R2-X2 Astromech Droid Pack Series IIThe Saga Collection Entertainment Earth Exclusive
Item No.: Asst. 87055 No. 87057
Manufacturer: Hasbro
Number: n/a
Includes: n/a
Action Feature: Twist dome to extend or retract third leg
Retail: $39.99
Availability: January 2006
Appearances: Star Wars
Bio: Flies on X-Wing Fighter Red 10 during the Battle of Yavin. (Taken from the figure's box.)
Image: Adam Pawlus' carpet.
Commentary: When R4-G9 came out in 2005, I had one reaction: let's repaint the crap out of this. Thankfully a few months later I had my chance to propose a boxed set of droids (which went through a few mutations), and in its very first form the first astromech droid I put in any of the proposals was R2-X2 here. As such, you can guess, he's pretty special to me-- I mean, I got to ask someone to make this figure! It's been three years and it still makes me giddy. Since he's based on the best R2-D2-style body Hasbro has yet made, you can bet that he turned out as a pretty good figure. Twist the head, and his leg will go up and down. Move his legs and feet. Oh yes-- and admire his awesome black paint job, completely devoid of a clear plastic light-up eyeport. (This is important. If you're me. I'm glad they erred on making it look like the movie over the kid-friendly eyeport, which goes from "neat" to "eyesore" in about 2 seconds.)
It's a fun figure to play with, but it's lacking in accessories and basically exists to look cool. If you're reading this blog, that means you're probably the target market for it. Do you like the design? Great! Get one. If not, save your money. I'm hugely biased, but what did you expect? I think everybody should get this figure.
Collector's Notes: Sold out, not yet reissued. There's an ongoing debate between me and another collector on this figure's color. I say it's supposed to be black, he thinks it's dark green. The way I see it, Hasbro can always repaint it, but it looks right to me. One of my favorite things about this figure is that he apparently belongs to a Theron Nett in the movie. He still doesn't have a figure, but we've got his droid! (At least the droid looks cooler than yet another rebel pilot figure.) If you want just this robot, and not the boxed set, check eBay. There used to be tons of them individually for under $10, although lately they seem to have dried up. Also, I'm frequently asked "When can we expect Series III?" There are no plans to do another box of droids to my knowledge, so ask Hasbro if and when you see them. Since mid-2008, each figure includes a droid piece at retail, so I guess that's the main method for releasing Astromechs these days. (And the best, if you ask me, if you're a figure collector of the collect-them-all variety.)
Day 952: February 5, 2009
In one shot in the hangar this droid looks like it has a slight green hue to it, but the lighting is so weird back in the shadows of the hangar you can't really trust that for a reference. In the better lit briefing scene, there's a close up of this guy next to R2-D2 and he's definitely black.
ReplyDeleteAny chance Hasbro cleared the colors with Lucasfilm before making him? Any chance they have already 100 percent confirmed the color or did they just approve it in a "sure, go for it!" kind of way? (Cool! My "word verification" to post a comment below is "kersh"...Irving Kershner's nickname! Sweet! And....I'm a loser...)
ReplyDeleteActually, if you check out an HD screen cap of this little guy, in the briefing scene, he seems to be a dark green. I LOVE my figure anyway!!! And the little droid's paint scheme kinda shows up in Clone Wars too, as "Goldie". THANKS! And MORE Astromechs is ALWAYS welcome to me! :D
ReplyDeleteDo you have a link Brinn? The caps I have all show absolute black. Generally speaking, if you need a "special" method of viewing something, what you're then seeing is probably not really accurate.
ReplyDeleteFunnily enough, if you watch carefully in the briefing, R2 turns his head at one point towards this guy, and now everytime I see that I can't help but imagine R2 thinking "What the....you again?"
Hey Astro, I FINALLY FOUND the screen grabs on my HD and have up;oaded them here:
ReplyDeletehttp://home.cogeco.ca/~brinn71/R2-X2_01.jpg
http://home.cogeco.ca/~brinn71/R2-X2_02.jpg
These were untouched, as far as I know. You can kinda see green hilites; at least I do anyway.... :)
I dunno, I'm not really seeing it. Maybe at the very bottom of the frame there is sort of a "fade to green" thing going on, but that to me makes it seem more of a film stock/processing problem. I still think that the hangar shot coloring is probably due to the lighting.
ReplyDeleteYou know, in Rinzler's "The Making of Star Wars," he mentions at one point when talking about that when processing the film, there were problems with the black TIE pilots uniforms coming out looking a little green. I wonder if maybe what you're seeing is a manifestation of the same thing.
Thanks for taking the time to put up those scans.
You are welcome!
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree, it does seem to fade to green.
I do know that in film things are never 'Black' as it just absorbs light, so many things are actually darker colours; like Han's pants. For years I thought they were black but they were blue. They added dark silver to Vader's helmet and the TIE helmets for this reason, to pop detail out of the black helmets. I could see them painting this guy dark green to avoid the details of its body disappearing, but I guess we'll never know! The other colours in the scene look pretty good, so I don't know if if its that? Could be...?