil version of the Justice League.  Pretty straight-forward stuff.  That’s probably why, even after multiple attempts by DC to abandon the whole Multiverse concept, this group is always pretty quick to turn back up.  They’re actually a bit less frequent than you might think when it comes to toys, though.  Despite first appearing in 1964, it wasn’t until 2003 that they got their first action figures.  I’ll be looking at the first figure of Flash-equivalent Johnny Quick* today.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Johnny Quick was released in the one series Crime Syndicate line from DC Direct.  He’s based on Johnny’s classic design, which is a pretty straight forward take off of the Flash’s design (though not as straight-forward as the *other* evil Flash equivalent, the Reverse Flash, who pre-dated Johnny by a year).  The figure stands 6 inches tall and has 9 points of articulation.  Not a lot of movement, and he’s really only good for a basic standing pose, but this was pretty standard for DCD figures of the time.  Johnny pre-dates DCD’s move to artist-specific figures, so he’s instead patterned on DCD’s then current house style.  It’s a style that works especially well with silver age characters like Johnny.  The figure’s sculpt is basic and clean.  He’s not too bulky or too skinny.  Most of his costume details are painted, rather than sculpted, so his head is where most of the important work is.  It’s a decent enough sculpt, but I do wish his expression was a bit less bland.  Johnny was prone to his maniacal laughing and the like, so an evil grin really would have really hit the spot.  The others in this assortment were a bit more emotive, so poor Johnny was just left out in the cold.  The paint work on Johnny is clean, and the colors are bold.  His red/yellow were well-matched to the Flashes that DCD had available at the time, which was a plus.  Nothing particularly notable or exciting beyond that, but hey, passable is still passable.  Johnny’s only accessory was a Crime Syndicate logo-emblazoned display stand.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Acquiring the Crime Syndicate figures was a rather slow process for me, despite my excitement for them when they were announced.  Johnny was the fourth one I picked up, actually a few years after his release.  Despite having long since sold out of their initial quantity, Cosmic Comix had gotten in another of this guy, and I ended up grabbing him during a sale (I think it was for Free Comic Book day, but I could be wrong).  He’s an okay figure.  Not perfect, but he’s definitely a solid offering, especially for the time.

*not to be confused with DC’s heroic speedster, John “Johnny Quick” Chambers, an Earth-2-based hero from the ‘40s.

#1635: C-3PO

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C-3PO

STAR WARS: POWER OF THE FORCE II (KENNER)

“Designed as a protocol droid, C-3PO’s main programming function is to interact with human society. He is an interpreter fluent in over six million galactic languages, specializing in the areas of etiquette and translation – especially important during diplomatic missions. To aid in these tasks, he is equipped with microwave and olfactory sensors, photoreceptors, vocabulator speech units, energy transducers and broad-band antenna receivers. He was programmed with an elegant, human sounding voice, but more often than not C-3PO is heard whining and bickering with his companion, the astromech droid R2-D2.”

Hey, the Solo product officially dropped yesterday!  Yay…I guess?  I’ve not yet actually gone out and started tracking all of that stuff down, but I do have a metric ton of *old* Star Wars stuff to review.  I’m continuing with the Power of the Force theme I’ve had going for a little while now, and taking look at C-3PO!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

C-3PO was part of the first series of Kenner’s Power of the Force II line, hitting shelves in 1995.  He’s the third version of 3PO in the 3 3/4 inch scale, following up on the two from the vintage line.  As his design remained essentially the same for the entirety of the Original Trilogy, this figure serves to represent all of those appearances.  He stands 3 3/4 inches tall and has 6 points of articulation.  For 3PO, this was really about all the movement he’d ever need.  The figure’s sculpt is a fairly decent recreation of his film design.  As with all of the figures in this line, he was given a slight stylistic change-up, but it’s definitely more minor here than it was on other figures from the same assortment.  Compare him to, say, the first Han from this line, and you’ll see that he’s far less dramatically pre-posed and has his overall proportions far less changed from reality.  There’s actually a rather impressive level of detail on this figure’s sculpt, even managing to show through the vac-metalizing process and everything.  Clearly they had learned from their  experience with the vintage line.  Interestingly, though it wasn’t a selling point as it would be on later figures, this figure’s legs can be popped out of their sockets with relative ease, allowing for his slightly disassembled look from Empire.  Sure, it’s not 100% accurate, but it’s a fun little extra.  Though the figure is vac-metalized, that doesn’t mean he lacks paint like his vintage counterparts.  He gets the proper detailing for all of his wiring and such at his mid-section, a first for a 3PO figure.  The only minor issue with this figure’s paint is his right lower leg, which is gold like the rest of him, instead of its proper silver color.  Since the upper and lower leg were all one piece, there was unfortunately no way to do this correctly while still maintaining the shiny finish.  3PO included no accessories, but I’m not sure what you’d actually give him.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I had 3PO growing up.  I don’t actually recall where he came from.  Shameful, I know.  Over the years, I ended up losing one of the legs, so a replacement was in order.  I ended up finding a second one at Yesterday’s Fun while vacationing with my family over the holidays.  As far as 3PO figures go, there are certainly better ones out there, but this figure’s actually held up a lot better to the test of time than many of his compatriots.

#1634: Iron Man

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IRON MAN

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

So, yesterday, I had to review a Thor because it was Thor’s Day.  Obviously, I have to review an Iron Man today, what with it being….Friron Man’s Day?  Not buying it?  Yeah, that’s okay, I don’t blame you.  I’m still reviewing the Iron Man figure, though.  You know, because, well, I reviewed all of the others.  So, without further ado, here’s another Iron Man!  Woo!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Iron Man is the last figure in Series 1 of the basic Avengers: Infinity War line.  Tony is seen here in his brand-new Mark XLVIII armor, which is being called the “Bleeding Edge” armor, after a similarly advanced armor from the comics (pretty much all of the movie armors since Mk 43 have been patterned on the Bleeding Edge’s design, but it sounds like they’re actually using the name this time).  The figure stands 5 3/4 inches tall and he has 11 points of articulation.  The sculpt is once again all-new.  It reflects the more organic nature of this armor’s design pretty well.  It’s very smooth and sleek; sort of divergent from the rest of the figures from this assortment so far, who have all been full of a lot rough textures.  It does make this figure seem a bit simpler at first, and I wasn’t sure I liked that so much, but ultimately, I’ve found it to actually be a very clean and polished looking figure.  I also quite like the repulsor hand on the right arm; it’s a subtle change-up in the posing, but it adds a lot of character to the figure, as well as offering up some more variety in posing.  The paint is, like the sculpt, rather on the basic side; mostly he’s just molded in the appropriate red, with paint for the gold, silver, and blue.  The application is mostly pretty clean, though there’s a little bit of missing paint right at the top of Tony’s faceplate here.  Other than that, it’s solid work.  Iron Man includes a…cannon?  Something like that.  It’s done up to match his armor, which is nice enough.  I don’t know if it’s actually going to be in the movie, though, especially since it’s hand-held, which doesn’t quite seem like Tony’s style.  It’s also rather awkward for him to hold.  Really can’t see this getting much use, from collectors or kids, honestly.  It does at least have a peg for attaching the included Infinity Stone, which, for those keeping track, is the Time Stone.  Well, as long as it’s with *one* of the Sherlock Holmeses, I guess it’s okay.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Iron Man was the last of these I picked up.  I actually just got him within the last week, grabbed from my local TRU during one of my many visits.  I’d seen him a few times before, when I picked up the others.  Since there were an odd number of figures, and I grabbed the others during “buy-one-get-one” sales, he was just the actual odd-man-out every time.  I’m glad I finally grabbed him.  I mean, an Iron Man’s an Iron Man, but I didn’t have one in this particular style, and this design is actually pretty strong.

#1633: Thor

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THOR

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

Okay, you had to know which Infinity War figure I was reviewing today.  You just had to.  Because it’s Thursday, aka Thor’s Day.  When a guy’s got the day named after him, he’s kind of a lock for the subject of the review.  If you’re thinking to yourself, “hasn’t Ethan already done this gag?,” the answer is yes, I very definitely have.  I very definitely will again.  It’s probably a safe assumption that I’ll do this with every Thor figure I remember to do this with going forward (so, probably about a 50/50 split; I’m forgetful).  Anyway, here’s my latest Thor!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Thor is another figure from Series 1 of the basic Avengers: Infinity War line.  Thor’s design has not changed drastically since we last saw him in Ragnarok.  Well, actually, a little before we last saw him in Ragnarok, truth be told.  He’s got both of his eyes again.  As of yet, all of the trailers and the like have shown him still sporting the eyepatch.  It’s still possible it will be healed during the film.  Of course, Hemsworth wasn’t actually wearing the eyepatch on-set for Ragnarok, and I don’t believe he was for Infinity War either.  It’s always possible licensees were seeing unfinished shots from the film, in order to preserve Ragnarok’s twist, and now we just have a bunch of inaccurate Thor figures.  I guess we won’t know until we see the movie.  Anyway, the figure stands 5 3/4 inches tall and he has 11 points of articulation.  Like yesterday’s Star-Lord, his sculpt has some definite similarities to last year’s Legends release.  Understandable, since they’re adapting similar looks.  The Hemsworth likeness is halfway decent.  It’s not amazing, but it’s hardly like it’s impossible to figure out who it is.  The body, particularly the proportions, feel a bit more cartoony and exaggerated than the others I’ve looked at from the line.  I think that’s largely the arms, which have almost a Popeye sort of feel about them.  It’s not like it looks bad or anything, just slightly different from the previously established style.  The rest of the body is fairly well detailed, and his costume is quite well-defined.  The paint on this figure is passable, but definitely more on the basic side.  Where Cap’s hair went too brown, I think Thor’s goes too yellow, adding more to that whole cartoony thing.  Also, his eyes seem a bit off.  Or maybe it’s his eyebrows.  Either way, he ends up looking like he just remembered he didn’t put the trash out to the road last night.  That’s not how I tend to think of Thor looking.  Thor is packed with his new weapon, Stormbreaker, which is actually pretty cool, and has some pretty awesome electricity effects going on.  Also, like the other figures in the set, Thor’s got an infinity stone, specifically the Space Stone.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Thor seems to be a rarer figure in the first Infinity War assortment, as he’s the one I’ve seen the least.  When I found most of the others, he wasn’t there, so I ended up getting him alongside Widow the new day.  I wasn’t even sure I was going to get him, but I sort of wanted all of the stones.  He’s not a bad figure.  Perhaps a little bland in terms of design (having the eyepatch probably would have helped), but he’s still cool.

#1632: Star-Lord

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STAR-LORD

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

Wait a second, wasn’t I reviewing a bunch of Avengers figures?  Why the sudden shift to a Guardians of the Galaxy character?  This is totally crazy!

Yeah, so unless you’ve been living a rock for the last 2-3 years, you know by now that the Guardians will be teaming up with Earth’s Mightiest heroes for their third outing.  Pretty cool, huh?  Obviously, they’re just part of the whole ensemble, so they only make up a token segment of each assortment.  The first of the basic figures is Star-Lord, who I’ll be looking at today.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Star-Lord is part of the first series of basic Avengers: Infinity War figures.  Unlike the last two figures, it would appear that Peter hasn’t had any major costume changes since we last saw him.  He’s using pretty much exactly the same look we saw in Guardians Vol. 2.  If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.  The figure stands 5 1/2 inches tall and he has 11 points of articulation.  He’s got an all-new sculpt, but it definitely shares some common design elements with the Legends Star-Lord.  It’s the same basic design, so that is sensible.  It’s a pretty top-notch sculpt, with decent proportions and some pretty great texture work.  The arms are a little off, with the articulation having to be worked in and all, but they aren’t too bad. Just perhaps a little scrawny.  The hands are, thankfully, both sculpted for gripping, thus maximizing accessory-holding potential.  Star-Lord is wearing his helmet, so there’s no Pratt likeness here.  The helmet is expertly recreated, easily on par with the Legends version.  The paintwork is solid work overall.  It’s basic, of course, but everything is pretty clean, and all of the important details have been included.  Star-Lord is packed with a rather large gun of some sort.  It’s replacing his usual twin element blasters, but something different is certainly welcome.  It definitely looks like the sort of thing that Rocket would build, so I’m guessing that’s it origin.  As with the other figures in this set, Star-Lord also includes one of the Infinity Stones, specifically the Reality Stone, which can be attached to his gun.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I grabbed Star-Lord at the same time as Cap, in a visit to a Toys R Us.  I really only grabbed him because I was picking up the others that were there.  He’s not really a lot of new territory, but in Hasbro’s defense, there wasn’t a basic figure of the MCU Star-Lord, so it’s not like he’s unwarranted.  Ultimately, he’s a solid figure, and accents the rest of the set pretty well.

#1631: Black Widow

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BLACK WIDOW

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

All of our favorite heroes are back for Infinity War…okay, most of our favorite heroes…amongst our favorite heroes, many of them are—right, I’ll come in again.

Today, I’m looking at the latest figure of Black Widow, a character who has far too often been left out of the whole merchandising thing. For Infinity War, Hasbro looks to be making a conscious effort to avoid that, with two figures already out and a third one on its way.  I’ll be looking at one of those first two today.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Black Widow is part of the first series of the basic Avengers: Infinity War line.  This figure gives us Widow’s brand new look for the film, which, despite her prior looks all being just slight variations on the same basic design, is actually kind of new and different.  This time around, she’s sporting a look based on the second main Black Widow from the comics, Yelena Belova.  It’s mostly the blonde hair that informs this.  Supposedly, she’s changed her hair color while on the run after the events of Civil War.  The figure stands 5 1/4 inches tall and she has 11 points of articulation.  It’s the same articulation scheme as we saw on Cap (and before that, Shuri and Star-Lord).  Her sculpt is actually quite good.  The proportions are well-balanced, the head has a pretty solid Scarlett Johansson likeness, and the level of detail is almost on par with what you’d get from a Legends release.  My only real nit with the sculpt is that only one of her hands is in a gripping position, which limits her posing potential slightly when it comes to her weapon.  Even her paint is pretty decent.  It’s still rather on the basic side, but her face in particular gets some really clean work.  Certainly cleaner than what we saw on Cap yesterday.  Widow is packed with her staff, which is sadly only in its full assembled form.  No separate batons, but I guess she couldn’t hold them anyway.  There’s a rather obvious peg on it, where the Infinity Stone is meant to attach.  Not the smoothes way of handling that, but I guess it’s not awful.  Widow’s included stone is the Power Stone, which is the only one to be doubled-up in the first assortment (it also comes in the Rocket/Groot pack).  Giving her, rather than a bruiser like Hulk, the Power Stone is certainly an interesting choice.  I wonder if it means anything.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Widow is actually kind of the figure that sold me on this line.  I saw her in the store and I really liked her, and almost bought her on the spot.  That said, she was actually one of the few figures in the set I did *not* pick up from Toys R Us.  They were all out, so I ended up finding her at Target the next day, rounding out the set that way.  She’s actually a pretty good figure.  I’m curious to see how much the Legends release is able to improve on her.

#1630: Captain America

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CAPTAIN AMERICA

AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (HASBRO)

Apparently, there’s some sort of an Avengers movie coming out at the end of this month.  I know, it’s easy to miss it.  It’s not like there’s been *any* coverage or anything.  I’d imagine most people are planning to stay home that weekend, right?  Or perhaps go and see…<checking movies for April 27th>…the re-release of When Harry Met Sally perhaps.  Yep, that’s totally what the people want.  Or, I suppose, they could just see Infinity War.  I mean, I’m planning to see it.  I have to justify all this stuff I bought!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Captain America is from the first series of Hasbro’s basic Avengers: Infinity War line.  He depicts Cap with his bearded “Nomad” look, which is looking to be his main (possibly only) look from the movie.  It’s the same suit he was wearing in Civil War, but it’s looking a bit more worn.  As the name suggests, it’s calling back to his Nomad identity from the (first) time he quit being Captain America in the comics, though it doesn’t really look much like that particular design.  The figure stands about 5 1/2 inches tall and he has 11 points of articulation.  The lack of knee joints is still kind of bugging me, but he’s actually pretty posable for the price point.  His sculpt is unique to this particular figure, and does a pretty respectable job of recreating what we’ve seen from the trailers.  The level of detail isn’t quite on par with a Legends release, but it matches up well with the Homecoming and Black Panther offerings.  The paintwork is likewise a slight step-down from other offerings in the scale, but it’s not like it’s awful or anything.  Honestly, I think my only real complaint is how dark the hair and beard are.  At least some highlights or something would make it look a little better.  As it is, it’s decent, but kind of looks like an animated version of the character.  Cap is packed with one of his new Wakandan-designed shields, which he can’t quite hold like an actual shield, but it’s fairly cool.  Each figure in this series also comes with an Infinity Stone; Cap gets the Mind Stone, which can be clipped onto his shield.  It’s kind of nifty, and apparently ties into the “Hero Vision” gimmick that Hasbro’s currently pushing.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I was initially just planning to stick with the Marvel Legends offerings for Infinity War, but I ended up seeing these figures in the store, and they sort of oddly called to me.  I passed on them the first time I saw them, but ended up picking up Cap alongside most of the rest of Series 1 on one of my very many trips to Toys R Us recently.  He’s actually quite a good figure, especially for the price.  Sure, he’s not high-end, but I was hardly expecting that, now was I?

#1629: Ultimate Spider-Woman & Vault Guard

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ULTIMATE SPIDER-WOMAN & VAULT GUARD

MARVEL MINIMATES

Minimates are great, because they give you a wide swath of characters, but there’s also a little side bit of amusement, drawn from their multi-pack nature.  While there are plenty of totally natural pairings of characters, every so often, you just get a couple of left-overs, who deserved to be made, but had not hard-set compatriots.  Today’s pairing is notable in that, not only have the two characters never met, they aren’t even from the same universe!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Ultimate Spider-Woman and the Vault Guard were released in Series 30 of Marvel Minimates.  Spider-Woman was the one-per-case variant, swapping out for the more heavily-packed May Parker Spider-Girl.  The Vault Guard was packed in both versions of the set.

ULTIMATE SPIDER-WOMAN

“The result of genetic experimentation by Dr. Otto Octavius, Ultimate Spider-Woman actually shares a majority of her DNA and memories with Peter Parker. Choosing to abandon her previous life, she takes the name Jessica Drew and continues fighting crime.”

At the time of this figure’s release, Ultimate Spider-Woman was a relatively recent and still quite relevant member of the Ultimate Spider-Man supporting cast, though she did come after the Ultimate line had mostly disappeared from Marvel Minimates (Series 27’s Ultimates line-up notwithstanding).  Her placement likely had a lot to do with the character having one of the better designs to come out of the Ulitmate line in later years.  The figure stands 2 1/4 inches tall and has 14 points of articulation.  She’s built on the usual body, with an add-on for her hair.  The piece was originally designed for “Natalie” Six from the BSG line, but since that figure never made it to release, I believe this was its first appearance.  It’s a decent piece, though slightly restricting to the articulation on the neck.  The rest of the costume is handled via paint, which turned out relatively well.  The metallic red gives her a more unique look, and the creative use of shading, especially on the face, capture’s Bagely’s depictions of the character quite nicely.  The black on her face ends a little bit earlier than I’d like, but it’s not terrible.  Spider-Woman didn’t include any accessories, which always struck me as a bit of a waste.  The lack of an extra unmasked head is somewhat forgivable, since they weren’t yet a common item, but not even giving her a webline or something seems a bit weak.

VAULT GUARD

“Tasked with monitoring and protecting the maximum security super-villain prison known as the Vault, the Guardsmen utilized a variation of Tony Stark’s Iron Man armor to create their super-powered battle suits and weaponry.”

The fifth figure in the army building venture was one of the armored Guardsmen from super villain prison The Vault.  Thanks to some shared designs, he can also sort of double as a non-army builder as well, representing either Kevin or Michael O’Brien.  This is quite the versatile figure!  He’s built on the same standard body, with add-ons for his helmet, chest plate, gloves, and boots.  All these pieces are re-used, with the helmet being a standard mask piece, the chest plate coming from the Mark I War Machine, and the gloves and boots coming from the DC Series 1 Lex Luthor.  It all adds up to a Guardsman that’s a little bit of a departure from the sleeker design of the comics.  Why would they do this?  Simple, it’s emulating the Toy Biz Techno Wars Vault Guardsman figure from the 90s, which is actually a pretty nice little nod.  As designed, he was even supposed to have all of the detailing for a proper classic Guardsman painted under the extra armor bits.  For the final product, he ended up losing the proper detailing on the wrists and shins for boots and gloves, but still has the classic torso detailing (as well as a bonus face under the helmet).  If I have one complaint beyond those small missing details, it’s that his palette’s a bit more monochromatic than it should be.  He’s classically been all green, but the greens tended to be a little more divergent.  They aren’t awful as it is, though.  Guardsman included a spare set of standard green hands and feet, as well as a pair of mini-gun attachments for his shoulder armor.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I picked these guys up the day they were released from my usual haunt Cosmic Comix.  I’ve always been a big fan of the Guardsman, so I was thrilled about the inclusion here.  That said, I wasn’t super into either of his pack-mates.  I ended up going with the one whose design I most liked.  In the end, both figures have some minor nits, but they’re overall really cool additions to the collection.  Even if the pairing is still totally whack.