Hot Toys. Hot Toys and Star Wars. Two great tastes and all that. While I would love to be all-in with a line of Hot Toys Star Wars figures, sometimes sacrifices have to be made, and I’ve had to content myself with watching from afar. Sure, I’ve picked up a small handful of 12-inch Sideshow Star Wars offerings, but if I were to dig down and dig deep into Hot Toys Star Wars, then I’d be a goner.
But this is Boba Fett, and Boba Fett supersedes caution and thriftiness. There was no way I was going to pass on the chance to own a Hot Toys Boba Fett, so here we are. I guess some people don’t like Boba or the bounty hunters, but those people are wrong.
Sideshow put out a Boba Fett not too long ago, and I was tempted by that one, but I held out for the Hot Toys version. Mainly because this was a Return of the Jedi Boba, where the Sideshow and all the 6-inch Bobas from other companies seem to be Empire Strikes Back versions. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but this was different.
First off, we start with the packaging, which is typical Hot Toys class and stylishness. I tend to toss the packaging for most everything I buy, but Hot Toys packaging I keep. Not only in case I want to store the figure for some reason, but also because it’s just so heavy-duty and swanky.
The figure itself is beautiful. When you’re working at a 12-inch scale figure with cloth and all that, you want a “little person” feeling, and you get that with Boba. With no overly visible joints, the illusion is almost head-to-toe complete here.
I’ve read complaints about recent Hot Toys figures having restricted movement, mainly some of the Avengers figures, but I’m happy to say that Boba has none of those issues. His costume fits just right but is loose enough so he maintains a full range of motion. He’s got all the basic Hot Toys articulation, which is essentially an oversized Marvel Legends amount with double-jointed elbows and knees, fully mobile head, bicep joints, ball-jointed wrists and ankles, and fully mobile hips. While I haven’t stripped a Hot Toys down to his skivvies, I’m sure you can find an unclothed picture somewhere to show you what his joints are like. They all work great here. The only area I had an issue with was the reach across mobility where he looks like he’s activating his wrist rockets, and that’s mainly due to his chest armor. You can get close enough to fake it, though.
He has a mix of fabric and plastic bits for the armored parts. The paint job overall is spot-on, with all the expected chippings and battle damage. The greens are vibrant, the reds are perky, and the assorted other colors all look like they jumped from the screen. Above all else, Hot Toys figures are works of art, and just looking over all the details — especially details on someone like Boba who is all about the dinged up “lived-in” quality — is worth the price.
Boba comes with four sets of hands. He has two trigger hands for holding his gun on either side, a pair of fists, a pair of gripping hands for holding his gun, and a pair of slightly relaxed hands that are either for when he’s relaxing at Jabba’s or when he’s activating his flamethrower, rockets, or other deadly things.
He comes with four tools that slide into the pockets on his shins. His jet pack is removable, and that is one of two areas that caused me the most irritation. I’ll get to those in a second.
His rifle slips easily into his trigger hand and he hold it securely. For figures like this with removable hands, I usually end up keeping their weapon in the appropriate hand when I swap out the hands, since there’s no real need for him to have a trigger finger without something to trigger. The fingers are pliable, which lets you get the gun in nice and secure.
The range finder on the helmet slides down. The helmet looks great, with a nice glossy visor and all the aforementioned chipping and damage. His cape has a wire in it that allows for some posing.
The jet pack is attached by a pair of hangers on the back, and there’s also a magnet that’s supposed to keep it securely in place. Neither of these were adequate, as just the act of swapping hands made the jet pack fall off time and time again. The magnet they used isn’t very strong at all. I solved that just by attaching a much stronger rare earth magnet to the armor on his back. The stronger magnet serves as a much more powerful link between the relatively weaker magnet in his jet pack and the weaker magnet in the back of his armor. With that magnet in place his jet pack doesn’t flop around willy-nilly like it did before. It’s something you might want to consider doing if you decide to buy the figure. I used one of the larger, dime-sized magnets.
The only other issue is that his wrist gauntlets aren’t connected to anything and want to slide around a bit more than I’d like, which is especially noticeable when you’re trying to swap hands. There’s no real way to secure them without doing some alterations to the figure itself, so it’s essentially a necessary evil that you’ll have to put up with. It’s not too annoying but it’s something to be aware of.
I put Boba beside the previously released Sideshow Bossk figure, and I initially though he was a little undersized until I looked at some screencaps and saw that Bossk wasn’t as tall as I thought he should have been beside Boba. So the scale between the two works out okay. Bossk might seem a little on the small side by comparison, but it’s fudgeable. I know Sideshow has released an IG-88 (which I didn’t get) and has a 4-LOM coming out next year with an Empire Boba out now, so there’s a decent amount of scum that will eventually be able to mingle together.
He comes with a stand that doubles as a neat little grate like you would find in Jabba’s palace.
Despite a few small issues, Hot Toys has delivered a top-level Boba Fett figure. He’s pricey, and it seems like Hot Toys figures are a little overpriced, but I’m still glad to have him in my collection
There are two versions, both currently available at Big Bad Toy Store. Mine is the regular, but there’s a deluxe version for a bit more money that comes with a Sarlacc Pit display piece.
