Marvel Legends: Terrax Wave

This time last week there was panic on the forums of t'interweb that Wave 2 of Marvel Legends wouldn't see release on these shores as orders were being cancelled by Hasbro UK. After a slight panic, it appears that the release has simply been delayed until the summer (possibly due to Americans complaining that the first and second waves appeared in shops on top of each other). From all appearances Marvel Legends is doing okay in toy shops. Indeed at Memorabilia yesterday I overheard countless conversations about the figures.

Getting back to the toys at hand. The first wave of Legends - the 'Terrax' wave - has recently arrived in shops and looks a bit like this -

If only this had been the first wave Hasbro had ever released! If only we hadn't had to suffer the atrocity that was the White Queen figure that single-handedly killed off their initial attempt at making 6" Marvel figures. But the length of time since Legends figures stopped being produced has worked in Hasbro's favour. It means that there has been plenty of time for 'new' versions of the Big Guns to appear in the comics, as this wave shows. Included are Iron Man, Steve Rogers (aka Captain America) and Thor in modern costumes (there's even a more modern one for Iron Man awaiting plastic form).

The sculpts are good, the quality high. The paintwork on Ghost Rider I'm picking out in particular as being excellent. He really looks like he's glowing.

The main issue, however, is one of scale. There seems to be a strange variance across the wave. Thor, for example, is HUGE. Steve Rogers is big too. Iron Man is puny in comparison. Constrictor & Klaw are equally small, whereas Hope & Ghost Rider could be argued to fit in with either of those two groups.

To try and decide who whether it was a case of 'too big' or 'too small', I dug up a selection of older Legends-

It becomes clear that it's Thor and Steve Rogers who are too big and tower over (most of) the older Legends. Here's a comparison of Thor and a previous release-

And Steve standing next to a Marvel Select Black Widow, a lady who's supposed to be 7" in scale-

But besides the scale issue, I'm really happy with the toys and they set a high standard for things going forward. They are far superior to the little 4" Marvel Universe figures, which are always lacking in detail and have dubious paint jobs. Size, it seems, does matter.

I've mentioned before that the artwork on the packaging is fantastic (picture coming soon or, you know, just go into a shop and have a look for yourself), though I do think it was a mistake to leave off any kind of bio for the figures. Sure, it'd be a nightmare trying to fit text on in 6+ different languages, but how many kids know who Klaw is? Or Constrictor? Heck, even I had to look up who the Build A Figure for the wave was: Terrax:

Being 'too big' for a normal carded release, one part for Terrax comes with each of the individual figures. He's equally as great as the other figures in the wave, and unlike some of Hasbro's previous Build A Figures, all the limbs lock securely together. There's no fear of him falling apart.

The glaring problem is with his right hand. The material used for it is soft, rubbery and it's sculpted as partly open so he can't hold his axe very well at all. You can't really get him to hold the axe up without it slipping down.

To finish here's a picture that'll make you cry. Here's Terrax alongside Hulkbuster Iron Man from the Toybiz days of the line. Hulkbuster wasn't a Build A Figure, he came packaged as a regular figure. Oh how things have shrunk...