Luke X-wing... nice try, but no banana

**JediTricks** · 01-20-2006

Here's what I posted about the figure on a Transformers forum:

Some hits, a lot of misses though. Sculptors had a lot of opportunity to do something better, like taper the canopy and fuselage at the top so it gives the impression of sleekness, but instead they went for chibbi fat silliness, like the Playskool Jedi Force version in a smaller size. And don't get me started on the rear half of the fuselage being too short or the nose being stubby or the underside being the bot's legs and chest, with a lightsaber poorly clipped underneath getting in the way of the movable front landing foot. Locking the s-foils closed wouldn't happen till I figured out the trick of moving the upper wing out a little, now they lock nicely but still have oversized cannons on the end (the missile gimmick doesn't work at all, and the cannons don't want to stay aligned thanks to weak design and crappy packaging, plus the pop out easily). S-foils open but don't lock, though open they do look good (the ship itself looks good from the front). Transformation has a few ok ideas like the head chest, the hips, and the arms hiding, but there's so much kibble to deal with that kills it. Bot mode is dopey, a big orange mess with narrow legs and wide wing-shoulders, plus a lot of backpack kibble. The shoulders in the instructions are supposed to rotate up but there's a large stop sculpted there which makes 'em pop out and stress the peg, with this range of motion removed the figure can't do half as much with his tiny arms as he should (especially because they're fairly well articulated) such as up above straight in front of him. The instructions and prototype photos show the feet rotated around so the nosecone becomes "shoes", but I think this is not the intention of the designers as the front landing gear gets in the way all the time and there's very little of a heel spur, more likely the ankle shouldn't have been rotated and the fold-out panel is actually the toes, this allows the landing gear to get totally out of the way and gives much better heel stability. Finally, the bot mode cockpit is screwy, the chair is sculpted waaaay too small for the figure in height and the width isn't enough to hold him either, so it's just an empty box to rattle around for the Luke pilot minifig. The Luke minifig is rubbery to the point where I fear his arms may come off from sticking during articulation, but he actually has a recognizable face sculpt so there's something gained. Overall, a few better choices in sculpting the fuselage, better use of the kibble, and this might have been good, but as it is it's easily the weakest of the starfighters so far.

Honestly, I don't get why the minifig is rubbery when Vader & Obi-Wan weren't, I don't get why they bothered with the silly helmet (which, btw, isn't removable and the lens is barely translucent), and there's just so much that "could have been". I'm not totally disappointed, and I forgot to mention that there is some ok paint work, but basically I feel like they should have tried to do a little better here since it's such an important ship in the SW universe.

**starwarsfan1** · 01-21-2006

I think it was ok. I just found it yesterday at Target. It looks good next to all of the others. the one that I think was the worst of the four was Grievous. It cant stand up, the lightsabers dont stay in his hands, and its the biggest pain in the a** to transform him back to vehicle from bot mode.

**El Chuxter** · 01-21-2006

JT, I still don't care at all about this figure, but that has got to be the "Subject of the Day"!

**Kidhuman** · 01-21-2006

Damn, I put this one on lay-a-way for some reason, the more I look at it the more I hate it. I need to find the Vader one.

**Jayspawn** · 01-21-2006

All the SW Transformers are crap! They are warming the pegs at my stores!

**JediTricks** · 01-22-2006

Thanks Chux... I think.

Jayspawn, do you post on every SW:TF thread even though you have nothing to add beyond how much you don't like the line?

They're not pegwarming here, even Greivous sells after a few days, it's actually quite hard to find 'em around here so far.

The consensus seems to be with SWfan, that Grievous is worse than this figure (which I've long suspected and is why I still don't own Grievous). KH, I would not say I hate this figure, but Obi-Wan and Vader are better than it. If I were in your shoes... well, I still would have bought Luke, but I would have bought the others too... ok, I'm not good at putting myself in your shoes.