WWE Ultimate Edition Dusty Rhodes action figure review (2024)

The ‘Common Man’ era should have been a wrap for Dusty Rhodes in terms of being taken seriously. Vince McMahon thought he was having a good laugh at the expense of The American Dream, but he underestimated Dusty’s unshakeable charisma and ability to connect with fans.

Mattel has already made a polka dots version of Dusty Rhodes for the Elite collection, but having the chance to get an Ultimate Edition version complete with butterfly shoulders for even more effective Bionic Elbows and a cheap price was too good a deal to pass up.

Let’s see if the most articulated version yet of Dusty Rhodes delivers the (polka dot) a dream-like figure or if it’s just a nightmare.

Package: Like the Walmart exclusive Monday Night Wars line, the Target UE Legends color scheme is flipped with a mostly red with white accents setup.

The side features a happy, smiling Dusty Rhodes as if he’s getting the crowd hyped up. It’s a great portrait of The Common Man.

As usual, the back shines with a terrific pose of The Dream rocking all of his accessories. The reference photo is also solid showing Dusty Rhodes ready to load up the Bionic Elbow.

Mattel’s bios have little competition, and this Dusty Rhodes bio show why they’re the best in the game. Check the reference to Dusty’s feud with Big Boss Man.

Likeness: Since Dusty Rhodes has a very unique physique compared to the modern super muscular stars in the WWE today, Mattel crafted a new mold for The Dream.

Previous Dusty figures have been pretty good about getting his physique down, but I was worried how the higher articulation would impact the sculpt, but the additional torso joint doesn’t make him look overly segmented.

The legs seem to be carryovers from Elite Dusty figures, which were fine since he didn’t suffer from bird legs like some thicker wrestlers like the first Greg ‘The Hammer’ Valentine figure.

Scale: Dusty Rhodes was 6’2” making him noticeably shorter than his rival the 6’7″ Big Boss Man and a bit taller than the 6’1″ Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase and Macho King Randy Savage. His scale is fairly decent since the Big Boss Man figure is too short.

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Paint: Dusty Rhodes has that peroxide blonde that Mattel is always 50/50 on making look good. It turned out solid for The Dream. I remain impressed that Mattel has put in that extra level of paint apps for his birthmark on his stomach.

The polka dot applications are clean on his tights. I’m doubly surprised the design team remembered that both kneepads weren’t uniform and the five dots weren’t in the same pattern.

Articulation: Dusty Rhodes never had an extensive move set. He was much more of a punching and elbow tossing brawler. Dusty would pop off a strong lariat, head butt, stomps, fist drops, piledriver and a running elbow drop.

 

Thanks to the butterfly shoulder articulation, he can apply a much better looking Weaverlock. With the drop-down hips, Dusty can apply a cleaner figure four.

Ultimate Edition Dusty Rhodes has:

• neck
• bicep
• ball-jointed shoulders
• butterfly shoulder
• elbows (double-jointed)
• wrists
• waist
• hips
• thighs
• knees (double-jointed)
• ankles
• feet

Accessories: Ultimate Edition figures are loaded with a bunch of accessories, which helps in providing a definitive WWF Dusty Rhodes.

First up is his polka dot tank top shirt. This is a solid fit and I appreciate that it doesn’t have Velcro.

He also gets three additional sets of hands — fists, open palms and pointing index fingers.

During his feud with the Big Boss Man, he nabbed his cop hat and baton.

For his classic look, he’s also got his headband.

Finally, there are two more head sculpts. One features a pretty cool expression, which could be interpreted as Dream sucking wind and trying to catch his breath or getting worked up and ready to go on offense.

The second one is a wilder, slightly deranged or happy portrait. I can’t tell what the intended expression was, but I probably won’t ever use it beyond the sake of this review.

Worth it?  I got Dusty Rhodes for less than $20 price tag, which is a great value for an Ultimate Edition figure.

Rating: 9.5 out of 10

Dusty Rhodes ended up having a fun 90s run in the WWF and that’s reflected well with this figure. With the mold in place, hopefully we get an NWA version with different expressions and hairstyles.

Where to Get It?  Dusty Rhodes is sold out at Target, but you can still get Elite versions over at Amazon.

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