Original Review by Chris 10/29/14

Oh those wacky Super Battle Droids and their series of comic misadventures.  Super Battle Droids were the brain child of Colonel Monty Python of the Techno Union.  He theorized that if his soldiers were silly and slapsticky enough, the enemy would laugh themselves to death.  As a precaution, a single maintenance worker was only allowed to be in the presence of one Super Battle Droid at a time to avoid comedic overload.  One unfortunate soul accidentally activated two at once and had to spend a week in hospital.  The model that we see during the opening of Revenge of the Sith is the BD2-S Super Battle Droid with the “S” standing for “Scooby Doo Legs” which allows the droids to hilariously peddle their feet while staying in place.  We see them do this when R2 covers the deck of the Invisible Hand with oil.  Before continuing, please take a moment to wipe away the laughter tears as you think back to that classic comedy sketch from Star Wars Episode III:  Citizens on Patrol.  It simply makes sense to have this light hearted scene in this kids movie that will later see a man suffer a quadruple amputation just before being burned alive by a lava flow.  My God this movie hangs together so well.  Who made it?  Was it the Coen brothers?  I bet it was the Coen brothers.

It’s a shame that the CIS wasn’t able to persist a little longer as they were about to perfect the BD2-J Super Battle Droid which would have fully integrated a side splitting slide whistle.  Surely that would have turned the tide.  I should come clean at this point and tell you that I don’t like Revenge of the Sith or any of the Prequel Trilogy movies.  I have to confess this because I’ve clearly masked my feelings too well up to this point. Disney:  if you do one thing before my days are out, please reboot the PT.  I usually like to keep my self-indulgent off topic rants to one paragraph, but the battle droids in general are the one thing from the PT that I find myself getting angrier and angrier about as time goes on. Revenge of the Sith is a bizarre entry in the trilogy because the longer it’s been since I’ve last watched it, the better it gets.  This could be because people keep insisting it’s actually good when it’s not, but I think the real reason is that specific scenes from the movie are absolutely great.  So as time goes by, all you remember are the good things and you forget all the interminable crap in between.  By 2007, I was easily a year removed from the last time I had seen Episode III, so I was actually in the mood to army build some Super Battle Droids.

Up to this point, Hasbro had not accomplished a collector grade version of the Super Battle Droid.  In fact, all of the efforts to that point could be considered poor with improper scale, minimal articulation, and a lack of detailing that made them look decidedly plastic.  Hasbro finally got out of their own way with this 30th Anniversary Collection release.  It has ball jointed articulation at the shoulders and elbows and ball joint-like articulation at the torso.  The lower body features swivel hips and knees.  Unfortunately, wrists and ankles were not in the cards.  The ball jointed shoulders on my sample were extremely tight and actually caused the halves of the torso to split apart, which is how I got to examine the true articulation of the torso. It’s more of a fancy swivel joint than a ball joint. Even though ankles would have helped, you can surely pose the Super Battle Droid menacingly, or relentlessly marching into battle with its blaster arm raised.  This figure would see multiple retools, repaints and re-releases, but the most notable is 2010’s Geonosis Arena Conflict set which finally incorporated articulated ankles.  The most problematic issue with the lack of ankles on this release is that the left foot is sculpted with an upward angle, so you are forced to place the left leg back to stand the figure.  No neutral pose can be achieved.

There seems to be an intentional inconsistency with the color of the plastic used on this figure. There are swirls of lighter and darker colors throughout.  When you combine this with the dark over wash which naturally settles in the areas where grease and grime would collect and you have a highly realistic looking Super Battle Droid which serves to highlight the shortcomings of previous releases.  The figure comes with flame affects which can be attached to the figure to recreate the scene I spent too much time mocking in the opening of this review.  It’s nice to recreate that scene, but it also means your figure has holes in the torso when you choose to not apply the flames. This is disappointing.  Almost every subsequent release of this figure in Saga Legends, mutli-packs and the Vintage Collection had to the torso retooled to delete those holes.  Amazingly that Vintage Collection release did not use the articulated ankle version from 2010 despite that line’s premium status and price point.

This almost becomes a manic depressive figure with the highs and lows in stark contrast.  The end result is ultimately a 6 out of 10 figure.  If you don’t have one in your collection, you probably want to consider picking up at least one for the unique flame accessories. 

Updated Review by Bret, 8/31/19:

One thing to mention is that this figure is meant to interact with its wave mate, 30-04 R2-D2.  The flames that were included with R2-D2 are sculpted in such a way as to allow it to lock onto the torso of the prone SBD.  It’s a cool trick by Hasbro, and as I mentioned in the R2 review, it’s one of my favorite things when figures and accessories from one purchase are meant to interact with those from another.  Despite Chris’s relentless mocking of Super Battle Droids (I don’t disagree, actually), this is a really good figure (minus the ankles), and the interaction with R2 is an awesome bonus.