Do you see those ab dots?  Those are some ab dots, yeah? Mr. Nomadscout likes to tease me unmerciful for always drilling in on this detail in Stormtrooper reviews, but the details are what separate the dignified collectibles offered in the adult-oriented Vintage Collection from the foolish kid things in the 5POA line.  This detail is something I always focus on because the ab plate, with its high-contrast black dots, is something that differentiates the unique Stormtrooper armor from its Sandtrooper cousin.  The details are important.  So when I saw an array of cleanly painted black dots on the ab plate of this Han Solo Stormtrooper figure, I had a Boss Nass reaction.

If they’re paying attention to the little things, chances are the big things will be done fairly well.  Perhaps one of the most important aspects of a Stormtrooper figure is the helmet.  I usually hate removable helmets because they are often vaguely sculpted, suffer from proportionality issues, and have sloppy paint applications.  But this removable helmet has none of those issues.  In fact, I daresay this is the best looking Stormtrooper helmet in the history of the line; removable or otherwise.  The paint apps are crisp and clean, and the helmet even has the exact right amount of glossiness.  It’s amazing.  Considering that this figure includes the Original Trilogy-accurate holster, which the upcoming Rogue One based Stormtrooper does not, many collectors will surely be buying extras to use as standard Stormtroopers.  The fact that there’s a really good Harrison Ford likeness under the helmet will be our little secret.

The base figure is still a descendant of the 2004 VOTC Stormtrooper.  I hate that figure.  The legs were in a narrow ballerina stance.  That issue was mitigated when the base figure was fitted with ball jointed hips for the Dewback-riding Sandtrooper figure.  Those fancy new hips were passed down to the VC41 - Stormtrooper, to the loathsome Black Series #13 Stormtrooper, and finally to this figure.  While this is vastly preferable to the original narrow stance, it can’t achieve a perfectly neutral stance.  Han is always cooling the boys, if you catch my drift.  The unforgiving rigid hands from 2004 are still present.  Those hands are sculpted to enforce a left handed blaster grip for THWG (two handed weapon grip) poses.  I may have gotten lucky with my sample, but I was actually able to achieve a right handed THWG with minimal effort.  Usually hours of negotiation are required to get the left hand to be able to receive the barrel of the E-11 blaster.  Not so in my case.  Additionally, the E-11 is the newer sculpt that has been used recently, and looks fantastic.  It’s cast in rigid black plastic with silver accents.  Very nice.  Of course, prior to Luke and Han’s clever Stormtrooper ruse being detected by the surly Lt. Childsen, Han was carrying the larger DLT-19 heavy blaster rifle which he immediately passes off to Chewbacca once the shooting starts.  It would have bene nice if this accessory were also included.  One last thing is that’s the color is a uniform and brilliantly clean white.  This hasn’t been a done well on Stormtroopers in the past. 

If this were strictly a Stormtrooper figure, I would say it’s certainly passable, but needs improvement.  I feel as a Han in Stormtrooper disguise figure, the standards should be relaxed some. I’m tempted to say it’s definitive for this purpose, but will call it close enough since there is a some room for improvement.  It’s by far the best Han Stormtrooper in the history of the line after many, often bizarre, attempts.  The first release was a Froot Loops mail-away figure.  What?  Yup.  That figure was retooled, for some reason, into an oddly posed version for the Death Star Escape Cinema Scene.  This was followed buy an equally bizarre and unforgivingly posed figure in the Saga Trash Compactor sets.  Finally a modern attempt was made based on the VOTC Stormtrooper, but “wha waaaaaah” it featured stylized comic book coloring and shading.  The blue shading employed in the two dimensional comic book form did not translate to the three dimensional figure.  At all.  The shading was eventually dropped in a running change, but it still had the red lenses.  This was technically correct since it was sourced to the comics, but fans were disappointed.  Finally, a movie-style update came in the Legacy Collection (Blue).  It was almost identical to the comic book figure (except the canister in the back is loose instead of molded to the belt), but it gave the helmet proper black lenses. Then that exact figure was re-released in TLC (Red).  So basically, with some paint variations and an inconsequential belt canister change, we got the same figure 4 times in a row.  It’s been a long and winding road, but we’ve finally arrived at this close-to-definitive Han Solo (Stormtrooper) figure.  It earns an 8 out of 10.