In honor of Memorial Day, we bring you this Pit Droid 2-pack, because Pit Droids should be remembered for their service to pod racers across the galaxy.

These guys would have been great comic relief in TPM if we didn’t already have C-3PO and R2-D2.  And Jar Jar.  And Gragra, who’s comedic contribution to the film has been underrated for far too long.  They were silly, cute, and even did a Three Stooges routine.  Hasbro LOVED pit droids.  They made millions of them.  MILLIONS!  This pit droid model first appeared in a two-pack with Gasgano earlier in the Episode I line.  It also was available as a bonus figure in lieu of the commtech chips in the European “Pit Droid 2-packs”, which followed on the heels of the “Battle Droid 2-packs.”  In those offerings, there were 2 different sculpts, both of which were available in 3 colors.  Then we got this pit droid two-pack.  At least one more came with the TVC Ratts Tyrell, and then another pair in a Walmart battle pack.  Oh, there was also the “folded” version which came with POTJ Jar Jar Binks.  Additionally, Hasbro released the Otoga 222 pit droid model 3 or 4 times over the course of time.  If you tried to get every version, you would have built a veritable army of these fools, as evidenced in image 14 above.  Look at it.  It took me an hour to set that up.  It was nerve-racking.

These particular figures are 2 different sculpts, and 2 different paint schemes.  Both have 5POA, including a ball jointed head.  Most of the pit droids are tricky to stand up, and some just won’t do it at all, especially if there’s even the slightest warping of the legs over time, as a few of mine have shown.  In this pair, one of the droids can stand okay on his own, but this success is short-lived if you have him hold the giant grease gun (or whatever it is).  Believe it or not, he can hold it and stand up, but in order to do so, he has to be bent backwards pretty far, to the point where the gun is angled upward at a ridiculous angle just to maintain balance.  It does look pretty good if you rest it agains a Podracer vehicle for support, as in the last image.

The other droid is less problematic, but still difficult to stand.  I should win some kind of major award for getting them both standing long enough to take the images for this gallery.  They do look just like their on screen counterparts, but it’s a shame they are so problematic.  With today’s tech, these droids probably could have more articulation, which would make them a lot more useful than these 1999/2000 molds.  I’m sure the number of people that have such an update on their wishlists is restricted just to Randy and Blue Knight, but I wouldn’t be upset if Hasbro did so, and snuck them into a pack with the remaining unmade podracer pilots.

These are barely action figures, but they are great little additions to your Mom Espa setups.  Just having them sprinkled around the background of a Boonta Eve Classic display, or even Watto’s shop, really helps bring things to life in the one true scale.  I struggle to give these guys a 4, because they don’t stand well, and they don’t interact with the accessory too well.  But with a little patience and creativity, you can put ‘em to good use.