Nomadscout’s Collection Part XIII

Now is the time on Sprockets when we dance while looking at more of my collection...

Previous parts can be found here if you missed them or are interested in looking again:
PART I: CIS Droids
PART II: CIS Factions and Leadership
PART III: Naboo
PART IV: Coruscant
PART V: Clone Troopers (Phase I)
PART VI: Jedi
PART VII: Clone Troopers (Phase II)
PART VIII: GAR Vehicles
PART IX: Republic Navy
PART X: Jedi Starfighters
PART XI: Kashyyyk and Utapau
PART XII: Solo

Rogue One was rather warmly received by most fans. It was a year after Disney's first foray, The Force Awakens, which was full of controversy for various reasons. That controversy was multiplied 10-fold the following year when The Last Jedi came out, but the annual release schedule hadn't set in yet - something that very much negatively impacted Solo's reception following TLJ.

Rogue One was well-liked because it brought us back to the OT era, literally leading up to the moments before Episode IV. The characters, while disposable, were enjoyable enough, as were the costume, planet, and vehicle designs.

But collectors had a major problem. In 2017, the majority of figures from Hasbro in the 3.75" line were of the 5POA variety, and while the vehicles could generally be decent, many lacked the details that made them more collector-friendly. The Rogue One packaged line also was infamous for introducing the Nerf cross-over feature. Large, brightly colored Nerf missiles were housed by laughably large launchers that destroyed the aesthetic of their respective vehicles. And just to muddy the waters even more, a slew of Rebels figures and toys - which maintained the animated styling, was mixed in to line, despite the package art being from Rogue One.

Meanwhile, the collector-focused line was reduced to a mere trickle of releases in the dreaded "Black Series" packaging, and was relegated to be exclusive, in its entirety, to Walmart. The line was at its nadir then, and Hasbro could only muster 4 figures in support of Rogue One by late 2016/early 2017. It wasn't until over two years later in 2019 that the next newly tooled figure sourced to Rogue One was released in the resurrected TVC, which was VC140 Stormtrooper.

So while collector-friendly figures and toys for Rogue One got the short end of the stick, if you sprinkled in some of the 5POA figures that were never made in TVC, and also repurposed some of your OT vehicles and figures, you could amass a decent amount of display material in support of the film.

One thing that separated this movie from previous releases is that the story jumped around frequently from location to location, and also jumped the timeline a bit. The closest thing to that point was the Order 66 montage in Revenge of the Sith. As such, not every scene has meaningful representation - or any at all.

From the top, the planet Lah'mu, where Galen Erso and his family are in hiding, we have nothing except for the Death Troopers. There's probably not much collector support for the Erso family at this stage in the timeline, but a younger Krennic with his poncho might have some appeal. I also dig the little droid that is out in the fields when Krennic's shuttle approaches. The shuttle would be cool, but I suspect there's more interest in an updated Lambda class shuttle (I'm not a big supporter of that, myself).

We then see Wobani, where an adult Jyn Erso is serving time. She is wearing her main outfit. Her cellmate is an interesting looking alien of the Blutopian species, while stormtroopers guard the prison. A quick jump to the Ring of Kafrene, and we see Cassian Andor collecting information from a spy named Kivik. We have neither of these figures. Another quick jump is to Jedha, where we meet Saw's partisan's for the first time, along with the Imperial Pilot defector, Bodhi Rook. We have Bodhi, Edrio Two Tubes, and the rather large Moroff in 5POA form only. We then return to Wobani where the Rebels undertake a rescue mission of Jyn. We have the "Clone Turbo Tank" (at least in its Clone Wars load out), along with Jyn, stormtroopers, and K-2SO. However, we don't have Sergeant Melshi (who is more important now that we have some backstory from Andor), nor any of other members of Extraction Team Bravo. To be fair, most of this isn't high on the list of items collectors are asking for, but I think we deserve a Melshi, and I dig the Blutopian alien design.

After all that, we start to get into the meat of the story, spending time on Yavin IV. Here we meet some familiar characters, and a few new ones. General Antoc Merrick is in our collections, along with his astromech, R2-SHW. But here you can throw in figures from your OT collections, as this version of the Yavin base is essentially the same one that appears a mere few days later in ANH. We have pilots you could use for the background, along with various Rebel technicians, guards, and soldiers. You could use any of your previously owned X-Wings or Y-Wings from Red Squadron (more on that later) for the hanger scenes, along with the little transport vehicle.

If you want to get creative, you can also use your General Jan Dodonna figure from 2004, which is kind of terrible at this point, but it's all we have - even though it's a different actor (Ser Barristan Selmy from GoT). And if you want to stretch accuracy, you could use your (also terrible) ROTJ Mon Mothma from POTF2. Otherwise, we don't have any of the other rebel leaders or senators at the base - with the exception of Bail Organa in a new outfit. And we are introduced to General Draven, who really should have his own figure.

We are introduced to the U-Wing for the first time. Hasbro gave us a simplified and undersized U-Wing, which contains the nonsense nerf-launching feature. This release probably doesn't satisfy many collectors, mainly because of it's size and design, it has no cargo area, so you can't load the team in the body of the ship, nor can you have a gunner blasting his gun out the side. The U-Wing often comes up on collector wish lists. I fully agree that the existing ship is very sub-par, but I'm not sure I want a new one at this point. It would be huge, and entirely too..."wingy". It would take up a lot of space and not be "shelf-installable" like the sail barge. It would only hold a few figures, so I'm not sure it's a good use of space.

We return to Jedha, where we meet Saw Gerrera (after a younger cameo in the opening scene) and more of his partisans. We have Saw in 5POA form, and it's a cool looking figure, but this is one of my top wants in TVC, especially now that Saw seems to be everywhere in the pre-ANH timeline. A quick cut to a Star Destroyer bridge, where we see the Death Star nearing completion, and see Krennic as he meets with Tarkin. The CGI character is meant to be identical his appearance a few days later in ANH. Every collector knows that the existing TVC Tarkin is terrible, so a new one is needed. It can serve in your Rogue One dioramas as well as ANH. Jyn then has a flashback to her youth on Coruscant, where we see an even younger version of her parents, as well as Krennic. All of it probably get a "pass" by collectors.

And finally we return to Jedha for some major action. But first a quick view of "Bor Gullet", the weird tentacled blob that can read minds. This is the closest thing to a "beast" in the film, and clearly Hasbro had no interest. That might mirror the feelings of collectors, but a small part of me would kind of like to see it someday. So then we go to the streets of Jedha City, and eventually the Partisan attack on the Imperial Convoy. Throughout this entire sequence we meet tons of options for background characters. I know Chris is enthralled by the Decraniated, and would love to see a figure made. An easter egg is that we see Dr. Evezan and Ponda Baba in the streets, so here's another opportunity to bust out your OT figures. There's an AT-ST patrolling in the distance, so add that as well. We meet Chirrut Îmwe (great figure!) and Baze Malbus (it's a war crime that we don't have him in TVC - along with Bodhi Rook) for the first time. Lots of stormtroopers are everywhere, as are "Jedha" Patrol Troopers (similar look to sand troopers). And we see the Imperial Combat Assault Tank, which is one of the most detailed toys made by Hasbro to date. TVC eventually gave us the driver and the commander. For this battle, we lack a TVC version of Cassian, although it does exist in 5POA form. Oh yeah, you could also use an OT TIE Fighter, several of which can be seen patrolling the skies over the city.

After the Death Star blows up the city and the crew escapes, they go on the next step of the mission, which is to kill Galen Erso on Eadu. From here, we have almost nothing additional. You could use your 5POA Cassian and Baze, along with Chirrut. You can also use the Death Troopers. Interestingly, now might be a good time to bust out the "carbonized" Death Trooper, because it kind of looks wet from the Eadu rain. We don't have Krennic in his rain gear, but we do have a 5POA Galen Erso in his science uniform - yet not the other scientists. Finally, but perhaps most importantly, we do have a 5POA Jyn in her rain poncho and battle gear, but it's arguably one of the worst 5POA figures out there. The team escapes on an imperial shuttle, as their U-Wing was destroyed in a crash landing on Eadu. Cool design, but not something collectors are looking for.

We take a quick detour to Mustafar, where we meet an old man advisor who alerts an un-armored Darth Vader as he takes a bacta bath. He suits up to meet with Krennic, chokes him, makes a joke, and moves on with his day. A "citadel" on Mustafar has some appeal for collectors. I mean, how cool would Vader's Castle be? But ultimately, it doesn't really do much to elevate our displays.

Then we go to Yavin, where the Rebel council meets to discuss next steps now that the Death Star has been revealed. Here we meet Admiral Raddus for the first time. While we only have him in 5POA form, his figure is notable in that it has an articulated jaw. Later, when Cassian assembles his team of volunteers, we see Melshi again, as well as meeting Pao for the first time, a figure of whom we have in 5POA - also with an articulated jaw. Another character we have from the 5POA line is Lieutenant Sefla, who is later seen battling on Scarif. And one more is Bistan, the alien that fires the machine gun from the side of his U-Wing like he is listening to Ride of the Valkyries.

The team makes an unauthorized trip to Scarif, after declaring itself "Rogue One". They commandeered an Imperial shuttle that was on Yavin. This ship is arguably more notable than Cassian's U-Wing as a location worthy of a TVC vehicle. Here the entire team gathers and discusses plans, and plenty of dialogue and some action take place on the shuttle, or nearby on the Scarif landing pad. Nevertheless, the chances of Hasbro making this are essentially zero.

Once on Scarif, it becomes another opportunity to bust out some OT Imperials. Along with the Death Star Gunners, you can use Stormtroopers, grey uniformed officers, black uniformed officers, TIE Pilots, Imperial technicians, etc. We are also introduced the the Scarif Shore troopers, in various ranks, which have been introduced into TVC. One 5POA figure we have is the Imperial Ground Crew. This figure was given a Jyn headswap so we have her disguise. The same cannot be said for Cassian's disguise. Hasbro recently delivered a Cal Kestis in officer disguise. I would have much preferred Cassian from this scene.

After Admiral Raddus defies orders and takes the fleet from Yavin to travel to Scarif, we get a quick shot/dialogue from none other than C-3PO and R2-D2. It's beyond the time for us to have a new Threepio to replace the weird one from TVC 1.0. We also get a quick shot of C1-10P, and we now have him in TVC thanks to Ahoska. Oh, and along with General Draven, I would really like a Tenzigo Weems, the communications specialist that runs after Senator Mon Monthma to let her know that Raddus left for Scarif. On that note, I would love a Mon Cal cruiser bridge, for double duty in our RO and ROTJ displays.

Once the fleet arrives at Scarif, we are treated to my single favorite "fan service" moment in all of the new media. After Merrick reports in as Blue Leader, we see archival footage of Garven Dreis and Dutch Vander reporting in as Red and Gold leaders, respectively. That was totally unexpected when I saw it for the first time, and got all giddy when I realized what was happening. So - here's your chance to bust out those 2 figures, along with their astromechs. Now, in order to do that, I've broken my own rule regarding Disney bootleg figures and toys. Disney produced an R2-BHD (Tooby) astromech to go with Vander, a figure never made by Hasbro. It gives me agita, but it's part of my collection. And while we got an awesome Blue Leader X-Wing in TVC, you can also bust out your Red Leader X-Wing, as well as an OT Y-Wing.

That just leaves the AT-ACT, which was controversial in that it was considered super expensive, and wasn't collector friendly. After purchasing it, I wrote a long review defending its place in your collection. I mean, it's a remote controlled AT-AT (sort of)! The thing walks, moves its head, and makes pew pew sounds! It's a marvel - if you were willing to shell out the cash for it. But it's undersized, and has the nerf feature, and cost a whopping $300. So people hated it.

And finally, you can use your Tantive IV hallway, rebel fleet troopers, Vader, and even your ANH Leia and Captain Antilles to finish out the final crazy scene.

So that's a lot of text. Sorry about that. In a nutshell, if you're willing to mix TVC, 5POA, and some non-RO sourced OT stuff, you've got yourself a decent collection to support this film. What do we need in TVC? Baze, Bodhi, Saw, Melshi, Raddus, Draven, Mon Mothma, and more generic troopers. A better Jyn would be nice, but not critical right now. Nice to haves would be more pilots from Blue and Red Squadron - especially Red 5 - Bail Organa, and Tenzigo Weems.

In general, it's taken too long for us to get what we need for Rogue One because of the whole 5POA debacle, but a completing the crew with Baze and Bodhi would be the most critical needs here. Otherwise, I think we in okay shape with this.

Share pics of your Rogue One displays in the comments...Let's Go Mets!

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