So, we all knew this was going to happen. It was foretold.
This Black Series two pack, which I think is a Target
exclusive, or at least, Target is the only place I’ve ever seen it, contains a
Poe Dameron in civilian clothes and a First Order Trooper with some riot gear.
I’ve been seeing this for like two months now, each time walking past it and
muttering. “Why does there have to be another trooper in a pack that would
force me to buy a non-Imperial figure? That would break my one Black Series rule.
Why do I want that stupid trooper anyway? It’s just New Hat Syndrome, AGAIN.”
Poe comes with a blaster and a helmet; the trooper comes
with two blasters, a riot shield and club. 
Poe is pretty nice, honestly. I think the biggest thing that
the Resistance figures have going against them at this point is that no one knows
who they are, so there’s not too much of an impetus to buy them. Now. I keep
saying, wait three more weeks until the movie comes out; then try to find Rey
or Finn or any of them in stores. Troopers never go out of style, and even
though the First Order ones are different from both previous iterations, being
the Clones and the OT Stormtrooper, they are still obviously Imperial Stormtroopers,
so they sell. Anyhow, back to Poe: my wife, upon purchasing this set, said “Now
we have a knock off Han Solo,” and visually, that’s not untrue. Poe is wearing
the deep V-neck and vest combo made famous by the galaxy’s most famous
smuggler, only in brown instead of white and blue. I don’t own any Hans other
than the Trooper Han, but Poe could honestly be a new head on the original
Black Series Han body for all I know. Regardless, Poe looks good but, due to
not having any knowledge of the character yet, he’s kind of just a guy with a
helmet and gun at this point. 
The Riot Trooper was the half of the set that I wanted and
always lamented ‘having’ to get. Come on, it’s just a First Order trooper with
some extra accessories. And while that is mostly what this figure is, the shield
is apparently not designed to come off the arm, despite having a bit of
movement in it for posing. That makes this purchase a relief, honestly, because
even though I got this for a reduced price, $40 is too much to pay for a riot
shield. I got it on sale for about $30, so it was a bit better initially; then,
finding out that this was indeed a separate trooper made things better, because
now at least I got an individual trooper for less than the price of the
individual First Order Trooper figure.
This is the third time I’ve gotten a First Order Trooper
now, and I have a real complaint about their legs. They just don’t stand very
well, and they always look bow legged. The thigh armor on them is what I think
is to blame, as the First Order guys have armor that comes up higher on the
hip; whereas, with the OT Stormtroopers and the Clones, the thigh armor covers the
front part of the legs. As a result, Clones and OT Troops have a hard time
moving their legs forward. But the First Order troops have a hard time keeping
their legs straight, since they don’t have the armor in the front the keep the
legs from moving back and forth. Their thigh joints are also looser than the other
figures, but all three of my First Order guys have suffered from this, so it’s
got to be something with the design.
 |
| Clone, OT and FO trooper hips |
Ultimately this is not a big deal, you
just have to fuss with the figures a bit to get them to stand, and they don’t
do that rigid at attention pose easily. The figure tends to rock backwards when
you stand him, and that is because, also unlike Clones or OT Troopers, his feet
aren’t flat. You can see this even in pictures, and for the first time, it may
actually be a plus that my photo set up is the clear plastic lid of my
turntable, because you can see the reflection of the bottoms of the First Order’s
feet in the pictures. This, along with the looseness of the legs and the hip
armor, makes for a figure that has some difficulty in just standing.
This version does all the stuff the other ones do: he’s got
the slot in the leg for a blaster to attach, the helmet redesign is well
realized and looks sharp. The arms don’t bend as much as most other Black
Series do, and that is a letdown in terms of the shield arm, as it means he can’t
hold the shield in front of himself or closer to his body. He essentially
sticks his left arm straight out in front of him, and is thus defended. The shield
moves around on the arm a bit, but does not come off, or at very least is not
intended to come off easily. It’s not molded to the arm, but there don’t appear
to be any easy ways of separating it, as it is held on by plastic rings that
are molded directly to the inside of the shield. This adds to the
different-ness of the figure, because it actually is a Trooper that you can’t
get elsewise. It may be a First Order guy with a couple new accessories, but
the accessories are largely integral to the figure. The riot club slings under his forearm. This would
have been a good opportunity to deck this armor out in some different paint or
something, but the armor and the shield are plain black and white. I was kind
of surprised to see that the shield didn’t even have a logo or insignia on the
front; seems like a missed opportunity to me. Some red on the armor, and this
could have been the First Order Shocktrooper, or hell, any color and it could have
been called basically anything, since The
Force Awakens is an open world of narrative possibility at this point. And
that was all they did with the million Clone repaints from the Revenge of the Sith line: “This guy is
red. Why is this guy red?” “Because he’s a Shocktrooper, duh.” Trust me, I own
most of those million Clone repaints, so I would know.
The final verdict here is that the set consists of a figure
for a character we know nothing about, and a pretty typical new version/powered
up release, a refit as opposed to a repaint, which for any Star Wars line of
toys is hardly a new concept. How many Obi-Wans are there that have either a
lightsaber –or—a lightsaber handle –or—both, and are thus different figures?
Still would have loved some extra paint or detail on the Trooper, but. I feel
like I’m writing this a whole lot lately, but this is a good pick up at a
discounted price, or if you haven’t been able to obtain a First Order Trooper
yet by other means, or if you’ve got an affinity for Poe Dameron or pilots or
Han Solo impersonators. I was in it for the Trooper, so I’m pretty satisfied,
and once more, at the $30 I paid, I feel good about the purchase.
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