Star Wars Black Series No 2 Rey & BB-8 (Jakku) The Force Awakens Hasbro Figure

Second up in the new Black Series figures from Hasbro is Rey and droid BB-8 - and here's the read up if you're interested!

Personally, I consider this a 2 pack. I don't really think BB-8 can be considered an accessory, but I'm very glad Hasbro didn't sell him on his own for full price!

Rey comes with her staff as a weapon/accessory

This is a pretty well moulded piece and I like that it has wraps and a strap, but that strap being a very stiff plastic is a pain.

Rey herself isn't great, but she's definitely lacking.

The main issue I have with Rey is the lack of paint. The sculpt of her clothes look brilliant, but no shading? No dirty dry brush look? It's a real shame as I think she's a good looking figure. The boots, clothing, satchel and hair could all do with some colour variation.

But you know what? At least her eyes are painted well

But look at this hard plastic strap!

So frustrating!

So the articulation on Rey is standard Black Series: Her head looks left and right and up (a tiny bit) and down. Shoulders are ball and hinge, single jointed elbows, and articulated wrists. Her waist rotation is well hidden by her belt and it allows her to turn left and right.

Her hips are on a ball peg and the soft rubber robes don't really inhibit the movement. There is upper thigh swivel, single jointed knees, and her ankles rock back and forth, swivel and pivot.

Now onto BB-8!

BB-8 is a great little figure. Really great.

The head is on a peg so can swivel so can move forward, back, left and right... right around the top of the sphere.

He his weighted so stays up always with his head on top which is great and the paint apps are all neat and really make BB-8 look brilliant. Especially the wash that he's been given making him look as though he's been around on the dusty planet of Jakku for a while.

Honestly, BB-8 is pretty much worth the price of admission alone here.

Stay tuned guys, I'll be bringing you more Force Awakens Black Series figures soon!

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Star Wars Black Series No 1 Finn (Jakku) The Force Awakens Figure

Number one in the new Black Series 6" figures is Finn in his Jakku outfit. And firstly, I really like the new slick packaging!

If you're interested, here's the read up on Finn that's on the packaging

Out of the packaging and I'm instantly impressed. Finn comes with a new style of blaster which is in a gold/bronze colour with a silver barrel. A dirty wash has been applied to the blaster which gives it a bit of a worn weathered look.

Finn himself, I think, looks great.

Finn's quite a good likeness to John Boyega so that's a positive! He's wearing a nice brown jacket which is a really good mould with wrinkles and details and has some red paint apps too.

The black sweater underneath the jacket has a good rough material effect, his trousers are plain black for the most part which are wrinkled and there are paint apps at his feet. His boots are a sand colour and this sandy dust look travels a little up past his ankles, making it look as though he's been walking in the sand.

Finn's head looks left and right but can't look up or down sadly. His shoulders can rotate his arms right round and up a little, and down to his body. His jacket is a softer plastic so doesn't really inhibit his arm movement. His elbows are single jointed and his wrists rotate and swivel. He has an ab crunch which can move him forward, but the jacket doesn't let him move back. This ab crunch is in place of any waist articulation.

His hips are on a ball and hinge joint, he has thigh rotation, double jointed knees and ankle rotation, joints and pivots.

I'm impressed so far Hasbro! Stay tuned for more of the new Black Series figures!

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Star Wars Force Friday Midnight Madness Haul Blog The Force Awakens Black Series

I won't often do haul posts, but this felt necessary!

Last night I went to Smyth's Toy Store to attend the Midnight Madness event for Force Friday. A whole ton of new Star Wars toys were released today including Mashers, Black Series, Lego, Micro Machines, die cast models, and much more. For me, the real want were the new 6" Black Series figures.

A friend and I went to the event together and while he sat in the car I kind of accidentally started the queue while making a phone call... And I'm glad I did! Being the first in the queue definitely had it's perks - but I'll get to that.

Firstly let's take a look at the freebies I got at the event!

Firstly, I got this poster (sorry about the terrible picture!):

I also got a small sticker sheet of The Force Awakens characters

And the last free goodies I got were these Lego Star Wars minifigure key rings including Wicket, Imperial Guard, Imperial Gunner, C3-PO and The Emperor!

So like I said, I was glad to be first in the queue because Smyth's got ONE box of the first wave of 6" Black Series figures in, and thankfully I managed to scoop them up straight away! I genuinely feel bad that others missed out but Smyth's should have realised that as it was a midnight launch the majority of people there would be adult collectors - those same collectors should have been catered for.

The only figure from the first wave I didn't buy was Chewie. Like I said in my review of the original Chewbacca, I couldn't justify buying, what is essentially, a different head sculpt.

Stay tuned as I'll be getting reviews and pictures of each of these as soon as I can!

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Star Wars Black Series No 6 Yoda Hasbro Figure

Honestly, I had to wait for this guy to drop in price before I picked him up. I just couldn't justify paying full price for a 2 and half inch figure.

In saying that though, I'm actually really quite surprised with how much I like this figure! Yoda comes with his cane

Which is nicely sculpted to look like withered wood, but it's just the one colour of brown.

Yoda also, thankfully, comes with his wee small lightsaber which can be used with just the hilt or place the blade in it to have it lit.

And as a throwback to the vintage figure, Yoda also comes with a snake!

Yoda is pretty plain looking but the head sculpt is really solid, with wrinkles, hair and facial details all well sculpted. And his eyes are painted well too!

His robe is soft goods, which I know isn't too well liked by many, but for me, it works here.

As for articulation, Yoda's head turns left and right and looks up a tiny bit. The shoulders allow the arms to move up a bit and back and forward. His elbows bend and his wrists rotate.

No waist articulation, hips are on a ball so the legs come forward and back a little, there's thigh rotation, no knee joint, and the ankles turn left and right.

Like I said, I was surprised by how much I liked this figure. I didn't think it looked very good in package, but that's probably because of all the empty space in the box. Next to the other Black Series figures he looks pretty great.

If you can find him cheap, which I think yo should be able to for the next few days while The Force Awakens figures take over.

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Star Wars Black Series No 14 Clone Commander Cody Hasbro 6" Figure

I completely forgot to photograph this guy in his packaging, so thank you Dorkside Toys for the image!

So we're going to be looking at the last of the clones that have been released in the Black Series - Commander Cody. For me, this guy was highly anticipated for 2 reasons: 1st - this is a great looking character design and I was excited to see him brought to the Black Series; and 2nd - this hopefully means that my favourite clone will be brought to the Black Series: Captain Rex!

Cody comes with 2 weapons, and, unsurprisingly, they are exactly the same guns that we've seen with the other 3 clones.

I'll quickly run down the articulation on Cody first. His head is on a ball and hinge and he can look up and down a decent amount and his head fully rotates. His shoulders are also on a ball and hinge but the shoulder armour hinders the arm from moving up, his arms still rotate right round. He has bicep swivel, double jointed elbows, and hinge and rotation at the wrist.

The ab rotation takes the place of any waist rotation - this ab articulation does not really let Cody lean forward or back but this is mostly due to the armour/belt. His hips are on a ball and hinge but again, the armour doesn't let the legs move too far forward, back or out, but it does still work. Cody has double jointed knees, hinged and rocker ankles.

So Cody's body is the same as the other clones, the differences are the colours, the shoulder armour, the back armour piece and, of course, the helmet.

The weathered look to the mustard paint on Cody's torso and left thigh looks great, as does the grey on his arms. The antennae on Cody's helmet and shoulder are all a softer plastic meaning you shouldn't need to worry about them breaking. The visor on his helmet looks great too, and has a neat white line up and over it.

There are a few parts which also has a nice gold paint applied to them. There's a band on his right arm, 2 belt pouches and a strip on his back pack.

This guy, so far is easily my favourite clone so far, but I stand by what I said - if Captain Rex makes an appearance I don't doubt he'll take that title.

We're getting even closer to Force Friday! Anyone else hitting up any midnight openings? I'll be trying for sure!

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Star Wars Black Series No 4 Chewbacca Hasbro Figure

Time to check out Han's best pal, Chewbacca! You may have noticed the numbering of the Black Series is all over the place - this is because Hasbro changed the packaging from black and orange to black and light blue. It's changing again for the new figures released on Friday. Because Hasbro.

Chewie comes with his bowcaster that requires a little assembly straight out of the box.

It's just a peg that clips the two parts together, and once it's together it's a good looking weapon with a silver dry brush giving it a metallic, realistic look.

Chewbacca is a big figure with really well sculpted fur detail all over. The paint apps on Chewie are all pretty good. The fur is pretty screen accurate with a mostly brown colour with dark lowlights throughout. His fingers and toes are grey, his eyes are relatively well painted and his teeth and nose have separate paint apps.

His satchel is very well painted and sculpted. It's removable but it leaves a flat line on his shoulder where the strap sits so I'd recommend leaving it there.

Chewie's articulation is quite well hidden by his fur but that same fur can also be a little inhibitive.

His head pretty much only looks forward but you can make it look left and right a little. His shoulders are on a ball and hinge joint, the elbows bend and rotate, and his hands hinge back and forth and also rotate.

Chewie has an ab rotation and waist rotation, the hips move out, forward and back, there's thigh rotation, single jointed knee and knee swivel, and his ankles pivot side to side and rotate up and down, but the fur here hinders this movement.

There's a new Chewbacca figure coming out with this first wave of new The Force Awakens figures released on Friday, but as far as I can tell the only thing that makes that figure different to this one, is that the new Chewie doesn't have an open screaming mouth.

I won't be picking that figure up, no point for me, but I'll try and get the rest!

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