Marvel Legends 85th Anniversary Astonishing Wolverine review

The Astonishing Wolverine is a rare Marvel Legends figure as it helps complete not one but two teams.

Your mileage may vary in terms of figure quality, but the Astonishing X-Men is just a Colossus and Beast away from completion. And we also get a major member for the New Avengers team that gets more help with the addition of Luke Cage and Iron Fist. And you can also throw in Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers in there too though that team needs a lot of help.

I’ve had the old Toy Biz Astonishing Wolverine for years. He’d held up relatively well enough until the last batch of Marvel Legends. Now he looked ready for retirement. Let’s see if the Hasbro version will be my new definitive version of this attire for Wolverine.

Packaging: This is my first Marvel Legends figure with the streamlined, skinner packaging. The 85th Anniversary color scheme is black and copper with some random tech piping.

On the left side, we get a shot of some Astonishing X-Men artwork from John Cassaday. There’s nothing on the left side, which will make peg checking tough from this side.

Over on the back, we get another glimpse of Cassaday’s artwork with Wolverine coming for us. It’s too bad this packaging ditches any kind of bio or at least the comics fans could check out from this costume’s run. The package insert is fun with various logos from the A-list heroes.

Likeness: This is a pretty solid likeness of Cassaday’s Wolverine. He’s shorter, but wide enough to still look menacing. The head sculpt is superb.

 

The default one has Wolverine with the cowl off showing off an incredible likeness to Cassaday’s artwork. I love the irritated expression that looks like it could go from simmering to boiling over in no time.

Logan’s sideburns have some depth to them as they pop out from his cheeks like actual facial hair would appear. His hair sculpt is also impressive with some strands going counter to the rest of his swept back pattern.

The ML team didn’t shortchange the detail on his costume. There’s seams and sculpted line work for the paneling just like Cassaday drew it. His claws have an impressive length to them as well though I’d still prefer they be locked in than removable.

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Paint: Yellow is a hard color to maintain with basically any other color. It can easily be too light allowing for bleeding through of other colors or the shade is off. Hasbro’s ML team nailed it.

There’s a strong distinction with the line work of the yellow and royal blue.  The only area with a weaker paint app is the small yellow slivers around his shoulder blades, but it’s understandable. The hair on his arms also looks great looking far more intricate than some random lines along his forearms.

Wolverine’s head sculpt is also superb with excellent stubble and clean work with his facial hair.

Scale: Wolverine should be the shortest member of either team. He’ll be looking up at Spider-Man and Iron Man or Cyclops and Colossus. He’s scaled up just fine matching up nicely with his teammates in the New Avengers and Astonishing X-Men.

Articulation: Hasbro has done right by Wolverine’s articulation and the 85th figure takes things to another level.

Wolverine gets the floating upper torso joint, which offers more side-to-side range. He’s also still got the waist hinge allowing for deeper crouches. The butterfly shoulders also aid in straightforward claw slashes and lunges.

This is the most articulated Wolverine figure from Hasbro yet and now of course I’m wondering if I’d buy my 80th Tiger Stripe and Brown & Orange with this setup.

Astonishing Wolverine has:

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

Accessories:  Astonishing X-Men Wolverine has all the accessories he legit needed.

He’s got a set of fists with retracted claws and a pointing left hand and a fingers-spread left hand.

The pointing hand proves to be pretty fun to show more personality for this figure.

It’s nice having some other options than the standard claws retracted or out.

Worth it?  Astonishing Wolverine was the regular price of $24.99. He quickly became a fast-selling item, so I didn’t delay in ordering him. He’s worth the price tag thanks to the accessories and well-engineered articulation.

Rating: 10 out of 10

This necessary Wolverine for a number of teams got an excellent figure making for one of the strongest Logan Marvel Legends yet.

Where to get it?  For now, online is the best route to get Astonishing Wolverine is from Amazon or Entertainment Earth.

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