Tag Archives: X-Men

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0041: Gambit

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

GAMBIT

MARVEL LEGENDS (TOY BIZ)

Okay, after a brief interruption in the Flashback Friday Figure Addendums last week, we are back, and we are jumping back onto that Toy Biz bandwagon!  This one strays a bit later than a lot of the Addendums, hitting up Toy Biz’s move to 1/12 scale figures with Marvel Legends.  Let’s look at Gambit!

So, Happy President’s Day, I guess. Um, I don’t really have that much in the way of presidential action figures, so I’m just gonna go ahead as if it’s any other day. But I thought I’d point it out anyway. Just to mess with you.

Looking back at my past reviews, I’m actually a bit shocked by how few reviews I’ve done of ToyBiz’s Marvel Legends. For a while back there they were, like, the only line I really collected, and I’ve done quite a few reviews of DC Direct figures, which I collected about the same time, so it seems odd I haven’t really looked at any of them. I think part of this might be that I have some bad memories of trying to track certain figures down, and part of it might be that the figures just haven’t aged all that well. Or, I’m going by a totally randomized list, and not as many of them have popped up. Who knows? (Well, me but that kinda ruins my intro).

So, in an effort to attempt to correct some slight oversight, I’ll be reviewing the Marvel Legends version of the X-Men’s own resident scum bag, Gambit! Gambit isn’t as big a deal as he once was, but he was pretty big in the 90s, and even into the early 2000s, hence his place in the line. So, let’s take a look at the figure!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Gambit was released as part of the 4th wave of ToyBiz’s Marvel Legends line. He stands about 6 inches tall, and he has 40 points of articulation. The figure depicts Gambit in him classic pink/blue/black leotard and brown trench coat look that everyone thought was oh so rad in the 90s. It’s a truly hideous design, but I can’t help but be so damned nostalgic about it, because being born in the 90s ruined me as a person. The sculpt was pretty good at the time, but now feels like one of the more outdated sculpts in the line, with huge hands, some pretty serious monkey arms, and an overall emaciated look to him. I think the head still holds up, with that perfect floppy Gambit hair, and the totally in character smirk. The coat isn’t the best tailored thing ever, but it isn’t too bad, and it does somewhat mask the odd proportions of the figure. The figure’s paint is pretty good, though it can be sloppy in some places, particularly the face, which I’ve seen have some variance from figure to figure. I do appreciate that this is one of the only Gambit figures to give him the appropriate black sleeves with those weird pink squares, instead of just leaving them pink. The figure had a really nice assortment of accessories that I wish I still had, including: his staff, an energy explosion with a set of cards to simulate his powers, and a base sculpted to look like a fallen Sentinel hand. These pieces were all pretty cool, and I think I still have the stand in a box with some others, but the other two pieces are long gone.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Believe it or not, Gambit was one of my favorite ToyBiz Legends. I’m not really sure why, as I’m not that big a fan of the character, and the figure isn’t that amazing, but I really liked him. I suppose coming early in the line, he got a lot more play time than some of the later figures, and he was one of the figures in the line who you didn’t have to devote all your free time to tracking down.

He hasn’t aged amazingly well, but he’s still held up better than some of the figures, which does give a leg up. And given Gambit’s rather quick decline in popularity, the character has yet to see any kind of rerelease in the more recent incarnations of the line, which I suppose makes this guy a bit more valuable. 

That is a very long intro, and it sure does take a while to get to the point, doesn’t it?  I was still getting the feel for how to jump into things, I think, and I was still doing a lot of call outs for even more minor holidays, which I just don’t do now.  At this point, I was still recovering from being burned by some bad experiences collecting Toy Biz Legends.  Another decade removed, I’m less that way, and generally feel a bit more nostalgic about the whole experience.  Also, I do kind of rag on Gambit for being not really relevant anymore, which is funny here in 2025, when he’s definitely come back around.

Generally, the review proper’s not bad.  I stand by a lot of what I said.  The sculpt has good aspects, but also some issues as well, much like most of the Toy Biz run of this period.  When I originally reviewed him, he was sans accessories.  Since then, I’ve tracked down the stand (which I knew I had when I reviewed him originally, but just didn’t go to the trouble of tracking down), as well as the charged card effect piece (which I was convinced there was no chance at me finding originally, but I was clearly wrong).  The display bases could be a bit of a mixed bag, but Gambit’s is undoubtedly one of the best from the line, and the best of the running subset of damaged Sentinel bases packed with X-Men characters.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0036: Wolverine – Prisoner & Kenuichio Harada

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

WOLVERINE — PRISONER & KENUICHIO HARADA

MARVEL MINIMATES (DIAMOND SELECT TOYS)

Last week’s Marvel Minimates Flashback Friday Figure Addendum went so well, I’ve decided to keep it going.  Honestly, I’ve got things mapped out far enough ahead that I would have kept it going anyway.  It’s my site, and all.  So, I’m going back to the very early days of the site, with a set that’s noteworthy for being the first set of Minimates I reviewed new for the site.  That’s pretty nifty!  Of course, it’s stuff from The Wolverine, so maybe let’s not let “nifty” take us too far.  Anyway, here’s Prisoner Wolverine & Kenuichio Harada!

The Wolverine was released this summer.  It was a sequel to X-Men 3, and it was one of those few times that a movie actually manages to make its predecessor better, not by making it look better by comparison, but by retroactively adding some emotion to a lackluster film.  The Wolverine was not a perfect movie, but it wasn’t bad either.

Like most of the recent Marvel movies, Diamond Select Toys did a selection of figures from their Minimates line in order to tie-in with the movie.  Like previous movies, this one was given a comic book store assortment, and a Toys R Us assortment.  I’ll be taking a look at one of the sets from the Toys R Us assortment today.

The characters featured are, of course, Wolverine himself, and somewhat antagonist, Kenuichio Harada.

THE FIGURES THEMSELVES

Like I said above, these guys were released as part of the Toys R Us tie-in series for The Wolverine.

WOLVERINE (PRISONER)

First up is the titular character.  Wolverine is depicted here in his “prisoner” look, which is what he’s wearing during the WWII era flash-backs in the film when he is a POW in Japan.  There’re some important scenes that feature him with this look, so it’s not surprising to see it pop up here.  It’s a bit odd to see it packed with Harada, but it’s not a huge deal.  The figure is once again built on the basic Minimate body, standing about 2 ½ inches tall and featuring 14 points of articulation.  He features sculpted hair and claws and a sculpted belt.  I’m not 100%, but I’m fairly certain that the claws are a reuse from a previous Wolverine.  The other pieces are new, although the hair piece was also used on two of the three other Wolverines in the wave.  Wolvie is mostly molded in the appropriate colors, but the paint still makes up most of the detailing.  It’s well done and fairly intricate.  The face on this version is fairly calm, which is okay, since Wolverine kept pretty calm during the captivity scenes.  The Hugh Jackman likeness is better than some of the one’s we’ve seen in the past, but not quite dead on.  Wolverine includes the sword he was presented by Yashida, a display stand, and three sets of hands:  one regular, one clawed, and one bone clawed.  The Adamantium claws aren’t scene accurate, but I appreciate that they give people the option to choose.

KENUICHIO HARADA

Next is Japanese Hawkeye  Kenuichio Harada, technically an antagonist, but an unwilling one, making him more of an anti-villain.  He’s shown here in his ninja gear from the film, which is what he spends most of his screen time in, so it makes sense.  Like Wolverine, he’s built on the basic Minimate body, meaning he stands about 2 ½ inches tall and has the standard 14 points of articulation, although his hair restricts the neck joint a bit.  Harada has a sculpted jacket and hair, as well as wrist pieces to simulate the ends of his gloves.  The hair and jacket are new pieces, although the jacket is shared with the Black Clan ninjas also in this wave.  The hair seems a bit off for the character, whose hair was far less bulky in the film.  It looks right in the control art on the box, but something seems to have been lost in translation.  Paint wise, he’s really only got the detailing on his face, which is passable.  The likeness isn’t as good as Wolverine’s, but it isn’t too bad.  Harada is rounded out with his trusty bow, two arrows, an alternate masked head, and a clear display stand.  The Bow and arrows appear to be reused from one of the Haweyes from last year, and the head is identical to the head on the Black Clan ninja.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Oh boy.  Hold on tight guys, it’s another tru.com story.  Yeah, so I’m always uncertain as to whether my local TRU will get their exclusive wave, so I tend to order online.  I’ve mentioned before that tru.com has a tendency not to put up pictures or label their sets correctly, making online ordering difficult.  But it’s okay, as long as you have the proper sku code, which allows you to go directly to the corret product page.  And that’s how I ordered this set and the other exclusive set from this wave.  Unfortunately, I seem to be smarter than tru’s online store, as they still sent me Wolverine and Shingen in place of this set.  And that’s not cool because Shingen kinda sucks.  Anyway, I ended up having to drive to my local TRU and exchange it.  Which is what I was trying to avoid.

Oh well, I have them now.  Which is good, because Harada was my favorite character in the film and I’d be bummed to have missed out on him.

Well, I was somewhat complimentary of The Wolverine.  It was still new and fresh in my mind, and Days of Future Past hadn’t come out to reset my expectations of the X-Men movies, so I was rather positive.  I don’t know I’d be as positive now, but admittedly, I haven’t watched the movie since 2013, so it’s hard to truly gauge.  My review’s honestly pretty much spot-on beyond that.  I got the Minimates reviews down pretty quickly, as you can see.  I had personally forgotten a lot of my TRU.com-centered diatribe.  Seven years without them has let me forget how frustrating dealing with them could be.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0031: Magneto

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

MAGNETO

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

Okay, you guys, I’m doing it for real this time!  I’m *actually* wrapping up Toy Biz X-Men Series 1….more or less.  I’m focussing on the more, though, because I think that sounds better for me personally.  So, for today’s Flashback Friday Figure Addendum, let’s return back to Magneto!

“The evil mutant master of magnetism, Magneto is the arch-enemy of the X-Men. With his magnetic power, Magneto’s magnetic force can pull even the heaviest objects to him, throw them miles away, or cause them to shatter with sudden explosiveness. Magneto plans to enslave mankind and mercilessly rule Earth with the other evil mutants. But first he must destroy the X-Men, the super hero mutants who are mankind’s defenders.”

Magneto’s first action figure came from Mattel’s Secret Wars line. Though sold as a villain, the story was an early adopter of the heroic turn for the character. By the time of his second figure, he’d run the whole gamut of villain to hero and back again. It’s a little odd to see the character referred to simply as an evil mutant, but that’s where he landed when the team came into all of their notoriety, I suppose.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Magneto was released in Series 1 of Toy Biz’s X-Men line, as one of three villains presented therein. Magneto had gone through a few different costumes by this point, but returned to his classic design just in time for this figure’s release. The figure stands 5 inches tall and he has 9 points of articulation. Magneto’s sculpt was an all-new offering, and it remained unique to this figure all throughout Toy Biz’s tenure with the license. Magneto sports perhaps the finest sculpt in the whole first series. His proportions are notably less goofy and his posture far less stilted than other figures from this assortment. He’s not painfully scrawny like Cyclops was, and he can actually manage some decent poses, unlike Storm. His helmet was removable, and while that made it more than a little bit oversized, and just a touch goofy looking, it does mean we were treated to the fully detailed un-helmeted head beneath it, which does a very nice job of capturing Magneto’s usual stern but well-meaning expression. Despite the big emphasis on the whole “evil” bit in the bio, that’s not quite what was presented by the figure here, and he ends up very true to the character in that regard. Though later figures in the line would go the sculpted cape route, this one got a cloth piece, keeping with the vaguely Super Powers-esque aesthetic that these early Toy Biz offerings had. Like the bulkier helmet, it’s a bit dated looking and slightly goofy, but it’s not bad for what it is. Magneto’s paintwork is pretty straight forward stuff. The red parts are all molded plastic, and everything else is painted. Application is mostly pretty clean; there’s some slight slop on the boots and gloves, but it’s very minor. In addition to the removable helmet and cape, this guy came with three pieces of “metal debris,” which, via magnets in his torso and hands, could be attached to the figure, thus simulating his powers.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I have two of this guy, and it’s all my dad’s fault. Well, not directly, I suppose. When I was just getting into collecting, my dad and I were doing a lot of tandem buying, where we’d both get something. On one of our trips, he got this figure, and I really liked it, but I never ended up finding another at retail. A few years later, I found this guy (along with Nightcrawler) at a flea market, sans helmet and cape. Despite the missing pieces, that was certainly good enough for me, at least at the time. In recent years, I become slightly more picky about such things, so I ended up tracking down a second one, via my friends at Yesterday’s Fun, and this one had the missing pieces. This remains my favorite Magneto figure, and I’m happy to have a more complete release.

Man, I did cover my bases on “more complete” at the end there.  Good for me.  Well, now he’s *actually* complete.  And then some!  I managed to find those missing “debris” parts for my figure, and, along the way, I also managed to snag the paint variant that I neglected to mention the last time.  For his initial and all subsequent releases, Magneto got the all purple collar, as seen in my original review, but for only the initial run, there was also a variant with a red box in the middle, unpainted.  It gives him an extra bit of flair, but I imagine it was a lot more difficult to keep consistent, hence just filling it in for later runs.  Not crazy different, but nifty.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0030: Archangel

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

ARCHANGEL

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

Hey, did you guys realize there were still some figures from Toy Biz’s first series of X-Men I hadn’t addendummed?  Because there are.  So, here I go, fixing that.  Ooooooooooooooh yeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaah!  …*ahem*… Sorry about that.  Anyway, here’s Archangel.

“Archangel is the high-flying X-Man with a knock-out secret weapon– wingtip darts filled with paralyzing fluid! Archangel can fire these darts with uncanny accuracy from any height and speed. With his amazing metal wings, Archangel is able to fly faster than the speed of sound and silently attack like a striking eagle. This ability strikes terror in the hearts of evil mutants, for their first warning of Archangel’s attack is usually the impact of one of his darts!”

In the late ’80s/early ’90s, there was a trend in comics, of taking characters with formerly passive powers and either creating a new character with those powers plus an offensive component, or even just reforging the original into something more “kick-ass.”  Founding X-Men member Warren Worthington III, originally known as Angel, found himself on the receiving end of one of these make-overs, become the war-ready Archangel.  It was a lasting look, and one that was at the forefront when it came time for Warren’s first action figure.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Archangel was released in Series 1 of Toy Biz’s X-Men line.  His presence is somewhat interesting, as he’s the only X-Man in the line-up who wasn’t from the “All-New, All-Different” lineup.  Archangel was still wearing his hideous “Death” togs he got from Apocalypse at the time of this figure, so that’s what he’s wearing here.  Boy, was this costume ugly.  I mean, I love it, but it’s ugly.  The figure stands 4 3/4 inches tall and he has 9 points of articulation (his wings can also move, but it’s tied into his action feature, and they don’t really hold poses or anything).  His sculpt was unique to him.  It’s not terrible, but I do think he’s a fair bit more dated than some of the others in the set.  His head’s kind of large, and his facial expression is sort of goony. I think it’s the eyes; they seem too close together.  The body is rather stiffly posed, and his proportions are definitely a little off.  The arms are probably the worst part; they just look so scrawny when compared to the rest of him.  The wings are okay, though they suffer a bit from the comics’ lack of consistency on the exact shaping of them.  They’re also slightly marred by the “missile launching feature” at the tops.  I use the quotes because there’s no actual spring-loaded feature or anything; you just pushed them out with your thumb.  Kind of disappointing.  The torso is also impacted a bit by the wings.  Toy Biz wasn’t sure how to attach them, so they went for this this big honking block on his back.  Elegant it is not.  Archangel’s paintwork is decent enough; it’s a little brighter than a lot of interpretations of this costume tend to be, but it’s not like it was going to get *less* ugly.  There were two versions of this guy’s colorscheme; the original release had white wings, while the re-release offered both white and grey wings.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Archangel was one of my earlier additions to my collection.  Though the Invasion series had hit right when I started collecting (and given me my first three X-Men figures in the process), the Archangel variant included there wasn’t quite as plentiful, so I ended up getting this guy’s re-release instead.  He’s not aged particularly well, and I definitely prefer other Archangel’s, but he still has a quaint sort of a charm to him.

This review hit in the midst of a run of these reviews I ran in 2018, as I was doing a dive into the first series of the line, following finally getting a complete set of them.  At the time, I didn’t have his two thumb missiles, but I have managed to square up a pair of them to go with mine since.  They’re kind of unimpressive, but at least they’re there?  Wooooooooo.

 

#3858: Banshee

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

BANSHEE

MARVEL LEGENDS (HASBRO)

Last week, I took a detour from my ’90s Marvel reviews for something that was still *kind of* a ’90s Marvel review.  This week, all I can truly promise is the Marvel.  In fact, it’s kind of meant to *replace* a more ’90s-centric piece already in my collection.  That doesn’t seem right, does it?  Well, look, there are layers, okay?  Today we’re talking about Banshee, a surprisingly early addition to the X-Men mythos, first appearing in 1967 during Roy Thomas and Werner Roth’s run on the original team.  He was a reluctant antagonist, and would eventually join the team proper when the “All-New, All-Different” line-up debuted in Giant-Size X-Men #1.  Since he and Sunfire were both “returning characters,” they didn’t get to be on the fancy Gil Kane-drawn cover to the issue with the rest of the team, which means they more frequently get left out of figure coverage related to the issue.  Fittingly, Hasbro started their “modern” recreation of the team in Legends form back in 2017 with Sunfire, and are finally closing it out (more or less) eight years later with Banshee.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Banshee is part of the Classic Comic Collection series of Marvel Legends, which just started hitting in the last month or so.  It’s certainly an interesting line-up of characters, and by that I mean they seem to have just sort of drawn names out of a hat.  Banshee is one of two X-Men in the line-up, the other being Dakken, whom I don’t know that he’s ever met.  This is Banshee’s third time in Legends form, all three having been under Hasbro.  He’s based on his classic green and yellow garb, which is the same as his first Legends figure, from Hasbro’s first series of Legends after they got the license in 2007 (which, incidentally, like this figure, was in a hodgepodge assortment that happened to include an Ultimate Iron Man figure).  That one was *not* good, so this one’s been a long-time coming.  The figure stands about 6 1/4 inches tall and he has 34 points of articulation.  As we’ve all been kind of expecting since we got Strike Team Banshee back in 2023, this figure makes liberal use of parts from that one, sharing both heads, the modified upper torso, and the attachments for the glider wings with the earlier figure.  I still love both heads (sculpted by Paul Harding), and the calm one in particular feels more at home on this costume, what with the clearly ’70s muttonchops and all.  It’s still a little odd that he doesn’t have consistent hair between the two heads, but it is what it is.  On the flip side, I’m still not super into the very obvious pegs that attach the glider wings to him.  Sure, they’re secure, but they’re awful to look at.  This guy swaps out the Jim Lee-specific costume elements for the standard Vulcan pieces, making for a slightly cleaner sculpt.  In terms of color work, he changes things up, obviously, to match the new palette.  I’m always partial to the green and yellow, so I do generally like it.  That said, the tops of the boots and gloves being painted rather than molded is a bit jarring.  Otherwise, though, it all looks decent.  Banshee is packed with five different hands: a pair of fists, an open right hand, and two gripping hands.  These hands are unique, as near as I can tell, in that they have stitching on them to indicate gloves.  It’s a small detail, but I actually really like it.  Banshee is also packed with a small replica of Giant-Size X-Men #1, as is the gimmick of this assortment for…reasons?  I don’t know.  It’s nifty enough, even if it’s not *quite* scaled right.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Back in 2006, I was *thrilled* by the announcement of Banshee being in Hasbro’s first series of Marvel Legends.  In 2007, I was *not thrilled* by Hasbro’s actual Banshee figure.  I just never much cared for it.  I’ve been waiting for a better one since.  As we made our way through the updated GSXM line-up, I kept hoping the next one would be him, making it especially comedic when we got the Strike Force version first (especially since *exactly* the same thing happened in Minimates).  I made do with that one, but this was the one I was really waiting for.  He’s simple, and it’s not like he’s really doing anything new, but it’s very, very nice to have the GSXM line-up finished, and also, since Banshee was around for a bit, also have all of the subsequent line-up changes before he left the team in ’79.  That’s my favorite era of the book, and it’s really my X-Men, so this is really awesome.

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.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0029: Bishop

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

BISHOP

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

Who better for a jump back in time than one of the X-Men’s resident time travellers, Lucas Bishop, a guy who only goes by his last name, because it’s cooler that way, so it’s just Bishop!

“Accidentally wrenched back through several decades by the time-twisting evil mutant named Fitzroy, Bishop arrived in our era from one of Earth’s many possible futures. Bishop survived the battle that followed, thanks to his mutant ability to absorb the energy attacks of others and turn that power back against his foes. Stranded in our time, Bishop has added his might to that of the present-day X-Men by joining their Gold Team!”

The X-Men really just became a haven for displaced time-travelers, didn’t they?  Also guys with vague, unrelated “cool” names that were just common place words, and whose abilities translated to “has a gun”.  All of these things nicely describe Bishop, an uber ’90s character, who could only be more ’90s if he wore a leather jacket and had shoulder pads.  I suppose he got off easy in that regard.  Bishop was prominent enough in the ’90s to feature on X-Men: The Animated Series, and by extension find his way into Toy Biz’s line of X-Men figures from the same period, getting what would be his very first action figure.  I’ll be taking a look at that figure today!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Bishop was initially released as part of Series 4 of the X-Men line, and would see subsequent re-release in the Marvel Universe line and as part of a multi-pack with Wolverine and Gambit.  All three releases of the figure are functionally identical, but it’s worth noting that mine is a Series 4 release.  Bishop is sporting his primary look from the ’90s, which was the only one he had at the time of the figure’s release.  The figure stands 5 inches tall and he has 9 points of articulation.  Though he’s rocking a waist swivel, he loses movement in his neck, presumably due to his hair.  Curiously, though, the Deluxe 10-inch figure and 2 1/2-inch Steel Mutants figure that are both patterned on the same sculpt both had a neck joint, so why it was missing from this guy is anyone’s guess.  Beyond that, the sculpt is fairly typical for the time.  He’s super bulky, but that’s just Bishop.  I will say that they were starting to run into the limits of this slightly simpler style of elbow joint they used, since it’s a little small for such a large arm.  It works overall, though.  The detailing on the hair is pretty nice, and definitely does his very dated hair cut proud.  Bishop’s paintwork is fairly basic, and a little bit messy on my figure.  There’s a lot of fuzzy edges, and the yellow sections are definitely prone to some serious bleedover.  In 1996, Bishop was also re-issued as part of the “Flashback” assortment, which was all repaints.  For that release, his blue was swapped for grey and black, and his yellow for gold, and his skintone was made somewhat lighter.  There was a second, predominantly red deco also shown, but it never hit shelves.  Whatever the case, the paint is a little cleaner on that release, but of course the trade off is that he’s not in his classic colors any more.  Whichever release you get, Bishop included two large blaster rifles in black, and features a “Quick-Draw Weapon Release” action feature.  Press the button on his back and his right arm swings upward.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I didn’t have Bishop as a kid, largely because his episodes of the cartoon were some of my least favorite, so I never formed much of an enjoyment of the character.  That said, I really dig the ’90s X-Men line and I’m slowly working through building a complete collection, which meant getting this guy at some point, right?  I found both versions of Bishop at a toy show a while back, allowing me to close off that corner of the X-Mythos in one fell swoop, I suppose.  He’s not really one of the better Toy Biz X-Men, but then he’s far from the worst.  He fills in the roster pretty nicely.

Bishop stands as a single Toy Biz review in a month that was otherwise without them.  I’d be hard-pressed to tell you *why* I reviewed him at that time, since I wasn’t doing any notable run of Toy Biz reviews at the time.  He wasn’t even new at the time, having been picked up two summers prior.  And, I feel the need to confess that I did *not* complete the collection in one fell swoop as I stated.  I had actually gotten the regular a little bit earlier, during a birthday excursion in 2017, while the variant was indeed from a toy show the following year.  In my original review, I noted that he had two guns, but I only showed one of them.  I unearthed the second one, so I’ve added it to the main photo, so he’s all proper and complete.

#3854: Cyclops

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

CYCLOPS

X-MEN ’97 (MONDO)

Are you guys ready for a super crazy radical shift in how reviews go around here? …Well, I hope not, because that’s not really happening. I mean, sure, in contrast to the last several weeks of ’90s Toy Biz reviews, I’m instead doing something totally different. Okay, not totally different. It’s still Marvel. And while it’s not actually *from* the ’90s, it’s certainly ’90s inspired. Mondo, who I haven’t actually discussed here, is a company that didn’t *start* with toys, but they’ve moved into them, and they’re offerings have a lot of ’90s coverage, which undoubtedly has some overlap with my interests. They started doing 1/6 scale figures based on X-Men: The Animated Series a few years ago, and are slowly working their way through not just the main cast, but also a number of supporting players. And last year, in the midst of all that awesome X-Men ’97 hype, they did a Cyclops, which I’m looking at today!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Cyclops is figure 1 in the X-Men ’97 line from Mondo. It’s an interesting choice, since they haven’t yet finished up the main run of their Animated line and, well, he’s also very clearly an original series Cyclops. Sure, the box uses the ’97 logo, and the main image is the ’97, but all of the storyboard images are from the original show, and he’s clearly based on the original design sheet. He’s clearly a figure intended for the first line refitted for a quick tie-in with the newer show. Not that I’m complaining either way.  There were two releases of the figure: the standard, and a deluxe version that was a timed exclusive available directly through Mondo’s store.  The core figure remains the same for both versions. The figure stands just over 12 inches tall and he has 31 points of articulation.  Unlike a lot of 1/6 figures, the Mondo animated figures are fully sculpted, with an articulation scheme not unlike a Marvel Legend.  The range of motion is okay in some spots, but rather restricted in some others.  The hips and shoulders in particular are rather stiff, but you can work with them if you’re patient.  The sculpt, handled by Alex Brewer, is a unique offering, and it’s a pretty solid match for the animation design.  It’s clean, and the head in particular really looks the part.  I especially like how sharply defined the hair and its flippy ’90s goodness.  The only thing I’m not crazy about is how the shoulder harness hovers.  It’s a frequent issue with this design, and it’s one of the quirks of maintaining an okay range of motion on the torso.  Cyclops’ paint work (laid out by Tomasz Rozejowski) goes for the cel-shading angle.  It’s always a tricky prospect, but I think they actually did a respectable job of making it work, even in three dimensions.  As it stands, it gives the sculpt an impressive extra bit of pop.  The standard release of Cyclops includes an alternate head with a screaming expression, two alternate visors (one for optic blasts, and the other with a flare effect attached), two different optic blast attachments, 9 different hands (in fists, open gesture, pointing, two fingers extended, and a right gripping hand), and a cup of coffee.  It’s a solid, basic assortment of parts.  The deluxe version also added an extra optic blast, a head without the head gear, a pair of sunglasses, an alternate Sentinel-style head, and a jacket and extra arms and hands for his bomber jacket look.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Back when this figure was shown off, I totally wanted…specifically the deluxe version.  He had all the extras I wanted, and I was all game to jump on and get him when he dropped.  And then…well, a stomach bug tore its way through my household, and I totally missed the drop dealing with that, so I didn’t get the exclusive.  I was bummed, and thought about getting the standard, but I lost my initiative, and it just didn’t happen.  That is, until this guy got traded into All Time, giving me the opportunity to see him in person.  Even without the extras, he felt worth it.  I’d still love to get the deluxe one, if I could, but for now, this guy’s still pretty awesome.

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.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0028: Gambit

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

GAMBIT

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

Hey-ho, we are back with the Flashback Friday Figure Addendums here at the FiQ, and I’m sticking with that whole “Toy Biz Marvel” thing, because it sure does bring me comfort.  Or something like that.  Moving past cleaning up my reviews of the first series for a moment, I’m jumping later into the line, with Gambit!

“Gambit has the mutant ability to take the energy of any object and put it to his own use. That use usually means turning the object into a deadly weapon. Gambit is a martial arts expert with a lightning-fast karate kick. When battling multiple attackers, Gambit relies on his Techno Battle Staff for additional assault power.”

As someone whose primary introduction to the X-Men came from their ’90s cartoon, I have an almost unhealthy appreciation for their resident Cajun sleazeball, one Remy LaBeau, aka Gambit.  I am, of course, not at all alone in this, which has helped to keep him relatively high on the action figure count.  Today, I’m jumping back to the beginning, and taking a look at his very first figure (more or less).

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Gambit was initially released in the second series of Toy Biz’s X-Men line.  Following the success of the cartoon, he was subsequently re-released in the “Classics” assortment a few years later.  The figure reviewed here is technically the later release, though the only actual difference between the two is the accessory selection.  This figure stands 5 inches tall and he has 9 points of articulation.  Gambit’s sculpt is fairly typical of an early Toy Biz figure, meaning he’s a little more rudimentary than later offerings would be.  He’s slightly scrawny, and the details are a little softer.  This is definitely a kinder, friendlier looking Gambit than you usually see.  It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s definitely different than other Gambits.  His trench coat seems to have thrown Toy Biz for a bit of a loop, as well.  Rather than sculpting it onto him, they opted for a removable piece…mostly, anyway.  The bulk of the jacket is just a thin plastic get-up, not unlike the capes from the old Kenner Star Wars figures.  It’s not terribly sturdy, and isn’t really the sort of thing we ever saw again from them.  It looks alright, but certainly limits his playability when in place.  What’s slightly odd is the decision to make the collar of this jacket a sculpted element, which is part of the figure’s torso.  This means it’s always there, even when the coat is off of the figure.  Why not just leave the collar as part of the coat?  Who knows.  Well, someone at Toy Biz probably knew, I guess.  Gambit’s paintwork is alright.  It’s pretty basic, and gets the general gist of the character down.  There’s a lot of pink, which is really the most important thing when you get right down to it.  It does get a handful of details wrong, though, such as keeping the sleeves of the shirt pink (rather than matching with the pants as they did in the comics), and the pink squares on the sides of his legs are a different pattern than usually seen.  The original release of Gambit included his staff, while the re-release included the bandolier and knives (presumably meant to stand in for his playing cards) from Longshot.  Gambit has an action feature, a kicking action, which is an interesting choice for the character.  It’s also not implemented incredibly well, because it’s default state is actually with the leg extended, meaning the latch is in a constant state of strain when he’s in a basic standing pose.  The end result is a figure that you will commonly find with his leg forever stuck at a 90 degree angle.  Fortunately, this isn’t the case with my figure, but I’ve seen my fair share of figures that weren’t so lucky.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I don’t recall exactly where I got Gambit, but I know I was with my parents, and it was very early into my collecting because it was before we moved into the house that they’ve been in since I was four.  So, somewhere in late ’95?  Anyway, despite how harsh I may have been on this figure in the actual review segment, it’s worth noting that this remains my very favorite Gambit figure to date, and just one of my favorite X-Men figures in general.

That review hails from right at the end of 2018, as I fell into my return to the vintage reviews a bit.  A few things to clarify here.  As I note in the original review, there are two releases of Gambit, and my original was the second release, with Longshot’s bandolier and knives.  My original photo actually didn’t have Longshot’s knife, but rather a proper playing card, which came from the later X-Men vs Street Fighter Gambit.  I must have grabbed the wrong piece during my original bulk photo session and just never fixed it.  For the purposes of this revisit, I did manage to track down a proper original release Gambit, so now I’ve got the staff as well, and a slightly less messed up coat.  Slightly.  That coat’s still not built to go the distance.  In my original review, I said I didn’t recall where/when I got Gambit.  I seem to have had a lapse in memory there, because I definitely remember getting it from a mall trip with my dad on a day off with him when we were living in our old house.  I got him and Tony Stark, and my Dad got Corsair, I believe.  I remember sneaking down during what was supposed to be my nap time to play with them.

#3850: X-Man

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

X-MAN

MARVEL’S MOST WANTED (TOY BIZ)

“Nate Grey is a stranger in a strange world. He’s a survivor of the Age of Apocalypse – a world like ours, but one where the evil mutant Apocalypse ruled supreme. Now, after that world’s ruin, Nate finds himself on our Earth, struggling to save it from a similar destiny. Genetically engineered to be the most powerful psi-talent ever, Nate’s discovered that the psychic strain may be too much for his body to handle. Nate has also found that he bears a striking resemblance to the future warrior known as X-Man Cable…”

By-and-large, the sweeping changes made by the “Age of Apocalypse” crossover were swept back to other way when the even ended, reverting the main cast of characters back to their mainstream counterparts without much fuss.  But, what of the characters who didn’t have a counterpart?  Well, a small handful of them actually got to stick around, at least for a little bit.  Nate Grey, aka X-Man, was *technically* the equal number to Cable, but with a different backstory and direct lineage, as well as a quite different ultimate outcome in terms of character, he got kept around for a bit past the event’s wrap-up.  That wound up being extra fortunate, because it *also* gave him extra time to get some toy coverage!

THE FIGURE ITSELF

X-Man is the third and final figure in Toy Biz’s 1998 Marvel’s Most Wanted line.  Its an odd line-up for the name it was given.  At the time, Nate was the closest you’d get to a “heavy hitter” since he was headlining his own book (Blink would later headline Exiles, elevating her personal status a bit, at the same time that Nate was on the downswing; Spat pretty much never got time in the spotlight).  In his solo book, Nate was constantly changing out his attire, generally keeping just a general feel of look, so to go with something more directly marketable, this figure goes back to his original AoA look, which, to be fair, he also sported for a bit in the main 616.  The figure stands just over 5 inches tall and he has 14 points of articulation.  He was honestly pretty solid on the movement front, but contains an interesting design oddity.  His shoulder joints consist of a mix of swivel and ball-joint assembly, with the ball joint pegging into a swivel joint on the main torso.  Said swivel is ultimately redundant, since the ball joint can turn just fine on its own.  Why is it like that?  I don’t know.  The sculpt here is one of the more stylized of the Toy Biz run, though that was kind of true in general for this particular set.  He’s a bit pre-posed, with an odd sort of twist to the body, and he ultimately looks quite a bit elongated, especially the head.  It does end up feeling pretty true to the character, though, so I can’t really knock it.  X-Man’s paint work is generally basic; the suit consists of molded blue and painted yellow.  Application’s all pretty clean, so no issues there.  He’s packed with a rather involved display stand, presumably meant to replicate his psychic powers.  It was one Toy Biz liked a lot; it wound up re-used for Astral Doctor Strange and the Marvel Legends Human Torch.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

X-Man is the only one of this set I had as a kid.  I was at Toys “R” Us with my dad, and it was either him or Red Skull.  I only *sort of* knew him from a team-up I’d read with Spider-Man, but I’ve always been more a heroes guy than a villains guy, so X-Man it was.  In retrospect, choosing him over the Nazi does feel like the obvious choice, right?  X-Man actually got a bit of service as some non-X-Man characters, serving as the Rick Jones to my Avengers for a while, and also as a stand-in for Kid Action/Action Boy alongside my Toy Biz M. Bison, who was my go-to for Captain Action.  Look, sometimes my figure options didn’t always match up with the stories my mind needed to tell, okay? Ultimately, he’s still my favorite of the three figures, though it’s certainly nice to have him alongside the other two after all of these years.

Flashback Friday Figure Addendum #0027: Apocalypse

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

APOCALYPSE

X-MEN (TOY BIZ)

After a brief stop over to the world of Star Wars, this week the Flashback Friday Figure Addendums head back over to Marvel territory. Yes, the end is nigh!  …well, okay, not quite, but I *am* looking at Apocalypse.

“Apocalypse is the evil mutant who has used his sinister genius and mutant ability to turn himself into a merciless one man army! Apocalypse is incredibly strong, able to change his size at will, and has created for himself a weapon system designed to destroy the X-Men. Apocalypse is the most frightening evil mutant on Earth when he turns himself into a giant, puts on this deadly arsenal and attacks!”

Following Magneto’s turn to the side of good in the ’80s, the X-Men spent quite a bit of time in search of a new over-arching big bad. They found a number of potential offerings, none of whom quite hit that same spot, but perhaps the most successful of them was En Sabah Nur, aka Apocalypse. He was a consistent foe in the back half of the ’80s, up into the ’90s, so his place early into Toy Biz’s run was certainly sensible.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Apocalypse was one of the three villains released alongside our heroes in Series 1 of Toy Biz’s X-Men line. He served as a rather sensible counterpart to the same series’ Archangel figure. The figure stands 5 1/2 inches tall and he had 11 points of articulation (though two of those points can be somewhat debated, since they’re tied into his “action-feature”). Apocalypse’s sculpt, like many others in this assortment, is definitely showing its age. What’s interesting is that it’s due to slightly different factors than some of the others. It’s not that he doesn’t quite live up to his comics appearance the way Archangel or Storm or Cyclops do, it’s actually that he’s too faithful to an Apocalypse design that itself has fallen out of fashion. He depicts Apocalypse as he is seen in his earlier X-Factor appearances, when he was still rather lean, and still rather square and stiff. It’s a very different take on the character, and his beefier revamp design from just a few years later would end up being the prevailing design and informing how the character was depicted for the three decades since his creation. As such, this guy definitely looks out of place amongst the others, but paired with the Cyclops and Archangel from this assortment, he starts to fit in a bit better. Ultimately, the actual sculpt is one of the more competent ones from this first set. I think I’d place him in the number three slot, after Nightcrawler and Magneto. His proportions are certainly believable for this incarnation of the character, and his construction is quite sturdy. Apocalypse’s paintwork is fairly standard stuff. It’s rather limited, and the application is messy in some spots, especially the belt. Apocalypse included a staff, which is supposed to have a “gem” at the top of it. Mine’s gone missing, so my Apocalypse just looks like he’s holding a broken ball-point pen. He also has an “Extending Body” feature, where his torso and legs extend outward, in sort of a stretching sort of fashion. It’s rather goofy, and not really worth much extra, but it’s not like it impedes the figure overall.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I’m not 100% sure how I got Apocalypse. He was an earlier addition to the collection, I know that much, most likely gotten during my parents early efforts to expand my collection. I was watching the cartoon by that point, so I knew the character. Regardless of how I got the figure, he’s stuck with me for quite some time, despite my not being super into Apocalypse. As I noted in the review, he’s a somewhat dated figure, based on an outdated design, but he’s actually one of the stronger figures in the first assortment, and he depicts a version of the character we don’t often see.

This review is from 2018, so…well, okay, I guess it’s not *super* recent, but in my mind I consider it recent.  It’s got all the trappings of a modern review.  And, you know what, I was actually pretty kind to this figure, given it’s Apocalypse and he’s not usually one of my favorites.  It helps that this is just a figure that I find really fun, even now.  When I reviewed him, my Apocalypse was missing the “Jewel” from his staff, which I have now found.  Yay!  It’s just a solid blue spike-y thing, not particularly jewel-y, and I don’t think it really disarms the “ballpoint pen” vibe the staff already had, but at least it’s complete.  Of course, he’s still missing the cables that go from the torso to the arms, but that’s a whole other thing.