Marvel Legends Black Panther figure review – Captain America: Civil War
There were so many highlights in Captain America: Civil War it was hard to limit it to my Top 5 favorite. Forced to choose one that would definitely be the arrival of Black Panther to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Hasbro already released a pretty great classic Black Panther figure in the early stages of its commendable turnaround with the Marvel Legends license. And even though I’ve got the Hot Toys version on pre-order my impatience for a movie figure got the best of me. It helps when it looks this good though.
Packaging: If you’ve grabbed a Marvel Legends figure at all in the past two years you know the drill. Wide display window to showcase the figure, side panel drawing and largely inadequate bio.
I like the prominent Captain America: Civil War logo on the front of the package. The blue accents are a lighter, more striking shade that helps it stand out this time.
Likeness: Hasbro probably could have gone the easy route and slapped together a blank body with the movie style head and called it a day. Or simply blame Marvel for not getting the final movie costume designs in to them.
Instead, Hasbro went the other route and made an entirely new body with all of the intricate design elements sculpted. Seeing Panther in action onscreen it’s hard to catch all of the costume detailing so I’m really impressed Hasbro included them.
This isn’t a sculpt Hasbro will be able to reuse until the Black Panther movie. And even then some of the design elements are likely to be changed somewhat.
Scale: Hasbro has tried to keep the scale in line with the movie figures. T’Challa doesn’t seem particularly out of wack scale wise, but I’ll be better able to gauge that when I add more of the movie versions of the MCU characters.
Paint: While most of the outfit is fitting black, there’s silver accent points throughout. It’s very well done and in keeping with the rest of the figure it’s exceptional. It’s just silver, but it requires very precise paint applications. There’s no bleeding or overspray here.
Articulation: Black Panther has the standard Marvel Legends articulation. In his case, I wish I could get better crouching positions, but beyond that, the articulation scheme covers all the poses I envisioned.
Black Panther has:
- neck
- ball-jointed shoulders
- bicep
- elbow
- wrist
- wrist hinge
- torso
- waist
- hip
- thigh
- knee (double-jointed)
- ankle
Accessories: In remaining movie accurate, there wasn’t a lot of options for Black Panther. Rather than just slapping in the Giant Man Build-A-Figure leg Hasbro included an unmasked head sculpt.
While Hasbro’s efforts in nailing Chris Evans’ likeness have been spotty, this is a pretty great take on Chadwick Boseman. It’s got the focused intensity and you don’t want to mess with the king of Wakanda vibe going perfectly.
Worth it? The dedicated sculpt with an alternate head sculpt really makes the regular $20 a great price. Hasbro put some serious effort into this one and this is like getting a DC Icons figure for the Marvel Legend price. Hard to beat that value.
Rating: 10 out of 10
I’m putting together my list for best 6″ figure for the year. Hasbro is filling up a lot of slots already and Black Panther definitely will be in the running.
Where to get it? Black Panther is the most popular figure in this wave with good reason. I’ve seen him in the wild at Wal-Mart, but I’ve heard folks finding him at Toys R Us and Target as well.