Review of Chef Bender, Mom, Roberto
Futurama Action Figures

Introduction

Toynami's Futurama series has hit wave 8 with the release of Mom, the evil president of MomCorp and mother figure to robots all over the universe, and Chef Bender.

This wave also completes the Build A Bot figure of the psychotic Roberto. Stabby, stabby, stabby!

Mom is another key character on ths show, operating as the only true villain. It's unlikely we'll get her three sons, but one can always hope.

Chef Bender is another variant figure that was originall produced by Moore, but it's still a welcome addition, especially since finding the old versions can be pretty tricky these days.

But what is to be with the Toynami line? This wave is the last one I know of that's been announced, and we do have the entire Planet Express set now. Is Toynami finished? We'll know for sure after the next couple days, sice Toy Fair is currently going on in New York.

You can pick these up at a lot of online stores for around $12 - $14 a pop.

EDIT - Sure enough, Toynami showed off wave 9 at Toy Fair this week. It's going to be the cop, URL, along with another Bender variant - Wooden Bender. I like this variant better than the Chef, since it's such a unique look for him. It also looks like Morbo is going to be the next BAF. Click here for a photo of all three.

Packaging - ***
As you'd expect, these boxes match the previous wave's packaging. They are colorful and bright, with some nice character specific personalization on the front and back.

One of the best things is that these are collector friendly, which means you can remove the figure and accessories without any damage. Even better, the BAF Roberto can be put together and taken apart easily as well, allowing you to put everything back at a later date if you need to.

Sculpting - ***1/2
I'm very happy with all three of these figures, particularly with the sculpts.

Mom looks great in either her fat suit, which snaps together on both sides but slips apart easily, or in her underlying body suit and boots. You can display her either way, but I did find that without the suit, she has a very hard time remaining upright. That's probably not surprising considering the big, heavy hair and the skinny legs (and the lack of articulation doesn't help), but it may effect your opinion.  I'm sticking with her in the fat suit, which allows her to stand easily.

Chef Bender's outfit is sculpted, not a separate piece. Except for the hat of course, which is a tight fit, but once you get it in place it will stay there.

Then there's Roberto, who is made up of five pieces. The neck, arms and legs are all bendy, and the body is a little plain. I was disappointed that the eyes eyes and teeth don't have a little more sculpting to them (the outside edges of the eyes are cut, but nothing else), but it's still better than just paint or a tampo. 

He stands taller than most of the other robots, especially Bender, and fits in with the overall display extremely well. These figures are in a 6" scale.

Paint - Bender, Roberto ***1/2; Mom ***
The paint work on Bender and Roberto is quite well done, with clean lines and edges, consistent colors, and very little slop.

Mom has a few more issues, particularly on the dress. None of these figures have any extreme detail work, but that's in line with the style of the show itself.

Articulation - Roberto ***1/2; Bender **1/2; Mom **
Roberto is surprisingly flexible, especially the bendy arms and legs. The short neck is also bendy, although it's tough to get too much out of it.

The head turns as well, as does the waist. I found that getting some cool poses out of him was pretty easy, but you do want to work with the arms before inserting them in the torso. They pop on and off pretty easily, so you can remove them and bend them into position, then re-insert them. If you try bending them in place, the short shoulder pegs can get damaged.

Bender has a little less articulation here than we had with the standard version. Here the arms aren't bendy, since they have the sculpted chef sleeves. There's the cut neck, cut shoulders and bendy legs though, giving you at least a few decent poses.

Mom is the least articulated by far. There's only the cut shoulders, one cut elbow and one cut wrist. That will let you get her left arm in a bent wrist pose similar to her common stance on the show, but that's about it. Even more troubling, without any leg articulation it can be quite tricky to find her center of gravity and keep her standing.

Accessories - Bender ***1/2; Mom ***; Roberto **1/2
I'm going to assume you want Roberto - hey, he's great! Who wouldn't want to add another recognizable robot to the shelf? And assuming that, I awarded my scores. Of course, if you're a weirdo and have no interest in Roberto, your scores here would be lower.

Even without the BAF pieces, both figures have accessories. I'm counting Mom's suit, since it's removable and since it was such a great touch, allowing you to display her either way.

Bender has his chef's hat, as well as a large spoon he can easily hold. There's also a knife, but this is intended for Roberto (and why he has a score in this category, when BAF's usually don't).

The knife has a small tab on the handle that fits in a slot on Roberto's right hand. It's a good fit too, so he won't drop it unexpectedly.

Chef Bender also comes with two additional sets of eyes, similar to the original release. Better yet, all three sets of eyes have different expressions than the three we got before! Here he can look straight ahead with fully open eyes, look up and too the right with open eyes, or look forward with eyes that are slightly closed both from the top and bottom lids. Adding in three new expressions really ups the value of this figure, since you can swap these around with the previous versions.

Fun Factor - ***
Futurama is one of those shows that kid's usually don't 'get', but if you have a youngster in the house that does, these are actually pretty good toys. The bendy feature works well, and the addition of Mom to the mix gives you that all important conflict.

Value - ***
With mass market figures like DC Universe Classics reaching $15 at regular retailers, getting these for $12 or so is looking like a much better deal.

Things to Watch Out For -
As I mentioned, I'd remove Roberto's arms before bending them too much, and then re-insert them once you have the ideal pose. Other than that, you should be good to go!

Overall - Roberto, Bender ***1/2; Mom ***
If the line does end with wave 8, we'll still have a great set to display. We've gotten the majority of key characters now, including a pretty complete Planet Express crew.

I'd still like it to continue of course, and I'm hoping that we see some announcements of wave 9 and 10 out of Toy Fair. But even if we don't, it's been a great run and wave 8 would be a solid end.

Score Recap (out of ****):
Packaging - ***
Sculpting - ***1/2
Paint - Roberto, Bender ***1/2; Mom ***
Articulation - Roberto ***1/2; Bender **1/2; Mom **
Accessories - Bender ***1/2; Mom ***; Roberto **1/2
Fun Factor - ***1/2
Value - ***
Overall - Roberto, Bender ***1/2; Mom ***

Where to Buy 
Online options include these site sponsors:

- Entertainment Earth has the set for $24.

- or you can search ebay for a deal.

Related Links -
I've covered quite a bit of Futurama goodness:

- last up was the first half of Roberto, Hermes and Farnsworth.

- previously there was series 6 with Amy and Clobberella.

- there are reviews of series 5, series 4, as well as the Robot Santa and Santa Bender SDCC exclusive, and series 3 in a couple reviews, since I didn't get them all at the same time.  Here you can see Bender and the Robot Devil BAF, and here's Kif.

- I also covered the second series and first series as well.

For more Futurama stuff:

- Toynami got their feet wet with the Futurama I-men.

- there's the series 1 set from MAC, along with the Toyfare exclusive Leela.  There was also some Christmas ornaments, a larger scale (8") Nibbler.

- Rocket USA did some cool die cast figures and the tin wind up Bender.

- there were also quite a few bendies, including Kif and Leela.

- and if you're looking for the unique, try the Horrible Gelatinus Blob, or the Brain Slug!

You should also hit the Search Reviews page, in case any other applicable reviews were done after this one was published.

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