Tag Archives: Toy Biz

Flashback Figure Addendum #0023: Rogue

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

ROGUE

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

Gonna go back to the Addedums even when it’s not a Friday!  Why, because, for right now at least, the Figure Addendums are a sub-feature of my Marvel Monday’s, that’s why!  Today, though, it’s first Addendum for this item, rather than being the second, and sending us all into some sort of crazy world.  Let’s jump back to 2017 for a follow-up look at Rogue!

Another non-newest series of X-Men Marvel Legends X-Men figure? Does this mean Ethan’s still looking for that freaking Cyclops figure? No, actually. Ethan found that freaking Cyclops figure yesterday afternoon. He was very excited about that freaking Cyclops figure. But, he also needs some time to properly appreciate those figures before jumping into the reviews. Still, X-Men on the brain and all that, so let’s take a look at the back catalogue again. We’re going even further back this time, and pulling out one of the old Toy Biz 5-inch figures. Let’s look at Rogue!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Rogue was released in Series 6 of Toy Biz’s X-Men line, and was by far the most popular figure in the series. She was actually quite rare for some time, but was eventually re-released as part of the KB Toys-exclusive Marvel Universe line. The two figures are more or less identical. I think mine may actually be the re-release, since the timelines line up best that way. The figure stands 5 inches tall and has 7 points of articulation. The articulation count is a bit lower than other figures TB was producing at the time, mostly due to the upper cut action feature on her left arm, which removes the neck movement (to allow for the lever that activates the feature) and the left elbow movement. It also limits the left shoulder a bit. Not really sure why they opted to go for such an intrusive feature. Rogue sported an all-new sculpt (which would later be re-used for Polaris). It’s fairly standard for the time. Nothing super amazing, but it’s a decent enough recreation of her Jim Lee look. Her proportions are a bit weird; her hairs is really small, and her legs seem to make up a larger portion of her body than they should. She’s also a bit on the boxy side. But, like I said, fairly standard for the time, so I can’t judge it too harshly. Missing from my figure is her add-on belt, which replicated her wacky asymmetrical thing from the comics. Yay for asymmetry! Rogue’s paint work is decent enough. Everything is applied pretty cleanly and all of the important details are there. I will say I’ve always found this figure’s color palette to be a bit washed out and dull. I guess the cartoon and future figures just have made me expect this costume to be a bit warmer. Rogue included no accessories, not even the weird ‘90s blaster thing that Toy Biz seemed to give to all of the other figures who they couldn’t think of anything better to give to. Alas, I suppose she’ll just have to steal one from one of the other figures.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Rogue was one of the last “main X-Men” I got when I was growing up. Most of the others had seen one or two re-releases, so getting them wasn’t too prohibitive. I actually ended up getting the 10-inch version of her first. Ultimately, I’m pretty sure I ended up with the Universe re-release when it hit. I think she was a Christmas present from my parents if I’m not mistaken, likely from our first Christmas in the house I spent most of my childhood in. She may not be the best Rogue figure I own, or even the first Rogue figure I owned, but I was really happy to get her when she was new.

This review is from the period of time when I was actively hunting for the Warlock Series of Marvel Legends in the spring of 2017.  I had just found the Jim Lee Cyclops, who was the last figure I needed in the set, so I was very excited, and very definitely in an X-Men review.  This was also while I was living several states away from most of my collection, so Rogue here was actually reviewed remotely.  I don’t really do that sort of thing anymore.  Since this review, I did manage to find a belt for her, finally completing her whole look.  It’s a minor touch, but it adds a lot.  In the process, I also got a whole variant to this figure!  There are actually four *different* versions of the original Rogue figure, all concerning the color of her eyes, how many lashes she has, and whether or not she has eyeshadow.  My original is the light green eyes with four lashes and no eyeshadow version, but the one that I bought to get the replacement belt is the dark green eyes with four lashes as eyeshadow version.  I don’t know if I’ll be going to the trouble of getting the two three-lash versions, so I’m counting this as complete for now!

#3828: Ka-Zar & Zabu

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

KA-ZAR & ZABU

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

“The X-Men find themselves mysteriously transported to the Savage Land a prehistoric tropical jungle in the middle of the Arctic circle!  With the help of their friend and leader of the Savage Land, Ka-Zar, the X-Men weave their way through this treacherous land.  Aided by dinosaurs and other prehistoric beasts, Storm, Wolverine, Angel and Joseph have their hands full throughout their dangerous journey.

Native and leader of the Savage Land, Ka-Zar rules his prehistoric kingdom with his faithful sidekick, Zabu. An expert fighter, hunter and tracker, nothing dares to threaten Ka-Zar. Zabu, the saber-tooth tiger, is ready to protect his master with his two massive razor-sharp teeth and huge paws. Ka-Zar and Zabu rule the Savage Land side-by-side keeping all its prehistoric beasts in order and safe from outside attacks.”

So, remember waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back at the beginning of the site when I reviewed Savage Land Angel?  And then, like, at the middle point between then and now, when I did an addendum about Savage Land Angel?  And then this morning when I did a *second* addendum about Savage Land Angel?  Great.  Well, what you may not know about Savage Land Angel from the three times I’ve focussed on him here on the site is that he was part of a larger set of Savage Land-themed figures, of which there are four more.  Guess what my Monday Marvel theme is gonna be this month!  That’s right, the rest of those guys.  Alright!  So, let’s look at the Savage-Land-iest of the bunch, Ka-Zar and Zabu!

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Ka-Zar and Zabu make up the second of the five sets in the “Savage Land” Series of Toy Biz’s X-Men line.  These were a larger boxed series from 1997, which paired off with the thematically opposite “Space Riders” Series from the same year.  While the Riders each got a large space vehicle, each figure in the “Savage Land” set was packed with a larger beast of some sort.  In the case of Ka-Zar, his was by far the most sensible, as he paired off with his “brother” the sabretooth tiger Zabu.  This would mark the first time either character saw action figure treatment, but not the last, as Hasbro’s now tackled them twice as Legends.

Ka-Zar is the more conventional figure in the set.  He’s based on that usual off-brand Tarzan look, which makes sense.  The figure stands a little over 5 inches tall and he has 9 points of articulation.  He’s built on a variation of the Archangel II mold, a favorite of Toy Biz’s during the 5-inch era.  That being said, he actually gets a fair bit of new and reworked parts.  The head is outright new, and it’s certainly dynamic.  That hair’s just jutting straight out to the side there, isn’t it?  He’s also got quite an intense, almost crazed look in his eyes.  Wow.  I don’t know that I’d be super comforted by this guy being my ally in a place called the Savage Land, but I’m also not an X-Man.  His torso is modified, removing the wing-flapping apparatus that most uses of the mold sported, which is actually really nice.  He also gets modified lower arms and legs.  Now his hands are actually gripping, and he’s got bare feet, as well as some anklets, you know, for properly accessorizing.  He also gets an add-on piece for his loin cloth, which you can remove if you want, but why would you?  Why would you do that?  Ka-Zar’s paint work’s actually pretty fun.  He’s got those crazy eyes, of course, but also some tribal markings, to keep him a little more interesting.  Ka-Zar is packed with a shield, a spear, and an axe.  The shield has storage for both weapons, which is very fun indeed.

Zabu is, in essence, a glorified accessory, I suppose.  He’s bigger than Ka-Zar, of course, but only sort of articulated, since most of his movement is tied into his action feature.  His sculpt’s certainly very stylized, but in such a way that he feels pretty much right at home with the general Toy Biz Marvel vibe.  There’s a lot of neat detailing going on, and I do like the fur texturing.  His paint’s basic, and the shades of orange on the differing plastics don’t match up perfectly, but it’s not terrible.  He’s got a “pounce” feature, where his back legs are sort of spring loaded, so sitting him down leads to him “pouncing” back up.  It’s rudimentary, and basic, and stupid, and I absolutely love it to no end.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Toy Biz Marvel is my one true love when it comes to Marvel toys.  Heck, toys in general, really.  I could leave everything else behind, but Toy Biz Marvel would be difficult.  So, I’m trying to more properly appreciate my Toy Biz Marvel collection, and that means putting them up in a more proper display.  While going through things that were not on display, I came across my Legends Ka-Zar and Zabu, and asked myself that ever important question “am I ever going to display these?”  The answer was no, and I realized that, as nice as they were, if I wasn’t going to display them, then why was I keeping them.  The simplest answer was that I didn’t own this set yet.  So, I fixed that with a sensibly priced eBay purchase, and here we are.  These are not as technically impressive as the Legends, but I love them ever so much more, so I’m glad I finally tracked them down.

Flashback Figure Addendum #0022: Savage Land Angel

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

SAVAGE LAND ANGEL

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

Oh man, are we bringing back the Addendums?  Yeah we are!  With the twist that it’s not Friday.  And why’s that? Because I’m doing a thematic thing here.  But, perhaps the craziest part of this Addendum is the fact that I’ve run an Addendum for this review before.  Crazy, right?  Super crazy.  So, let’s jump, for a third time, into the crazy world of 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.

And, in my last addendum did I have to say?

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.

Okay, so not so bad.  Addressed the review issues and changes.  Brought up what was missing the first time around, and also what I found during The Find.  Man, The Find was a hell of a thing.  I’ve had no major finds like that since, but I’ve resorted to actually buying replacement parts as I find them, which has led to the second addendum, which I even brought up in the first addendum!  So, now I’ve got the vest and the miniature Sauron figure.  The vest is super basic, but there it is.  Sauron is definitely much more gimicky than his single release.  He’s got a wing-flapping action, so there’s that.  He’s kind of not built for standing on his own, or anything, so he’s gotta be propped up on something.  And now, here’s the whole complete thing.  No additional Addendums needed!

#3823: Doctor Doom

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

DOCTOR DOOM

MARVEL FAMOUS COVERS (TOY BIZ)

“Victor Von Doom was a brilliant, if arrogant scientist, studying alongside Reed Richards. But when he was caught in a horrible accident, Doom was driven over the edge. Covering himself in armor, he became Doctor Doom! Ruler of his homeland of Latveria, Doom will not be satisfied until he has taken over the entire planet. Using the vast resources at his command and the incredible technologies he has created, Doom faces off against his old nemesis, Reed Richards, now the leader of the Fantastic Four.”

In the ’90s, Toy Biz’s main scale for Marvel was of course their highly expansive 5-inch line, but they tried out a number of other sizes in tandem to sort of see what stuck.  The 10-inch line certainly had the most longevity of the secondaries, but they also had a pretty solid go at their own sort of Mego follow-up, Famous Covers.  Famous Covers was sort of an odd line sort of at cross purposes, but it’s nothing if not an interesting experiment.  We got a weird, quirky cross-section of the Marvel universe, and that did *not* include a full Fantastic Four, but it *did* at least include a Doctor Doom.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Doctor Doom was released as part of the “First Appearances” Series of Famous Covers, which was the line’s second assortment.  Though branded as “first appearance” and showing the cover to his original appearance on the cover, Doom is not actually his first appearance design, but rather his later, more classic design, which makes sense.  The figure is about 8 1/2 inches tall and he has 23 points of articulation…in theory.  In practice, he’s got, like, two, because the rubber armor pieces they’ve put on him restricted almost all of his articulation to the point of not really being worth it.  For whatever reason, Toy Biz opted to handle his armor in the same way they did the boots and gloves, so they’re just these thick rubber pieces, that mostly just flop around.  They’re also really clunky, especially when compared to the size of the figure’s head.  The head’s at least a very nice sculpt, even if it’s very small.  Since he’s got a full mask, he lacks the overly intense expression most of the other figures in the line had, which isn’t such a bad thing.  In addition to the rubber armor pieces, Doom gets a cloth tunic and cape; the tunic’s fine enough, and the bulk of the cape works out alright, apart from the hood being quite difficult to get the lay in any fashion that’s not just really silly looking.  The paint on this guy is decent enough.  The head’s particularly good, as expected, but the armor on the body at least gets some panel lining.  Famous Covers figures were always a bit light on accessories, and given the number of sculpted parts, it’s not much of a surprise that Doom was sans-accessories for this release.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I remember getting Doom when I was a kid.  There was a Toy Liquidators outlet near us, which my Nana had taken me, I wanna say for my birthday?  This guy was there, but still a little pricier, so I didn’t get him at that time.  I instead went back with my dad later that same day, and he bought it for me, I believe as an incentive for finishing the summer reading program.  He’s not the most playable figure, and he’s quite goofy looking, but I also kinda love him?

#3818: Iron Man – First Appearance

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

IRON MAN — FIRST APPEARANCE

MARVEL LEGENDS (TOY BIZ)

And here we are, back at the Toy Biz Marvel Legends.  Sure, they’re not as numerous as the 5-inch line (especially not when it comes to my collection in particular), but there still are a lot of them, and they still make up a decent little chunk of my Marvel collection.  As Toy Biz went deeper into their run with the line (which was, admittedly, just a drop in the bucket compared to what Hasbro’s been doing), they revisited some of the main characters.  Despite not yet getting his major boost from his live action movie, Iron Man was nevertheless a consistent character in the line, appearing in six out of its fifteen series.  Towards the tail end of their run, we got him in his original get-up, which I’m taking a look at today!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Iron Man was released in the Mojo Series of Marvel Legends, the 14th standard assortment release, and penultimate series from Toy Biz.  He and his cohorts were a sort of under the wire release, hitting just before the holiday season, a month or so before Toy Biz handed the reins over the Hasbro.  The figure stands almost 7 inches tall and he has 39 points of articulation.  Boy, is that a lot of articulation.  It’s partly so high because they gave him individually articulated fingers, which don’t do a ton, but also manage to not look as terrible here as on other figures from the line.  He does notably lack the line’s usual mid-torso movement and toe joints, but neither of those was likely to work to well with the design.  As it is, he’s got a lot of joints that give him an okay amount of movement, but not as much as other figures, due to his bulky nature.  His sculpt was totally unique, and remained so, only being shared with his variant.  It’s honestly a pretty good one.  The articulation sticks out a bit in some spots, but not as badly as some of the other TB Legends.  He also manages to look quite a bit like the proper first appearance design, and to my eye looks more on the mark than Hasbro’s more recent offering, especially around the shaping of the eyes on the mask.  His faceplate is removable, revealing Tony Stark’s face beneath.  It was a feature share with most of Toy Biz’s Legends Iron Men, and one that works better, I think, on those than it really does here.  Still, it’s not a bad sculpt, and this one feels like it was the closest Toy Biz got to just giving us Timothy Dalton as Tony.  There were two different color schemes in play for this release.  The standard was silver, depicting his proper first appearance armor, while the variant was gold, as it was starting with his second appearance.  The paint’s pretty much the same for either, just swapping the palette out.  There’s some slight accenting on the main armor, which works okay, but they’re also a little prone to scuffing.  And, if you want to get technical, the variant *should* get a different waist piece, but that clearly wasn’t in TB’s budget at the time.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I stuck with Toy Biz’s Legends to the very end, though I did get spotty on some of the releases.  That said, this one I didn’t skip.  At least the standard, who was a Christmas gift from my parents on the year of his release.  He’s one of the handful of Toy Biz’s run that I think honestly held up pretty well, hence my rather critical view of the Hasbro version.  I managed to snag the variant in the last year or so, for a pretty good deal, just before Hasbro updated that one, too.  They have some spots that show their age, but I generally really like them.

#3814: Cyclops – Civilian

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

CYCLOPS — CIVILIAN

X-MEN: THE MOVIE (TOY BIZ)

“Scott Summers, the X-Man code-named Cyclops, has the mutant ability to shoot incredibly powerful optic blasts from his eyes. These beams can destroy virtually anything and can only be contained by a substance known as Ruby Quartz. Cyclops wears a visor made of this substance to control his blasts while fighting in combat which aid in his control and accuracy of the destructive beams. The field leader of the clandestine team of outlaw mutant super heroes wears his visor and black uniform in battle to keep his secret hidden from the general public.”

This year is the 25th anniversary of the first X-Men movie, which also means its the 25th anniversary of the tie-in toyline!  One of the notable things about said toyline was its jump in scale.  Technically, Blade had also done it, but it was a rather small line, and only *sort of* messed with the scale change.  X-Men fully embraced the move to 6-inch, with a complete run of all the movie’s primary players…and then some.  In the wake of the film and initial merchandise’s success, we got a rather hastily thrown together follow-up to the main push, with a bunch of more minor costume variants for the characters.  Our boy Scott Summers was in on that push, getting his second movie based figure, which I’m looking at today!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Cyclops (Civilian) is part of the third series of Toy Biz’s X-Men: The Movie tie-in line, which, fun fact, is most commonly referred to as the *second* series because 1 and 2 were released simultaneously to promote the movie and feature no actual distinguishing on the back of the packaging.  So, functionally, it’s the second series, but, in my mind, I know it’s the third.  The first Cyclops was based on his main team suited look, but this one is instead based on his more casual attire while he’s searching for Rogue and Logan at the train station.  Why’s he still wearing the visor if he’s trying to blend in?  I don’t know, but it makes for a cooler look, so we’re going with it.  The figure stands right about 6 inches tall and he has 10 points of articulation.  He maintains that closer to the 5-inch style of articulation, which would remain until the Spider-Man lines revamped things in the next two years.  As it stands, he’s still quite posable.  Since they’d moved up the scale, Toy Biz was able to repurpose some parts from their WCW line; Cyclops is using the body from Eric Bischoff, with a new head and jacket piece.  It’s a basic guy with a jacket and jeans, so it’s fine; the most awkward part of the whole thing is that his black undershirt is just the torso’s exposed skin at the neck painted black, but it’s honestly not that noticeable.  The new jacket makes it the more sensible canvas jacket Scott’s got in the movie, and the new head makes its…well, Scott.  It’s clearly based on the same basic sculpt as the standard Cyclops head, but it’s been scaled up a touch, made most evident by the fact that his visor is *just* a bit wider, so it floats on the head of the prior figure.  The hat is a separate, but non-removable piece, which is actually a pretty nice sculpt.  There’s a spot at the top of it that allows for a light piping feature, so he can light up his eyes without any fancy electronics.  His paint work is okay; basic, but not in a bad sense.  It does what it needs to.  Cyclops, like all of the figures from his assortment, included a small set of dog tags…for reasons?  I don’t know why, and they’re not at all to scale, but there they are.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I got the first Cyclops right away, and I broke his visor a bit shy of right away, so he was without it.  I remember this guy’s announcement in ToyFare, and I remember eagerly awaiting his arrival.  I also remember him being rather tricky to find at first, but I did, on one of my many trips to the local mall’s KB Toys with my Grandmother.  I was non-plussed about the visor not being interchangeable, but I made do, and I ran this one into the ground just like the original.  A replacement was a little easier to find, though, than the standard, so I got a second one about six or seven years ago.  He’s nifty.  Non-essential, but he throws me back to a time where we had fewer super hero movies, and you could get a few non-essential variants of he main characters.  I dig him a lot.

#3809: Daredevil

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

DAREDEVIL

SPIDER-MAN: CLASSICS (TOY BIZ)

Last week, Daredevil: Born Again, the long-awaited continuation of Netflix’s Daredevil show, dropped its first two episodes, and I’m officially in that Daredevil vibe again, so let’s talk a little bit of Daredevil.  Thanks to the show’s success, we’ve gotten a few instances of ol’ Horn-Head horn-headlining his own set of Marvel Legends, but it wasn’t always that way; he used to pretty much only get by on Spider-Man’s coattails.  Today, I’m jumping back even earlier than last week’s Toy Biz Marvel Legends review, to their pre-cursor line, Spider-Man: Classics, which granted us our first 6-inch Daredevil!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Daredevil was released in Series 2 of Spider-Man: Classics.  There were two versions, a standard red, and a variant yellow.  I looked at the yellow one *way* back in 2014, during my first year here on the site, so here’s the standard.  Daredevil actually wasn’t in the original line-up for the series, with Scarlet Spider in his place for the initial announcement.  It seems like maybe they realized that three out of the four figures being a Spider-Man might not quite work, so DD got the nod to fill out the assortment, and Scarlet Spider was moved to a KB Toys exclusive.  The figure stands just over 6 inches tall and he has 30 points of articulation (which was proudly boasted on the package).  He’s the exact same sculpt as the variant, so he’s using Black Spidey as the staring point, with a new head, hands, feet, and holster.  It’s a sculpt that certainly shows its age, and is hampered a bit by the lack of bicep swivels (which were standardized with the First Appearance Spidey in this same assortment), but there’s a neat stylistic element to it.  I’ve always particularly enjoyed the head sculpt.  This figure’s color work isn’t as involved as his variant, since he’s all-red, rather than the mix of the yellow suit.  It’s not bad, though the boots and gloves not getting any difference in shading reduces their ability to stand out.  The belt, symbol, and eyes do, at least, and there’s airbrushing on the body that really helps to break up all the flat red.  The figure is packed with his billy club, a wall-mountable display stand that looks like a stained glass window, and a copy of Daredevil #241.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I was so invested in getting this guy’s variant back in the day that I wound up missing out on the standard entirely during its run at retail.  By the time I wanted to go back, he’d dried up and we were onto newer releases.  I eventually did find the variant, and I love that one, but I still didn’t have this guy, and that felt off.  I finally got one via a trade-in at work last year.  He’s not quite as unique as the yellow version, and there’s a lot more options for this costume design, but I do still really dig him for what he is.

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.

#3804: Captain America – Ultimate

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

CAPTAIN AMERICA — ULTIMATE

MARVEL LEGENDS (TOY BIZ)

“In 1940, as America prepared for war, young and frail Steve Rogers volunteered for an experiment that transformed him into the ultimate physical specimen: Captain America. Enhanced by the Super-Soldier Serum, Captain America’s agility, strength, endurance and reaction time were superior to those of an Olympic-level athlete. Cap also mastered a number of fighting forms, including American-style boxing and judo. These abilities, combined with his indestructible shield, made him one of the finest human combatants Earth had ever known. Steve Rogers battled the Nazis until a mishap placed him in suspended animation deep within the Himalayan Mountains. Decades later he was discovered by Tony Stark and S.H.I.E.L.D. and became a cornerstone of the Ultimates.”

It’s a new month, but I’m still keeping that Toy Biz Marvel train rolling, albeit in a slightly different fashion.  Last month it was all 5-inch figures, but this month, I’m taking it up a notch…and I mean that literally, because the figures are actually gonna be taller, because we’re jumping ahead into the Marvel Legends era for a bit.  Yeah, it’s classic Marvel Legends!  And, I’m still sort of staying in a comfort zone, with a look at one of the line’s Captain Americas…well, two of them, I guess.  And, sure, it’s Ultimate Cap, but I’ll take what I can get.  At least he always makes for a pretty decent toy.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Ultimate Captain America was released in Series 8 of Toy Biz’s Marvel Legends, which was the last series before the introduction of Build-A-Figures, which also led to Toy Biz abandoning the actual numbering for the line.  He was one of the three figures in the line-up to get a variant, which I’ll touch on later in the review.  The figure stands just shy of 6 1/2 inches tall and he has 46 points of articulation.  His articulation’s pretty typical of this era of Toy Biz’s run.  It’s not bad, but it’s definitely a little over complicated relative to the range of motion he gets.  It’s also prone to getting a bit loose over time, especially on the hips.  The sculpt was all-new, and it was…well, it was certainly something.  The articulation definitely took the precedent on this one, so the flow of the sculpt is a little bit odd and disjointed.  His proportions are sort of odd, with the head being a bit small, and the hands and feet being a bit large.  He’s also got a little bit of a hunch.  That said, the work on outfit, especially the texturing, is really good, and conveys the modernized take on his design well.  The variant figure gets a unique head sculpt, which adds the classic head wings.  It’s also just totally different from the standard, with a slightly friendlier expression, which makes more sense for the 616 version of the character.  He’s more modernized to match the body sculpt, so there’s extra stitching, as well as straps on the sides.  It’s an interesting approach, but perhaps not the most truly classic version.  It serves more as a prototype for the more proper classic Cap they built out of this mold the following year.  The paint work on the figure is pretty decent.  There’s a lot of accenting to bring out the sculpted elements, and it works pretty well.  The standard version gets additional grey detailing, as is proper to the Ultimate design, while the standard is straight blue.  However, early versions of the two figures had the details reversed, giving Ultimate Cap the full blue look, and Classic Cap the grey, meaning there are actually a total of four different versions of this figure.  Regardless of the version, Cap is packed with his shield (the same one used with the Series 1 figure), a display stand, and a poster booklet (in place of the usual comic book).  The poster book, interestingly, is actually more classic Cap images than Ultimate, but I’m hardly complaining.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I’m really not a fan of Ultimate Captain America as a character, so I wasn’t much for this one at the time of his release.  I also had the Series 1 version, and he was pretty much perfect to me.  That said, I’ve gotten more comfortable with having a lot of Captain America figures these days, so I ended up snagging the standard release sealed a couple of years ago, and then the variant loose just last year.  And now I have them both.  They’re kind of a mixed bag, but an intriguing part of the Cap Legends genealogy.

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

#3800: Whirlwind

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

WHIRLWIND

IRON MAN (TOY BIZ)

“A mutant born with the power to spin at superhuman velocities, Whirlwind delights in using his special talents to terrorize others-first as the neighborhood bully, and now as a powerful costumed Super Villain! Volatile and brutal, Whirlwind doesn’t really care what target the evil Mandarin sends him to destroy-he’ll obliterate it in an instant with maniacal glee!”

We’re back with the Iron Man reviews today, specifically of the Toy Biz variety because that’s what I like to do. I’m keeping things rolling with the antagonists, I suppose. Today’s entry is Whirlwind! It’s worth noting that despite the show’s insistence on sticking purely to Iron Man villains, not filling in with more interesting villains, Whirlwind’s actually not really an Iron Man villain at all, and is instead an Ant-Man and Wasp villain, but I guess Iron Man just sort of takes what he wants. It does seem kind of cruel to steal from Ant-Man, but, you know, that’s just Tony. He’s a bit cruel. This was Whirlwind’s very first action figure, which was pretty cool for him, so let’s take a look at it!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Whirlwind was released in the second series of Toy Biz’s Iron Man toy line. He’s based on his animated incarnation, which was in turn based on his classic costume, more specifically his second costume design after he added the chain mail and also added a shirt. Thank you for that, Whirlwind. The figure stands about 5 inches tall and he has 9 points of articulation. The articulation on this one is kind of interesting because it’s a sort of a mix of unique and kind of basic. He loses the knee joints, which had become fairly standard of this point, but has disc and peg shoulders. The shoulders are rather loose in order to facilitate his action feature. He also has a waist swivel, but again it’s restricted to facilitate his action feature and isn’t really much for posing. His sculpt is pretty much on par with what we expected from the line. He is a little on the bulky side, but also not bad for Whirlwind. The chainmail detailing is actually pretty good. The hands and feet seemed rather large, and conversely the helmet feels a little small, like it might be difficult to fit an actual head underneath. The face plate is also definitely giving like more ironron Man vibes than Whirlwind usually did, but it’s not bad. Whirlwind’s paintwork is pretty decent, and pretty basic. It’s really just the silver applications. His hands are a little bit more prone to chipping, which is a little bit of a bummer, but not the end of the world. Whirlwind is packed with two removable wrist sawblades, which are super easy to lose, but also super cool. as well as an ID card like the other non-armored characters in the series. Whirlwind has a spinning feature; turning his waist a number of times and then pressing the button on his back to release it will cause his upper half to spin. It works okay, but it does cause some issues with posability.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I actually got Whirlwind back close to the original run. I’ve brought up Ageless Heroes a few times on the site. It was a comic store, not too far from where I grew up, that went out of business in ’99/’000. They had a lot of Toy Biz Marvel figures and had they put them on pretty deep discount. So, I picked up a lot of them at the time. This one in particular was sort of consolation prize. The Avengers: United They Stand figures have just been released and were very hard to find at first. After a failed trip trying to find them, my dad took me to Ageless Heroes where I picked out this guy. He’s not perfect, but he’s pretty cool and I do really like him. And, it’s not like there’s a plethora of Whirlwind figures out there.

#3795: Blizzard

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

BLIZZARD

IRON MAN (TOY BIZ)

“A once-brilliant scientist driven insane when he tested his portable cold generator on himself, the man now known as the Blizzard has become the twisted enemy of all that is decent. Possessing the ability to create untold amounts of ice and snow with a single thought, the Blizzard always has a chilly reception ready for those who would oppose him-particularly his arch-enemy, Iron Man!”

Okay, let’s jump back into the Iron Man villain well, I suppose!  Last week was Whiplash Blacklash, who’s always been sort of forgettable.  Today it’s Blizzard, who’s not as forgettable in general, but is minorly forgettable in the sense that most people don’t know there’s actually two of them.  The full face mask and generally similar designs don’t really help matters there.  Nor does the fact the cartoon the Iron Man line was based on identified Blizzard as one guy, while the toy identified him as another.  Hooray for confusion!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Blizzard was released in Series 2 of Toy Biz’s Iron Man line, as one of the three “antagonist” figures.  He’s an adaptation of Blizzard’s animated design, which was a pretty good, solid “classic” Blizzard design.  The figure stands about 5 inches tall and he has 10 points of articulation.  His movement is pretty decent for the era, though it’s not revolutionary or anything.  The sculpt was new at the time (though it saw re-use later down the line for Dormammu of all characters), and it’s generally okay, apart from one odd quirk.  The general build and layout of the costume elements certainly works, but, for some reason, he kinda looks like he has two left feet?  Guess he’s not much of a dancer.  His paint work is limited to a bunch of white on blue plastic.  It honestly works pretty well, though, so it’s pretty striking.  Blizzard is packed with an ice glove attachment for his right hand, an ice cane, and an identification card.  Generally, it’s a nice selection of extras.  He also gets an action feature; much like a number of the earlier Wolverine figures, he has a little thumb-hold on his back, so you can move him at the waist, which will swing his arms up and down.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I’ve always liked Blizzard pretty well, and I especially liked him in the cartoon.  I didn’t get this one new, but I got him *relatively* close to new.  I found him loose at a toy show, in the early ’00s.  He didn’t have any of his accessories, but he worked for my purposes at the time.  I just got the chance to complete him a few weeks ago, when a complete one came in through work.  Aside from the slightly odd foot sculpt, he’s a really nice, pretty basic figure.