Thursday, October 17, 2013

Star Wars Figure of the Day: Day 2,037: Imperial Technician (Death Star Scanning Crew)

IMPERIAL TECHNICIAN Death Star Scanning Crew
The Vintage Collection Kmart Exclusive
Item No.:
Asst. A5605 No. A5606
Manufacturer: Hasbro
Number: n/a
Includes: Blaster, Scanning Equipment with removable wheels, Imperial Officer figure
Action Feature: n/a
Retail: $15.99
Availability: October 2013
Appearances: Star Wars

Bio: The Millennium Falcon is captured by the Death Star.  A scanning crew searches the ship for crew or Droids, while an Imperial officer monitors the investigation.   (Taken from the figure's cardback.)

Image: Adam's photo lab.

Commentary: This is a slightly different Imperial Technician from yesterday - the figure is basically the same, with the original 2009 head.   And it's actually pretty much the same figure from 2009 with batch differences - obviously, things like skin tone aren't an exact match when you whip up a batch of "flesh" like four years later.  The figure is fundamentally the same, with the same 14 joints, excellent range of movement, and perfectly fine sculpting.  Obviously Hasbro has done better, but Hasbro has done worse and I like this figure a bunch.  It's perfectly fine.

In addition to an Imperial blaster, it comes with an extensively repainted scanning equipment base, and inside are what I assume are the Death Star's collection of vinyl - surely there's some "White Light/White Heat" and "Ultimate Spinach" in there.  (I'm just assuming.)   The wheeled accessory has been improved slightly, and now features significantly different deco.  The base is a lighter blue color, with grey corners and some white highlights on the "LPs" in the middle.  The red vertical stripes on the sides are now unpainted.  It's surprisingly different, so I'd suggest getting both versions of this figure if you're the kind of person who has small armies.  Can you ever have enough Imperials?  (Well, if Hasbro never puts out a Death Star, yeah,  yeah you can.)  I like it.

Collector's Notes: The "Death Star Scanning Crew" set is the less interesting one of the sets - the Scanning Trooper is basically a repack with a repainted accessory, while the Officer is arguably quite interesting.  I like the other one more, and this is anecdotally the slower seller.  To anyone who has enjoyed this column, take some advice - go ahead and buy it.  For $16 it's pretty much worth it, especially in light of where this line is (OK, isn't) going.

--Adam Pawlus


Day 2,037: October 17, 2013

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is clearly the lesser of the two sets, but I'm glad that it was revisited with a bit of love for the collectors. I wish they had been able to improve the paint apps on this guy. He still sports the same old eye-rolling deco that pretty much says, "oh, here we go unloading this ship scanning equipment again! Oh, the drear!"

Still, I like it and am glad I picked it up.

Fanzine Making Time said...

Sure there are a pair of 13th Floor Elevators LPs too...
Great to have FOTD back!