We recently pondered whether a figure could be so bad that it’s actually good, and we immediately dismissed the concept.  Bad figures are bad.  Period.  That being said, sometimes they’re so bad that they’re laughable.  Enter 2003’s Throne Room Duel Luke Skywalker figure.  In the nineteen year history of the modern line, this figure is still considered by many to be the worst figures made.  It’s certainly near unanimous that it’s among the worst.  It seems we had two choices in the Star Wars “Saga” line.  Collection 2 featured more neutrally posed and largely static figures, which still have viability as display pieces in your collection.  Collection 1 consisted of action feature laden figures with dynamic scene specific poses.  Almost none of these Collection 1 figures are relevant anymore.

This Throne Room Duel Luke Skywalker never had any relevance other than its place on the “worst of the worst” list and to serve as a punchline.  The hunched shoulders and tucked chin make it immediately reminiscent of Richard Nixon.  The scowl on the face is so over the top that it’s worthy of a WWE monologue.  The anatomy of the figure is clearly the result of some sort of genetic hybridization.  The arms are as long and perhaps longer than the legs and are more befitting an orangutan than a human.  The arms are so long in order to facilitate the lightsaber slashing action which is activated by another unfortunately placed bum button.  To be fair, the button is in the small of the back and not placed so that it looks like Luke is in the throes of a proctological emergency like some other figures.

The action feature also requires disproportionately huge shoulders in order to house the slashing mechanism.  When the arms are lowered, the huge shoulders combined with the sculpted shrug give the figure a hunched back appearance when viewed from the side.  It’s as if Hasbro wanted this figure to be laughably bad from every angle.  To keep beating the dead horse that is the slashing action feature, it also all but eliminates any practical posing of the arms. The shoulder rotation has hard stops that are indicated with a click.  If you rotate the arms to any point between two hard stops it will spring back to the next clockwise stop.  The elbow hinges are so loose that only gravity permitted poses are achievable.  The legs are pre-posed bracing Luke for the ultimate chop in his battle with Darth Vader.  That pregnant moment before the final blow of the battle with the saber drawn back above Luke’s head is the only viable pose you can achieve with this figure for display.  I have to be honest, in profile the figure doesn’t look too terrible in that pose if you can ignore the protruding action feature button.

Since we don’t give points for ironic appreciation of figures here, the figure itself would deserve only a single Bantha Skull grade (if we did give ironic scores this is a solid 10).  But the “Saga” line often had redeeming value in the large accessories and this figure is no exception.  The included platform and railing has value to your modern collection.  You will have to tactfully secure the breakaway railing, but once you do it serves as a nice companion piece for your Vintage Collection Endor Capture Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. It earns another point for this set to bring it to a 2 out of 10.  Fortunately the figure is so terrible that you can get the railing rather cheaply.  At the time of this review, there is one auction starting at $0.95 with zero bids and only one day left.