Liking my Comics: Legends Wolverine

After having so much enjoyment come out of the wonderful world of Archangel, I jumped onto Amazon.com and sought out the other figures I wanted from the line.  It turns out I got a few extra as well that I didn’t know I wanted…  Funny how that works… 

Long story short, I have Wolverine from the ‘Hit Monkey’ series, that is also the same series that Archangel comes from.  Oh and the good news? Online he wasn’t $30.  Huzzah!

This is Wolverine in his X-Force duds.  Or so google tells me.  I first came across this costume as a costume in the rather fun Wolverine Origins game that I bought for my PS3 many many moons ago.  It was an unlockable skin to take the place of the Jackman you usually have to play with.  I must admit that I quite like it.  I thought my favourite Wolvey costume would be his blue and yellow duds, but nope.  This would be it here.

Despite it being part of the Hit Monkey series, there aren’t any actual Hit Monkey parts included.  Neither did Archangel have any.  Odd, especially since Wolverine doesn’t come with any accessories. 

Odd but clever if you think about it.  People will buy Archangel and Wolverine regardless of whether they are getting Hit Monkey or not.  People will not buy, um, random-obscure-muscle-guy as no-one knows who he is.   I don’t carer for Hit Monkey, so I am not fussed either way.

The packets has some nice artwork, with Wolvey’s face on the top and a whole scene on the back.  Interestingly, they have the same artwork for both sides, but his left claw is angled down on the front and up on the back.  Man, I want a giant Sentinel figure now.

Oooh, look! there is the picture of Archangel that started all this Marvel toy bizzo off.  It still has the classic font and ink dots on the name, he’s plastered in his typical Wolverine look with claws out and ready to scratch.  Mine has a slightly wonky middle claw on one of his hand that I am attempting to correct.

The back has a larger version of the artwork with that sentinel on it.

I was surprised to see that Wolverine here doesn't have the multi-lingual bio that Archangel had.  Curious.

And there he is.  What a nice looking toy I immediately thought.  It too smelt like crayons.  The colours are nice and work together well.  Annoyingly Wolvey has slightly wonky knees, just like Archangel did too.  There is a nice blackwash that highlights the musculature and it’s over the important parts.  The silver/grey is a nice slightly shiny paint and really looks very nice indeed.  The moment I pulled this guy out of his case, it felt like a solid figure and I had a good feeling about it.

The articulation is very good.  Better than I expected to be honest.  Double jointed knees and elbows, bicep and thigh swivels, wrist swivels and hinges, hinged shoulders with a swivel in there too, a diaphragm joint and waits swivel as well.  Due to the clean head sculpt he has a great range of movement in his neck.

I was really surprised to see that his shoulders are connected to another point of articulation that allows him to move his shoulders forwards and back as well.  I was taken aback when I discovered this, it’s an extra joint that is super handy and I was chuffed to see it!  Balance is fantastic, his ankles although very adaptable are hindered by the boot belts, which is a shame as they don’t bend up much.

Oh man, that is soooo nice.

Out of the pack and I noticed that the ‘ears’ on his mask had been pushed quite close to his head.  I know X-Force costume has smaller ears than his normal one, but they still stick out a bit.  Luckily they are soft plastic and can be bent forwards.  I think a bit of hair dryer action on them will help them stay in place permanently.

I really like the sculpting on this dude.  He has buckles on his forearm guards and boots.  Muscles, nice clean belt buckle and belt are also included.  It almost looks like he has steel capped boots on too!  WOW!  Paint details are pretty good and I am pleased to say that

His face sculpt is lovely and stern. Check out that big jaw and slightly grumpy face!  I also dig the red eyes.

Mine seems to have a little bit of battle damage to the right side of his face.  That’ kind of OK with me though, adds a bit of character.  The creases in his mask are another nice touch, the frown is needed for his face.

Now, let’s have a look at the real winners of this guy.  His claws.

They are just beautiful.  The right length to look good, with the middle one being a tad longer, they appear to sit flush with the back of his hand, despite being extra pieces.  The plastic used is a good colour.  They are magnificent.  After checking out some other people’s reviews, it has general consensus of being the best Wolverine claws in a toy yet.  I haven’t had any other Wolverine’s so I can’t say either way, but I will say I love these claws.  Apparently you can take them off as well, I haven’t tried yet but will later on. So you can have him flick Cyclops the bird-claw, threaten people with the face-frame-middle-claw-sheathed, or have him pop some brews with one. Or take them all off for relaxing Wolvey.  Brilliant.

The wrist joints are incredibly handy as well with a good range of spinning and bending motion.

So what we end up with on old Wolverine here is one damn fine action figure.  Sure, he might smell like crayons when you first get him out of the box, but hey, who cares?  This thing is incredible!  Not only is it a good Legends figure, it’s probably one of the better figures in this size range I have seen.  Great posing options, beautiful paints and colours and those incredible claws!

My only actual gripes about this toy is his hip joints (they are a bit counter-intuitive), but I think that is to do with the design, as opposed to just this figure and his size as Archangel had me thinking the same thing and I think I know what it is.    I just want to confirm it with another figure…   and his height as he seems to be as tall as Archangel, where I am pretty certain in the comic he is a bit of a short-arse. (He does scale well with some more colossal characters I have recently acquired though…)  Oh and that blu tack there is meant to straighten out my wonky claw.  (It didn’t work by the way…).  But aside from the hip joints, which still have a great range of movement, this is a brilliant toy. 

Get one, you won’t be disappointed.