So I haven’t finished reviewing wave 1, but let’s all ignore that as I move on to what I have (mostly) finished, and that’s wave two, the Arnim Zola wave. How does it stack up to wave 1? Click ahead to find out.
Wave 2 follows Hasbro’s pattern of taking some steps forward and backwards simultaneously, which essentially means they’re doing a funky version of the “running man” while on a treadmill that’s on an iced over pond that’s on a conveyor belt. They may not be completely overhauling the action figure industry, but you really have to sit back and watch.
One area that Wave 2 vastly improves over wave 1 is the amount of figures or costume variations. With the running change formula two figures turns into four, one costume turns into two, and an unmasked guy puts on his mask. It’s all very confusing and hasn’t been the easiest thing in the world to deal with since nobody seems to sell sets that come with everybody, plus people are still trying to track down Masked Dakens and Big Time Spidey’s, so that’s a fun time with toys. But let’s talk about the figures themselves. How do they do? How do you do? Fine, thanks for asking. As with my initial review, I’m focusing heavily on play value—the point of toys–with other aesthetics bringing up the rear.
Let’s get the first one out of the way: Drax. I want to like this figure. I wish I could like him more than I do. I love the character of Drax, and through reading Annihilation and Guardians of the Galaxy have overcome my prejudices and have grown to love this look for him–though his original 70’s costume will always be my primary desire.
For play value, he’s not horrible, he’s got a lot of motion, he can hit plenty of badass poses and all that, but his body is just wrong. He’s got the Ka-zar effect going on: this was never supposed to be a body for bare-chested characters, and yet here it is. Combined with the new forearm/hand sculpt that doesn’t have the same amount of muscle detailing and the half-skin-tight, half loose-fitting pant sculpt, the figure looks pulled from too many different sources to gel properly. He’s got a great head, great boots, and let’s face it, with this body he doesn’t have any of the horrible articulation decisions that have plagued other Hasbro figures, so he does have plenty of play value.
So he wins on Playsthetics, but fails in aesthetics. Depending on what’s more important for you, he could be fine, but if you’re hoping for that perfect version of this Drax, this isn’t it.
Next up we have Daken, Wolverine’s son. I know, I know, the man’s been getting down with the ladies for over a century, he must practice EXTRAORDINARILY safe sex if this is the only kid he’s got out there.
As a figure, Daken…is. He exists. He’s got the standard articulation, he’s got a evocative headsculpt, the paint’s all there, but he just…is. His forearms have a redundant swivel to them—a new forearm sculpt would have worked wonders for him, but he’s got nice fists with nice bone claws, but otherwise there’s nothing really standoutish about him, except for his well-painted tattoos.
So that aside, his play and pose value is pretty high, and his Mohawk is exceptionally surly and gives off a ton of attitude. He’s a fun toy with nothing exceptional about him. And that’s ok. Good for you, Mohawked dude with daddy issues. You’re one in a million.
The long awaited Wrecking Crew is making their triumphant debut in the Marvel Legends line. Working the running change angle, Thunderball and Piledriver share a ball. Snicker. But they also share a sculpt. Thunderball comes out on top of the slot sharing (snicker again) with appropriate glove detailing and his ginormous Wrecking ball.
I will state first off I’m fairly biased. I love the Wrecking Crew. They’re a staple of the Marvel villain set, and anytime they show up it makes for an enormously fun comic. I shake my head when I think of how long it’s taken them to get made. How Toybiz never managed to squeak them out I’ll never know, but now that we’re getting them I can’t wait for the full set. Unlike many, I’ve held off on making my own out of blind hope that they’d be made eventually.
That said, I really don’t like this bastardized Torso. Didn’t like it for Warpath, don’t like it here.
But with that said—Love the figure. It’s probably too big, it’s probably got problems, but it’s the beginning of the Wrecking Crew, and I can forgive almost anything. Well, not Piledriver’s lack of fists, that’s dumb, but Thunderball has what he needs, and he just looks badassed. He’s got the great new hip setup that they’re starting to work into the line, and it makes a difference. The age of balls is slowly fading, to be replaced with…whatever these are called. Hip swivel dealies. Sure. HSD’s. That can’t help catching on.
I wish his Wrecking ball didn’t have a pre-posed sculpted chain and instead had individual plastic links, because that would have pushed him that much further in the pose-and-play arena. His size may bug you if you think of the Crew as not ginormous, and yeah, that does bug me as well since I can be a huge scale nazi about these things. But he’s not MS Thanos levels of toodamnbig, so I can work with it. I can deal with it. Maybe I just want a Wrecking Crew so much that I have blinders on about his size. That’s possible. Kill me. I like the figure, he’s fun to mess around with and play with, and he looks totally badass. Fun toys are fun.
To wrap up part one of this review, let’s turn our attention to one version of Spider-man that this wave is giving us. When Johnny Storm died (spoiler!!!) the FF switched focus and began calling themselves the Future Foundation, since they still had the trademark to FF. They switched over to snazzy Black and White costumes and let Spider-man join, because Spidey is a joiner nowadays and is one step away from joining every team in the Marvel Universe, except for the Xavier Academy Lacrosse team.
This is a beautiful figure. The stark unmuddied white, the crisp black, the great design…Bam, it’s a taste sensation. Add in the new forearms and calves which means it’s lost the redundant meat from the Black Spidey in the Red Hulk wave, and the addition of the new ankles which allow for more side-range and this old 90th generation Bullseye body mutation has been turned into a showpiece. Gone as well is the Black spidey peahead, with a new headsculpt that’s size appropriate to the body. Not sure how he fits his entire chin into it, but the total package is so sparkly and perky and Crest whitening stripped that it doesn’t matter.
A complete, good, cohesive Fantastic Four has long been one of my most-wanted things, since–despite the sheer number of figures they’ve had–each one has sucked in some way. Spidey makes me want to have a complete Future Foundation as well. I’ve heard good things about the comic. I got into the concept with the arc in Slott’s Amazing Spider-man (something everybody should go out and read, it washes the stink of One More Day and ridiculous deals with the Mephisto off like an industrial strength loofa to the face). Fun figure with off the charts play value and a spotless appearance.
So that takes care of part one, some good, some mediocre. Join me here again for part 2, where two of the best Marvel figures ever are covered, one of which epitomizes everything action figures can be.
