Tag Archives: Chewbacca

#2511: Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS: POWER OF THE FORCE II (KENNER)

“As Han Solo’s partner, Chewbacca the Wookiee (or Chewie, as Solo calls him) distinguished himself as a talented pilot, starship mechanic and smuggler. After being rescued from Imperial slavers by Solo, Chewbacca pledged a life debt to the rogue pilot and followed him to several different planets as their relationship grew and the two became close friends and partners. When Solo acquired the light freighter Millennium Falcon, he and Chewbacca began their career as intergalactic smugglers. Chewbacca’s reputation as a brawler gave him a distinct advantage in shady business negotiations, and it was he who initiated the deal to transport Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker from Tatooine to Alderaan.”

Okay, so here’s something of an odd thing that slipped through the cracks of my review schedule: somehow, in all of the Power of the Force reviews I’ve written here on the site, I’ve managed to leave one single figure from the initial assortment un-reviewed for far longer than I realized. I speak of today’s entry, the line’s first take on Chewbacca, who has thus far escaped my reviewing focus.  Not to worry, dear reader, I’ve got him all set for today, so lets take a look at this crazy monkey man who really isn’t a monkey man!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Chewbacca was, as noted in the intro, part of Kenner’s first 1995 assortment for their revamped Power of the Force line.  He joined standard versions of Luke, Han, Leia, R2, C-3PO, Obi-Wan, Vader, Lando, the Stormtrooper, and Boba Fett in bringing Star Wars back to toy shelves for the first time in over a decade.  This would mark Chewy’s second time getting a 3 3/4-scale figure, following his old vintage release, placing him in the same category as Vader, the Stormtrooper, and Boba Fett.  The figure stands 4 inches tall and he has 6 points of articulation…technically.  There’s a neck joint there, but best of luck really getting any sort of motion out of it.  This guy got an all-new sculpt, which would serve as the basis for Chewy’s Shadows of the Empire figure as well. Chewbacca’s vintage sculpt was definitely on the scrawny side of things and…well, this one definitely goes for the other end of the spectrum.  Way on the other end of the spectrum.  This guy’s like two of the vintage guy.  Chewy may have been bigger than the other characters, but he wasn’t a body builder like this one.  He falls into a similar category to Vader, who was likewise a little on the small side for his vintage release, and then ballooned way up for his ’95 figure.  It’s downright goofy looking, and ends up making Chewy look a lot more simian than he did in the films, especially with that less shaggy, more carefully groomed appearance he’s got.  At the very least, the texturing on the fur isn’t too bad, though the bandolier isn’t quite so lucky; it looks stretched to fit Chewy’s new bulk, and ends up missing out on some of the better detail work of later versions.  The major details are there, but not much beyond that.  Chewbacca’s paintwork is fairly decent, perhaps the best of the initial batch, in fact.  He actually gets some nice accenting on his fur to give it its proper variations in color, a definite step up from the vintage counterpart.  Chewbacca was packed with both his usual bowcaster and also a more generic and definitely very ’90s gun, just in case one wasn’t enough for him.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Part of the reason Chewbacca got overlooked for review is because he kind of got overlooked in my collection, too.  As I mentioned in my Bounty Hunter Chewbacca review, that was my standard, and quite frankly, my go-to Chewbacca as a kid.  I didn’t actually have a basic Chewy; he was one of the figures that was in the batch of figures my Grandmother had for me and my cousin at her house.  It meant I got to play with one, but it wasn’t ultimately mine.  When the figures got split up between us, Chewy went with my cousin, and I never thought much about it, having moved onto better Chewbaccas.  When filling in my collection, I actually forgot about this figure, until managing to find one loose a couple of Christmases ago while on vacation.  I then forgot I had that figure and hadn’t actually reviewed it until I took it down off the shelf for the photo that ended my recent C-3PO review, at which point I got him onto the schedule as soon as I could.  And, here we are.  He’s not great, or anything.  He’s goofy and not very accurate, but also not as fun as the Bounty Hunter Chewy, so he’s just sort of here.

#2278: Chewbacca & C-3PO

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , , , ,

CHEWBACCA & C-3PO

STAR WARS: THE BLACK SERIES (HASBRO)

“Encountering a Stormtrooper in Cloud City, C-3PO was blasted at point blank range and his limbs were scattered.  Chewbacca gathered the parts of the protocol droid and partially reassembled him.”

Remember when I was talking about C-3PO’s late entry into The Black Series, just three days ago?  Well, lucky him, he’s gotten not one, but two exclusive figure releases right on top of each other.  I suppose he’s just finally getting the due he deserves.  While the last figure was based on 3PO’s most recent appearance, this one goes back to the original trilogy, and gives us a dedicated Empire Strikes Back 3PO.  You can’t really have an Empire 3PO without a proper Empire/Jedi Chewy to carry him around.  So, one-two-boom, here they are, in one convenient Amazon-exclusive package!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Chewbacca and C-3PO are, as noted in the intro, are an Amazon-exclusive pairing, which was listed for pre-order shortly after Force Friday and started shipping in November.  The two are packaged in a box that’s similar in size to the deluxe-size package used for Grievous, which is a lot smaller than previous two-pack boxes.  It makes this feel a little less like a two-pack, and more like a deluxe Chewbacca that includes 3PO as an accessory.

CHEWBACCA

For his first (and previously only OT-based) Black Series figure, we got Chewy based on A New Hope.  While his look is more or less the same in all of the original films, there were some slight changes in his look from A New Hope to Empire, mostly to do with how the hair on his head sat.  For the later movies Chewy was all about “bangs” game.  We got our first taste of a Chewy with bangs on the Target-exclusive Solo-based figure, but those weren’t *quite* right for a vintage Chewy, and he had the wrong bandolier.  This one aims to be the definitive secondary Chewbacca.  He stands just shy of 8 inches tall and he has 27 points of articulation.  Like the last Chewbacca, this one borrows heavily from the first Black Series Chewbacca.  This one gets yet another new head and upper torso, but keeps the standard bandolier that the Solo version ditched (hence the need for a new upper torso with only one bandolier imprint, rather the the v-shape of the Solo release).  While I had some issues with the mold when it debuted, at the very least, the mold quality has improved, and so now the parts sit better together, making for a better looking figure overall.  The new head’s the main focus of the figure, of course, with the slightly looser hair on his head, as well as a more relaxed expression, which feels more in line with Chewy’s more reserved status as the trilogy progressed.  I liked the improvements of the Solo sculpt a lot, but this does even better, and makes for the most cohesive Chewbacca sculpt to date.  The paintwork on this figure largely a match for the Solo version, which is a plus, since that was a solid paint-app.  The transitions are much more subtle, and the eyes are more lifelike than the original Chewbacca, resulting in a much more natural-looking take on the character.  As a late-in-the-movie version of the character, this Chewy is after he’s lost his bowcaster.  So, instead of that, he’s got a stolen Imperial blaster, borrowed from one of the proper Stormtroopers.

C-3PO

Ho boy, it’s another C-3PO.  It’s been days.  Days, I tell you.  As noted in the intro, this guy is based on 3PO’s appearance in Empire.  It’s not really much different from his appearance in the previous film (which is what the first Black Series figure was based on).  The color of the foot changes, and he’s a little messier.  In terms of construction, he’s using the same combined 3PO/4-LOM set-up as the 3PO I looked at three days ago, but this time around he gets the relaxed 3PO hands, instead of the posed 4-LOM hands.  It’s still a good sculpt, so I’ve got no complaints.  The paintwork follows the Target-exclusive’s lead, going for a slightly duller gold, which looks a bit more movie accurate.  In contrast to the very clean 3POs we’ve gotten previously, this one’s also got some serious dirt and grime, no doubt gotten when he got all blasted apart.  The main gimmick to this guy is the ability to pop his arms and legs off, simulating the major damage 3PO takes while in Cloud City.  In order to complete this look, he also has wire attachments that connect to each of his joints to replace the missing limbs.  They don’t really stay in place, but they do the job, and they look convincing.  He also has a net bag for Chewy to carry him in, completing the whole look.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I’ve always dug this particular set-up for these two characters, with the Star Wars Saga release being my go-to Chewbacca for years, and the Applause plastic statue thing being literally the only one of those things I ever owned.  I’ve also been jonesing for a proper Empire/Jedi Chewy, since we had the rest of the main cast from Empire.  Needless to say, I was on board for this set when it was first shown, and I was definitely happy to get this pair from my parents for Christmas.  I’m very happy with both figures included, and they’re my default versions of both characters.

#2224: Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS: GALAXY OF ADVENTURES (HASBRO)

So far, the focus of the Galaxy of Adventures line has been on the new trilogy, specifically Rise of Skywalker.  Not a huge shock given that they hit with that film’s product launch.  That said, there are a few Original Trilogy elements in play as well, and definitely will be more of a shift to that as the line continues.  The first assortment does have two hold-overs, with today’s figure, Chewbacca, making for a nice bridge between the two trilogies.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Chewbacca is another of the six figure assortment that makes up Wave 1 of the basic Galaxy of Adventures figures.  Chewbacca is one of the four figures that will be carrying forward to Wave 2, which is sensible, since his best friend Han will be joining him in that line-up. At just over 6 inches tall, Chewbacca is the tallest figure in the line so far, which is fairly typical for Chewbacca figures.  He’s got 23 points of articulation, but he’s definitely the most restricted of the figures at launch.  It’s really more a design thing, since the hair means that areas such as the neck are never going to have the same mobility of other characters.  That being said, he actually ended up far more posable than I was expecting when I looked at him in the packaging.  Of all the figures, Chewbacca is also probably the most stylized, something I wasn’t sure I’d like at first, but ultimately I really quite like in hand.  He’s got almost a Genndy Tartakovsky style to him, which is something I’m always okay with, and also just continues the general trend of this line feeling like a slightly larger scale Clone Wars line.  The stylization also helps Chewie in the one area where Chewie figures always have trouble, which is convincingly working in the articulation.  It’s still pretty obvious where the joints are, but there’s a slightly better flow to how they’re implemented.  Chewbacca’s paintwork is some of the more complex of the line, which is actually a bit of a reverse from how it usually works out.  There are some variations within the coloring of his fur, which is especially impressive on the head, where all of the different colorations converge.  Chewbacca is packed with his go-to weapon, the Bowcaster, which takes a little bit of doing to get into his hands the first time, but stays securely, and is easier to mess with on later attempts.  He’s also got a “Wookie Slam” feature, which is similar to the other spring-loaded arm features, but with both arms instead of just one.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Chewbacca is the one figure in the first set I really wasn’t sold on.  Something about how he looked in the package just seemed off to me.  So, he was the last figure I was intending to grab.  Then Super Awesome Wife made it clear I was getting all of them on that fateful Walmart trip, and so he was along for the ride.  I’m really glad that was the case, because Chewbacca was the most pleasant surprise of the bunch.  Everyone else, I had a good sense on, but Chewie’s a lot better than he seems at first glance, and I’m just very happy with the end result.  I can’t wait to have a Han to go with him.

 

 

#2025: Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , ,

CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS (KENNER)

On this May the Fourth, it’s with a heavy heart that we bid adieu to Peter Mayhew, the man behind Chewbacca for four decades.  The people behind these masks can sometimes easily be forgotten, but Peter was beloved by his fellow cast members.  And, fortunately, his legacy will live on through his replacement Joonas Suotamo, who took over the role from Peter in The Last Jedi.  In honor of Peter, today I’m going to look at the very first Chewbacca, which feels kinda right.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Chewbacca was one of the first four figures offered in the original Star Wars line, initially shipping in early 1978 as part of the fulfillment for the Early Bird set, before finding his way to a standard carded release shortly thereafter.  Chewbacca was one of the few characters not to get a new version during the three-film run, and as such this figure was in production until the end of the line in the ’80s.  This one came from the ’78 release, a fact I know based on how I acquired him.  That said, there were no notable changes to the main figure during the vintage line.  The figure stands 4 inches tall (the largest of the initial figures) and has 4 points of articulation.  He loses out on the neck articulation due to the nature of his furry design.  Chewbacca’s sculpt was totally unique to him, and it’s certainly a product of its time.  Action figure sculpting wasn’t quite yet up to the level of being able to convincingly translate a walking furball into plastic form, so this guy ends up looking…surprisingly polished?  It’s like somebody really thoroughly shellacked him, or maybe like he’s Cousin It’s much taller brother.  He’s definitely not as intimidating as later versions of the character would be.  Of course, in its own way, perhaps that’s more appropriate to the character, who was generally pretty lovable in the film.  Maybe Kenner was onto something there.  The figure’s paint work is pretty simple.  Mostly, he’s just molded in brown plastic, with a little paint here and there for the eyes, mouth, and bandolier.  It gets the job done, but it’s certainly not extensive.  Chewbacca was originally packed with his bowcaster, which my figure no longer has.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

As I’ve touched on a few times before here, my vintage Star Wars collection was kind of jump-started by my Dad giving me his old figures when I was growing up.  Chewbacca was amongst those figures, and, since I’ve established here on the site that my first Chewbacca wasn’t a default one, this guy was kind of my go-to Chewbacca for a good long while.  Like a lot of the vintage figures, he’s goofy and dated, but he’s also a really nifty little figure.

#1752: Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS: THE BLACK SERIES

“A mighty Wookiee nearly two centuries old, Chewbacca has fallen upon hard times during this age of the expanding Empire.”

Let’s keep this extraneous Star Wars love going, I suppose…wait, that doesn’t sound quite right.  Never mind.

I broke my rule about the clones, but I also had this other rule with the Black Series, where I was going to avoid minor variations of the same characters.  Now, technically Vader was the first one I broke the rule for, but that was a slightly special case.  I stayed true with Chewbacca and didn’t buy the Force Awakens variant.  Well, Solo broke me, what can I say.  Was he worth it?  Let’s find out!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Chewbacca was released right around the same time as the rest of the Solo product launch, but the comparatively soft roll-out of the Solo product compared to prior movies meant that he just started showing up in some places very recently.  He’s not part of the main line-up, but is instead a Target exclusive.  Chewbacca stands 8 inches tall and he has 27 points of articulation. Unsurprisingly, given his generally consistent look over the course of the film’s, this Chewbacca figure shares a lot of parts with the original Black Series release, namely everything but the head, upper torso, and bandolier. I was rather critical of the sculpt back when it was new, and I still stand by those critiques.  There are just some issues that are inherent to the process of adapting a design like Chewbacca’s into a highly articulated plastic figure.  There are going to have to be some compromises, and they do have negative impact on this sculpt.  With all that said, I think this figure does a lot to salvage the sculpt.  The new head is really strong.  While it’s been reworked to allow for the goggles to sit better on his face, he actually still looks pretty good without the goggles in-place.  In fact, he makes a for a decent approximation of Chewbacca’s messier hair style from Empire and Jedi, which I’m definitely okay with.  The new torso’s really just a slight change, mostly done to help the new double-strapped bandolier sit better on his shoulders.  But it definitely helps, and as a result, this Chewbacca’s bandolier sits a lot flusher to the body than the first one’s did.  It’s a minor change, but one that does a lot to help the figure.  Minor changes to the sculpt aside, I think the biggest thing that helps this new release is the paintwork.  The first Chewbacca was released during the line’s worst period paint-wise.  While his paint wasn’t *bad*, it was definitely very basic, and lacking in any form of subtlety, which hit that figure pretty hard.  By contrast, this figure’s hitting while the line is at a very high point, and he definitely shows it.  The transitions between shades on the fur are less jarring, and work has been done to keep these changes from being right on the joints.  In addition, he’s far less glossy overall, which only helps in making him look a lot less goofy.  In Solo, Chewbacca hasn’t yet gotten his distinctive bowcaster, so he’s instead carrying a different heavy blaster rifle entirely.  This one’s patterned on the M-60 machine gun (thanks Tim!), which is certainly a fun one.  The piece is very well sculpted and an accurate recreation of the design from the movie.  And, not only does it avoid the usual lack of paint issue, but it’s even got moving parts!  A very impressive piece.  In addition, Chewbacca also includes his goggles from the train heist, which go on and off pretty easily.  Not as impressive as the gun, but fun nonetheless.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I saw Chewbacca fairly early on, back in May, but decided to pass on him at that time.  Of course, then I didn’t see him for a couple of months, so when I came across him again (after having seen and quite enjoyed the movie), I didn’t feel like I could pass him up.  I’m glad I opted to get him the second time around, as he’s a pretty sizable improvement on the last one, and definitely my favorite Chewbacca to date.

The Blaster In Question #0052: Chewbacca Blaster

Posted by Tim Marron in Nerf Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

BlasterInQuestion1

CHEWBACCA BLASTER  

SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY (GLOWSTRIKE)

chew1Changing gears only slightly from last week, I have another movie tie-in blaster for you.  I mean, it’s mine, it’s for me.  You can’t have this one.  The review is for you, though, so you’re welcome.  With the building hype surrounding the upcoming Solo film, of course Hasbro brought some goodies to the table.  Today, I’ll be looking at the supposed primary weapon of everyone’s favorite space-faring shag carpet, at least for this movie (we don’t like to talk about the Nerf Bowcaster).  As a bonus, I’ll be reviewing this blaster entirely in Chewie’s native tongue.

THE BLASTER ITSELF

chew2Rara arrarRA RARA rara rARAAA rrrrrr  aa A r AR A a RR r RRRR A AAAA ra ARRAARAA aarararra raar ar ra rarar rrr aa ra raa rarra ararr aara ok, that’s enough of that.  What I said was, this blaster was released in 2018 as branded merch for the movie Solo: A Star Wars Story.  Despite its size, it’s actually a very simple blaster, mechanically speaking.  It’s effectively a muzzle-loading shotgun that fires two darts at once.  It might have been nice to have a staggered trigger on the blaster like the Roughcut, but that would have added a significant amount of additional bulk and moving pieces, and subsequently driven the price up.  It does seem like Hasbro are trying to be a little more wallet friendly with this round of Star Wars products, probably after seeing how slowly the more recent Deluxe Stormtrooper blaster and its $80 price tag moved.  As with all Star Wars blasters now, the Chewbacca blaster features lights and sounds and uses the Glowstrike darts to approximate the feeling of firing a laser weapon.  The sound effect in this blaster is fairly satisfying and bass-y which is definitely fitting.  The use of real-world firearms as the bases for the movie props once again gives this blaster pretty good ergonomics.  This blaster in particular is built on the receiver and stock of an M60 machine gun.  I feel confident that the Nerf version is substantially scaled down from the original but they’ve kept the grips a good size so it’s not bad.  The stock of the blaster has a storage area under the butt plate, and is removable, using the chew3standard Nerf stock attachment lug.  There’s also a rail on the top of the blaster for the included scope if you want, or you could remove it and leave it off forever.  That’s valid too, especially with a scope like this.  At least you have the option to take it off without using a hacksaw.  I know it’s meant to look like the movie prop, so I can’t fault Hasbro for including it, but it’s just a narrow tube in a weirdly shaped shell.  The scope on the Han Solo blaster pistol has a sight front post so you can at least pretend you’re aiming it properly.  It might have been nice to have something like that here, but sadly no.   Something noteworthy about this wave of Star Wars blasters is that the boxes actually advertise range claims.  Historically, Nerf only bothers doing this if the performance is at least halfway decent, and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised when that turned out to be the case here too.  It’s almost even more impressive when you remember this blaster fires two darts at once using a single plunger tube (we also don’t like to talk about the DoubleDealer).  Having to reload 2 darts for every trigger pull does slow down your potential for follow-ups, the decent amount of power, the lights, the sounds and the Glowstrike darts make this a great blaster for ambushing your younger siblings, especially at night.  The Chewbacca Blaster comes packaged with the stock, the scope, and 6 Glowstrike Elite darts.  Batteries are only required for the lights and sounds, and the Glowstrike functionality.  Fortunately, they come already installed in the blaster.chew4

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I bought this blaster on one of the regular scavenging trips Ethan and I make to TRU.  While I was initially a little disappointed by how simple the mechanism was, I did gradually stop caring too much about that given how nice the other features are.  Not including the scope.  Sure, it’s not super-efficient or practical as far as Nerf blasters go, but is it fun?   ARr r R RRRaaa arar raarr RA RAR A rr a raraara raa rara.  That’s a “yes.”

 

#1415: Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI

For The Force Awakens, Disney had some restrictions on which characters were allowed to be released before the film, which almost completely relegated the original trilogy’s returning heroes to post-film assortments.  One major exception to this was the franchise’s premier walking carpet, Chewbacca, who made several appearances at the first Force Friday.  I didn’t get any of them, but the option was there, and that’s the important thing.  Chewie’s returning yet again for The Last Jedi, and given that he accompanied Rey to meet Luke at the end of the last film, it’s likely he’ll be receiving a more prominent role to boot.  He’s taking it slow on the action figures this time, with just the one figure to start with.  That’s better than nothing, though.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Chewbacca is another of the 11 launch figures for the Star Wars: The Last Jedi line.  He comes from the Teal assortment, and gets to fight with C-3PO over which one of them’s the more known quantity in the set.  Chewbacca is based on his ever so slightly tweaked look from the new trilogy. It’s not much different from the prior design; the big change is the new bandolier.  The figure’s a big one, standing almost 5 inches tall.  He’s got the standard 5 points of articulation, though the neck movement is rather limited by the design.  The sculpt looks to re-use the torso and left arm from the TFA Millennium Falcon Chewie, albeit with some slightly sharper mold-lines.  The rest is new, or at the very least tweaked. The head and bandolier remove the elements of the Falcon headset, and the head gets an open mouthed expression in contrast to the closed mouths of the last two Chewies.  The bandolier is a separate piece, but thanks to the slight divot on the torso, it actually stays in place, which I’m a fan of.  The legs now have the slightest bend at the knees, making him appear to be mid-stride, and the right arm is bent at the elbow, so he can hold his bowcaster at least a little better than the prior figures.  There’s a nice heft to this figure, which I think has been missing from some of the more recent Chewbaccas (the Black Series version in particular felt far too scrawny to me).  Getting the paint right on a Chewbacca figure is always a little difficult.  Fur’s not easy to handle, especially at a mass-production scale.  This figure does okay.  Some of the transitions could stand to be a little more subtle, but I’ve seen far worse.  The work on the eyes and mouth is very sharp, and the bandolier is pretty decent, too.  Chewie is packed with his bowcaster, which is a new, three-piece mold.  It’s a cool idea, but ends up falling apart a lot, especially when you try getting him to hold it.  Chewie also includes the newest Star Wars-sensation, the Porg!  I have no clue how prominent these little guys will end up being, but it’s nice to get at least one small-scale version in the initial launch, and especially nice that it’s not in a huge set (like poor BB-8 was for TFA).

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I didn’t pick up a single Chewbacca from the Force Awakens product.  In fact, I haven’t actually bought a small-scale Chewbacca figure since the Star Wars Saga release from 2003.  I guess getting a new one was a bit overdue.  I wasn’t 100% sold on getting this guy, but when I saw the figure in person during my pre-Force Friday find, I liked him enough to put him on my list for the actual event.  He’s a nice figure, definitely one of the better versions of him I own.

#0672: Bounty Hunter Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

BOUNTY HUNTER CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS: POWER OF THE FORCE II

ChewieBountyHunter1

My first introduction to Star Wars toys was courtesy of Kenner’s Power of the Force II line of figures. The interesting thing is that I came into the line during the second round of figures, so some of my initial versions of the main characters weren’t exactly standard issue. I’ve already discussed how Dagobah training Luke was my first figure in the line, and some of the other main characters followed a similar pattern. Chewbacca was one such character, which seems a little odd, since you wouldn’t think there would be a lot of potential Chewbacca variants. Well, faithful reader, feast your eyes on Bounty Hunter Chewbacca!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

ChewieBountyHunter2Bounty Hunter Chewbacca was part of the second year of Power of the Force II figures. He was released as part of a small subset of figures based on Shadows of the Empire, which is a story set between Empire and Jedi. In the story, Chewbacca has to take on the guise of well-known Wookie bounty hunter Snoova in order to infiltrate Imperial City. So, technically, this figure could pass for either character. This is only the third time that Chewbacca had made it into the 3 ¾ inch line, which is surprisingly low, given his prominence. The figure stands a little over 4 inches tall and has 6 points of articulation. As a Chewbacca variant, you might think that this figure would be heavy on reuse. However, that’s not the case, as the only shared part between this and the regular POTF2 Chewie is the left leg. Everything else is new to this guy, though the sculpt maintains more than a few similarities with the regular version. Chewbacca definitely has a slightly exaggerated style about him (as did most of the POTFII figures) but I think this is one of the few figures in the line that really couldn’t work without the slightly cartoony feel. The concept looks pretty nifty here, presented in all its over-complicated 90s glory, but placed on a more realistically proportioned body I dare say it would look downright silly. And being exaggerated certainly doesn’t mean the figure doesn’t have some great texturing. The armor in particular looks sufficiently worn and beaten. Someone had a lot of fun sculpting this guy. This version of Chewbacca also got some of the very best paintwork POTF2 had to offer. All of the base paint is cleanly applied, with minimal bleed over. He’s also got some pretty nice work on his fur, which, in story, has patches died to make him look more like Snoova. They could have just been solid blotches of color, but they’ve actually been worked in rather subtly, making them look like they’re actually died into his fur. Chewbacca was packed with a giant blaster and a sci-fi looking axe, which both just add to the 90s over-complication thing. They can both be held, or the axe can also be plugged into his back for storage.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

This guy was my very first Chewbacca figure. If I recall correctly, Chewie was one of the last main characters I got. I remember that my Grandmother took me to the store (Sears, I think) specifically because I had asked to get a Chewbacca figure. I seem to recall that both versions of Chewbacca were there, but I picked this one. Even then I knew what cool was! The one pictured is actually a replacement I picked up a few months ago, as the original got lost some ways back. I have to admit, I was ready to tear into this one for its absurdity when I first sat down to write this, but I’ve come out of the review with a rekindled love for this X-Treme little guy.

#0580: Chewbacca

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , ,

CHEWBACCA

STAR WARS: THE BLACK SERIES

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Once a line of figures gets a few series in, there will inevitably crop up one or two characters that are noticeably absent. Following the first three series of Star Wars: The Black Series, it was quite obvious that these two characters were Darth Vader and Chewbacca. Then, both found their way into the 5th series of the line. And there was much rejoicing! Yay! Except for one small issue: they weren’t exactly easy to find. See, there were two things that led to this. The first was that stores were sitting on lots of unsold stock of the first four series, so they under-ordered Series 5. In addition, while the series was all new figures, two of the four were variants of previously released characters. Obviously, this made the two new characters even more desirable, causing quite a bit of scarcity. I myself missed out on Chewbacca the first time around, but, fortunately for me, he got a rerelease!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Chewbacca2Chewbacca was originally part of Series 5 of Star Wars: The Black Series, however he eventually found his way into Series 7 cases as well. He’s figure number 04 in the second round of numbering for the line. The figure has 27 points of articulation and stands a whopping 8 inches tall. He’s actually so tall that he was pushed back to Series 5 from Series 4 so that Hasbro would have time to re-design the packaging so that poor Chewy wouldn’t have to be crammed in some contorted pose in order to be properly seen. Dude’s really big.  Chewbacca is one of the handful of characters who essentially look the same in all of the Star Wars films they appear in. That being said, you can sort of tell which movie he’s from by what his “bangs” are doing. For this figure, they’ve gone with the slicked back A New Hope look, which works fine with me. Given Chewbacca’s unique look, it’s no surprise that he makes use of an entirely new set of sculpted pieces. To be totally honest, it isn’t one of my favorites that the line has produced. It’s certainly not bad, and in fact, they’ve done an admirable job of translating a design that doesn’t work very well on an articulated figure to…umm…an articulated figure. The fur is all pretty well textured, but the breaks for articulation are rather obvious and obtrusive. Not sure it could have been any better, but it looks off. The head was actually the part of the figure I liked the least at first, but my opinion has changed over time and now I think it might be my favorite part of the figure. I’m still not 100% sold on the decision for the mouth to be open, but it looks perfectly fine in person. The sculpt being a little on the wonky side is not at all helped by an iffy paint job. Now, to be fair, this paint isn’t poorly applied or messy. It’s all exactly where it should be. It’s just not as…subtle as it could be. There are two different shades of brown: one dark and one light. The problem is that there’s no shade between, so the change from one to another is rather sudden. It really doesn’t help that many of these changes occur at the connections of joints, which are already a bit jarring to begin with. Chewbacca is armed only with his trusty bowcaster. It might have been nice to get another Stormtrooper rifle or maybe a set of handcuffs, but the lighter accessory load is excusable given the figure’s size.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

When Series 5 was announced, I knew I wanted to get a Chewbacca figure. However, when I ended up finding the series, I could only find Luke and Vader, with no sign of Chewbacca. That bummed me out quite a bit. I mentioned it to my dad, who kept an eye out for Chewbacca for several months. He finally came across one while getting lunch from Wegman’s one day, much to my excitement. I know I was a little down on this guy in my actual review. I stand by that, but I will say that just having the figure in hand improves my personal opinion of the figure, even if the actual quality could be a bit better. I think part of it is just that Chewy is an important piece of the films and a collection wouldn’t be complete without him.

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