Star Wars Rebels Saga Legends
Item No.: Asst. A3857 No. A8648
Manufacturer: Hasbro
Number: #SL05
Includes: Rifle
Action Feature: n/a
Retail: $5.99
Availability: October 2014
Appearances: Star Wars Rebels
Bio: Agent Kallus is a member of the Imperial Security Bureau, a secret police force that hunts down and crushes any rebellion in the galaxy. Intelligent and ruthless, Kallus is a skilled pilot who makes it his mission to stop troublesome freedom fighters. (Taken from the figure's packaging.)
Image: Adam's photo lab.
Availability: Click here to buy it at Entertainment Earth now!
Commentary: Not bad. Not bad at all. Agent Kallus will never be the Admiral Screed figure I'll never get, but it's one of the better figures from this wave in terms of overall quality. It ain't perfect but it's a worthwhile design upgrade to the long-running Imperial Officer. Heck, it's basically an armored-up version of the original Kenner figure from the 1980s. He has glossy black gloves and boots - this is what earns him a lot of extra praise - and trades the Navy cap with a helmet which is a distant cousin of the Naval Trooper/Death Squad Commando bucket. Interestingly, it looks like the head is a two-piece ordeal - the helmet isn't removable, but it's molded in a separate color of plastic than the head. We've seen this before with figures' hair (see Mara Jade) and Playmobil has been doing things like this for years, even with the horns of its dinosaurs.
This feels like a descendant of the Droids cartoon line. Kallus has straight arms and no subtext - it's a bad guy, named accordingly and dressed in black. He stands or sits just fine, and should fit in most vehicles. Actually, I kind of wish he had his own vehicle right now. He has no problems holding his weapon - a bo-rifle, but not the same one that Zeb has. It's unpainted and features no articulated parts, plus it's a wee bit skinnier. Kallus' deco is pretty good - a black plastic figure has grey shoulders and some body armor not unlike that of General Veers, and a rank badge that to this day I don't understand.
There's a little triangle on the collar of his uniform, and the deco doesn't match the show exactly - but it makes for a good action figure. My only real gripe are his eyebrows are the wrong color, and if I could add a fake complaint it would be that the figure lacks the character's greatest gag - the helmet-shaped sideburns. Maybe they could show up in the future somewhere, because as an easy-to-grasp metaphor - the helmet really never comes off - it seems like it would be a good feature to deliver to the tiny tots.
The back of the figure has a couple of little slats, and you can sort of cram his rifle in there for storage if you like. I like this - it's a neat spin on the holster thing, which is a feature I can't get enough of. On-figure storage? Yes please.
Since the deco is basically on the mark, deco isn't sloppy, and the shiny bits are shiny I can't complain with what I got for the money. In an era where super-articulated figures cost $11-$13, a decent $5 figure that feels like an honest-to-goodness toy is pretty welcome. I don't begrudge the articulation of the fancier figures, but I do find it nice to see a figure at mid-1990s prices again. That sort of thing matters to me as a collector, mostly because when you realize you have over 2,000 of these things and a lot of them cost you $10 (or more, in some cases) you want to get those prices back down to $5 or $6.Collector's Notes: I got this from Entertainment Earth. This wave is starting to show up at Target, Toys R Us, and reportedly elsewhere.
--Adam Pawlus
Day 2,112: November 13, 2014
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