Marvel Legends: Thanos

 

Man, Byron was right: April really is the cruelest month. What with Star Wars Celebration, numerous birthdays, the start of the NHL Playoffs, the winding down of the Spring semester, and this year, Avengers: Endgame to end not only the month, but the current cycle of the MCU. In honor of that last piece, let’s take a look at Marvel Legends Thanos, in his comic book, and thus best, appearance.

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.

Marvel Legends: Thor

In preparation for the Marvel Comics event “War of the Realms,” let’s have a look at Legends Thor, as she appears in Jason Aaron’s spectacular Thor run dating from 2014 until just last year. Spoilers ahead, for those who don’t know who this Thors’ secret identity is, so proceed with caution.

FansProject Intimidator: Down Force

Apparently, Down Force is the second member of the Intimidator group to be released, not Last Chance, to correct a previous mistake. No matter; regardless of release order, Down Force is the FansProject stand-in for Dragstrip, the loveable psychotic six-wheeled race car member of the Stunticons.

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)

Ju-Jiang Jet Commander JJ-02B: Jet Harrier

Jet Harrier, or “Harrier,” as he will be known hereafter, is the second member of the “Third Party”/upsized KO Combiner Wars Aerialbot team, known as Slingshot or “Quickslinger” in Hasbro parlance, and the first of the limb figures of the set. Roughly Masterpiece size, Harrier is the same height as MP Sideswipe.

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.

Unique Toys Ordin: O-01 Troll

 Back in October, I had decided that my TFCon 2018 hunt list would include members of the Unique Toys Abominus team, named Ordin. Mere days before the convention, I found and won an eBay auction for the entire set. So, that was pretty easy. Let’s take a look at the first figure in the set, Troll, a Third Party version of Terrorcon Blot.

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.

Perfect Effect: Beast Gorira

 

This figure represents a couple of Coffin firsts. It is the first figure from Perfect Effect that we’ve ever looked at; and, it is the first Third Party Beast * era figure to make its way into the Coffin collection. And let me tell you, it’s just a prime example of how good such a piece can be.

Beast Gorira is a pretty gigantic Third Party version of Optimal Optimus, or Transmetal II Optimus Primal, from beloved Transformers series Beast Wars. An updated official figure for the character was released in the Power of the Primes line last year, but even photos of that toy prove that it can’t compete with this. Beast Gorira is exceptionally screen accurate, and is also very accurate to the original Hasbro toy from the late 90’s, as well. A quad changer, the figure can convert between robot, gorilla, car/tank/truck thing, and jet-type vehicle. It comes with one accessory, a nicely molded and painted blaster, and has no other removable parts, which basically means that it lacks the missiles and removable forearm armor that the Hasbro original has. That is absolutely fine, as 3P figures rarely come with missiles and the arm armor was basically just partsforming kibble anyway.

Marvel Legends: Magneto

 Mutant activist Magneto is perhaps one of the most problematic villains in comics, seeing as he really is responsible for some horrible atrocities, but also is a staunch advocate of Mutant rights . . . that often transgress into genocidal ideas. So yeah, problematic.

Transformers: Masterpiece MP-17+ Prowl (Anime Colors)

 

Long, long ago, we covered Masterpiece Bluestreak, then a Toys R Us exclusive in the US. That figure was a repaint of Masterpiece Prowl, who recently received the Takara Cartoon Accurate repaint itself, and is here rereleased as MP-17+, another in a growing sequence of Masterpiece figures getting a touch up, conceivably so as to allow them to mesh with the new direction of the line being more cartoon accurate without needing to be redesigned.

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.

MakeToys: MTRM-12 Skycrow and MTRM-13 Lightning

 

The second and third of the MakeToys Seekers, Skycrow is a straight up black and purple repaint of the excellent Meteor, and Lightning is a light blue version of the same. You know who they are supposed to be.

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.

MakeToys: Wrestle

 MakeToys has slowly but steadily become a real Coffin favorite company, thanks to fantastic figures like Contact Shot, Quantron, Despotron and others, and as a result have earned a place on the permanent shopping list around these parts. TFCon 2018 offered a chance at Wrestle, a Masterpiece Grapple-alike, and thus it was added to the collection. 

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.

Ju-Jiang Jet Commander JJ-02A: Jet Concorde

 Preface: I’m super excited to talk about these figures.

This is going to be the first entry on a real exciting batch of figures, the oversized Combiner Wars Aerialbot KOs from Ju-Jiang, a (sorta) Third Party company that makes upsized knock off versions of official Hasbro Transformers. My overall knowledge of the company is very limited, but up for review here is Jet Concorde, the upsized version of Combiner Wars Voyager Silverbolt, Aerialbot commander and eventual Superion torso. But to call these KOs and leave it at that would do a massive disservice to the figures themselves, as they are so, so much more than KOs and, as we’ll see as we progress through the set, are in many facets greatly improved versions of their original inspirations.

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.