SH Figuarts Count Dooku figure review

Count Dooku was easily one of my favorite characters of the prequels. He added a different air to the Sith than a Darth Vader or Maul and getting Christopher Lee to play him was a major coup. The overall storyline shortchanged his role in Revenge of the Sith, but the Clone Wars series does a lot to expand his presence in this pivotal part of the franchise.

When the SH Figuarts Count Dooku was revealed there was zero chance I wasn’t gonna track him down despite being a web exclusive. It wasn’t easy, but he’s finally in my collection. Now let’s see if the good count was worth all the extra effort.

Packaging:  Dooku gets an oversized package, which is weird since he doesn’t necessarily need it like a Chewbacca. The front features a cool image of Dooku throwing out a little Force lightning and a picture of the figure.

Since these aren’t at retail the lack of a window to see the figure isn’t as bad as some other lines, but it still looks a little off for this scale. I like the bookend portrait, which looks cool the more you line these figures up together. The back showcases the accessories and some useful pose possibilities.

Likeness: The default sculpt really captures the aloof nature of Lord Tyrannus and a great likeness to Christopher Lee. The torso piece is heavily segmented to allow for the articulation, which is fine although my biggest issue is the mostly plain area that needed more wrinkles like the rest of the sculpt.

The cape flares out too wide like a superhero cape whereas Dooku’s flowed more like a cloak that draped his shoulders and stayed relatively tight up against him until he moved his arms out. I like the execution of the clasp with the tiny chain, but for some reason Figuarts positioned the inner lining of the cape in an arc around his shoulders when it should be much closer. It throws the whole look off to a degree and looks way sloppier than a classy guy like Dooku would have his outfit.

Scale:  The scaling on this line is impressive. Dooku was tall and at this point in the prequels he was still a fraction taller than Anakin while being decidely taller than Obi-Wan Kenobi. That scale is reflected nicely here.

Paint:  Unlike Han’s brown/blue ESB jacket, I feel like we can all agree Count Dooku wears a brown so dark it comes off like black, right? Hasbro’s upcoming Black Series Dooku definitely has more of that dark chocolate brown.

Figuarts went the other direction and gave us a very brown outfit. It’s jarring to see all this brown together. Figuarts seemed to have a darker attire in its prototype picture and the packaging. It might be worth finding a darker brown paint and giving it a few swipes just to give it a more authentic look.

Articulation:  There’s not a lot you won’t be able to do posing-wise with this guy. Figuarts engineers their body types to tackle all of the essential poses.

Dooku was more of the posturing Sith so standing regally while fighting in his measured Sith attack style with wide sweeping strikes is key. If you wanted to, you could have more dynamic poses specifically the Revenge of the Sith pre-decapitation pose.

Count Dooku has:

• Neck
• Shoulders
• Elbows (double-jointed)
• Wrist
• Waist
• Hips
• Knees (double-jointed)
• Ankles

Accessories:  Dooku comes with a good assortment of accessories. He gets an unlit lightsaber hilt and a lit hilt. Figuarts suggests taking off the blade when placing it in his hand, but I was able to do it without much trouble.

He’s got four pairs of hands with a Force push set, lightsaber holding, fists and Sith lightning hands. They swap out easily enough, which hasn’t always been the case with this line so that was appreciated.

I like the Sith Lightning hands as the lightning effect turned out well.

Bonus: the lightning is made of a soft enough material that I didn’t have to worry about breaking it when I swapped those hands on and off.

He’s got two head sculpts. The extra head is only slightly different as it has the People’s Eyebrow. Dooku wasn’t the most expressive character, but I would have loved a smiling or angry head sculpt as the difference between the two head sculpts is way too subtle.

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Worth It?  At this point it really depends on how crazy a Star Wars fan you are. Dooku is about $110 now, which isn’t as crazy as some of the other exclusives. You can get him cheaper on eBay if you do a quick search as well.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Dooku is adequate, but a darker paint job and better implementation of the cape would have definitely earned him a few more points for me.

Where to Get it? You can actually get Count Dooku from Amazon or you can go the cheaper eBay route.