Hasbro (Return of) Marvel Legends Wave 3 Packaged Pics

When I wrote my Best Week Ever / Good Toy Karma post (reply to that post for a chance to win Free Stuff!) I was pretty excited to get my Pile of Loot from Big Bad Toy Store with RoML wave 3. Now, what Hasbro told us at SDCC was that this wave is actually a filler wave – they had only planned 2 waves in 2012 to relaunch the line, but because those got bunched up at the start of the year and because sales on those waves were good enough, they put together this third wave. And so that means there’s a heck of a lot of reuse and no build-a-figure – instead you’ll get the stand that was included with the 6-inch Wal-Mart exclusive Avengers, minus the Avengers logo.

Even so, I think this wave will be warmly received. It’s still carrying the positive buzz from the relaunch, and the reuse that’s here is done pretty well. Packaged pics only right now, but I’ll give some comments for each figure despite not having them open yet.

Hasbro anchors the line with USAgent and Iron Man in his neo-classic armor, and leverages some Avengers buzz, which came back to theaters over Labor Day weekend. Sure, it’s not Steve Rogers, but casual fans won’t care. USAgent is on the Bucky Cap buck (bucky buck?) and as such will be a fine figure, although some may question if John Walker deserves a little bit of a bigger build. I don’t think I’ll mind.

Iron Man is a holdover from the 6-inch Iron Man Classics line. So while the sculpt is completely new and nice looking, compared to many of your Legends figures he will stand a little less tall. Judging from the sides of the package, it looks like Iron Man would come up to USAgent’s eyebrows.

With Deadpool and Dr. Doom, you’ve got two straight-up re-releases. Luckily, the originals, Deadpool from the ML 2-packs and Dr. Doom from Fantastic Four Classics, are both pretty good figures in their own rights. Deadpool is in his X-Force costume, so that is a nice addition to the Uncanny X-Force 3-pack exclusive from San Diego Comic-Con. Sure, the harness is not the one he actually wears in Uncanny X-Force, but I’ll live. The only change for the good doctor from his FFC release is an updated paint job that is supposed to pop more, as the original was done with plastic in the desired colors and little paint, resulting in somewhat of a flat appearance. I’ll need to dig my Doom out, but right now it’s tough to tell.

Incidentally, even though these two have just one look showing in their package art, they’re both planned for a running change. Deadpool will get his red and black suit for those who missed out on the 2-packs. And Doom will get his white Future Foundation look, connecting nicely with the FF Spider-Man variant from earlier in the year.

Punisher and Mystique will both have running changes to different characters, with Blade and Danielle Moonstar subbing in. Punisher has been fairly well-received from what I can tell from the boards. Just goes to show you how far a better-tooled head and some paint will go. I am pretty sure if the Punisher from the Nemesis wave would have been beloved if that head weren’t so pinched and pallid. The new version has that nice head sculpt, which turned out decent in production, as well as some parts swapping with the Ultimate Nick Fury (the jacket and arms). I like a trenchless Punisher, though, so maybe some part-swapping of my own is in order.

Mystique has got even more blatant re-use, featuring the Black Widow body with the Madame Hydra head. Looking closely at Mystique’s head, the angular features that were so apparent with Madame Hydra don’t look as jarring with the blue skin. I wonder if there was another head molded, because this one definitely doesn’t have the misshapen look to it. In any case, I will probably be swapping out that head soon anyways.