Tag Archives: Cloak

#3926: Cloak & Dagger

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

CLOAK & DAGGER

CLOAK & DAGGER (TOY BIZ)

“Teenagers possessing the powers of light and darkness, Tyrone Johnson and Tandy Bowen are Cloak and Dagger! Drawing opponents into himself, Cloak later releases them weakened and unable to fight and longer. His costume conceals his shadowy power, a place of darkness that feeds on its victims. Wielding her power in the form of blades of pure light, Dagger is able to drain her enemies of their vitality; she can also use her power to alleviate Cloak’s hunger for light. Brought together by destiny, Cloak and Dagger remain a duo committed to ridding the streets of the criminals who would destroy it.”

Cloak and Dagger were created in 1982 as a pair of antagonists (but not villains) for Spider-Man, a fact that I used to open my only other Cloak and Dagger review, all the way back in 2018.  What does that mean?  Largely that my connection to the characters in tangental at best.  I’ve probably read a couple of comics where they appeared, but I don’t know that I’ve ever really read any focus stories, and certainly not any of their stand alone stuff.  They have a clever name, though, and a neat visual dynamic, so, that’s cool for toys, right?

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Cloak and Dagger were released in 1997 as their own stand-alone boxed two-pack under Toy Biz’s larger 5-Inch Marvel banner.  In terms of styling and era of release, they’re a lot like the Famous Couples sets, but they were general release and without marked edition sizes. This was the first figure treatment for both characters, and they would remain the only ones for almost a decade, until Diamond Select released both Select and Minimates versions.  The set included the two figures, as well as a small tin with an illustration on the front.  Maybe you can keep all the weird junk from the other two-packs in it?

CLOAK

Cloak starts us off with a relatively by the numbers re-use based figure.  He stands 5 inches tall and has 11 points of articulation.  Cloak is primarily using the Octo-Spidey base body that Toy Biz was so fond of using.  It’s perfectly fine here, since it’s mostly just an excuse to hold up his cloak.  The head is a re-use of Deadpool II’s unmasked head, which, if nothing else, has the virtue of being a less frequently used part.  In the earlier days, Cloak’s face tended to have a lot of line work, so the texturing of the sculpt works okay to replicate that.  It’s not perfect, but it’s not bad.  The color work does a bit of the lifting on differentiating him from the earlier uses of the parts.  He makes a lot of use of accenting and washes, which works very nicely.  Adorning all of the reused sculpted parts, is a soft goods cloak piece.  It’s thick, and rough in texture, and mostly just hangs there.  The print with the stripes works, though, and it’s got a good presence.

DAGGER

Lest there be any fear of things getting too crazy here, Dagger keeps Cloak’s re-use basis going, also being rather by the numbers.  She’s just shy of 5 inches tall and she has 9 points of articulation.  Her movement is very limited, due to a combination of the hard plastic hair restricting her neck, and the use of v-hips.  Generally, she’s just for standing.  She does at least get universal shoulders.  She’s constructed entirely out of parts from the “Ninja” series of X-Men, with the head of Psylocke, and the body of Deathbird (albeit with the torso and arms modified to remove the connection points for the wings).  The head’s actually a pretty solid match for Dagger’s usual depictions, and the color shift helps to differentiate in well from the original usage.  The body’s okay, but the sculpted belt-line goes through a spot on her waist that’s supposed to be skin, which does look a little bit odd.  Her coloring is pretty nice; the white sections of her outfit are pearlescent, and I’m always a sucker for that.  Beyond that, it’s fairly basic paint work, which does what it needs to and sells the look generally well.  The only slightly off bit is the amulet on the front of her chest, which looks very fake, but that’s about it.  Dagger gets four “dagger” pieces, which are actually just Marrow’s bone pieces, but cast in clear plastic.  Honestly, apart from being far too large, they work better than expected.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

This set proved my first introduction to the characters.  Of course, I didn’t know who they were, so I didn’t buy one new, and they weren’t my first *figures* of the two (those would be the Minimates), but it does still sort of cement them as the standard look of the characters in my head.  I finally got a chance to snag the set a few years ago, in a larger collection, with most of the other multipacks. As noted within the review proper, they’re both very by the numbers figures, entirely reliant on re-used parts.  But, it ultimately works okay for them, and I think this winds up as a pretty neat little set.

Shoutout to my friends at All Time Toys, from whom I purchased this figure for review!  If you’re looking for cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay storefront.

#1834: Cloak & Dagger

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

CLOAK & DAGGER

MARVEL LEGENDS (HASBRO)

“A hooded vigilante in the war on drug crimes, Tyrone Johnson uses powers of darkness as Cloak.

Tandy Bowen channels her unrivaled possession of Lightforce into signature light dagger weapons, earning herself the name Dagger.”

Created in 1982 as to face off against Spider-Man (albeit in sort of an anti-heroic fashion), Cloak and Dagger were, from their very inception, intended for a spin-off-driven future.  It sort of didn’t quite work out so much that way for them, but they have nevertheless retained a cult-classic status, which proved enough for them to get a TV show last year.  Time will tell if this is what escalates them beyond cult status.  In the mean time, they’ve both just been added to the ranks of Marvel Legends.  Today, I’ll be looking at their Marvel Legends debut.

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Cloak and Dagger are figures 3 and 4 in the SP//dr Series of Marvel Legends.  This marks the characters’ debut in this style, though their second figures from Hasbro, who also offered them in their Marvel Universe line. 

CLOAK

Cloak stands 6 1/2 inches tall and he has 32 points of articulation.  Has the articulation is, of course, slightly different than “uses the articulation”, which thanks to the titular cloak, Tyrone doesn’t really do.  Though he’s built on the Reaper body, it really amounts to little more than elaborate cloak-hanger.  He does get a different set of hands than we usually see on this body; they’re outstretched in an open gesture.  You aren’t going to see them much, but at least this way they’re a bit different.  The previously mentioned cloak is an all-new piece.  While articulation-restricting, it’s quite a nicely sculpted piece, and it hangs well on the Reaper base body.  Its nice to see that Hasbro’s gotten over their trend of bad capes, though it’s a little bit unfortunate that this is the only option he have for displaying him.  Cloak gets a new head as well.  It’s clearly a later-in-his-career version of Cloak, as denoted by the goatee.  Its an interesting choice, but not one that really makes for much of a difference in the character’s depiction.  The hood of the cloak is fixed to the head, separate from the main cloak, as has become Hasbro’s standard for such designs.  The paintwork/color work on Cloak is subtle, but pretty impressive.  The cloak and his arms are molded in a semi-translucent plastic, which gives him something of an etherial quality, which definitely works well for the character.  Though he doesn’t get any character-specific extras, Cloak does include the head to SP//dr.

DAGGER

The light to Cloak’s dark, Dagger stands 6 inches tall and has 27 points of articulation.  Dagger is built on the mid-sized female base body, a good fit for how the character is usually depicted.  Like Elektra, she’s saddled with slightly more restricted elbows, but they aren’t quite as terrible for Dagger.  Dagger’s one new piece is her head-sculpt, which is a really nice piece.  The hair in particular really turned out well.  It flows well with the body, its got a natural hang, and the detailing is nice and sharp.  The rest of the work is dene via paint, and even then, she’s really pretty basic.  The majority of the work is, again, on the head, specifically the hair, which gets some solid accenting, which helps it look more realistic and provides more depth to the sculpt.  Dagger is packed with an effects piece, simulating her throwing her light daggers.  It clips onto her wrist, and generally looks pretty cool.  I’m always down for effects pieces.  She also includes the torso of SP//dr, which is the largest and most important piece, so she’s got that going for her.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I don’t really have a huge attachment to Cloak and Dagger, but I do think the two of them have a rather striking design going on, and they make for fun figures.  Also, I really wanted to build SP//dr, so they have that going for them as well.  There’s not a whole lot new going on with either of these, but that’s kind of reasonable given their designs, and the execution is solid.

I purchased Cloak and Dagger from my friends at All Time Toys.  If you’re interested in buying these two or other Legends figures, or are looking for other cool toys both old and new, please check out their website and their eBay Store.