The Star Wars Prequel Trilogy had three main characters: Padmé Amidala, Anakin Skywalker, and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Between Bandai and Hasbro we have a few Anakin and Obi-Wan figures in the 6-inch scale, but Padmé had become somewhat conspicuous in her absence until now. While this is not my preferred costume for this character, it’s still a fantastic action figure, so let’s take a look at the S.H. Figuarts Padmé Amidala!
Padme comes with an alternate portrait, three sets of hands, and a blaster. The hands are blaster grip, relaxed, and open. I think I would have liked some fists, but the options here are pretty useful.
The gun is a little irritating. Though well-sculpted and detailed, it pops apart at the handle on super tiny pegs that don’t grip very well. This is an intentional design to facilitate swapping, but I feel like they are daring me to lose the darn thing.
The portraits are both really nice, though I prefer the one with the closed mouth. It’s almost creepy how much it looks like Natalie Portman. The second head is also good, but can look awkward at times and doesn’t seem as much of dead-on Portman likeness as the regular head. The face printing tech is pretty nice here, the only odd bit is there is a lot of darkness under the nose that can look weird from a low angle.
The overall sculpt is fantastically detailed and captures the Geonosis arena battle costume perfectly. The paint is very subtle and includes very light weathering to indicate the orange dust of Geonosis and very light shading around the ab muscles.
One odd thing I missed is the cuts on her back. They meticulously created the torn shirt as another layer of plastic over the skin-colored torso, but did not include any indications of the Nexu scratches on her back.
The articulation is really good, with great range of motion at the neck and torso ball-and-socket joints.
Padmé has the following articulation:
- Swivel/hinge shoulders, elbows, wrists, and knees
- Ball-and-socket head, neck, pectorals, hips, upper torso, and lower torso
- Hinged toes
Overall, this is a fantastic figure. It’s a shame that it was exclusive and therefore pricier and tougher to get than other Figuarts figures. My only slight gripe is that I would have preferred this costume pre-Nexu scratch belly shirt. I really love the scarf and chrome gun of the clean costume.
This figure is going to look great on the shelf, it’s just for my photography hobby purposes the clean costume would have been a bit more useful to me because it’s less scene specific. I realize that’s a concern unique to me.
