Square Enix is doing it again, throwing their own spin on the Star Wars universe, this time with the Stormtrooper and Boba Fett.
The Variant Play Arts Kai Darth Vader was revealed back in December so it’s been a little while since we’ve heard anything else about this line. So busting out with two new figure announcements is definitely the way to go. Those who prefer more classic, movie accurate designs will scoff but with the deluge of Star Wars product we’re currently experiencing it’s nice to get something different. And these definitely are different, while keeping with the spirit of the characters.
First up is the Stormtrooper.
The style is something you might find in a modern video game, and that in itself isn’t a bad thing. The trooper comes with the standard Play Arts Kai stand, a heavy blaster, a blaster rifle, a muzzle blast, and three sets of hands. Two gun toting, two open, and two fists.
And there there is Boba Fett.
Quite a departure but the basic elements are all there. Fett comes with a PAK stand and some kind of flight stand, a pistol, a rifle, two knives, two backpack jet blasts, and a gauntlet attachment with a flame blast. Oh, and of course three sets of hands. Two gun, two fists, and two open.
These figures come in at about 10.25″ inches tall and will retail for about $100.
It’s not that the movie-accurate designs are preferable because they are movie accurate. It’s that they are quite simply better designs. It’s alarming how many designers (and I fought against the urge to put the word in quotation marks) for film, comic-books, toys, and video games are not good designers, not in the least.
It seems their focus is on “what looks cool” and not on the elements of good design. They seem not to care about the number of angles created by the lines of the object, the silhouette, the scale of adjacent parts, the balance between areas of detail and broad open areas, the use of color to add or subtract interest (and I could go on and on…. Why are these elements important? Because most of these objects don’t exist as static images, but at 24 frames per second (used by good filmmakers) and far higher for video games.
Designs such as the above are too busy, completely too busy. The eye doesn’t know where to rest. The armor doesn’t tell a story because the eye isn’t invited to contemplate any single area because every piece of the armor is competing with itself. Go back and look at the original stormtrooper and Boba Fett designs. They are classic, iconic. They are simple. They read well on the screen because they have silhouettes that help them be quickly identified in whatever pose they may be in. They aren’t overburdened with an excess of angles, colors, or extraneous and meaningless overwhelming detail.
This goes not just for the armor of Star Wars, but also the spacecraft and sets, which again are the most iconic and among the best designed of any sci-fi/fantasy worlds. This is because designers and concept artists like Ralph McQuarrie didn’t study comic-books, films, and video games, but art, architecture, and design. Drawing on a broader source of inspiration, their designs were fresher, more thoughtful, “read” well on screen.
These designs are really poor. They seem like something an eleven-year-old unschooled in design and with an unhealthy preoccupation with making things “look cool” would come up with. The proportions are incredibly unrealistic, appearing to be tall men, freakishly steroidal muscular men, not real people (you know, the sort that make stories interesting) underneath.
This is the sort of thing I wish would get shot down by licensing. I don’t care how good the plastic is, the design is extremely poor quality.
Incredible. I wish these were 3.75 inch scale so I could put them with the rest of my collection. There are some sharp angles but overall I actually would love if their looks in film were updated to be more like this. It works, I’m just not sure I want 10 inch figures at all.
interesting figures, but I honestly don’t understand the appeal
The Stormtrooper has a familiar look.
It just occurred to me. A Cyberman of Doctor Who lore! (Sans the cross bar handles atop their heads) “DELETE! DELETE!”–Ha-ha! Oh my! So I guess PAK Astromechs will look like Daleks!?? Lol R2D2 speaks,”Exterminate!” 😉
You are reading my mind.
That is Exactly what I think about it! LoL
Specifically,I thought about the few Marvel Legends icons I have and the ones I sold right before the line got cancelled.
@12 inches they’re bigger than these PAK figures, so it IS tempting to get these, but I really don’t have the Space!
I have other PAK figures in 9″, so The Force may have a strong influence on me to cave and get these.
Ugh, these look so stupid.
PAK needs to stop.
I wish these Play Arts figures were 6 or 7 inches. I just can’t bring myself to start collecting a new scale. But they are very tempting.