Packaging - ***1/2
The usual ML style packages, but I have to admit to really liking the Hulk colors and logo.  The back gives personalized data on the specific figure encased within, along with a run down of the other 8 and which piece of the big guy they include.  They've even thrown in some basic instructions for putting Triple F together, as well as a mini-product catalog.

There is a bit of weirdness on the Wendigo package.  It shows the Savage Hulk, Samson and Absorbing Man blacked out on the back, with the words "Coming Fall 2008".  Hmmm.

Sculpting - Wendigo, Hulk ***1/2; Absorbing Man, Samson ***
I'm probably being gullible here, but I like Hulk's sculpt.  There's good detailing in the face and veining of the arms, and I like the comic book proportions.  If anything, the arms are a bit too veined in front, and not in back.

The calves are a bit weird looking, with some odd muscle striations, but when viewed as the big picture, the overall sculpt is pretty solid.  The hands are both sculpted in interesting gesture poses that work great with the anger in the facial expression.

Wendigo is the most technically nice of these three, and he's certainly the largest at about 8" tall.  There's some reasonable detailing no the fur, but even that's inconsistent.  For example, there's lots of texture detail on his calves, but far less on his thighs.

Wendigo is probably the most desired out of these four, largely because he's not a character that has been done to death.  People did their own customs using the Sasquatch in the past, but this version is a bit closer to proper scale.

Absorbing Man isn't bad, and I suspect he'll be more popular with fans of the character than with I.  There's some good texturing along his 'stone' side and arm, as well as decent detailing in the brick left leg.  Both of his hands are sculpted in grip poses to work with the ball and chain accessory, but they also look good empty.

Doc Samson is the most basic, with muscle and wrinkle texture, but nothing too unique for the line.  On the plus side, the boots are nicely done, and the shirt has sculpted edges on the sleeves and neck, rather than just painted.  His facial expression is stern without being goofy, and the gripping and fisted hand sculpts look good.  On the negative side, the hair is a bit tootsie roll in it's level of detail.

These are the usual ML scale, but all three are pretty tall.  Both Samson and Hulk are 7" tall, while Absorbing Man is about 6 3/4". Wendigo is the big boy of the bunch at 8" tall.

All the figures stand great on their own.  Probably the biggest issue most folks will have with the sculpts is that the plastic feels cheap.  The torsos, especially Hulk's, are made from a very hard, brittle plastic, while the arms and legs are made from a softer plastic.  This difference may be an issue for some.

Paint - Absorbing Man ***; Samson, Hulk **1/2; Wendigo *1/2
While I like the sculpts well enough, there's something quite off putting about the paint jobs.  Some of it is obvious, but some of it is more of a 'feel'.

The Hulk issues are obvious.  The teeth are sloppier than they should be, and the weird wash they used on the body looks poor.  Most of the gray body parts were cast in the color, making them look cheap.

On the other hand is Absorbing Man.  The work on his pants, brick leg, and stone sections is actually pretty well done, and there's far less slop than the others.  While there's still some of the cast coloration, it's not as prevalent.

Samson is some place in the middle, more of that 'feel' situation.  The cut lines are clean, and there's not really any slop, but the cast plastic colors are more annoying here, especially the red shirt.  The yellow of the boots isn't much better.  While he's clean, there's a cheapness about the paint work that bothers me.

Wendigo is the big disappointment to me, because he was the one of these four that I was most looking forward to.  And while his sculpt isn't perfect, the awful paint job takes away what potential it had.

He's been cast in a gray plastic, and then at least one, maybe two washes were applied.  These look terrible, with all kinds of inconsistency in the color and application.  The thighs on mine are much darker than the rest of the figure, and all the joints and pegs are much lighter.  In fact, many of the disks and pegs are the very light gray of the cast plastic, with no paint at all.  This is one of the ugliest paint jobs in person that I've seen in quite awhile.

Articulation - Hulk, Wendigo ***1/2; Absorbing Man ***; Samson **1/2
All the ML's are getting less articulation, but some are losing more than others.  And some work better with what's left as well.

Wendigo is the closest of these four to the old ML articulation.  He has the same neck as usual, plus both ball jointed shoulders and hips.  The shoulders are just the post/pin style that are only jointed on the torso side, but the elbows are pin and post as well so the arm can turn at the elbow.  The wrist is pin and post too, as is the ankles.

Wendigo's ball jointed hips are jointed on both sides of the ball, just like the old days.  There's double jointed knees as well, and a relatively decent ab crunch.

There's no tail articulation, and he has no half foot or waist joint.  But of the four, he has perhaps the best overall articulation.

The Hulk still poses pretty damn well too, even with fewer joints than his older Marvel Legends cousins.  He still has the usual neck joint, and because there's no restrictive hair or sculpt, it tilts back and forth pretty well.  The arms are ball joints with a joint on both sides of the ball, the elbows are single pin, as are the wrists, ankles and knees.  The elbows, knees, ankles and wrists are all pin and post style, so the turn as well as move forward and back.

The hips are pin and post too, or as often called, ball jointed with a joint only on the torso side.  The leg turns, and moves back and forth on the disk, but there's no sort of cut joint.  This isn't too big of a problem for the Hulk though, as the knees turn.

He has a good ab crunch joint too, but there's no cut waist at all.  That means turning the upper body in relation to the lower body is pretty restricted.

The Absorbing Man is exactly the same as the Hulk, with one less joint - the shoulder does not have a joint on the arm side.  While the elbow turns, the lack of the upper bicep cut joint is a big loss.

While he doesn't have the waist joint either, his ab crunch joint turns side to side better than the Hulk, making it's loss less of an issue.

Samson ends up with even less.  Like Absorbing Man, his shoulders are less articulated than the Hulk, and rather than having the pin/post knees, he has double jointed pins.  This is an issue because the pin/post style at least allowed the lower leg to turn - without it, there's no way to turn any part of the leg toward the outside.

He also has that restrictive hair, which makes his neck joint less useful.  You'll need to use that ab crunch to get him looking forward.

Accessories - with FFF: Wendigo, Hulk, Samson **1/2; Absorbing Man *** - w/o FFF: Hulk, Samson Bupkis; Absorbing Man **
This is one of the categories where Fin Fang Foom makes a difference.  If you care about the BAF, you're getting a better deal.

That's because Wendigo, Hulk and Doc Samson only come with one accessory, the FFF piece.  The Hulk's is only the left leg and foot, but at least Samson comes with the huge tail and lower torso.  Wendigo has the one arm and wing.

If you aren't buying these to complete Foom (or are one of the unlucky ones that never find all eight pieces), they're just worthless hunks of plastic.

Absorbing Man has the other leg and foot, but he also comes with a ball and chain that he can use as a weapon.  It's not much, but it's something.

Foom (so far): **1/2
I separated out the actual FFF pieces here, because they deserve discussion on their own.  Obviously, I only have three of the eight so far, so I have no idea if my final view of Foom will be better or worse.  However, with the two legs, upper tail and lower torso, here's the situation.

The articulation and sculpt are looking good, but the paint is awful.  The torso and tail are that same very hard, brittle plastic that we have with the Hulk torso, and the paint work on it is very poorly done.  The light green is sloppy and inconsistent, and the entire thing feels and looks cheap.  Let's hope that with some arms and a head, he looks a lot better.

Fun Factor - ***
While they might not be quite the collector's line they used to be, they are still mighty fun toys.  Only Samson really lacks in the leg articulation, and all of them have the quality for hard play.

Value - FFF Fans **;  FFF Haters *
The price of a Marvel Legend mass market action figure has risen to $15 a pop.  Yep, that's right - the same kind of price you might pay for a specialty market toy at Hot Topic.  Now, I'll admit the FFF BAF is pretty damn cool, even with the cheap plastic torso.  But if you're not interested in the BAF, you're getting royally hosed on this wave.  Even if you are, the value isn't nearly what it used to be.

Things to Watch Out For - 
You'll want to pay attention to paint, just like any other mass produced action figure these days.  But once they are open, they are sturdy enough to handle basic play without fear of breakage.

Overall - with FFF: Hulk ***; Samson, Absorbing Man **1/2; Wendigo **; without FFF Hulk, Absorbing Man, Samson **; Wendigo *1/2
Whether you care about Foom or not is a huge consideration for these individual figures.  Why?  Because of the huge cost.  Paying $15 each is bad enough to get Foom, but if you're not interested in him, you're really getting hosed.

Yea, the scoring is more complicated, but the basic result is this - if you want to complete old Foom, Hulk is a decent figure with just some wonky paint wash.  Absorbing Man and Samson are mediocre at this price point, and Wendigo is ruined by an awful paint application.

If you don't care about Foom, all those scores get even worse.  Paying $15 for a figure like Wendigo with that awful paint job should be a crime.

If these were $10 Marvel Legends figures, I probably would have even dropped the Triple F caveat. But at this new higher price point, it's hard to ignore the difference he makes. And even at ten bucks, you deserve better paint than you're getting with the washes on Hulk and Wendigo.

Score Recap:
Packaging - ***1/2
Sculpting - Hulk, Wendigo ***1/2; Samson, Absorbing Man ***
Paint - Absorbing Man ***; Samson, Hulk **1/2; Wendigo *1/2
Articulation - Hulk, Wendigo ***1/2; Absorbing Man ***; Samson **1/2
Accessories - with FFF: Wendigo, Hulk, Samson **1/2 Absorbing Man ***; w/o FFF: Hulk, Samson Bupkis; Absorbing Man **
Foom (so far) - **1/2
Fun Factor - ***
Value - FFF Fans **;  FFF Haters *
Overall - with FFF: Hulk ***; Samson, Absorbing Man **1/2; Wendigo **; without FFF Hulk, Absorbing Man, Samson **; Wendigo *1/2

Where to Buy -
These are hitting Toys R Us first, but other retailers should get them in.  Online options include:

- Entertainment Earth has the case for $128.

- for the Australian collectors, try out Shopping.com.

- or search ebay with MyAuctionLinks.

Related Links -
I've reviewed a lot of ML's:

- I never did look at the third wave of Hasbro ML's, but I did cover wave 2 and series 1, first at MROTW and then here at QSE.

- you’ll want to check out my review of the other four figures at MROTW.

- Hasbro has also released several of the 12″ Marvel Legends Icons, including Punisher and Doom, and my favorite, Thor.
And if you still pine for the days Toybiz -

- in the 12″ Icons line, there’s Spider-man and Beast, Wolverine and Venom.

- The Face Offs series 1 (with Hulk/Leader in one review and the other two sets in another) and series 2 both had guest reviews.

- there’s the guest review of the Fearsome Foes of Spider-man boxed set, Urban Legends box set, X-men Legends boxed set, and the Fantastic Four boxed set, along with my review of the Monsters boxed set.

- The previous Sentinel BAF was guest reviewed.

- then there’s the various series reviews, including the Wal-mart series, series 13, series 12, series 9 (including Galactus), series 8 Captain Marvel and Doc Ock, series 7 Vision, series 6 Juggernaut, Wolverine and Deadpool, series 5 Blade, Nick Fury, Sabertooth and Colossus, along with series 5 Red Skull, Silver Surfer and Mr. Fantastic, series 4 Goliath, Punisher, Beast, Gambit, and Elektra, series 3 Daredevil and then the rest of the series, series 2 Thing and Namor, and finally, from three and a half years ago, the series 1 review.

Discussion:
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