Tag Archives: Marvel

#1246: Strong Zealot & Astral Form Doctor Strange

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

STRONG ZEALOT & ASTRAL FORM DOCTOR STANGE

MARVEL MINIMATES

Okay, one more day of the Doctor Strange Minimates.  Well, unless I track down the two specialty exclusive sets.  Which I probably will, because that’s the sort of person I am.  Anyway, today we get another version of the film’s title character, who this time around is facing off against one of Kaecilius’s Zealot followers.  Specifically the strong one.  It says so on the box!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

The Strong Zealot and Astral Form Doctor Strange were the Toys R Us-exclusive set for the Doctor Strange assortment of Marvel Minimates.  It’s actually a pretty solid pairing, since the Strange fights this particular Zealot while in Astral Form.

STRONG ZEALOT

Okay, so the box just calls him “Strong Zealot,” but this guy was actually named Lucian (not that it’s ever said in the movie), and he was played by stunt man Scott Adkins.  This is actually the second time Adkins has gotten a Minimate; he portrayed Weapon XI in X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  Hey, it’s not his fault!  Anyway, this particular Zealot was actually fairly important, so it’s cool that he got his own specific ‘mate.  The figure is built on the standard ‘mate body, so he’s about 2 1/4 inches tall and he has the usual 14 points of articulation.  He has two add-on pieces for his hair and skirt piece. The hair s re-used from BSG’s Anders.  It’s not a perfect match for Lucian’s hair, but it’s close enough that it doesn’t look too off.  The skirt looks to be a new piece, and it’s about on par with the rest of the pieces from this particular assortment.  Actually, the details might even be a little sharper on this particular piece, which is always a good thing.  The paint on the Zealot is generally pretty top-notch.  He’s got all of the various shades of purple down pretty well, and there’s plenty of detail work therein.  He’s got the funky eyes to match Kaecilius’ alternate head, and it looks just as cool here as it did there, with the added bonus of being on a slightly better ‘mate.  Lucian’s only extra is a clear display stand.  While something else might have been nice, I can’t really think of anything else you could give him.  Maybe a head without the eye stuff?

ASTRAL FORM DOCTOR STRANGE

Astral Form Strange figures are pretty standard, since they mean you can get an easy re-use out of the already existing Strange molds.  That being said, this is actually the first time the look has shown up in ‘mate form, so it’s noteworthy in that respect.  Anyway, this figure uses all the same pieces as the regular Doctor Strange from this same series.  They were good there, and they remain good here.  He keeps the cloak of levitation, despite its absence during his main Astral Projection scene, but I’m hardly going to complain about getting an extra piece here.  The main difference here is the coloring; this figure is molded in a translucent pale yellow, which works well enough.  He still retained his overall coloring in the movie, with just a slight tint, but that’s a bit harder to do in plastic, so this is the look that most figure versions have been going with.  The actual details are lifted directly from the normal Strange figure as well.  While a different expression or something might have been nice, this is perfectly acceptable.  Like his pack-mate, Strange’s only extra is the display stand, which is a little frustrating on a figure that’s all parts re-use.  A flight stand or something would have been nice.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Like the last two sets, this pair was a Valentine’s Day gift from Super Awesome Girlfriend.  This set is definitely less essential than the last two, but I find myself really liking it.  Lucian’s a cool minor character, and we finally get Strange in one of his more important looks (and you can probably pass this off as comic version if you really want to).  All in all, this is a pretty fun set.

#1245: Mordo & Kaecilius

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

MORDO & KAECILIUS

MARVEL MINIMATES

When Doctor Strange was still in production and most of what we had was cast list, there was a lot of confusion about who exactly would be the film’s antagonist.  Mordo, one of Strange’s usual foes, had been cast, but Marvel was reporting he would be on the side of good this time.  Mads Mickelson had been cast, but as who?  Everything seemed to point to either Dormamu or Nightmare, since those are really the only two other foes anyone’s ever heard of.  So, it was a bit of a surprise when Mickelson was revealed to be playing Kaecilius, a rather minor character from the comics.  Ultimately, while he’s certainly a driving force in the film, Kaecilius takes the back seat to….pretty much every one else in the film.  He didn’t get picked up for either the Marvel Legends or Marvel Select tie-ins for the film, but fortunately Minimates can offer a more rounded cast, so he did show up there, alongside Mordo.

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Mordo and Kaecilius are the second of the two sets shared between Series 70 of Marvel Minimates and the TRU-exclusive tie-in series for the movie.  They’re easily the oddest pairing in the assortment.  They are in some scenes together, but I don’t believe these two ever directly interact in the film.  I guess they’re a case of pairing the spares in the assortment.

MORDO

Mordo was definitely my favorite part of the movie, and clearly had a decent following, so it’s my guess that he’s meant to be this particular set’s hook.  The figure is built on the usual ‘mate body, and so he has all the standard articulation and is about 2 1/4 inches in height. He uses add-ons for his hair and skirt.  The hair is a re-use of TWD’s Battle-Damaged Tyrese, and it’s a pretty good fit for Mordo’s on-screen appearance.  The skirt is a new piece, ad it matches up pretty well with the design from he movie, as well as fitting in stylistically with the sculpted pieces from Strange.  I do wish it sat a little more flush with the upper torso, but that’s a minor complaint.  The paint work on Mordo is quite expertly handled.  The base color work is all pretty good; he doesn’t seem to have been brightened up like the others, but that’s okay for him.  The details are really top notch.  He’s got the appropriate scars on his face, and the slightest bit of stubble.  I don’t know that he’s the spitting image of Ejiofor, but he’s close enough that you can more or less make out who he’s supposed to be.  The most impressive paint work is definitely not he torso, which has a ton of really ornate work, on both the front and the back no less.  Mordo’s only accessory is a clear display stand.  It’s too bad he didn’t also get his staff.  The inaccuracy of the one included with the Hasbro figure and the total omission here leads me to believe it wasn’t included in the material sent to licensors.

KAECILIUS

Here he is!  The bland guy himself!  Okay, that’s not really fair.  Kaecilius was perfectly entertaining, and Mads Mickelson turned in a pretty great performance in the role.  But he really was rather secondary, wasn’t he?  Anyway, like Mordo, he’s build on the standard body.  He uses  add-ons for his hair and skirt.  Both pieces are new to this figure, and do a reasonable job of capturing Kaecilius’s look from the movie.  The skirt is a little on the soft side, but not horribly so.  The paint work on Kaecilius is okay, but probably the weakest in the series.  There’s a fair bit of slop on the base color work, which is rather frustrating.  The worst of it seems to be on the skirt, which doesn’t help the already present issues with the softness of the sculpt.  The detail lines are all pretty clean, and they sum up his look pretty well, but they feel a bit simplistic when compared to the really fine level of details seen on Mordo and Strange.  The basic head presents a decent enough likeness of Mickelson, but is rather bland.  There’s an alternate “powered” head, which helps to make him a little more exciting.  The details around the eyes are nice and sharp, and do a nice job of capturing the cracked skin as it looks on screen.  In addition to the extra head, he’s also got the standard display stand.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Like yesterday’s set, these two were a Valentine’s Day present from Super Awesome Girlfriend.  While Mordo’s probably my favorite ‘mate in the series, Kaecilius is definitely the weakest figure included.  He’s just rather bland, and lacks the really solid execution like we saw on the Ancient One.  Still, it’s not a bad set, and accents yesterday’s pair quite well!

#1244: Doctor Strange & Ancient One

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

DOCTOR STRANGE & THE ANCIENT ONE

MARVEL MINIMATES

Not gonna lie, I’ve kind of fallen behind with Minimates.  I used to pick them up as soon as they were released, but now I sort of grab them as I remember and have the available funds.  One set I totally missed when it hit was the tie-in stuff for Doctor Strange, which I’m finally getting around to picking up now.  Today, I’ll be taking a look at the title character and his mentor, the Ancient One!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Strange and the Ancient One were one of the cross-over sets for the Doctor Strange ‘mates, and as such were shared between the TRU-Doctor Strange assortment and Series 70 of the main line of Marvel Minimates.  Both figures are based on their looks from the Doctor Strange movie.

DOCTOR STRANGE

First up is the movie’s main character, Doctor Stephen Strange!  Stephen had a number of looks over the course of the movie, most of which found their way into ‘mate form, but this one is based on his primary look.  The figure is built on the standard ‘mate body, so he’s about 2 1/2 inches tall and he has 14 points of articulation.  The legs are rather restricted by the skirt piece, but his movement is otherwise pretty good.  Strange uses add-on pieces for his hair, cape, and skirt piece, all of which are new to this figure.  The pieces are quite nicely rendered; they preserve all the important details, while still keeping it simple enough that the ‘mate aesthetic is preserved.  The rest of the work is handled via paint, which is also quite nicely handled.  It does seem they’ve brightened his color palette ever so slightly, but I can’t say that really bugs me.  Apart from that, there’s a lot of really sharp detail work.  Most of it’s on the face and torso, but there’s also fully detailed boots on the legs, and they’ve even included his scars on the backs of his hands.  The hand thing in particular really impressed me, since that’s the sort of thing that is easy to miss, but very key to the character.  Strange is packed with a pair of extra hands with magic effects attached, which make for some very fun posing opportunities, as well as the standard clear display stand.

THE ANCIENT ONE

The Ancient One is another in the long line of expendable mentors in superhero origin stories (okay, it’s not just superhero origins, as one Obi Wan Kenobi will attest).  It’s a role that can sort of be on the shallow side, but I felt Doctor Strange’s portrayal of the Ancient One made for a pretty intriguing character, and one I’m quite happy to have a figure of.  Like Strange, she’s built on the standard ‘mate body.  She has the poofy upper arm pieces (first introduced on Series 29’s 90s Storm) to denote her robes, as well as a long skirt add-on and a hood (borrowed from Spider-Gwen).  The pieces aren’t exactly a perfect recreation of the Ancient One’s garb from the movie, but it’s pretty clear that one figure in this series really needed to just be parts re-use and the Ancient One was close enough to work.  And, in that respect, she’s perfectly fine.  Obviously for her, the pain carries a lot more of the weight.  Fortunately, it’s quite nicely done.  The robes are very cleanly defended and I really dig the bright colors.  The patterns on the front are also very nicely rendered, and keep her from being too drab.  The face looks enough like Tilda Swinton on the role that you can figure out who it’s supposed to be, which is good.  My one major complaint is that they left off the scar she had on the back of her head.  It’s pretty prominently seen at several points in the movie, and the fact that they remembered to include Strange’s hand scars makes its absence rather notable.  The Ancient One includes an extra pulled-down hood piece and the usual display stand.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Not being in the same state as my comic book store means that I don’t spot new Minimates when they hit, and that was the case with this whole series.  I kept meaning to order it online, but just never remembered.  On Valentine’s Day, Super Awesome Girlfriend and I were out and about, and we saw the the whole set at Toys R Us.  Since she hadn’t yet gotten me anything (in her defense, we said no gifts and then I went back on it), she picked them all up for me.  This set’s probably the strongest in the series, due to the prominence of the characters included and the general construction of both figures.  If you liked the movie, this is definitely a good set to grab.

#1242: Cyclops

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

CYCLOPS

X-MEN: CLASSICS (TOY BIZ)

I’ve spent the better part of the last two weeks searching for the latest Marvel Legends Cyclops figure, with no luck so far (he’s the only one who illudes me.…).  Fortunately for me, I have an extensive backlog of figures I can pull from, allowing me to review a Cyclops just about any time I want to.  Heck, I can even review one that’s wearing the same costume!  In the same scale!  Isn’t that nifty?  I sure think it is!  So, without further ado, here’s a Cyclops figure!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Cyclops hails from the first (and sadly only) series of Toy Biz’s X-Men: Classics line.  Since they had launched Marvel Legends, Toy Biz had been using Spider-Man: Classics to release Spider-related characters in the same style, thereby clearing the way for Legends to release more obscure characters from elsewhere.  In 2004, they launched both X-Men: Classics and Hulk: Classics, in an attempt to do the same with those groups of characters.  Somehow, the X-Men got the short straw, and their line only lasted a single series before the team was rolled back into Marvel Legends (the line didn’t even last long enough for them to actually exit Legends, of course).  On the plus side of things, the line did manage to give us our first version of the X-Men’s stalwart field leader, Cyclops!  The figure stands a little over 6 inches tall and he has 37 points of articulation.  Due to a light up feature, his neck movement is restricted to just a cut joint, and even then, it can only go so far in each direction.  It’s better than no movement at all, but frustrating that that this guy is hampered by the same issue that the 5-inch figures had finally moved past.  Cyclops had an all-new sculpt, based on his Jim Lee-era design.  Though every piece here is new, I’ve always thought he looked rather similar to the Legends Gambit in terms of aesthetics.  I have to wonder if they had a common starting point.  The sculpt is a bit of a mixed bag if I’m honest.  The head is definitely the strongest bit; it’s probably the best Cyclops sculpt that Toy Biz ever produced, and just encapsulates the character very well.  I wish the body lived up to it.  It’s not awful, but it’s very scrawny.  Sure, Scott’s long had the nickname “Slim,” but this seems a bit excessive.  It also doesn’t help that it’s the Jim Lee design, and Lee always depicted Scott as pretty solid.  The figure suffers from some rather obvious articulation as well (a common issue with TB figures of this era), which only makes the lankiness look worse.  The actual details of the costume are actually pretty nice, and the work on the boots in particular is really top-notch, so that’s a plus.    The paintwork on Scott is okay overall.  The work is mostly pretty clean, and there’s some pretty good accent work.  There’s the usual slight inconsistencies of accenting from piece to piece of the figure, and the head seemed particularly prone to chipping, but other than that it seems fine.  I think my biggest gripe is the shade of blue they used; it just seems too muted for Cyclops.  While Legends was all about the collector driven extras, the Classics lines went a little more toy-etic.  Cyclops included a stand that I believe is meant to replicate a portion of the Danger Room.  There’s a cannon hooked up to one side, and Scott can be hooked up to the pole on the other side.  There’s a box at the top of the pole with a plug that goes into Scott’s back, and a lever at the base of the stand.  When the lever is pulled, Scott spins 90 degrees and his eyes light up, and then the cannon “explodes” via a spring-loaded feature, simulating him hitting it with his optic blast.  It’s quite gimmicky, and never worked particularly well on my figure.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

When I first saw this figure, it was as part of Raving Toy Maniac’s coverage of one of the Toy Fairs.  He was there alongside Series 5 and 6 of the main Legends line, with no info as to where he would be showing up.  Eventually we found out.  Of course, 2004 was kind of when Legends was at its worst in terms of scarcity and scalpers, so I never actually saw this guy at retail.  That summer my family took a trip to the large KB Toys warehouse store located in Dover, which I had been to once before, and which housed a huge selection of figures going back almost a decade .  When we arrived at the store, it was cleared out and closed, which was more than a little bit of a bummer.  Feeling bad for me, my Dad tracked this guy down from an online vendor, and bought him for me (he likes to buy me Cyclops figures when I’m down.  It’s a thing).  He paid a whopping $15 with shipping, which is kind of laughable these days.  This figure’s not perfect, but he was one of my favorites for a good long while, and I still think of him quite fondly.

#1240: Invisible Woman

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

FORCE FIELD INVISIBLE WOMAN

MARVEL MINIMATES

At one point, the Fantastic Four were the premier characters at Marvel.  They’re the whole reason for the modern Marvel universe’s existence, and were a central piece of said universe for almost 50 years.  Unfortunately, the fact that the film license for the characters lies with 20th Century Fox has made the characters very difficult to use in Marvel’s current structure, which is very reliant on movie momentum to keep things going.  This, plus a less than stellar relationship with Fox and the fact that the Four don’t have the same selling power as Spider-Man and the X-Men, has led to Marvel’s first family and all associated characters being absent from pretty much all Marvel merchandise for quite a few years, which is a real shame.  Before it all fell apart, the FF were the main source of one of my all-time favorite assortments of Marvel Minimates, which is where today’s version of the Invisible Woman hails from.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Force Field Invisible Woman was released alongside the Moloid (previously reviewed here) in Series 48 of Marvel Minimates.  Sue was the heavier-packed regular release to Alicia’s short-packed variant release.  She, like the rest of the team in this series, is based on her appearance during John Byrne’s lengthy run on the title in the ‘80s, which just so happens to be my favorite set of costumes for the team (in no small part due to the presence of the designs in the ‘90s cartoon, which served as my main introduction to the characters.)  The figure stands about 2 1/4 inches tall and has 14 points of articulation.  She’s built on the standard body, with an add-on piece for her hair.  It’s a new piece, and it does a reasonable enough job of capturing Sue’s standard look, from early in Byrne’s run and any time an artist other than Byrne depicted this design.  Seems odd that they sculpted an all-new piece, since there were several that probably would have worked fine, but I’m not complaining.  She also has an alternate hairpiece, based on the mullet she was sporting for while during Byrne’s run.  Not my preferred look for her, but it was a look she had for a good long while in the costume, so it’s good DST didn’t leave it out.  The paint on Sue is about what you’d expect from a modern ‘mate.  The details are nice and clean, and the colors are a pretty decent match for the comics.  If we’re getting picky, the shadows should be black, not dark blue, since Byrne has stated many times that the costumes weren’t actually blue.  However, it’s dark enough that it’s still passable.  Sue is packed with two sets of arms and legs: solid colors and partially transparent, simulating her powers.  She also includes a stand made up to look like the beginnings of an invisible shield, which is a really fun piece. 

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

This whole series was one of my most anticipated releases of Minimates at the time, so I made it a point of going to Cosmic Comix the day they were released to pick them up.  I’ve got other Invisible Woman ‘mates, but this one’s my favorite.  The costume choice is great, and the extras are, well, they’re just fantastic.  Which is very appropriate, is it not?

#1237: Black Queen Jean Grey

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

BLACK QUEEN JEAN GREY

MARVEL LEGENDS (HASBRO)

I’ve spend the last week and a half hunting for the latest X-Men-themed series of Marvel Legends, which means I’m really in the mood to review some X-Men Legends.  Unfortunately, I haven’t exactly had much luck with finding those particular figures, so I’ll have to dig into my back catalogue to make up for it.  So, today I’ll be looking at one of Hasbro’s earlier X-Men figures, Black Queen Jean Grey!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Black Queen Jean Grey was released as a Toys R Us exclusive, in between the 2nd and 3rd series of Hasbro’s first run with Marvel Legends.  She was one of three such figures that year, and also one of the two of those three to be built on this particular body.  The figure stands about 6 inches tall and has 29 points of articulation.  This version of Jean was mostly created to get an extra use out of the Series 1 Emma Frost mold.  Without getting into it too much, the Emma Frost figure isn’t exactly popular with fans.  Were it not for the Legendary Riders Scarlet Witch, she’d easily be the most hideous Marvel Legends figure ever produced.  The body is oddly lanky in all the wrong places, has incredibly obvious joints and large hands, and just generally looks pretty fragile, not befitting the usual depictions of Emma in the comics.  So, the fact that this figure was built on that body was not particularly a point in its favor.  Also, it’s worth noting that, while Emma’s and Jean’s designs were originally pretty close, the Emma figure from Marvel Legends was based on her Astonishing X-Men design, which was a fair bit different from the design Jean was sporting as Black Queen.  The corset’s too short (and not actually a corset if you look closely), and she’s wearing pants, rather than the tights she had in the comics.  With that said, there are some new pieces that sort of help bridge the gap between designs.  The figure gets a new head sculpt, as well as a slightly tweaked clasp on the cape, to remove the original figure’s X-logo (of course, the one on the waist still remains, but whatever).  The head does a lot, and I mean A LOT, to carry this figure, despite the flaws of the body.  It’s definitely some top notch work, and easily the best work Hasbro put out in their first few years with the license.  It manages to capture the character of the Black Queen incarnation of Jean pretty much spot on, with that incredibly devious look she was sporting for most of her time in the identity.  It’s really good work.  The paint also does a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of saving the figure from the body sculpt.  The over abundance of black helps to hide a number of the inaccurate details, as well as masking the joints and making the whole body flow just a bit better.  The paintwork is generally pretty cleanly handled, without too much bleed over or noticeable slop.  He palette is still flat, like a lot of the early Hasbro stuff, but it’s actually okay on this figure.  Jean was packed with a whip accessory, which I misplaced at some point over the years.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I found this figure when it was brand new, at a Toys R Us that no longer exists.  I can’t even say why I was there, truth be told, since TRU was going through a particularly depressing period where they stocked absolutely nothing anyone was interested in.  At the time, all of my Legends figures were coming from Cosmic Comix, KB Toys, or Walmart.  But, I was in a TRU, and they had this figure, so I got her.  After the Emma Frost and X3 Jean Grey figures, this was the first figure to make it clear that not *every* female figure from Hasbro was going to totally suck.  Despite her questionable origins, this figure is actually pretty great, and shows how much of a difference a simple palette swap can make.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0007: Savage Land Angel

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Flashback Friday Figure Addendum and tagged with , , , , ,

Another Friday, another Flashback Friday Figure Addendum!  This one’s another look back at Toy Biz’s epic line of 5-inch Marvel figures, with Savage Land Angel!

The 90s X-Men line!  Now there was a line.  I haven’t really looked at this line yet on the site, aside from the Original Members Boxed Set, which wasn’t actually part of the line.  But in the 90s, the X-Men were the big thing.  They had a TV show, their comics sold millions, and they had one of the most comprehensive toy lines to date.  There was a Cho’d action figure for God’s sake!  Towards the end of the line, they began to run out of new characters to release, so they started doing these theme waves with rereleases of the main characters.  One of those theme waves was a set of figures based on the X-Men’s many trips to the Savage Land.  It featured figures of the X-Men in tattered “Savage Land” uniforms.  Today, I’ll be looking at the Angel figure from that line.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

So, as I said above, Angel here hails from the Savage Land series of Toy Biz’s 5-inch X-Men line.  He stands roughly 5 inches tall and has 11 points of articulation.  If you read the review of the Fallen, you’ve seen a lot of this figure before.   He shares all but his head, arms and feet with that figure.  The head was actually one that saw frequent reuse over at Toy Biz, and I know this wasn’t the first figure to use it, but I honestly don’t know what was.   Anyway, it works fine here, though it might be a bit scowly for a pre-Archangel Warren Worthington.  The figure’s look is mostly done through paint, which depicts a tattered version of Angel’s blue and white costume from the silver age*.   It’s cool to see this costume here, but a bit disappointing that the costume never got a proper release.  Angel at one point featured a pair of (very small) wings, a gray vest with an X-logo, and some weird claw thing that attached to his wrist, but I lost most of those pieces many years ago.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I got this figure on one of my many trips the KB Toys outlet in Rehoboth Beach.  I was very excited to get it because Angel figures were a bit of a rarity in the 90s.  I know I really liked this guy, and for reasons I can’t fathom at this point, I know he spent a lot of time in my Ghostbusters Ecto-1.

Well, that’s not an awful review.  Still a bit shorter than the average review nowadays, but not horribly so.  I actually listed off all of the relevant information for the figure, and even referenced re-used parts and everything (though, rather amusingly, the Fallen pieces I referenced weren’t even discussed in my The Fallen review).

When I last reviewed this figure, he was missing both of his wings and the little wrist claw, both of which were returned to him during The Find.  The wings are rather on the small side, but detailed nicely enough.  I’m not really even sure what the claw supposed to be, but there it is.  Still missing is the grey cloth vest.  Also, I didn’t mention this previously, but each figure in the Savage Land series included a creature figure of some sort.  Angel included a small Sauron figure, which I still haven’t found.  Maybe he’ll turn up one of these days and I can write a *second* addendum.

#1235: Ultron

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

ULTRON

MARVEL AVENGERS PLAYMATION (HASBRO)

Hey, look, it’s another Playmation review!  If you don’t know what Playmation is, consult yesterday’s review, which I hope explained the concept well enough.  Anyway, I’ve got another one.  This one’s an Ultron, and I’m pretty much obligated to by Ultron figures, especially when they’re vaguely classic in design.  So, here he is.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Ultron was another of the later additions to the Marvel Avengers Playmation line.  This guy was a deluxe offering, so he’s a little larger in size than Super Adaptoid and the other basic-sized figures.  The figure stands about 6 1/2 inches tall and he has joints at his neck, shoulders, and mid-torso.  No hip movement for this guy, mostly due to both legs being affixed to the base.  Like the Adaptoid, Ultron isn’t really based on one singular design from anywhere in particular.  He’s probably the closest to the design Ultron had in the second season of Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, which wasn’t too far removed from his classic design.  As is fairly typical at this point, the head, and the antenna in particular, have changed in shape a bit.  Also, he’s got tendrils now because of reasons I guess.  Maybe he was jealous of Brainiac 13?  The general quality of the sculpt is pretty good.  I like the pose quite a bit, even if he did steal it from his son Vision’s first appearance cover.  Nevertheless, it’s appropriately menacing.  Ultron benefits from being mechanical in design, and thereby leaning into the curve of what this line was good at doing.  Some of the details feel a bit on the soft side, but he’s about on par with the rest of there figures in that regard.  The base piece is really the coolest part here, with a greatly battered Captain America shield, and even a little Mjolnir.  It paints a nice picture of Ultron’s assumed defeat of the Avengers.  In terms of paintwork, the base figure is mostly molded in a grey plastic, which is rather drab.  The head is painted silver, in order to help facilitate the light-up head feature exhibited when this guy is used with the game.  A lot of good that does me.  The base is the highlight again, featuring a great bit of weathering on Cap’s Shield.  Very cool.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Wanna guess where I got Ultron?  I’ll give you a hint, it was the same place where I got yesterday’s figure.  Yeah, I was picking up the Super Adaptoid from Ollie’s and they had this guy there too.  He was like a dollar more, but that’s not really a huge difference.  I’m always happy to see a new (vaguely) classic Ultron figure, so was a cool find.  He’s not the sort of thing I would have grabbed at full price, and he’s little more than a plastic statue, but he looks cool on the shelf.

#1234: Super Adaptoid

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

SUPER ADAPTOID

MARVEL AVENGERS PLAYMATION (HASBRO)

Man, the toys-to-life thing sure imploded fast.  After the success of Skylanders and Amiibo, everyone and their mother wanted in on it.  While Lego’s Dimensions attempt seems to have taken off in much the same way as the first two, Disney’s Infinity was discontinued in fairly short order (despite early success).  Somewhere along the line, Hasbro also tried their hand at the concept, creating their Playmation line, which I think most people were unaware even existed.  It got a handful of the figures out there, but its far more limited scope (they only did Avengers characters) and overlapping with the already failing Disney Infinity meant that never really took off or got any sort of notoriety.  It did manage to offer a few somewhat unique items, including today’s focus, the Super Adaptoid, an Avengers foe that had, up to this point, gone without any action figures.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

The Super Adaptoid was released in the second round of basic Marvel Avengers Playmation figures.  The Playmation figures were bigger than most other toys-to-life items, being a just slightly smaller scale than Hasbro’s Marvel Legends and the like.  The Adaptoid stands just shy of 6 inches tall (which, with his slight kneel, means he’s close enough that you can fudge the scale, should you want to display him with your Legends collection).  Another change that Playmation offered was giving the figures some articulation; it’s not a lot, but the Adaptoid can move at the shoulders, neck, mid-torso, and a little bit at the hips.  You’re not going to get a ton of variety in how he can be posed, but it’s enough to make him more than a statue. The Super Adaptoid has had a few looks over they years, with his most prevalent being an all-green amalgamation of Cap, Hawkeye, Iron Man, Wasp, and Thor.  This figure isn’t quite that design, but it’s a slightly modernized take on it, I guess.  It’s sort of like they married his classic design with his design from Avengers Assembled.  It’s not a terrible look, and probably a lot less goofy looking than his original design, while still keeping a lot of the basic traits.  It’s workable, and I certainly prefer it to his last comics appearance design.  The figure’s sculpt is actually pretty cool; a lot of this line’s figures looked sort of odd or strangely inhuman, but for a character like the Adaptoid, it’s not a bad thing.  The various stolen hero details are petty cool, and you can pretty clearly discern what came from whom.  As far as the pose goes, it’s not too extreme a pose, but also not as boring as a simple standing pose.  The legs seem a little odd, but they aren’t terrible, and at least he can stand.  I also appreciate the small little base, which has him standing on the remains of one of the Ultron drones.  It keeps him standing steady and looks cool to boot.  That’s the way to do it.  Now, Hasbro could have taken the easy way out on the paint and just done him in mostly solid green.  However, they didn’t do that; they actually used a nice variety of greens, which keeps the consistency from the comics, while also providing some nice depth to the look. 

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I didn’t pay much attention to Playmation when it was hitting retail, mostly due to owning lots of the characters presented lots of times over, and typically in a superior form.  That being said, I caught this guy’s image on the back of one of the packages and was moderately intrigued.  I even thought about picking him up at full price a few times, but I just never got around to it.  Eventually, I ended up finding a whole bunch of them at Ollie’s.  This guy was like $3, which was good enough for me to finally pick him up.  I’m glad I did.  I still don’t really have any interest in the actual game these guys were attached to, but a cool Super Adaptoid is a cool Super Adaptoid.

#1231: Baron Zemo

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

BARON ZEMO

MARVEL SUPER HEROES: SECRET WARS (MATTEL)

zemosw1

Mattel’s Marvel Super Heroes: Secret Wars is a strange beast.  It’s one of the earliest examples of true cross-media promotion when it came to action figures and comics, since Marvel essentially created a giant cross-over event out of whole cloth simply to give Mattel a slightly easier time of marketing the toys.  But then, Mattel, being Mattel, went and made some really odd choices.  Despite Marvel purposely filling the comic with many of their heaviest hitting heroes and villains, and wrapping them in a neat and tidy package with a bow, Mattel’s character choices for the series are beyond odd.  Sure, there are the clear hits like Spider-Man, Captain America, Iron Man and Wolverine, but Marvel mainstays like the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, and the Hulk were absent, while many minor and in some cases rather recent additions to the Marvel ‘verse were released, despite playing no part in the actual comic Mattel specifically requested to have as a tie-in.  One such character was Baron Helmut Zemo.  The character was not a part of the Secret Wars event, and though he had appeared back in 1973, he had only taken on the Baron Zemo identity seen here in ’82, just two years prior to this figure’s release.  He wouldn’t even truly become a major player in the Marvel universe until three years later, during The Avengers “Under Siege” story arc.  An odd choice.  Still, he got the figure, and now, 33 years later, it feels a little less odd to have a Zemo figure.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

zemosw2Baron Zemo was released in the second series of the Marvel Super Heroes: Secret Wars line.  As noted above and like everyone else in the series (barring the Black Costumed Spider-Man), he played no part in the Secret Wars maxi-series.  Interestingly, though this figure is clearly meant to be Helmut, the second Baron Zemo, and the back of the package lists his identity as such, the short comic on the back of the box presents a Zemo that far more resembles Heinrich, Helmut’s father.  This was hardly the only discrepancy of this nature in this line, of course.  The figure stands about 4 1/2 inches tall and has 5 points of articulation.  Unlike Daredevil and Spider-Man, who’s presence in this line-up seems to have mostly been due to the low number of new parts needed, Zemo actually got an impressive selection of new parts.  The torso is the same basic piece seen on several of the other figures I’ve looked at, but the arms, legs, head, and belt add-on were all unique to this figure.  The new pieces of course are all still victim to the very simplistic style of this line, but Zemo looks passable enough.  There’s some mild texturing on the fur bits, and the folds on the sleeves are rather believable.  The head looks to just bee a slightly re-worked Spider-Man head, but that’s actually not an unfair re-tooling.  A basic masked head is a basic masked head.  In terms of paintwork, I suppose Mattel can have points for effort on this guy, but that’s as far as I’m willing to go.  The colors are okay, but the contrast between the mask and the jumpsuit is not as drastic as it should be.  There’s quite a bit of slot, and fuzzy lines all over the place.  Similar to what we saw on Daredevil, the black detail lines seem to start and stop wherever they please, with little regard to aesthetics.  His neck, for instance, has no details, making for a jarring break from the face and the shoulders.  Likewise, the lines have a clear break above his headpiece, which has the unintended effect of making him look like he’s got a bit of a receding hairline.  For accessories, Zemo was given one of the blasters included with Dr. Doom, as well as, what else, a goofy lenticular shield, like the ones included with every other figure in the line.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

You know how I keep claiming I never intended to really collect this line?  I think I’ve officially lost the battle, because this is the first figure I’ve bought with no real rationalization.  I got Iron Man because it was the only way to get the classic armor at the time.  Wolverine was $1.  Cap was because I like the character, and wanted him to go with Tony.  Doom and Kang were cheap.  Daredevil and Spider-Man were gifts.  Zemo?  I bought Zemo because I wanted to buy Zemo.  I picked him up from Yesterday’s Fun during the holiday season.  He’s the most I’ve ever personally spent on a Secret Wars figure (which, to be fair, was still a lot less than I’ve paid for most of my Super Powers figures).  Zemo’s what I’ve come to expect from this line: a slightly sub-par figure with a disproportionate amount of charm.  The average collector might not get a lot out of him, but to a hardcore collector like myself, there’s some nice history.