Why I don't POST for long periods of time...

>NOTE:  I have no idea why the post's text isn't white like the others.  If you know why this is, please let me know.

   See there is a legit reason for my disappearing act.  And I hope it won't happen again, but some of it is out of my control.  And that reason?

  I've been in and out of the hospital, trying to not DIE.  

  The sordid tale began like this: In 2009, while working on a game project (Dead To Rights: RETRIBUTION) in England, I experienced an excruciating pain in my left thumb.  All the joints were red, swollen and inflamed.  When I tried to move it, it was crazy painful and functionally useless.  Using a controller to review build updates was a no go.

  I showed it to my friend Kota (a med student at the time) and he brushed it off as a minor sprain, told me to ice it and it would go away in a few days.  I really wish he had been right.  That was in April.

  By summer, I was home and meeting with a Rheumatologist, trying to diagnose what kept happening to me. I was doing labs (despite being needle phobic) and regular examinations. At first it was just a joint or two.  Pain would be rough for a few days, then disappear.  "Rheumatoid Arthritis" he figured.  "That's not so bad", I thought.  

STRIKE ONE.

  A month or so later, it was continuing to get worse.  By this point it was hitting me in about 3 separate joints at a time.  BIG joints.  And it would last for days before cycling to different joints.  These "Flares" would completely make that joint unusable until it passed.  

  So DAY ONE might start out with terrible pain, swelling and inflammation in my left hip.  

  By DAY TWO the hip joint pain would become unbearable, while another joint (say, right knee) would start ramping up.  

  By DAY THREE the hip joint would become less painful (but still hurt like a BITCH), slightly less swollen, and a bit more mobile.  The right knee would be immobile and unbearable. And the left elbow would be ramping up.  

  See a pattern?  This cycle continued to worsen.  So what was it?  "Palindromic Rheumatism" my Doc surmised.  That was bad... Worse than RA.  But surely it couldn't get any worse, right?  

STRIKE TWO.

  Another month or so passed.  I felt like utter shit.  The pain continued.  I felt exhausted.  My limbs had a bit of a tingle going on occasionally.  Like when your foot falls asleep.  More Tests, more exams.

  By this point, I was trying to diagnose this thing on my own.  So I'm cross referencing my symptoms online, and I find a match.  I read all about it.  It's ugly. 

  I get a call from my Rheumatologist... He wants me to come in so that we can discuss his latest diagnosis.  And it's a bad sign when your Doc doesn't want to discuss it over the phone.

  So I go in.  He says something along the lines of "I've got some bad news for you".  He looks uneasy. This is followed by something like "By this point I'm pretty sure I've figured out what's happening to you.  It's difficult to determine solely based on labs as it's a bit of a diagnosis of exclusion."

  "But I'm fairly certain that it's..." 

 I can see the letters spelling out the words in my mind.

  "WEGENER's GRANULOMATOSIS"

  It sucks being right sometimes.  But at least you can somewhat mentally brace yourself when you see it coming.  He proceeds to tell me that WG is a rare Auto Immune condition that falls under the umbrella of ANCA Vasculitis.

  The short version:  Your immune system attacks the blood vessels in your body causing major inflammation in the walls of the veins / arteries.  Think of thickening the walls of a garden hose.  Get's bigger on the outside which makes it constrict on the inside.  This cuts off blood flow to that area.  No blood = no nutrients, no oxygen to those tissues.  If this isn't remedied immediately cellular damage / and tissue death occurs.  This is referred to as an "END ORGAN CONDITION".

  The shorter version:

"We don't know for sure what causes WG.  There is no cure for WG.  If left untreated you WILL DIE".

  There are two treatments for WG. The traditional treatment is CYTOXAN.

  Some (but not all) known side effects are: 

Bone Marrow Suppression / failure

Hair loss

Joint pain (irony!)

Slowed healing

And the REALLY fun ones like:

BLADDER CANCER 

(as well as other cancer risks)

Acute pneumonitis 

(15th leading cause of death in USA)

Progressive pulmonary fibrosis

Cardiotoxicity

Sterility

If that's not a sales pitch, I don't know what is!

  The "newer" treatment is RITUXIMAB. 

Some (but not all) known side effects are: 

Cardiac Arrest (Possible Death)

Cytokine Release Syndrome/Storm (possible death alone or from resulting Pulmonary Edema)

Tumor Lysis Syndrome 

(leading to kidney failure)

Assorted Viral infections

PML-Progressive Multifocal Leukoencephalopathy

(usually fatal)

Immune Toxicity

Pulmonary toxicity

and my favorites

Bowel Obstruction and Perforation

  Of course at the time, the only significant risk they told me about was PML.  Most of the others were not yet known, but one life changing complication that I would become intimately familiar with WAS known (since 2006)... Sadly, nobody made me aware of that risk.  Isn't medicine wonderful?

  I got a second opinion. BOTH treatments can kill you, and doing nothing is GUARANTEED to kill you.

  So I chose Rituximab.  

By late August I was on my way to the ER with a new symptom: agonizing abdominal pain.  They gave me IV morphine for the pain.  It didn't even touch it.  So they gave me IV DILAUDID.  That took away the pain... At least long enough to kick me out the door.

  A few days later I was back.  More of the same.  DILAUDID.  Send you home.

  By my third ER visit I was begging for a CT scan.  And they complied.  But in retrospect I'm certain that nobody looked at it.  If they had, somebody would have noticed a MAJOR problem was underway.

  My forth ER visit was getting ridiculous. I honestly don't remember too much of it.  I was in so much pain that I was pretty out of it. And they were all starting to blur together in my mind. They sent me home again.

Then came September 6th, 2009: The Day the World Went Away.

(continued NEXT POST)

  

The rumors of my DEMISE have been greatly exaggerated...

  I realize that very few people read or have read this blog.

  This is for a lot of reasons (lack of content, YouTube reviews of figures are more entertaining than blogs, and infrequent updates, for starters).

  Well I can fix two out of three.  

  I haven't posted much content, and to try to remedy that I'm going to start blogging again, as well as broadening the range of topics a bit.  

  When it comes to FIGURES, I want to take things beyond just the REVIEWS I've done in the past.  So I may cover figures I'm looking forward to, thoughts on official reveals, my WISHLIST of figures I'll never be able to afford, etc.

  And, I've just begun to try my "hand" (a bit of a back story about what makes this extra challenging NEXT POST) at some limited customizing of my figures.  This is mainly with paint pens at this point, but you have to start somewhere.  I used to be a professional artist (Game Industry) so conceptually have an idea of where to start, but nothing beats practice.  It's just been a ninja bitch since, "the will is strong, but the body is weak" (see NEXT POST).

  The figure I'm starting with is the Marvel Legends ULTRON PRIME Build A Figure (BAF).  That figure has a decent (if inaccurate) sculpt and articulation, but the extremely limited paintwork (a Hasbro trademark by this point) really limits what could be a great figure.  

 They molded the BAF out of a dark grey semi-satin finish plastic, and then gave each part a quick overspray of silver metallic paint that fades out to the plastic underneath.  And they didn't bother putting even that on the back of the figure.  Not a speck of paint back there.  This is either pure laziness or a budget issue at Hasbro.  Either way, it sucks...

 So I plan to post updates for each stage of the customizing, as well as some of the process and thoughts behind what I'm trying to accomplish.

  But what else will make this blog worth checking out?  Well here's what I have in mind:

  Being a former industry monkey and fan, I'm also going to open things up a bit to include GAMES.  This might be as simple as what games I'm playing, looking forward to, tech like AR or VR, or even full reviews.  Money is tight so I might not get my hands on every new game... In fact, I'm a broke bitch... But one thing is for certain: I WILL get my FALLOUT 4 on this year.

MOVIES: I watch a lot of them.  This has a lot to do with my situation.  These may be new, old, coming soon, etc.  I love good SCI FI (especially those with Transhumanist themes) and HORROR best, but also watch DOCUMENTARIES, some ACTION, and always have time for good ANIME.

TV:  Surprisingly, there are a LOT of great shows on these days.  While I only have basic cable (mostly mindless crap and "reality" shows), nearly all the good shows stream full HD episodes directly from their official web sites these days.  Add to that some Netflix, and I'm never lacking for good stuff to watch.  I may even touch on older shows sometime.

MUSIC:  Every month I make a new mix and share it with friends and family.  It's kind of a time capsule.  What's going on in my life, what (mostly) new music came out that month that fits my mood, what I feel nostalgic about... And also I want there to be some kind of musical record of my life during that time, in case I don't make it.  (More on that NEXT POST)

TECH: What emerging tech do I find fascinating?  What future tech could be on the horizon?  How will these things affect us as individuals and how will these leaps impact our cultures, societies and the world as a whole?  I don't have all the answers, but I love thinking about the question.

MISC. GEEKISHNESS:  This is where "everything else" related to GEEK culture goes.  Comic Book stuff, my personal favorite geeks, books I'm trying to read, thought provoking lectures by minds much greater than mine, memes, and things that make me lolololol!

  So all the stuff I just mentioned will hope to address the first problem with my blog.  And that's CONTENT.  I need to have more to talk about than just figure reviews.  With all that, I should have plenty to post about.  But how do I plan to remedy the infrequency of my previous posts?  

  TUNE IN NEXT POST FOR THE ANSWER!

REVIEW: Hasbro AVENGERS Captain America

Released 2012 

Hasbro releases a Cap figure worthy of THE AVENGERS

   I've said it before and I'll say it again: Hasbro has come a long way since taking over the Marvel License from Toy Biz.  This doesn't mean that their figures are perfect though, and many fans still debate which company did Marvel more justice.

From the package to the review

 By 2012, Hasbro had relaunched MARVEL LEGENDS as well as making headway with their Thor and Iron Man (1&2) movie lines.  So by the time that THE AVENGERS hit, they were ready to drop some pretty nice figures to go with it (Why they never released a 6" AVENGERS Black Widow figure is still beyond me, though).  

  Some of these were just figures they had released for Thor and Iron Man 2 with minor revisions, which is disappointing.  These included a "Battle Damaged" repaint of their Iron Man 2 Mark VI (they never released the Mark VII), Nick Fury, their Thor figure with a new helmet-free head sculpt.

Package rear view

  Beyond these cash in's though, came some nice new figures like a Jeremy Renner based Hawkeye, a really impressive Hulk and the Avengers style Captain America figure reviewed here.

SCALE and HEIGHT

Captain America: A bit taller than the average

This figure clocks in at just over 6 inches, making him slightly taller than some of the other Avengers figures.  It fits more closely with Hasbro MARVEL LEGENDS figures than the older Toy Biz figures.  But it's close enough to not really matter.

 I wouldn't recommend it to be used with the larger scale MARVEL SELECT figures since they are in a 7 inch scale.

Sculpt

Likeness FAIL

Hasbro's sculpting team had hit their stride prior to the release of this line and comes up short in only one area: Likeness.  Facially, this figure looks generic, bearing no real resemblance to Chris Evans.  That caught me a bit by surprise considering how DEAD ON their Nick Fury and Hawkeye figures came out.  So if that's important to you, your only real option is moving WAY up the spectrum to either NECA's 18" Inch CAP or a HOT TOYS Cap.  But both of those are in an entirely different league of product.

Good Sculpting overall

  That said, Hasbro's figure is film accurate both proportionally and when it comes to detail (if not, the paint apps).  

Nice Material Detail

Materials are rendered to a fine level of detail and bits like the "A" on his head are sculpted rather than just being stenciled.  Boots feature a nice tread pattern around the edge (though not underneath) and buckles can be found on the boots and the gloves.  Also a nice (if unnecessary, thanks to the lack of a waist joint) touch, is caps belt... which is a separate piece that sits as it's own layer.   This is respectable work and holds up under close examination.

Rear View

  Quality Control here has also improved.  Gone are the chunks of plastic literally RIPPED out of the sculpt by rough removal from the mold.  That problem plagued some of their other figures as recently as Iron Man 2 (2010).  Hasbro was improving their mass market production pipeline, and it showed.  

  

Paint Apps 

  If modern movie based Hasbro figures have a shortcoming, it's their paint apps.  They just aren't up to the spec you see on their MARVEL LEGENDS line.  And this isn't to say that they are let down by sloppy work or poor execution, because that's simply not the case.  

Flat Colors are used without shading or dry brushing :(

  What lets these figures down is a decision on Hasbro's part to save money: they use only flat colors to block out the different areas of the figure.  You simply won't find shading of any kind on this figure...ANYWHERE.  And that's a shame.  

  Another thing you WON'T find is dry brushing, which can be used to great effect when done well.  Whether Hasbro was going for a "squeaky clean" look or just "squeaky cheap", the end result is the same: No love on the dry brushing front.  Unfortunate.  

  The broad strokes of color are pretty good.  Cap is Red, White and Blue where you'd expect him to be and that's a good thing.  

Silver Trim helps break up otherwise dull Paint Apps

And metallic silver accents can be found here and there to add a bit of shimmer to what otherwise is pretty dull.  The "A" painted on his head doesn't line up with the sculpted "A" which kind of sucks, but his "wings" came out better. 

  Application is cleaner than previous Hasbro efforts with paint bleed only found when closely inspecting the figure. And the paint is applied with enough thickness to avoid the plastic underneath coming through.

  The color used for Caps skin looks a bit plastic and his eyes seem to have the bare minimum amount of effort put into them.  They don't have that "white dot" meant to pass for a reflective highlight.  This undermines any sense of "life" in the eyes.

  And finally, his shield is basic but well done, being molded from red, semi-metallic finish plastic, then painted with Blue and Silver where needed.

Articulation   

  If this figure is a bit weak on the Paint Apps, it tries to make up for this with excellent Articulation.  And except for one thing, it succeeds.

Try THAT, Hulk!

This time out, Hasbro's figure includes not only numerous points of articulation, but a very impressive range of motion for each joint.  This really is the key to a well articulated figure, and they seem to get it.

  The one thing keeping Avengers Cap from being a home run here is than damned legacy issue, held over from the Iron Man Movie line.

MISSING IN ACTION: Waist Joint

 AGAIN we have a Hasbro movie based figure with NO WAIST joint.  This is just ludicrous.  Say what you will about it interfering with the beautiful sculpt, but I'll make that trade any day.  It works GREAT on Hasbro's HEROIC AGE Iron Man, and there is no excuse for it to be missing here.  This has got to be a cost cutting measure.  I just can't imagine any other reason for the exclusion of this joint.  Fix this, and you're golden, Hasbro.

Captain POSTURE: Leaning ALL the way back

  Instead you get not an ab crunch but another damned diaphragm pivot joint.  This is the ONLY way to get Cap's shoulders to rotate off axis from the waist.   This joint pulls double duty by accounting for all bending motion. Backward bending is MUCH improved from previous figures, but you can pretty much forget about bending Cap forwards.  Apparently, he is "The Posture King".

Ready to salute

  The head is mounted atop a ball hinge joint, with a really nice Range of Motion.    As you'd expect, his head does rotate left and right as well as supporting looking very far up, if not too far down.

Impressive shoulder joints

His shoulders rotate and raise just like most MARVEL LEGENDS do, but raise up about 15-20 degrees farther than most other figures in this scale.

Not many figures can reach this far back

Biceps swivel nicely and elbows are double jointed, with a range of motion so great that cap can nearly reach the back of his head.  IM-pressive.

  Cleverly hidden at the glove line are wrist swivels, but you won't find ANY ability to flex or extend Cap's wrists (via a pivot).  Normally, this would frustrate me, but since most collectors will attach Ol' Steve's shield to his forearm, this doesn't feel like as much of an issue.  Then again, maybe you'd prefer to run his shield on his back and pop a pistol in his hand ala "The First Avenger"... and in that case, your options are a bit more limited than they need to be.

  Both hands are pre-posed into semi-open positions.  So if you were hoping for trigger hands, you'll need to look elsewhere.

PUNT!

  Hip joints are ball hinges connected at a "T" intersection.  This means the legs are prone to move together, though this can be easily overcome.  His legs can move forward (dorsiflexion) into one hell of a goal kick, so expect a full 90+ degrees of freedom here, and he can even bust the splits sideways.  Hip joints that allow for this should be standard issue on ALL Hasbro Movie and LEGENDS figures moving forward.  Top it off with upper thigh swivels and the possibilities really open up.  Just great stuff.

Joints like this should be standard issue for Hasbro

  Knees are double jointed and collapse all the way down, only being limited by their own dimensions.  And while feet can't be rotated via shin/calf swivel, this is made irrelevant thanks to those upper thigh joints. 

ROCKING out

 I've found rotation to be far less useful than Ankle ROCKERS anyway, which this figure features.  This is Hasbro's NEW Rocker design as well, which has a crazy range of motion.  The only drawback is that they get loose quick.  Already, one of mine is a bit loose, and I *just* took this figure out of the package.  If these ratcheted, it might help.

What this all equates to is a damned impressive figure when it comes to pose-ability, and half the fun of owning a figure is trying out new poses for your display.

Special Features

  Thankfully, Hasbro didn't waste money on stupid "Action Features", preferring to spend their budget on getting the highest quality possible.

Foot Peg Holes lend useful support

  One of those quality features that I always seem to call out are Foot Peg Holes, and FINALLY Hasbro seems to be listening to the fans on this.  With the weak ankle Rockers, having a bit of extra support from the included stand can only help.

Accessories 

  This figure is pretty spartan when it comes to accessories.  He includes two.

Hasbro Modular Stand with AVENGERS branding

  The first is one of Hasbro's modular stands.  Nice to have, but not an outright necessity.

A bit on the small side

  The second is Captain America's Iconic Vibranium Shield.  And I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with it: Not because it's a little on the small side, scale wise.  I can look beyond that.  But it's the STRAPS that are a bit maddening.

Messy Straps

  The idea is great on paper:  Make it so the shield can be worn on either Cap's arm OR on his back.  Sounds good.  But this is accomplished via two long plastic straps that you have wrap into a loop two times (each) if you want to affix the shield to his arm. Since the Straps are plastic, they easily fold over on them selves and get generally mangled when doing this.  It's do-able, but kind of a pain in the ass.

Other versions

To my knowledge, Hasbro produced no Variant of this figure.  Figma is rumored to be producing Avenger's figures, but those are said to be in a different scale.

Size Comparison

A bit taller than Spidey

I've shown Cap next to Hasbro's own Symbiote Spiderman Figure.

Opinion, Value and VERDICT 

My money is on Captain Britain

Hasbro is providing pretty great Value for money with their figures these days.  Since you won't find these at retail anymore, trades or ebay are probably your cheapest path to ownership.  Currently one can be yours in the package for about $20 and that ain't bad.  

Closing thoughts

"When Captain America throws his mighty SHIEEEEEEELD!"

Avenger's fans should be all over this.  

  For more REVIEWS like this one, keep checking back on yer' old pal Evotaph and GEEKISH PURSUITS.  In the meantime, please COMMENT and SUBSCRIBE!

REVIEW: Toy Biz MARVEL LEGENDS "Face Off" Hulk

Released 2006 

Toy Biz SMASHES their earlier efforts with this Incredible HULK figure!

Hulk Airlines

Any collector will tell you, there have been a LOT of Hulk Figures produced since big green saw his debut in May of 1962.  And truth be told, most of those efforts have produced less than stellar results.  But the bulk of these have seen release in recent years as demand for the big guy has steadily grown.

  It's not hard to imagine why the quality of these efforts has been so varied.  While "Huge Green dude" has remained a constant, the DETAILS of the Hulk's design has changed pretty drastically since the 60's.  Part of this is due to the ever evolving skill of the artists involved but an equal amount can probably be attributed to improvements in how toys themselves are made.  We've come a long way.  And by 2002, Toy Biz was going to finally get to take their shot at bringing this beloved character to life via plastic and paint.  Wisely, the Hulk was to be a cornerstone of their brand new MARVEL LEGENDS line of figures... a line that has seen an explosive burst of popularity (amongst comic book fans and collectors at least) in the years since.

CANNONBALL!

  But even Toy Biz had to start somewhere.  And by comparison to their latter day efforts, early Marvel Legends figures still had plenty of room for improvement.  2002 doesn't really feel like that long ago to me, but what a difference four years can make.  That series 1 Hulk was by no means a bad figure, but it wasn't until 2006 that Toy Biz would give us their definitive Hulk Figure as part of their FACE OFF series of two-packs.  And it's that Hulk, that I'm here to review now. 

SCALE and HEIGHT

There's a punchline here about "8 Inches" but I'm leaving it alone.

Face Off Hulk is not the biggest Hulk figure ever produced, but it is one of the bigger figures released in the MARVEL LEGENDS 6 inch scale.  All told, he clocks in at just over 8 inches... enough to make most Legends look small (as they should) by comparison.  He fits in well with Hasbro and Toy Biz MARVEL LEGENDS figures.

 I wouldn't recommend it to be used with the larger scale MARVEL SELECT figures since they are in a 7 inch scale.  You could probably get away with it, but might be better served using the Marvel SELECT Hulk from THE AVENGERS (released 2012).

Sculpt

  In my opinion, the Sculpt is one of this figures greatest strengths.  To be sure, this Hulk is a bit of a time capsule.  Stylistically, he's very much in keeping with the best elements of the Hulk as he appeared in the 1980's.  THIS is the Hulk that reigned alongside the mullet, "The Gipper", BEAT STREET and bandanas wrapped around thighs! It's a very different take on the Hulk than what we see in THE AVENGERS (2012), and that is a good thing (Not that modern Hulk is any less awesome, but I'm all for variety).

A Fantastic Sculpt

 There has been a tendency in other Hulk figures to make them look like EVERY muscle in his entire body is fully flexed at the same time, which is not only impossible, but looks a bit ridiculous.  What I admire here is a sense of realism based restraint in the sculpting.  He still looks massive and powerful, but is not all roid-raged out.  There's almost a look of repose to his physique... the potential for all that power to be released.

Rear view

  You won't find labyrinthine tangles of meaningless (and usually inaccurate) veins or muscles that look like they are about to snap for no reason.  The veins that are there are anatomically accurate and understated.  Hulk's feet are giant (which helps with stability) and his hands are rendered with muscular realism rather than just making his fingers look like fat sausages.

Bob Larkin's classic painting

  And his face... is EPIC, with a wide eyed expression ripped straight from the artwork of Bob Larkin's classic painting (which was used by Marvel's Marketing for years).  Teeth are over-sized, and his hair is messy and disheveled.  The modern Hulk has a much more clean cut hair style and more realistically sized teeth.  More human, less monster.  And I like my monsters.  Face Off Hulk just looks MEANER... scrappier, and more raw.  

The sculpt is otherwise clean.  I didn't spot any messy mold seams or chunks of missing plastic where the figure had been ripped away from the sprues.

  His skin has an almost elephant hide look to parts of it, with well placed wrinkles to seal the deal.  And his pants have an almost burlap feel to them.  This is some quality work, especially when you consider the price point that this figure was released at.

  

Paint Apps 

I know I keep coming back to this, but Toy Biz just seemed to put more "love" into their paint apps than Hasbro does.  For example, you'll find a layer of paint shading over the entire figure along with targeted use of washes to accent certain details.  You just don't see that from Hasbro.

The Face Off Hulk's skin is more of an emerald green than the warm green used for Modern Hulk and shading adds depth to the musculature.  This is more prevalent in the upper torso though, than the ankles and feet.  And fans of the original comics will appreciate Face Off Hulk sporting a snazzy pair of shredded PURPLE pants!  These have been given a wash to deepen the texture, which is a nice effect.

Ready for his close up

A lot of effort has gone into the paint apps used on the head as well.  Rather than just being black, his hair has been given a deep green wash for variety and unlike any other Hulk figure I've seen, the iris's of his eyes POP with an eerie off white color.  It reminds me of the contacts worn by Lou Ferrigno on the old 80's TV show.  Teeth have a brown-yellow wash over them... one more gritty detail unheard of in this era of blinding bleached teeth.

  Paint work overall is thick so none of the underlying plastic color bleeds through, and there are no discernible scuffs to be found.  Edges are crisp and there is no unwanted paint bleed anywhere.  Like the sculpting, the paint apps scream quality.  It's no surprise that this figure is so highly regarded in collectors circles.

Articulation   

  One area where you might expect this figure to fall a bit short is when it comes to the Articulation.  And there you'd be right.  This is not the most articulated figure in the world.  But then, we're not talking spiderman here, so I didn't expect to be able to twist the big guy into Yoga poses.

  It's surprising how many points of articulation the Face Off Hulk actually DOES have.  What undermines his articulation is the range of motion of each individual joint.  So what can you expect from big green?

Now THOSE are some huge Traps

  Well for starters, the head is mounted atop what I can only guess (you can't see it) is a ball-hinge joint.  This allows the Hulkster to look left and right as well as pretty far down... but not up.  That direction is wholly blocked by his massively over-sized trapezius muscle.

Possibly the only outright oversight on the figure is the lack of any kind of torso articulation.  There is no diaphragm pivot joint or ab-crunch to be found here.  I can understand the decision, since including such a joint would detract from the beautiful sculpt... but personally, I'd sacrifice that to get extra articulation.  What perfection this figure would be, with an Ab-crunch and a wider range of motion to existing joints.  So Face Off Hulk 100% cannot bend forward.  Bummer.

Waist Swivel of Justice

  Instead you get a waist swivel joint.  And that's more than Hasbro's Iron Man Figures can say so I'm glad to see it.

  His shoulders rotate and raise just like most MARVEL LEGENDS do, however this is again limited by his massive physique.  This time the limiting factor is purely his bulk.  Still, what's here is serviceable.

Limited Range of Motion

  Biceps swivel as you'd expect.   As for the elbows, those are single jointed and feature less than 90 degrees of play.  It wouldn't be until 2012 when we'd see a Hulk figure with double jointed elbows (Walmart exclusive AVENGERS Hulk).

Hulk SMAS... er, Slap..

  Finishing out the upper body articulation are wrists that swivel and pivot (which is awesome) and hands that feature the tried and true Toy Biz hand articulation.  This isn't on an individual finger basis, but the four fingers  on a hinge paired to a thumb that doesn't move.  Usually, this is a pretty useful set up, but in the case of Face Off Hulk, articulation is sacrificed again on the altar of sculpting.  Fingers are pre-posed into what are basically flat open palms.  These are better for slapping than punching, and folding them into approximations of fists, just doesn't really work.  A noticeable shortcoming in an otherwise excellent figure, and one that pretty seriously limits your options.

About as much motion as you can squeeze out of these joints

  His lower body articulation is similarly limited by his mass.  Hip joints are standard Toy Biz fare... Ball-Hinge joints.  In their default position his legs can be raised to the side and forward (dorsiflexion) albeit by a very limited number of degrees.  This is made a bit less cumbersome by the addition of upper thigh swivels.  Knees are single jointed and suffer the same limited range of motion.

Toy Biz's early ANKLE ROCKER design

Ankles and feet joints were ahead of their time in terms of functionality though the joints themselves aren't as integrated as modern designs.  Each axis of movement sported an independent joint and these worked together towards the over all motion.  His feet don't rotate (the hip swivels allow this by extension) but they do pivot vertically AND support camber adjustment (for that wide heroic stance) via an early ANKLE ROCKER design.  And there are even toe joints.  

  So it's a solid effort overall.  Not groundbreaking, but good enough to meet the expectations most collectors will have of a big ass HULK figure.

Special Features

Unlike modern Hasbro Legends, Toy Biz often rocked a hole in the figure's back that allowed you to get it up into the air with a flight stand.  While some say that Face Off Hulk is too beefy to allow this, Shartimus Prime (look up his excellent reviews on Youtube) proved that this can be done with a little creativity.

Make sure to use a solid flight stand with this

  Of course, when I tried to be cool like him, my (used) flight stand peg snapped off in his back... grounding my dreams of a green airborne meat missile.  So I had to fall back on a heavy duty aftermarket stand to get the big guy aloft.

Toy Biz going the extra mile

  And I have to give it to Toy Biz again for going the extra mile.  Face off Hulk features Foot Peg holes.

Accessories 

  Had I bought this figure new, he would have come with a two-figure flight stand and diorama card to insert into it.  He also would have come with a less than amazing figure of THE LEADER.  But all I was after was the Hulk himself, so I bought him loose via eBay.

Other versions

Open Mouth Variant

  The Face Off Hulk has an open mouth variant (different head sculpt).  The included LEADER figure has an entirely new head as well.  Otherwise, the Variant is identical to the base figure(s).

Size Comparison

Making Spidey look small

  For the sake of continuity I've shown the Hulk here next to Hasbro's Symbiote Black Spiderman.

Next to Hasbro's excellent AVENGERS HULK

As a Bonus, I snapped another shot of Face Off Hulk next to the Walmart exclusive AVENGERS Hulk figure.  Please note that AVENGERS Hulk has a wide default stance making him look slightly shorter, but both figures are actually about the same height.

Opinion, Value and VERDICT 

With the MARVEL SELECT She-Hulk

  This is a harder figure to come by these days.  Be it the superb sculpt, lovingly applied paint apps or decent articulation, it's one of, if not THE best Legends scale Hulk figure going.  Even used (without the LEADER or accessories) this guy can set you back close to $50 on ebay.  A shiny new two-pack runs closer to $80.  So this is not a casual purchase.  But collectors will likely find the Face Off Hulk an irresistible addition to their collection.

  For everybody else though, you could get just as much figure for a lot less money by picking up a Walmart Exclusive AVENGERS HULK figure (review forthcoming).  It's got a great sculpt, and superior articulation, if not the loving paint apps.

Closing thoughts

  Still the best Hulk Figure for your Legends Collection.  Just not the best VALUE.

  For more REVIEWS like this one, keep checking back on yer' old pal Evotaph and GEEKISH PURSUITS.  In the meantime, please COMMENT and SUBSCRIBE!