Titan Hero Sentinel

 Titan Hero Sentinel

Marvel, X-Men '97 - Hasbro

Everyone's favorite comic-adapted cartoon is back!  No, not Batman: The Animated Series.  Okay, everyone's second favorite comic-adapted cartoon is back!  X-Men '97 is on the way with some new toys to boot!  Marvel Legends six-inch scale will be later, but the four-inch Epic Hero scale is beginning to hit stores now, along with a compatible Blackbird jet and and one big baddie:  the Sentinel.  

These "Titan" figures are about fourteen inches tall and can be good enough to stand in with Legends figures.  (Thank goodness for the Arcade Game and fighting games for allowing us to fudge scale on these army builders.) 

They aren't super articulated, but sport more than standard, twelve-inch scale Hasbro offerings.  Paint and detail are minimal, but they match the cartoon and the comic source material.  Big, solid robots...nuff said.

As for army building, I went in for two...for now.  I've already got the Haslab Sentinel as Master Mold, a couple of Marvel Universe, one Toy Biz build-a-figure, and two re-released/upgraded 90s Toy Biz.  Robots get upgraded all the time, so my head canon changes to explain the size and design differences.

These new ones are $22 each, but I got mine as Amazon Warehouse steals for $15 (damaged packaging).  I like them enough to add a few more down the line, but will also keep my eyes open for another deal before I jump.  

If you don't have any Sentinels to menace your mutants, you cant lose with these.  If you like army building, they are worth picking up as well, even if you have more advanced "machs."  Grab them now to reenact the soul-crushing opening from the original series where (spoilers) Morph bites it and Beast gets incarcerated for several seasons! 

Saurozoic Warriors

Saurozoic Warriors

Boss Fight Studio

Boss Fight Studio was already becoming one of my favorite toy producers with their recent Popeye line, Bucky O'Hare, and Zorro Hacks figures.  And now they've gone an done this...created an original line that should appeal to action figure collectors of the 80s and 90s.  Kids of all ages love dinosaurs, too!

Saurozoic Warriors are anthropomorphic dinos in bright, fantastical colors and proportions akin to Ninja Turtles or Toxic Crusader.  What's not to love?  Boss Fight has even gone the distance to flesh out a backstory for each character, all coming together to for one colossal conflict. 

One faction is total ceratopsian.  Triceratops is my personal favorite dinosaur, so I love that the central character/leader here is of the three-horned persuasion.  His battle-scarred eye puts him over the (cera)top!

The Brachiosaur is a close runner up.  The execution on the neck and head alone are great!  So great, that this one needed a double dip.  A Big Bad Toy Store exclusive gives us a skeletal paint job.  The new deco is built into the story, but I don't mind pretending that he's a completely different sauropod solider for army building's sake.

The "tank" of this group is the stout and wide Stegosaurus.  If the sculpt alone didnt ooze "bad attitude, they gave him a leather vest and the biggest gun of the group to solidify his bad-assery.  Its a little strange that the stego is the only humanoid dino here to retain a tail.  I guess its only of the identifying features of the stego, so hard to go without?  Or it just balances him holding the big-ass gun.

The ceratopsian guard is the army builder of the group.  Im glad they have the gas mask to help solidify them as the foot soldiers.  Also gives off the Toxic Crusader vibe I mentioned above.

While billed as a 6-inch line, these scale a bit small in comparison to other lines.  I think they are right at home with Masters of the Universe Origins, not only in scale, but in articulation and the shared techno-barbarian themes.  Maybe in an effort to resurrect the Snake Men, a time portal reach back beyond Preternia and out popped these guys?  Go ahead and connect them with a Battle Bones origin!

These do run a bit high ($30) for figures of this scale, but the fun-factor and rarity of being an original line makes them easy to support.  The waves should also be spaced out with enough time to budget for them.  Another wave is on the way, and I cant wait.  No sign of a Tyrannosaurus Rex yet...would make an awesome deluxe figure, Boss Fight.  Bring 'em on!