Star Wars: The Black Series C-3PO

Franchise mainstay C-3PO does not make for the most exciting or impressive entry in the Black Series line, but is a necessary one. It was this view that kept him out of the Coffin collection for such a long time, only being welcomed a few weeks ago. The Walgreens exclusive version is the Original Trilogy 3PO, with the silver leg, not the general release from The Force Awakens, with the red arm.

Star Wars: The Black Series Padme Amidala

 

 

Taking a minute before we leave for our second day at Star Wars Celebration 2019 to take a look at one of the most recent Wave of Black Series figures, Padme Amidala as she appears in Episode II: Attack of the Clones. It has been stated at some point in the not too distant past that the line would take time in 2019 to focus on the Prequels, since this year marks twenty years since The Phantom Menace was released.  (I think we will talk about The Phantom Menace in the not too distant future here as well, just not right now. –mr)

Star Wars: Archive Pilot Luke Skywalker

 

The Archive series is a thing that has been hotly anticipated around here, offering reissued Black Series figures from earlier portions of the line that people such as I had missed the first time. Excellent. The first Wave is comprised of the three other Empire Strikes Back bounty hunters and pilot suit Luke Skywalker, all of which were missed the first time.

Star Wars: The Black Series Rebel Fleet Trooper

 If there was a let down about this figure, it would be the most obvious thing about it: this is an army builder background character, a guy that literally stands in the background of scenes unless he’s being directly murdered by Darth Vader. But, that one rogue point may not be a bad thing per say, but rather a new hopeful glimpse at the direction of the line in general.

Star Wars: The Black Series Dewback and Sandtrooper

The more and more of them that I collect, the more and more and more and more Black Series vehicles I want. And this size class and price point is terrific for them. Not enormous pieces like the First Order TIE Fighter, but larger than the Speeder Bike, this $60 plateau is turning out some excellent, excellent toys. Even things that seem generally bland like Luke’s Landspeeder end up being fun and engaging and worth the price.

Now that we’re done gushing, let’s talk about the Dewback, and its contribution to the line.

Star Wars: The Black Series Imperial Patrol Trooper (Solo: A Star Wars Story)

 Stand alone films Rogue One and Solo have, if absolutely nothing else, given us a few new Imperial units, such as the Deathtrooper, Shoretrooper, and this Patrol trooper, which is essentially the highway patrol officer of the Empire. Briefly (real briefly) seen pursuing young Han as he races the streets of Corellia, this is, like the other two mentioned newbies, an excellent addition to the Imperial ranks.

Star Wars: The Black Series L3-37

 2018’s Solo brought some new characters to the Star Wars universe, and tried to answer some not too frequently asked questions about existing ones, such as, how did the Millennium Falcon get the best navigation system in the galaxy? Look, no one was asking this; we all just took it as a given, because Han says it at some point in the Original Trilogy. But, the answer is here, in the form of L3-37, a feisty droid partner of the young Lando Calrissian who gets wrapped up with the Beckett Gang and their Kessel heist.

Star Wars: The Black Series Target Exclusive Ach-To Luke Skywalker (The Last Jedi)

 It sure feels like we’ve been paying a lot of attention to Star Wars figures the last few months: I have a pretty sizable backlog of Black Series figures to examine, and the list has been growing. It also feels like it’s getting close to time that we finally talk about The Last Jedi and Solo as movies, now that the climate of nuclear takes is in remission, aside from those die hards who are still infuriated by either or both. Those talks are coming, but for now, let’s get some exposure to another Black Series figure, the Target exclusive Episode VIII Luke Skywalker.

Star Wars: The Black Series Skiff Guard Lando (Return of the Jedi)

 Completing (for now) the Lando Trilogy (for now. . . ), skiff guard Lando presents the great character in his temporary Return of the Jedi Jabba’s palace guard appearance. There’s a tiny bit of cross over potential for this figure, as the removable helmet fits on Tobias Beckett from the Solo sequence of figures, so it could be possible to kitbash an in-disguise Beckett from his movie, but we’ll touch on that later on, whenever we get around to Tobias Beckett.

Star Wars: The Black Series Han Solo and Princess Leia Hoth boxed set

A second day of the 2019 Chicago Polar Vortex makes me think taking a look at this is a pretty good idea.

A European convention exclusive, this really gorgeous boxed set is one of those very rare occurrences where something in the Coffin collection stays in the package, without even intention of opening it, depicting Han and Leia in the halls of the Rebel base on Hoth. Both of these figures have been released already, and should be pretty readily available, but this box was simply too beautiful to pass up. And, your boy Moby almost did . . . .

Star Wars: The Black Series Zuckuss

 

Last of the three Disney Store exclusive Black Series figures, Zuckuss is the first actual new one, and the first one that adds actual value to your collection. Zuckuss is the last of the Empire Strikes Back bounty hunters, and with the first batch Archive series figures just about to be delivered, this means that you could finally complete your bounty hunter collection.

In order to talk about this figure, it’s important that we remember an idea that’s been floated around the Coffin for quite some time now, and that is that sometimes, figures are better as part of a team picture than they are individually, and that logic is 100% applicable to Zuckuss here. On his own, this figure is not really much to get worked up over. The head sculpt is nice and insectoid, and the figure comes with a unique blaster, which on its own is usually pretty cool. There is a lush mythology and cast in the Star Wars universe, and it’s easy to think of figure accessories as “just” parts for that figure; but in reality, or the reality of a fictional universe, they are artifacts of that fictional universe. Just like in our reality, not all accessories are the same, and the world has a vast array of weaponry and such in it, as sad as that is on a metaphysical level to say. But aside from the head and blaster, Zuckuss is not much to crow about.

Star Wars: The Black Series X-34 Landspeeder and Luke Skywalker

 

 Well, it’s January, so it’s the perfect time to be thinking about warmer, sunnier climes as well as still trying to march through all of the toys I got last year but never got around to examining. That is a long list, kiddies, and I arrived at the realization a few months ago that I could not and did not need to adhere to any particular chronology with my articles, which was a literal blog life saving realization. Anyhow, as predictions of a fair amount of snow come barreling towards Chicago, let’s look at the ’93 Chevy Cavalier of the Star Wars universe, the 6” scaled X-34 Landspeeder.

Oh, right. There’s a Luke Skywalker figure included in this as well.

Star Wars: Black Series Battle Damaged Captain Phasma (The Last Jedi)

 When Toys R Us closed, the status of multiple store exclusive figures was tossed into chaos. Almost all of them would be picked up by other venues, and some of them just ended up at online sources. Black Series Toys R Us exclusives were rescued by the Disney Store, and so were not missed. The second of three, this battle damaged Captain Phasma depicts neo-Boba Fett as she appears in her final scene in The Last Jedi, where she again is imperiled and for the time being presumed dead, because unless a filler comic miniseries is coming from Marvel to smooth over this one, it’s hard to see how she’s going to escape an exploding Star Destroyer and return for Episode IX.

But we all know that she will.

Star Wars: The Black Series Dengar

 One of the bounty hunters that stands around as Vader talks about not disintegrating the crew of the Millennium Falcon, Dengar is one of those figures that wound up in my collection somehow, and now, on the eve of the release of the first wave of Archive figures, containing Boba Fett, Bossk, and IG-88, ended up being totally necessary to have, as the Empire bounty hunter team is about to be complete. Or, is complete, if you’d been buying them since the beginning.

Star Wars: The Black Series Kylos Ren (The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi)

 Here’s an opportunity to get another multiple figures all handled in one article, so let’s take advantage. Let’s take a look at both of the Black Series Kylo Ren figures, one from The Force Awakens, and the other from The Last Jedi.

 By now, we all should know Kylo Ren; and unless we’re just being difficult, we should also all know that he’s a pretty good antagonist for the New Trilogy. He was a whiney emo kid in Episode VII, but in Episode VIII, he’d rounded out into a pretty developed character, and seems to be the actual tortured soul in the Star Wars universe that Anakin Skywalker was meant to be in his extra poor appearances in the heinous Prequel Trilogy. The former Ben Solo, like the other members of the new cast, has gotten a new 6” figure for each movie, and they are two very different figures.

Star Wars: The Black Series Imperial Stormtrooper with Blast Effects (Disney Store exclusive)

That’s an alright title, right? The figure is just called “Imperial Stormtrooper,” so my title should be ok, yeah? Sorry, it’s one of those kinds of mornings here at the Coffin, as the five day Thanksgiving Break enters its final day and we begin to steel ourselves for the last ten days of the Fall semester. Over the last few days I’ve been able to get some more stuff photographed, and thought I’d take advantage of the time between laundry to get something looked at quickly.

And believe me, this will not take long.

Star Wars: The Black Series Imperial Officers

One of the current existential crisis we’ve been going through here at the Coffin is whether or not we’d be able to produce articles on four different Star Wars figures that really only differ from each other in minor ways. The answer was always going to be “no,” but how to proceed was something that took some time to figure out. Ultimately, we decided to just talk about them all at once. So, here are The Black Series Director Orsen Krennic, Grand Moff Tarkin, Admiral Piett, and General Veers.

As a summary, each of these four Imperial Officers have the standard range of Black Series motion, and the standard allotment of joints. They are differentiated only by their heads and accessories. Each of them look as if they just stepped off of the screen, as their sculpts are real clear and accurate. There’s just not a whole lot to say about each of them individually.

Star Wars: The Black Series Obi-Wan Kenobi (Force Ghost)

 

Practically the total opposite of the Mimban Stormtrooper, Force Ghost Obi-Wan is an excellently rendered store exclusive. This time native to Walgreens, this figure takes the base Black Series Obi-Wan Kenobi and fancies him up into his Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi look, and the results are excellent.

Star Wars: The Black Series Mimban Stormtrooper (Solo: A Star Wars Story)

 Ha ha! The great Star Wars tradition of making figures of characters who got less than three seconds of screen time strikes again, this time in the form of the ever so briefly depicted Stormtroopers deployed to the muddy surface of Mimban in this springs’ spin off movie, Solo. Even my loving wife couldn’t play along and pretend that she noticed this guy in the movie: when I showed it to her, all she could ask was “who?”

Star Wars: The Black Series Imperial Range Trooper (Solo: A Star Wars Story)

 

 Making their debut in this years’ Solo: A Star Wars Story, the Imperial Range Trooper appeared in a bunch of promotional material for the movie and looked like the newly revealed unit would feature in the movie.

LOL.