Sunday, June 27, 2010

X-Men Monster Armor Wolverine

I used to have quite a number of toys when i was a kid, unfortunately most of them were either given away, confiscated by teachers, or lost. One of those figures that were given away was my X-Men Monster Armor Wolverine, when i got back into action figures I told myself that I'd get some of my old figs if given a chance. That's why when I had a chance, I traded away one of my Wolverine minimates for this one.

I'm not sure if this actually appeared in comics, this was released in the 90s (1997) which was a time wherein a lot of weird stuff was happening in the marvel universe. It was produced by Toybiz and it was a part of the set that based on my research, also included Cyclops, Rogue, Mystique, and Mr. Sinister himself.
pictures taken from Amazon
The figure i got was already loose, it's not really a problem for me since as much as possible I want to open up my action figures, it's just that I don't have the heart to open them up.

Here's the review:

Sculpt:
I'm going to start of with the figure itself, and later on with the "Monster Armor" the Wolverine figure is shown as battle damaged with the torn uniform actually being part of the sculpt. You can actually see some veins in his arms and legs popping out. The hair is also sculpted pretty nicely, but the best thing about the sculpt is the boots. The tattered effect looks great especially on the pointy parts of the boots. The folds on the trunks also add a nice touch. Wolverine here looks like a mix of the normal Wolverine and the Wolverine after a failed attempt at rebonding with adamantium. I don't like how he has long arms and big hands.
The sculpt of the accessories are GREAT. The details are very nice, especially with the ridges on the fingers/claws. The details on the monster face is great too. It's simple but you can see the effort in making the accessories look hairy.
Paint:
Both the figure and the armor have pretty solid paint applications. It's a simple paint application and there are no shadings involved. Blue is blue, yellow is yellow. If ever there are smudges, it's almost unnoticeable. The biggest problem with the paint is seen on the very first picture, the single strand of hair on Wolverine's forehead was not completely painted so it looks like Wolverine has a mole. One thing I want to nitpick about but i know i shouldn't is the lack of hair on the figure, he's supposed to be hairy guy but ehh, most old figures don't have the hair.

Poseability:
This figure has the old five points of articulation; one for the head, 2 for each arm and leg. That's pretty much it, pretty common for the older toys but what's worse is that whether or not the figure is wearing the armor, it has to stand with it's legs wide apart since the pointy part of the boots will pretty much hit each other.

the figure also can't look up unless you tilt it to the side, which means he's pretty much looking forward the entire time.Accessories:
Placing the "Monster Armor" on the figure is pretty easy, all you have to do is push it in place and it pretty much locks up there. The figure looks great wearing the armor as long as you look at it from the front. The mask looks like a mask from behind. the boots are a problem too, since you can see it from behind.
Another problem i have is the claw of the left arm. It seems real awkward since it's coming out of the forearm. I know it's the right place to put it in since the sculpt matches prefectly.

Since the figure is scaled at around 5", it towers over MU and other 3.75" figures while falls short of the ML and 6" scale. I guess as a monster you could pretty much use him as a big mutated Wolverine, kinda like a Hulked out Wolverine. Here's some shot with the MU 2-pack Tigerstripe Wolverine
Overall, it's not really a MUST HAVE figure. But if you're looking for a bulky Wolverine that might look like 5'3" next to MLs. You might have found it. It's a great catch for anyone who gets it but it's not really a loss if you pass on it. My guess is that you try to look for this figure in online shops and those shops that sell vintage toys if you're looking for this one.