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The picture on the box for this set is really busy. The front is covered in hexagons with pictures inside, looking a bit like a bee-hive. I have not read any of the Secret Invasion stories, so I don’t know if this has any relevance to the story or if this was just a design choice, but it is not very eye-catching in my opinion. The muted colors and busy-ness are not a great combination. An obnoxious “4 PK Collectible!” notice on a red circle is plastered right in the middle of the pack, which is also not a choice I would have made. It seems unnecessary to have at all, but if you put it there, do you want to draw the viewer’s attention right there, to this silly note, away from the figures themselves? The words “he loves you” are posted on the bottom of the front of the package, which I’m sure has something to do with the storyline.

One side of the box has all 4 regular faces for the figures contained in this set, and the other side has all 4 Skrull faces. The gimmick of this set is that each character has a reversible head, so that they can each be a Skrull. It is a cool gimmick, but one that leads to a problem with Beast that will be discussed below.

The back of the package shows all 4 figures with their Skrull faces showing. It also gives a brief description of each character, a picture of the extra Skrull heads that come with the set (these are in addition to the reversible heads), and a description of how you can switch these characters’ heads around.

This is Wolverine as he first appeared in the Incredible Hulk issues 180 and 181 back in the mid-1970s. The most notable visual changes between this and later versions of the classic, blue and yellow Wolverine concern his mask, and the major changes here are two-fold. First, he has shorter “ears” than he later does. Secondly, this early Wolverine has “whiskers” on his mask. Something that I did not immediately notice on this figure was that the whiskers are unpainted, though on the box, they are painted black as accurate to Wolvie’s original appearance. Once I did notice it, however, it really bugged me. Further, the paint on the mask is fairly sloppy here. There are sculpted lines signifying where the paint was supposed to go, and where it was not supposed to go, and the paint just doesn’t neatly follow these lines. This is unfortunate, as the mask sculpt itself is pretty great, but the sloppy and missing paint really detract from that. I actually decided to paint in the whiskers myself, which I think improves him quite a bit, but this is something that we should not have had to do, in my opinion.

The face under the mask shows Logan as angry but a bit annoyed. It is a pretty nice face, and unlike the mask piece, the tampo here is nice and crisp. Wolverine comes with an additional hair piece. This seems to be a new sculpt for him, and is a very nice improvement over previous Wolverine hair pieces, in my opinion. It isn’t too big, it gives him a nice, slightly receding hairline, it is finely detailed, and it gives him some cool sideburns. Wolverine’s Skrull face is a bit angrier than his human-faced counterpart. But he still looks a bit bored or annoyed. As with the other Skrull faces in this set, there are lots of lines and details here.

The tiger stripes and muscles on his chest (painted on the top and sides as well as the front and back of the chest block), the red belt on his crotch piece, and hair on his arms all have a clean paint application. The paint apps on the boots are slightly off, but nothing too drastic. Wolverine’s gloves and underwear don’t have an outline, but they appear fairly evenly applied to both sides. This Wolverine uses new hands with claws, which are a great improvement over previous Wolverines. The detail on the metal sheaths that the claw pops out of is impressive, given how small those hands and claws are. The claws themselves seem sturdier and are slightly less bulky than most previous versions. These clawed hands are just a great improvement all the way around.

In addition to the hair piece, mask, and clawed hands, there are also two new accessories that we are seeing with this Wolverine for the first time. The first are the new shoulder blades. They are separate pieces that fit in-between his arms and chest piece, and are really nice. A variation of this was also used with “Classic” Iron Man from wave 25, and I hope that Art Asylum continues to use pieces of this type in the future when appropriate. Secondly, the boots here are new. Instead of the old, bulky boots that we saw with “Giant Sized” Wolverine, these new boots are much slimmer. In fact, they are basically regular Minimate feet with extra boot extensions that slide up the front of the figure’s leg. These boots are also a vast improvement. For one, they are more aesthetically pleasing than the bigger boots, and secondly, they are more useful if you use LEGO stands with your Minimates (as I do). For the bulky boots like Wolverine and Thor have, you can’t really display these figures up on a flat LEGO stand (you have to add an extension so that their foot pegs lie higher than the surrounding ones), so these new boots are a nice change. Paint is applied to the sides and back of his feet to represent the boots, though there is no paint on the front where the boot extension slips up over the leg.

In conclusion, this is a well-known, iconic variation of Wolverine, and deserves a terrific Minimate. Unfortunately, the paint issues on the mask are not what we have come to expect from Minimates. However, this is balanced out to some extent by the paint applications on the rest of his body and the great new pieces used here. On the whole, this is a good Minimate, and one that I like, but a real under-achiever because of that mask.

MMC Score – 7 out of 10

This is the third version of Phoenix that we are seeing in Minimate form. The second version, like Beast, was from the X3 movie, and is now a highly sought-after chase figure. The first version that came out was a comic version, similar to this one, and was a convention exclusive. That version is distinctive from the one currently being reviewed, in that the previous release had a red outfit, and was Dark Phoenix, or Jean Grey possessed by a powerful cosmic force who consumed planets. This version of Phoenix is “Light Phoenix” I guess, or Jean when she was not fully taken over by the Phoenix entity, wearing a more pleasant facial expression and a more serene, green outfit (apologies if I am misrepresenting some detail regarding the Dark Phoenix saga – the comic version I have is in black and white, so it is hard for me to know precisely when she was what color).

The regular face on Phoenix is very nice. She has exaggerated eyelashes and full, pouty lips, suggesting that she is supposed to be quite good looking. I’m not sure if she has a “come hither”, or indifferent and contented look, but it looks great. Her hair seems to be a new sculpt, and is also quite nice, with a lot of detail. The hair looks intentionally tousled as if she had it done for a fashion photo shoot. I personally don’t see how a block figure could possibly look sexy, but if one were to meet this criteria, it would probably be this Phoenix. Since the character she is based on is supposed to be incredibly good looking, this is appropriate.

The Skrull face for Phoenix is menacing of course, with a slight, evil smirk. It is also clearly a girl, which you can tell because of the lips. Similar to Skrull Beast’s face, Skrull Jean has quite a bit of detail here.

Jean’s outfit consists of only three colors: green, black, and shiny gold. The gold works nicely, really helping her to pop when viewed alongside other Minimates. The neck post that you can see is painted black, and shows that Phoenix’s shirt covers her neck. The phoenix design on her upper chest is nice and crisp, painted in that shiny gold, and the rest of the paint application on her chest block is fine. However, her boots are a bit more problematic. On the previous comic Phoenix Minimate, you can clearly tell where the boots end and the pants begin, but here it is less clear, since there is no clear black edge. Plus, on one side the boots are painted higher than on the other side. Then, on the front, both boots come way up to her hips, but on the back, they only reach her knees. I don’t know if this was a mistake, or if it references something from the comic, but it looks a bit odd. Her gloves similarly lack a clear outline, but at least are more uniform. Jean comes with a sash piece that slips over her crotch area that is painted in that shiny gold color.

In conclusion, I think this is a very nice Minimate. The main issue is with the boots which pulls her score down a bit, but despite that, she is still my favorite Jean Grey figure released thus far.

Review and pictures by karamazov80

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