Original Review:  Chris - 12/17/2011 08:03 PM

Good.  Perhaps very good,  But not great.  I have a feeling that if we could catch Hasbro in a moment of honesty, they’d tell us that most of this figure was developed previously.  It just feels a little dated particularly in the arms.  The elbows are stiff with minimal range of motion.  The swivel forearms pop off with the least provocation.  This combination means that attempting to bend the elbows usually ends in action figure amputation.  I’m also not thrilled with the hands.  The grip pose is not perpendicular to the elbow, but slanted.  This means that some two handed saber poses are not possible because the hands end up slanting away from the body at opposite angles.  Lastly the ball jointed neck needs a little more range of motion.  Many of Maul’s fighting poses have him in a predatory crouch looking up at his adversary.  The range of motion of the head stops with Maul staring at straight forward.  The figure can not look upward.  None of these are damning critiques, but frustrating and annoying.

I’ve been accused of being a bit of an easy grader and the reason is quite simple.  If a figure has 14 points of articulation with ball joints at at least the shoulders, elbows, knees and ankles, it starts off at an 8/10 with me, and then subjective factors take it up or down from there usually within a point or two.  With that in mind, this figure is starting off with 8 out of 10.  The lower body is great and I feel balances off the negatives with the upper torso.  The ball jointed hips, knees and ankles really allow for some lifelike Maul fighting poses.  The soft goods lower skirt is executed very well.  The only other item that I feel is worthy of a point deduction is the plastic hood.  It works better than previous attempts at soft good hoods, but it still doesn’t work.  It’s passable, but not the holy grail.  Still I don’t think it’s worth affecting the grade of the figure.  So with a base of 8 out of 10 and the positives balancing out the negatives, 8 out of 10.  Updated score lowered to a 7.

Updated Review:  Chris- 8/15/2018 07:05 AM

I’m kinda the Darth Maul guy around here.  That’s what the fellas in the forum call me, old “Darth Maul Guy.”  Sometimes it’s “DMG” if they’re into the whole brevity thing.  Other times it’s just “Maul.”  And finally on occastion, I’m “T-bone.”  Don’t google this for confirmation.  These facts predate technology (thank you Sam Rockwell).  Suffice it to say, I’m quite the fan.  One of my high-end collectibles is the eFx Signature Edition Darth Maul Lightsaber.  The only 6” scale figure I still have on display is Darth Maul.  He is one of the best things to happen to Star Wars and if you disagree, you’re a turd.  George Lucas has a habit of striking gold and not realizing it.  He didn’t think Darth Vader, the number one villain in movie history, could carry a film by himself, and it’s fortunate he didn’t kill him off in Episode IV.  Fans similarly engaged with Boba Fett and Darth Maul, but unfortunately Lucas unceremoniously killed off each of them…at least temporarily (you know Fett’s getting out of the Sarlacc). 

Everything I said in the initial review stands and then some.  This second time around I found more things to be irritated with.  The biggest thing I’m irritated with is the angle on the neck post.  It juts out at 45 degrees and while that suits some aggressive fighting stances, it eliminates others.  It would be best if these posing decisions were left up to the consumer and not the sculptor. That perhaps wasn’t possible in 2012, but we have seen true ball jointed necks or even double jointed necks more recently, which allow ultimate posing flexibility.  The arms are still as frustrating today as well.  The swivel forearms and angled grips mean that in some poses the grip angles are opposing in the form of a “V”.  You can see the affect of this in pic four with the two part saber bending in the middle.  This would be greatly mitigated by modern ball jointed wrists.  You should all see where the verdict is heading by now.  Mr. Nomadscout is saying “Brian, NO!” as he reads this.

The unlit hilt is monstrous.  It can attach to the belt in theory.  In theory, Marge.  It extends pretty far past the waist, but the sculpted billowed tunic, which looks great, ends up knocking the hilt out.  The feature is thus effectively useless.  The hood kinda works and kinda doesn’t.  Because of Maul’s Zabrak horns, it doesn’t fit as snugly as it should.  The only way to make this work is with swappable heads as seen in the above-mentioned six inch figure.  The eyes are a little wonky on my sample.  It has a bit of that MacIntyre “Mac” Womack “do we look like the two dumbest guys in the world?” expression.  One last gripe is the tattered robe.  What is Hasbro’s fascination with this representation?  It was used on Fi-Ek Sirch and it has been used here.  In both cases the actual wardrobe looks like a fine garment, and not the distressed rags included with these figures.

The lower body and the soft goods implementation on the lower tabbard/tunic are both top notch, but can’t prevent me from lowering the score to a 7 from the original 8.  If Darth Maul is ever updated, this lower body could easily be reused.  Say that reminds me…

Deal with it.  It’s not about you, and it’s not about me sometimes.  Sometimes it’s about the market and the health of the line.  Darth Maul sells at about the same clip as Darth Vader.  This 2012 figure shipped heavily, and was carried forward into multiple cases.  Despite that, it might be the only TPM figure to sell through, and carded samples fetch a hefty premium today.  Next year is the 20th anniversary of The Phantom Menace.  After the disaster 2012 turned into, Hasbro should treat the source as radioactive, but the anniversary should be acknowledged.  A truly definitive Darth Maul would be the best way to do it.  The definitive version would have a proper robe, swappable heads for the hood, a double ball jointed neck and ball jointed writs to go with this figure’s lower body.

Updated Review:  Bret- 9/15/2020 07:05 AM

This is one of those figures you wish Hasbro could take the time to give a full on resuclpt, rather than doubling down on the old version.  If you read Chris’s reviews above, you’ll see his take on all the shortcomings of this figure.

Yesterday we reviewed the Photoreal version of Wicket, which got a major overhaul to the paint operations across the entire body, as well as the accessories.  Hasbro selected a figure that we already reviewed as essentially perfect, and re-released it.  If nothing else, it gave fans another opportunity to snag it without paying inflated secondary market prices.  But you did get a very slight upgrade for your efforts.

Here, Hasbro applied Photoreal to Darth Maul, and the effect is somewhat underwhelming, but still better.  On my original sample, the eyes were a bit crosseyed.  Here, that seems corrected, and the look is definitely more realistic and less toy-like.

But the rest of the figure remains virtually unchanged.  The most notable difference is that the binoculars are a darker gunmetal color, instead of the bright silver of the original.  But that’s it.  Any additional differences you might find would seem to be a product of the manufacturing differences that occur when spaced out by about 8 years of production.

I would have preferred Hasbro gave us an all-new mold, but in these lean days, I’m not sure such a figure would be anywhere near the top of my list. So in that sense, maybe it’s Hasbro’s way of telling us a new Maul isn’t in the foreseeable future. 

Pick up the figure if you’re in need of the character, but if you’re already Mauled out, you can safely pass on it.