| |
| |
Review |
| |
| Sculpt: |
| Obi-Wan Kenobi, slain Jedi Knight and mentor to Luke Skywalker, as seen as a spirit on Dagobah in THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. Spirit figures have been a bit of a thorn for Kenner/Hasbro. The vintage lines never even attempted them, and while the POTF2 Spirit Obi-Wan became a highly prized mail-in premium, the figure itself was fairly disappointing. For the Original Trilogy Collection, Hasbro's new Spirit Obi-Wan is a vast improvement over the blocks of blue translucent plastic from the past. The basic sculpt consists of parts from the POTJ line's Ben (Obi-Wan) Kenobi: Jedi Knight figure -- namely the torso, legs, and lower skirt. To these have been added all-new arms, head, and outer cloak. The new head is a much better likeness of the late Sir Alec Guiness than even the OTC Vintage-style Obi-Wan figure's head, while the hands and arms now reflect the figure's addition of its hooded outer cloak. Very nicely done, but Hasbro really could have at least gone to the effort of plugging the hole in the figure's belt where the POTJ Obi-Wan's lightsaber handle pegs: 8 out of 10. |
| |
| |
| |
| Paint: |
| The trick here was to create a figure that was translucent and also had a blue "glue," but without turning it into a deodorant gel-stick sculpture. Hasbro used the same method of creating a translucent effect here as they did with SAGA '04 Hologram Luke Skywalker, then combined that with a blue pearlescent sheen. While the figure is molded in most of the colors appropriate translucent colors -- brown for sleeves of robes, brown for outer cloak, flesh for head and hands, and tan for torso, legs, and bottom half of inner robe -- a few paint apps were necessary: the brown shirt underneath the tan inner robe, the brown of his boots and belt, the white of his hair, his eyes and eyebrows, the blue of his eyes, the tan of the inner robes where they peek out of the sleeves of the outer cloak, and the gold of his belt buckle. The lightsaber accessory is molded in clear blue, with black and silver paint details. The figure's base is molded in medium brown, with dark brown paint over it. There are a total of seven colors on the figure, and then there's the opalecent blue effect that truly "makes" the entire effect work: 9.5/10. |
| |
| |
| |
| Articulation: |
| There's a lot of articulation on this figure, but nothing that we haven't seen before. The head, both shoulders, both elbows, both wrists, and waist are all planer-cut jointed. The legs underneath the robe are also jointed at the hips, but as the inner robe is non-flexible, the joints are utterly useless: 7.5/10. |
| |
| |
| |
| Accessories: |
| The figure comes with Obi-Wan's lightsaber. We've never seen the Spirit Obi-Wan use a lightsaber in the films, and I'd always supposed that the saber was destroyed along with the first Death Star at the climax of ANH. Also included is the Dagobah swamp base: 7.5/10. |
| |
| |
| |
| Packaging: |
| The same OTC card as the rest of the series, with a character-specific background image--in this case, the same swampy background (featuring Luke's sinking X-wing fighter) as OTC #02 Yoda. The insert is a publicity still of Obi-Wan in TESB, and has the logo for THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK on the far right flange, then the figure's name and OTC collection number (OTC #03) on the right flange. The cardback uses an image of Obi-Wan that appears to have been lifted from ANH, then given the ghostly treatment and inserted into a Dagobah background image. The text erxplains how Obi-Wan was destroyed by Darth Vader, but his spirit appears to Luke and orders the young hero to seek out Master Yoda on Dagobah: 8/10. |
| |
| |
| |
| Availability: |
| As of this writing, the figure has been appearing at retail for a little over two months, and is also available from most online sources: 8/10. |
| |
| |
| |
| Conclusion: |
| A much-needed new version of Spirit Obi-Wan that puts all past efforts to shame, and looks really nice when displayed under bright light: 8.1/10. |
|
|
|
