Return of the Jedi is my favorite movie in the history of cinema.  It’s not the best movie in the history of cinema.  Not even close.  In fact you could argue it’s laughable at times, but it’s my favorite nonetheless.  Of Return of the Jedi, the first act is my favorite part of my favorite movie.  I also have deep admiration for truly creative people.  Those people who can make one thing that works on your subconscious to evoke another entirely different thing without you even realizing it.  Star Wars is loaded with this.  So I see the skeletal robot with its dead eyes and dead gaze.  It’s plying its trade like some sort of lobotomized torturer during the best part of my favorite movie, I am in love.  Deep platonic love.  And maybe a dash of romantic love, but most of that is reserved for my girl, EV-9D9.

8D8 was acid etched onto my soul the very first time I saw Return of the Jedi in 1983.  If the converted Vaudeville theater turned movie theater were still standing, I could take you to the exact seat I was sitting in.  Getting this figure in 1998, only the second 8D8 figure in the thirty eight years since the movie was released, was great based on the character alone.  The fact that the droid branding device was also included rocketed this release to instant legend status, but it has spoiled us.  Any future 8D8 figure would seem incomplete without one.  More on that later.

The figure itself is both unremarkable and remarkable at the same time.  The articulation is nothing to write home about, obviously, as a Power of the Force 2 (POTF2) figure. It’s only 5 points of articulation (5POA) as it lacks a waist joint.  In order to get the figure to stand, its left leg needs to be slid slightly forward due to an upward angle of the left foot.  Obviously it’s best if these posing decision are left to the customer to achieve via articulation, but in 1998 it was up to the sculptor.  The figure’s left arm is also pre-posed in a ninety degree bend presumably to mimic activating the branding device, but 8D8 appears to use his right arm for this purpose on-screen.  Neither hand can interact with the branding device at all.  The tiny c-clamp hands are too small to grip the handle, and the right hand is rotated ninety degrees making a grip actually impossible.  That is all the unremarkable part.  The remarkable aspect is that with the angled neck joint, there are moments when this figure looks like it jumped right off the screen.  That’s astounding for 1998.

The branding device is really just a vague impression of its on-screen counterpart.  The bottom half of the device in the movie holds and rotates the droid, and is not actually attached to the branding iron, which appears to be lowered from the ceiling.  On the accessory, the branding iron sits much too high.  It towers over any Power Droid placed in its way.  It would probably create a soothing warming sensation instead of searing hot droid pain.  What sadist programmed droids to feel pain?  Some of these inaccuracies are just from the fact that Hasbro had to get creative to turn the branding device into a free standing item. The massive and awesome, albeit inaccurate, accessory and the figure’s occasional high fidelity to the character have me doing something insane.  I’m giving a 5 out of 10 to a POTF2 figure.

Of course 8D8 is one of the “Original 96” Kenner figures, so we desperately need it in the Vintage Collection, but as mentioned above, the figure would feel hollow without the branding device.  The rub is that there is no way such a large accessory could fit in a Vintage Collection coffin bubble.  So I am praying to the toy gods that we someday get a Jabba’s Dungeon Adventure Set with a carded 8D8 as a pack-in.