Rogue One feels like an eternity ago.  Certainly in today’s pop culture “what have you done for me lately” climate, it’s inching towards obsolescence.  Since its release, we’ve had two new Star Wars movies, probably a half dozen Marvel movies, one Fifty Shades of Nonsense movie, and six hundred fifty three Fast and Furious movies.  I may be low on that last number.  While Sixers are treated to figures from movies that are still inside their relevance window, we’ve had to wait a year and a half to get one of the new Imperial Army designs introduced in the first stand alone Star Wars movie.  You may be thinking this is an odd gripe since we waited 20 years for our first ever Grand Moff Tarkin figure and we’re still requesting more figures from that source with another 20 years of wear on our treads.  Better late than never is definitely valid, but our 3.75” SA collecting hobby is a fragile one. It’s going to be difficult to grow the base when significant figures come so long after the media itself. 

The armored Imperials are always going to appeal to collectors.  I said “Imperials” before the comment section jumps down my throat and points out that the First Order Stormtrooper, due to its two-per-case-plus-carry-forward status, is peg warming mightily at the time of this review.  We likely would never have been treated to a super-articulated version of the Combat Assault Tank Driver were it not for the triumphant return of the Vintage Collection vehicle line via the amazing Imperial Combat Assault Tank.  A collector-grade vehicle demands a collector-grade driver, and this figure should be judged primarily on how well it interacts with the tank itself.  When posing this figure, something caught me somewhat by surprise in a negative way.  The armor on the calves of the figure limits the range of motion of the knee articulation.  If you look at the “kneeling” pose above, you can see the knee joints stop well before a 90 degree bend.  Since this figure’s primary job will be to sit (in the drivers seat), this was an initial concern as, obviously, one’s knees bend at 90 degrees when sitting in a chair.  But as when you’re driving a car, the seated position in the tank requires the figures legs to be extended forward, and not straight down as in a chair.  So that lack of range of motion does not prevent the figure from interacting with the tank itself.  It’s only limiting when posting the figure outside of the tank in action poses.  That is a bit frustrating, but not as damning as it would be on other action-oriented figures.

The articulation on the rest of the figure is what you would expect in the current landscape.  Ball-jointed wrists and hips plus an upper thigh swivel elevate the figure above standard super-articulation.  I believe the kids call this “plaid” articulation.  The ball-jointed hips are somewhat undone by the aforementioned lack of range at the knees.  The ball-jointed wrists, however, allow for varied and natural looking combat poses.  It is somewhere between difficult and impossible to position the floating trigger finger inside the trigger guard.  Instead, the trigger finger typically sits along side the trigger guard.  The Tank Driver’s range officer would be proud.  One thing I appreciated about Rogue One is that the “war” aspect of the titular Star Wars was taken somewhat seriously whereas the combat sequences and tactics in the Sequel Trilogy occasionally verge on Saturday-morning-cartoon silliness.  To that point, I like how the Tank Driver’s head is only partially exposed out of the hatch to strike the optimal compromise between visibility and cover.  It’s that way in the movie and that’s how the driver figure sits in the tank as you can see from the images above.  Speaking of the helmet, the sand wash disparity between the helmet and torso/arms is significant.  It’s a little jarring.  Taken all together this is a very good, but not perfect super articulated offering and lands at an 8 out of 10.

Of course, once you have this figure in hand, you’re going to be frustrated that you don’t have the tank commander figure, especially since that character is more prominent in the movie.  But in an environment where if feels like we’re hardly getting any figures, if Hasbro used a spot in TVC for that minor repaint of this figure, I’d lose my mind.  There are three minor trooper repaints we’re missing from Rogue One.  In addition to the Tank Commander, we need the Shoretrooper (Scarif Stormtrooper) Squad Leader and Captain.  I’ll be a monkey’s uncle if those three minor repaints/retools don’t represent the perfect three pack.