Star Wars: The Black Series Lando Calrissian (The Empire Strikes Back)

 

Quite a while ago now this figure came into my possession; at the time a rare example of actually finding a new figure from a new(ish) Wave in a retail store. Just when Black Series Lando was released as a member of whichever Wave is lost on me. I’m pretty sure Lando was in the Wave after the Revan Wave, the Imperial Guard one, and I think he was included in a Wave after that as well. Whatever; I’d never seen one in a store, and wasn’t enthused enough to buy one online by itself, so I grabbed him. Shortly thereafter, my feelings of wanting to backtrack through Black Series figures I’d skipped began to solidify, and I was glad that I found this Lando when I did.

Star Wars: The Black Series Han Solo (Solo: A Star Wars Story)

 

 The standalone Han Solo movie is reportedly the biggest box office flop in the Star Wars franchise. That is an entirely relative statement, as I’m not sure many people would label $265 million dollars in ticket sales a bad thing. But, the movie had a $400 million budget apparently, so in industry terms, it flopped. There are multiple theories as to why this happened, but as is the case with all things Star Wars these days, only a few of them are rational, while many more are fueled by a truly impotent rage coming from the more delicate corners of the fan community.

MakeToys MTCM-03C: Metalstorm

 

 

Ok, so. It’s been a while since we’ve spent some time on a converting robot action figure, and it feels like that should change.

Metalstorm is the MakeToys Scattershot, the largest figure in their excellent Quantron set. He is by far the largest figure of the team, something which at first makes the other four figures seem much too small, until one looks at it from the G1 perspective, after which point all is just fine. Metalstorm will have a lot of work to do, as he converts from robot to spacecraft to armored spacecraft to armored robot to torso; but not, as the G1 version did, that strange cannon tower, although certainly with enough applied creativity, said additional conversion could be fan moded. Initially, he seems to be the least impressive figure of the five, but given time ends up being really satisfying and fun.

Grave Considerations: TFCon Toronto 2018 and SDCC 2018 Reveals

Hi everyone. I know that this month has been a less than active one around the Coffin, and I don’t really know the reason why. I have been busy with summer classes, and Life has been busy with conventions and new toy reveals and movies and stuff, I just have not been able to find the time or motivation to do much blog-related work. Sure, I have posted a pair of articles this month, and have begun three or four more, but for some unknown reason I’m having a real hard time mustering up the energy to dedicate myself to Coffin business. So I figured I’d take a little time and talk about some toy reveals we’ve gotten this past week, between TFCon Toronto and San Diego Comic Con.

Grave Considerations/Coffin Shaker/Mass Burial: Coal Chamber

This piece sorta just happened out of the blue, inspired by a story I read yesterday online wherein Dez Farfara, vocalist of the generally meh DevilDriver and formerly of the generally rad Coal Chamber, has publicly stated, again, that Coal Chamber is forever broken up, and is not coming back. Apparently, the greater purpose of this interview was to announce that DevilDriver is going to start playing Coal Chamber songs live, which is sort of an interesting possibility, and that this was preceded by another round of Dez calling the old band members and everyone swearing at each other. I kinda just wanted to take a few minutes and talk about this. Part thinkpiece, part album review, part discography dive, it’s hard to really say where this fits, but here it is regardless.

TFC Toys Poseidon: Deathclaw

 It’s time to end the Poseidon hiatus, an unofficial thing that basically happened because I got caught up writing on some other things, but was never intended. Our last entry looked at the really good Iron Shell, and now, it’s time for the best figure in the set (or at least the one that blew my mind all those months ago –mr), Deathclaw, the Nautilator stand-in.

Star Wars: The Black Series Jaina Solo

 

The Star Wars Expanded Universe holds (or ‘held,’ depending on whether or not you allow Disney to control what Star Wars is for you . . . –mr) an enoromous cast of characters, many of whom approach Mary Sue territory pretty quickly. In the times before the New Trilogy brought us the continuing adventures of Luke, Leia, and Han, the EU told us what would happen to them after the events of Return of the Jedi. It turns out that Luke opened a Jedi training school, and Leia and Han had children. You know, before Disney wiped that out and the New Trilogy ignored the lore and did whatever it felt like doing.