Marvel Legends Firelord review

With the arrival of the HasLab Galactus, Hasbro timed its latest Retro Fantastic Four carded figure Firelord perfectly. Another in a lenthy list of former Galactus heralds, Firelord is one of the more formidable and popular thanks to his classic look and simple to comprehend power.

Firelord has been on my short list of Galactus heralds ironically for being the first person Jean Grey fought when she became Phoenix in X-Men. My first exposure to Firelord was not in Silver Surfer or Fantastic Four, but Uncanny X-Men so I’m probably looking forward to having him fight Phoenix more than anything else.

It’s time to see if this Firelord figure sparks or if he’s just gonna fizzle out on me.

Package: Firelord sports the vintage reproduction of the old Fantastic Four line. It features the logo from the original package with the team on the Fantasticar and a dark blue fading into a lighter blue. I really like the yellow with red drop shadow logo and the action shot of Firelord ready for battle.

His bio is unspectacular, but fine. I wish Hasbro included the other FF figures as a cross sell homage.

Likeness:  Firelord looks terrific. His head sculpt is perfect with the translucent flame material and stern expression. He really doesn’t look like someone you’d want to cross as he does not come off like someone remotely interested in playing games or wasting his time.

The rest of the figure’s detailed work is left up to the paintwork.

I don’t necessarily hate that although it does tend to make him look somewhat plain with no sculpted details for his top and shorts in particular.

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Scale:  Hasbro opted to go with the Sunfire buck for Firelord.

That makes sense on one hand as it has the butterfly shoulders that would be very useful for a character like Firelord, but it’s somewhat undersized for a character who’s been drawn as massive as Thor and Hercules.

It’s one of those deals where Firelord was as big as whoever drew him so he could be Thor size in one comic and then average size in another. For example, Firelord didn’t look that massive in fighting Phoenix.

Still, in figure form, he looks noticeably puny next to Thor and Hercules. Considering his semi-frequent team-ups with Thor, he’s gonna come up way too short. He fares better next to Silver Surfer, Super Skrull and Quasar.

Paint: Firelord has all the tricky colors to paint with orange, red, yellow and white. Fortunately, there weren’t any issues with bleeds or oversprays.

This figure has a remarkable sharp paintjob considering the lighter colors that don’t always offer the best coverage with one of two paint applications.

I was most impressed with how the paint took around his eyes with the darker reds helping to showcase the eyes stronger.

Articulation:  The great thing about the Sunfire mold is that it is a very fluid buck allowing for some smooth posing. There’s not a lot that’s out of range for it and you can hit some truly dynamic poses with it.

That’s ideal for a character like Firelord, who’s big on distance attacks and needs to look cool holding and channeling his Power Cosmic.

Firelord has:

• neck
• ball-jointed shoulders
• butterfly shoulders
• bicep
• elbow (double-jointed)
• wrist
• wrist hinge
• torso
• waist
• hip
• thigh
• knee (double-jointed)
• ankle

Accessories:  Firelord comes with his most obvious accessory – his flaming Cosmic Staff. It’s made of translucent material, which is perfect for catching light.

He’s also got gripping hands to actually hold the staff. Flying hands also would have been nice for him since there’s not a lot of other accessory options to justify this price point.

Worth it?  Firelord is typically $25. Thankfully, I waited out the Hasbro Pulse sale to get him for a far more reasonable 25% off.

Hasbro is in a tough spot as their figures aren’t worth $25 for this license and it’s more a matter of waiting out sales rather than jumping right when new releases come out.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

Firelord’s smaller scale is the biggest knock on an otherwise excellent version of one of the more popular ex-heralds of Galactus.

Where to get it? Online is the best route for Firelord. Amazon and Entertainment Earth are probably the easiest options.

As an Amazon Associate and Entertainment Earth affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases.