Happy Force Friday II!

September 1st, 2017, Force Friday II...or Christmas Day for many Star Wars collectors. Since I don't follow Star Wars toys as much as some, I only became familiar with this day a few days ago. Out of curiousity I did go to Target's website to see which stores around me would be participating in the Midnight launch. I wasn't planning on going, but I was curious. 1 store out of maybe 10 or so in my area was participating.

I strolled into my local Target near the house Friday morning (I really went there to buy a gift card for one of my employees) and when I walked down the toy aisle w/ Star Wars I was met by several adult men shopping the section. There was even a woman that had her husband on Facetime and she was holding the phone up to the different figures on the pegs. What a good wife!

Since images of these toys had made it's way to the internet prior to Force Friday, I had an idea of what to expect on store shelves today, but I do have to say it was nice getting to see these in person. I ended up grabbing a First Order Stormtrooper.

I love the new packaging. The red Star Wars logo really pops on the white blister card backing. Very prominent with the packging is the new gimmick, Force Link. I saw this bracelet type thing ($30?!) today, but it didn't seem like anyone was buying it as the pegs were still full. 

The back of the packaging really doesn't tell you much anything about the character, just an advertisement of how the Force Link gimmick works. Boring. I don't know who some of some of these new characters are so I was hoping to read something about them on the packaging.

After I got home and I was looking at the figure more carefully it dawned on me that this is the exact same figure from The Force Awakens...sans one gun.

I grabbed the one loose Stormtrooper I have from the previous movie and sure enough my hunch was right. Minus the oversized blaster that The Force Awakens version came with, this is the same figure. Even his blaster is the same. At least the extra gun included is regular sized and not that large gun the figure couldn't hold all that well.

I'm not a MOC collector, but dang I'm tempted to not even bother opening this figure now. I already have a loose specimen and besides, the packaging is oh so nice.

Speaking of the packaging, look how much smaller the new cards are as compared to even then the Rogue One releases. The packaging is shorter and not quite as wide as the previous Star Wars toys. I'm sure the Star Wars hoarders will be happy to know that Hasbro has reduced the packaging size so they can fit more toys in their storage unit.

Since the figure is basically the same, I'm not going to bother to open this one...at least for now. However I did review the First Order Stormtrooper from The Force Awakens so take a look at that post if you're curious about the figure itself.

Thanks for dropping by. Stay tuned as there might be more Star Wars posts coming in the near future.

Star Wars The Force Awakens: First Order Stormtrooper

So today, Friday, September 4, 2015 is Force Friday. The day that Hasbro and other companies unleash a plethora of new Star Wars toys and memorabilia upon the masses. Not being a huge Star Wars fan I barely knew this day even existed. Thanks to my news feed on Facebook however I was informed of the big day many fans had been waiting on...and the disappointment that a lot of people were going through.

I usually work from home on Fridays, or at least that is the plan. Today was one of those rare days that at least my day started off how I planned. I took my youngest daughter to Bojangles for a biscuit, then dropped her off at school. There is a Target just down the road and I wasn't quite ready to go home and delve into my laptop for work. A few moments later I found myself in Target.

It was around 8:30 AM so there wasn't a crowd or anything...kind of refreshing. I headed over to the toy department as I usually do and proceeded down the Transformers aisle. I noticed the figures had been moved again and this time there was new product on the pegs! Found the whole Combiner Wars wave of Protectobots, even Hot Spot. Make that a first.

Then I went over one aisle and noticed Star Wars had been given one whole side of the aisle! I saw action figures, vehicles, Revell model kits and Micro Machines? Yep, Hasbro was dusting off the old Micro Machines brand name again. I even saw transforming playsets that hearkened back to the 90's. I casually looked through the Force Awakens 3 3/4" figures and saw some pretty nice looking figures. Darth Vader, a few different types of Stormtroopers, some dude that reminded me of Darth Raven and a whole bunch of other characters that I wasn't familiar with. I'm not a Star Wars collector, but I can appreciate toys from just about any brand or license. I stood there looking at them all thinking I'd pick up one just for fun. About the this time more and more people (i.e. adult males) started converging on the aisle. I knew I needed to make a decision and quick so I grabbed one of the troop builder characters.

Most of the figures available had at least two left on the pegs. I have no idea if this store opened at midnight and sold a lot of their stock earlier, or even what the case assortment for these figures are. I've always liked the look of the average Stormtrooper so I walked out with a First Order Stormtrooper.

Equipped with sleek armor and powerful weapons, the Stormtroopers enforce the will of the First Order.

One of the first things I noticed was the multi-lingual packaging. From a business cost perspective I get it. It makes sense. However I'm just not used to seeing 4 different languages on my toy packaging. The back doesn't really give you much information on the character other than the one sentence from above. There are 2 other figures in this "subset", Rev (Starkiller Base) and Darth Vader. Each of these figures comes with a weapon that can combine with each other (3 pieces total) to form a larger weapon. For me this is just a marketing ploy to get you to buy a figure you don't really want just for the piece. 

I do have to say that Hasbro has done a great job with the artwork used for the packaging. Both the figures and the various vehicles looked beautiful sitting there on the retail shelves.

  

I don't have any other Stormtrooper figures from the other movies so I can't really compare him against other versions of the popular troop builder, but the figures seems familiar. It seems to have that classic design while yet sporting a new, updated helmet. Even his pistol seems to be the same as from before, just with some white paint apps. 

The figure has 5 points of articulation. Legs, arms and head. This is your basic action figure build. I'm fine with it. For me the more articulation means more loose joints down the road. I can't strike my figures in eye capturing dynamic poses anyhow so I'm fine with the square crotch, stiff articulated figure.

I do find it a little odd / funny that his included combiner weapon is nearly the size of the figure itself! The gun has a nice look and the blue paint apps are a very much welcomed addition. I guess once combined with the other 2 weapons the gun doesn't look so big. He is able to wield the gun in his right hand, but it makes him top heavy so don't expect to display him holding this gun without some sort of figure stand or other support.

Overall this is a pretty cool figure. The hardcore Star Wars fans may have more positive (or negative?) things to say, but for this casual fan I like it. I'm not jumping head first into buying The Force Awakens toys by any means, but don't be surprised if you see a few more of the First Order figures appear on this blog at some point or another.