Tag Archives: Saga

#3753: Jango Fett

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

JANGO FETT — FINAL BATTLE

STAR WARS SAGA (HASBRO)

A week ago, I was writing an intro about The Phantom Menace (for the SECOND time….), and I guess I’ve just decided to make my way on through the Star Wars…es.  So, let’s jump to Attack of the Clones!  Look, I’ve come around on the prequels as a whole in recent years, but Attack is emphatically the worst Star Wars movie, and it’s not even close.  It’s barely even a movie.  It’s a Wikipedia entry that they filmed to bridge the two actual movies in the prequels.  The thing is, I’m nostalgic as hell for it.  And the toys?  Oh, they’re emphatically some of the worst Star Wars toys produced.  But guess what?  I’m nostalgic as hell for those, too.  I’m an enigma, you guys.  Jango Fett was a big deal when Attack hit, and a lot of the toys centered on him.  Here’s the one with the best action feature ever.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Jango Fett (Final Battle) is figure 31 in the Star Wars Saga line, which ran alongside Attack‘s release.  He was one of the three Jangos available at launch, and the second of the two “standard” ones.  The figure stands 3 3/4 inches tall and he has 13 points of articulation.  His articulation, like so many of the Saga figures, is mostly pointless, thanks to how heavily pre-posed these figures were.  In Jango’s case, that pre-posing is exceedingly awkward, and doesn’t really much allow for…anything.  He’s also super hard to stand, largely because what even are his legs supposed to be doing?  What’s crazy is the’s got actual knee joints, a thing that were still not exceedingly common at this time, and they’re useless, which is just laughable.  On the plus side, I guess the actually quality of the sculpt isn’t bad.  It’s clean and the detailing is sharp, and he’s pretty accurate to the movie.  The biggest drawback (other than the posing) is the advertised action feature, where his gauntlet launches a fire-shaped missile.  It’s not very effective, and it means his left arm is misshapen.  Making up for it, however, is the unadvertised second action feature.  Saga made use of magnets on a number of figures, and a recurring instance was for easily removable body parts, to simulate the damage characters might take.  In Jango’s case, his whole neck joint’s a magnet, so you can behead him, easy-peasy.  It’s so freaking morbid, and I absolutely love it.  Jango’s paint work is a bit murky, which wasn’t uncommon in this era.  He’s got a lot of fake dirt build-up, which is definitely a bit too heavy.  It’s at least all pretty cleanly applied, so there’s that.  Jango is packed with the fire projectile, as well as his twin pistols.  Unfortunately, the holsters are non-functioning on this release, so there’s nowhere to store them.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

When these figures came out, both of my cousins around my age who collected Star Wars had this version of Jango, but I didn’t, and I always desperately wanted one.  Something about how morbid that head feature was just greatly amused me.  He’s on the short list of Saga figures I’ve purchased as an adult; he was traded into All Time a couple of years ago, and I just couldn’t resist him.  He’s terrible, but at the same time also wonderful.  He’s the perfect encapsulation of my relationship with the movie and its toyline as a whole.

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

#3713: Endor Rebel Soldier

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

ENDOR REBEL SOLDIER

STAR WARS SAGA (HASBRO)

“When Han Solo, Leia Organa and Luke Skywalker land on the forest moon of Endor to destroy the shield generator protecting the Death Star II, they are accompanied by a squadron of commandos. Loyal and courageous, these soldiers are inteprid fighters for the cause of the Rebellion.”

Wow, a Star Wars Saga review?  I really must be scraping the bottom the barrel for review subjects.  I mean, going to Saga.  Saga, people.  I mean, in the 3712 reviews here on the site, I’ve only reviewed a single Saga figure up to this point.  Which, honestly, pretty good metrics, right?  And even the one review can be chalked up to it being my first year reviewing and me just not knowing any better.  What am I getting at here?  Well, generally, that Star Wars Saga, the line designed to tie-in with Attack of the Clones’ product launch, is…well, it’s not a great line.  It wasn’t great when it was new, and it has’t gotten better with age.  The figures were all sorts of pre-posed, impossible to keep standing, and frequently just sort of weird looking.  But, I guess I’m reviewing one of them, and none of you can stop me because it’s my site and I do what I want.  It’s at least an Endor Rebel Soldier, so I think that makes it better?

THE FIGURE ITSELF

The Endor Rebel Soldier is figure No. 33 in Hasbro’s Star Wars Saga line-up.  He was part of Collection 2 and was released in 2002.  There were two variants: one bearded and one not.  This one is the not, in case you couldn’t tell.  He was the later of the two releases, and the rarer when the line was new, though it seems like after the fact, they’re pretty evenly balanced.  The figure stands 3 3/4 inches tall and he has 10 points of articulation.  The articulation’s not a bad count, but it’s largely unusable thanks to how the sculpt is set-up.  Like the rest of the line, this guy is very pre-posed.  He’s got sort of a lunging-while-pointing-his-blaster look, which, I guess isn’t a terrible choice for the character.  Honestly, the arms aren’t bad (though they’re hit pretty badly by the sculpt interfering with articulation, since the jacket overlay piece covers the shoulders, making those joints essentially worthless), but the legs seem a little odd.  Also, with such a very specific pose, army building feels a little difficult, since you wouldn’t expect a bunch of guys to all be running around in exactly the same rather strange fashion.  Unlike prior Endor Rebels, this one got a removable helmet.  It’s a nice piece, and it sits very well on the head.  Said head is a nice sculpt of its own.  It doesn’t appear to be based on any specific Rebel from the movie, instead going for more of a general purpose thing.  The paint work on this figure is notable for being the first time we really got a proper deco based on what the Rebels are actually wearing in the movie, rather than the straight green up and down.  The camo pattern on the legs is a little odd, and the feet are the wrong color, but it generally isn’t bad, and the application works out pretty well.  He’s packed with his blaster rifle and a backpack.  The rifle’s a bit warped, since he was packed holding it, but it does at least get the cool blast effect piece, which is pretty nifty.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I’ve always really dug the Endor Rebels, and the PotF one was one of my favorites from that line.  I wanted the Saga version, specifically the not bearded one, when they hit, but all I could ever find was the bearded one, who I begrudgingly bought, but decided to get rid of later.  I eventually got this one when I sizable run of Saga figures got traded into All Time way back in 2018.  Like last week’s Durge, I took the pictures of this guy pretty much right away, but just never got around to actually writing the review.  So, you know, here we are, I guess.  He’s not bad.  Not great, but given the rest of the line, he could certainly be worse.

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

#2629: C-3PO & R2-D2

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

HOLIDAY EDITION C-3PO & R2-D2

STAR WARS SAGA (HASBRO)

“Hasbro and Lucasfilm Ltd. are delighted to present, for the first time, this Star Wars Holiday Edition commemorative. Inspired by the artwork of renowned artist Ralph McQuarrie, this specially designed set captures the imaginative vision of McQuarrie’s art in collectible 3-3/4″ action figure scale. Our gift to you, this piece is a distinctive addition to any Star Wars collection. May the Force be with you, and happy holidays.”

It’s Christmas once again, which means it’s time for me to churn out another festive review!  After years of purely Christmas-themed items, two years ago I took my first look at a rather popular toy concept: the festive variant.  You’d be surprised how much mileage  you can get out of shoving a Santa hat on a popular character.  From 2002 to 2005, Hasbro made it a point of doing this very thing with the Star Wars characters once every Christmas season.  Their very first offerings were a natural pairing, C-3PO and R2-D2.  I’ll be looking at them today.

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

This pair was released in late 2002 as a Walmart-exclusive offering.  Officially, they’re part of the then running Star Wars Saga line which was launched for Attack of the Clones, but the packaging doesn’t bear any sort of notation of that.  This was very much its own standalone release, originally intended to be a Star Wars Fan Club offering, but ultimately re-purposed.

The first of the two figures here is 3PO, clad in a Santa Claus get-up, or at least the hat and jacket of one.  The figure stands 3 3/4 inches tall and has 5 joints, but it’s really hard to classify any of them but the neck as actual articulation.  The arms and legs both end up pretty restricted by the design of the jacket.  He’s a bit pre-posed, in the same way that any 3PO is pre-posed, though, with his arms held slightly aloft and bent.  The fake beard is permanently attached to his right hand, as though he’s about to put it on, I suppose, though how he’s going to get his arm up to his face is anyone’s guess.  The detailing on this figure is rather on the softer side, especially for the era of figures he was a part of.  It’s not like it’s bad, though, and it has a sort of artistic merit to it.  Plus, as a standalone piece, it’s not quite as imperative it matches the rest of the line.  Speaking of matching, let’s discuss the paint, and it’s whole not matching thing.  So, at this point in the line, 3PO figures were always vac metalized.  This figure follows that…for the head and legs.  Unfortunately, vac metalized plastic doesn’t hold large quantities of paint very well, so painting the jacket over it wouldn’t have gone very well.  Their solution was to paint the hands and what we can see of the chest a flat gold…and it’s pretty obvious.  I can’t really fault them, because their hands were tied.  Maybe if they’d done a cloth jacket instead?  It’s not the end of the world, though.

Pairing off with 3PO’s Santa impersonation, we also get R2 doing his best Rudolph.  The figure is 2 1/2 inches tall and has 3 points of articulation.  He’s built not from an R2-D2 figure, but from 2000’s R2-B1…for reasons, I guess.  The mold’s lack of the usual third leg was something of a shame, but not the end of the world.  The figure gets a new head-dome, which has been decorated with a rather hastily applied pair of antlers.  I dig that these are deliberately designed to look kinda tacky; it’s a nice touch, acknowledging the kitschy nature of the set.  R2’s paint is less compromised that 3PO’s.  Mostly, it just keeps to the standard R2 paint scheme of the time.

In addition to the figures, the set also included a little stand and backdrop which replicate the holiday card they’re based on, as well as a copy of the holiday card itself.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I never much got into these seasonal figures as a kid, and my parents didn’t shop much at Walmart, so I never really saw this pair.  It wasn’t only years later that I knew of their existence, and felt the need to pursue them (I’ve got holiday reviews to write, after all).  I ended up getting this set when one was traded into All Time earlier in the year.  I then had them sitting there unopened for about eight months, until I finally cracked them open for the purposes of this review.*  Are these figures great?  Nope, but they sure are a bunch of kitschy fun.

*Full disclosure: I wrote this review a year ago before replacing it at the last minute with Crackshot for last year’s Christmas review.  Hope you enjoyed it this time around.