The latest Hasbro Black Series item to hit the shelves is the Target Exclusive Poe Dameron and Riot Control Stormtrooper 2-pack. I ordered one from Target.com but saw so many on the shelves this past week, I couldn’t pass up grabbing another to build my riot-control trooper army up. Hasbro sure has my number when it comes to army-building.
The set comes with a trooper and Poe Dameron in what I’m assuming are military fatigues.
The trooper is pretty much the exact same trooper as the regular series one Black Series First Order Stormtrooper, but with a couple of new accessories.
The new accessories are a tonfa-style night stick and a squarish shield. I’m guessing the troopers use these when they want to heard crowds instead of mowing them down, though Stormtroopers have always struck me as the shoot-first type.
The tonfa and the shield are pretty solid plastic. The shield is so solid that I had to heat it up to get it off the arm as it was jammed on there pretty good on both troopers I bought.
The right hand doesn’t hold the tonfa handle too well as it’s a little loose, though it works well in the left hand. The shield clips are pretty stiff and a little tough to position without heating them.
The trooper also comes with the pistol and rifle from the series one trooper, which is nice. If you have the series 1 trooper, you know what you are getting, all the pros (sharp sculpt, shiny white armor) and cons (small feet makes them prone to falling, bad range of motion in the elbows) from that figure are present here.
Poe appears to be almost all-new sculpt. I’m assuming his head is a repeat of the wave two Poe, though I’m not 100 percent sure. The paint jobs are so different and this figure overall has a nicer face and his eyes aren’t as oddly buggy on this one. The eye paint is pretty simple, though, and it reminds me of old Fisher Price Adventure people. Still, it looks a lot better than the wave two figure.
The sculpt is really sharp and the clothing details pop nicely. It’s interesting to see how much sharper the sculpt is on Poe’s Jacket than Finn’s from wave one when they are basically the same jacket (I’m guessing there’s some clothes swapping going on between trooper Finn and Poe at some point).
The paint work on Poe’s jacket is a lot more effective at representing leather than the paint on Finn’s. There seems to be some dry-brushing on Poe’s jacket that brings out that sharp sculpt.
The removable helmet works okay, though seems a little large. I’m not sure; sometimes I think I like it, other times it seems too large. The details are neat, though it could use some weathering.
The blaster seems to be a variation on the one Finn carries in series one and has a nice, sharp sculpt and a little bit of bronze dry-brush for weathering.
Overall I like this set quite a bit. The sculpt on Poe is far and away better than his series two figure. and the paint, while not perfect, adds some nice detail. And adding to my First Order troops is a nice bonus.
- Check out Robokillah’s video review: