



Spider-Man: Far From Home is due out next month, and I'm pretty dang excited for it. Homecoming took me off guard with how good it was, and the continuing story of Tom Holland Peter in Europe is one I won't miss. With a new MCU movie comes (usually) a corresponding Legends line. Today, we'll look at two comic based figures from the wave that I found at Walgreens: Julia Carpenter Spider-Woman and Hydro-Man.





Packaging:





The packaging is great, as expected by now. The bios and art are nice, as usual, especially helpful with characters I'm less familiar with, such as these two. It shows the figures and the accessories very well, and they personalized the interior cardboard tray with a web pattern, which is a nice touch and makes a good backdrop.









Sculpting:





Julia is build on the female athletic body we've seen a few times recently, on Invisible Woman for instance, and it works well here. She comes across as a powerful, strong hero, so mission accomplished.









Her hair, while having some paint issues to be discussed later, came out very well. It looks pretty convincingly like it's in motion, and doesn't hinder the neck or shoulder articulation much.









If nothing else, Hydro is probably the most visually interesting figure in the wave. He's built on the Netflix Luke Cage buck, and for a buff guy in civilian clothes it works pretty well. The detail for the denim jeans and the laces on his boots is very impressive.





The water arms are permanently attached, and while they look great, and are light enough not to wilt, the lack of great articulation in them does limit the fun factor.

His head sculpt has a great smirk, no doubt he's a smug goon up to no good. Also, as others have noticed, he does look an awful lot like Willem Dafoe.





Articulation:





Julia has most of the joints you'd expect her to, but not quite as many as I'd like for a Spider-person. She's got: A ball jointed neck, ball shoulders, swivel/hinge elbows, hinge/swivel wrists, an ab swivel, ball hips, thigh cut, double jointed knees, and rocker/jointed ankles. All her points work well, and came out secure, but as a super acrobatic character, some more joints, namely in the elbows and torso would be much appreciated.













Hydro-man is a mixed bag. The best part of his figure, the water arms, are also the least articulated. He has: a ball jointed head, ball shoulders, single joint elbows with a swivel, hinged cut wrists, an ab crunch, waist swivel, ball hips, thigh cut, double joint knees, and rocker ankles. The base figure is very easy to pose and maneuver, but sadly the arms don't have much movement.





Paint:





Spider-Woman is mostly cast in black and white, and is mostly cleanly painted. A few white spots popped up on the black part of her thighs, but I'm more concerned about the squiggle of black paint that wound up on her right elbow. More subtly, the line between her face and mask has quite a bit of bleed over, right along the seam.





Her hair is pretty great, however. It's fairly convincingly two toned, mostly orange with blonde streaks, and it looked really good until I noticed the deep orange blob on the side of her head, pictured above. I suspect it may flake off, but it'd be nice if Hasbro could just tweak the paint a little beforehand.









What Hydro-Man may lack in some articulation, he makes up for with excellent paint. The clothes are great, all clean and no slop. The head is good, no bleed and looks nice and skeevy. The water parts are the real star, of course. The arms are cast in translucent plastic, painted a light blue. The water shoe effects are slightly darker, but painted to accentuate the illusion of motion. In short, his paint job is really good.





Accessories:





Spider-Woman comes with the MASSIVE torso of Molten Man, which is so big it's sealed in the box behind her, I guess because she and the piece couldn't both fit. She does come with one personal inclusion; an alternate web shooting hand. The web is attached to her hand with clear plastic, like Ronin's ninja star hand. It's a nice effect, but I'd have honestly prefer more traditional hands. As a member of the Spidey family, she'd be vastly improved with "thwippy" hands, and alternate fists. It'd really improve her fun factor and her posing options.

As nice as the web looks, it's pretty short, so you have to get really up close to connect it with a baddie.













While Spider-Woman has a somewhat lacking accessory, Hydro-man does a bit better. He comes with Molten Man's creepy noggin, and two water effects that slip over his boots. They have a good sculpt, and slip on and off easily. His hands can also come off, which gives a pretty cool alternate display look.





Overall:

Despite some shortcomings, these are still pretty great toys. Spider-Woman and Hydro-Man have both had figures before, but these are nice updates with modern sculpting and articulation. Each of them make a great addition to a figure display. I have no major issue with recommending them, but if you get the chance to buy Spider-Woman from a brick and mortar store, check the paint before you buy her.





Gallery:















