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Review |
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| Sculpt: |
| Arfive-Defour was an astromech droid sold to Owen Lars on his moisture farm far from Mos Eisley, in A NEW HOPE. As Owen's nephew, Luke Skywalker, was taking the small droid and the protocol droid See-Threepio to be cleaned, Arfive's motivator malfunctions. The little droid is traded back to the Jawas in exchange for Threepio's counterpart, Artoo-Detoo. Little does either Owen or Luke realize that these two droids will draw them into the heart of the Galactic Civil War between the dreaded Empire and the Rebel Alliance. This is only the second Arfive-Defour figure in the modern line. The POTF2 version was a hideous toy, badly conceived as a "secret-weapon" droid with a launching missile and gun-arms poorly "concealed" in its two outer legs. Collectors have literally been begging for a better Arfive for a decade, and have finally been rewarded with this figure. It uses the same body as the VOTC Artoo-Detoo, with the previously interchangeable torso panel glued shut. The head is an all-new sculpt, with a pop-up "bad motivator" similar to the VOTC R2-D2's pop-up sensor-scope. It's such a vast improvement over the POTF2 version, it rates a 9.5 out of 10. |
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| Paint: |
| The figure is molded primarily in white, with silver plastic used for the "bad motivator" and antenna. The cables on the two "feet" on his primary legs are molded in brown. The head has red and silver paint decorations. The body has red, blue, and silver paint applications, with blue and silver on the legs. There is a light, gray wash over the entire figure, producing a weathering effect. Overall, a very detailed, paint job that merits a 9/10. |
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| Articulation: |
| Planer-cut neck, "shoulders," and "feet." All three legs are wheeled, and it rolls easily on a flat, level surface. The "bad motivator" pops-up when the head is rotated: 8.5/10. |
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| Accessories: |
| Character-specific figure stand, removable antenna, and removable center leg: 8/10. |
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| Packaging: |
| The same The Saga Collection card as the rest of the series, with a character-specific background image--in this case, the base of the Jawa sand crawler at the Lars farm. The insert image is a nice close-up shot of Arfive and has The Saga Collection logo to the right of the character image. The figure's name is just below TSC logo, with its collection number (R5-D4 is Saga #032) just to the right. To the left are the five white-orange triangles, indicating the position of the enclosed mini-figure. The cardback features a small film image of Arfive (along with Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker), with text that explains his role in ANH, along with the diecut display area for the Exclusive Hologram Figure: 8.5/10. |
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| Availability: |
| As of this writing, the figure has been appearing at retail for about a month and it sells out often; it is also available from most online sources: 7/10. |
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| Conclusion: |
| Arfive-Defour at last gets the re-sculpt that collectors have demanded, and it's a very decent result. The only change I'd have made was using actual prismatic, foil stickers in the rectangular spaces in the droid's neck, as were used on the actual film prop. Still, this is so much better than what we got before, it rates a final score of 8.4/10. |
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