Figure Review: Sideshow Star Wars Momaw Nadon

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Star Wars: Scum & Villany

Momaw Nadon (Hammerhead)

12 Inch Scale

By: Sideshow Toys

$110

Momaw Nadon was exiled from his homeworld, Ithor, after he revealed secrets of Ithorian agricultural technology to the Galactic Empire. He spent much of his exile on Tatooine as a pacifistic farmer, and was seen in Chalmun’s Cantina when Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi came searching for passage to Alderaan. After a “great meet” of Ithorian Herd Ships, it was decided Nadon had acted with the best interest of the Ithorian people. His exile was ended, and he was restored as herd leader of Tafanda Bay. Despite this restoration, Nadon still believed he had brought shame upon himself and vowed to spend the rest of his life accounting for his mistake. By 25 ABY, he had been replaced as the high priest and leader of the Ithorian people by Relal Towron. It is unknown if Nadon was still alive during the time of the destruction of his beloved homeworld by the Yuuzhan Vong, or, if he was, what happened to him.

When I was a kid, Momaw was simply known as Hammerhead and his backstory was pretty vague in the Star Wars mythos. In the last 20 years or so, Lucas and the people in charge of the Star Wars franchise have filled in the legacy of this Ithorian with plenty of details and history. Here is the “official” bio of Momaw:

Actually there is a lot more in his bio, including convoluted nonsense about him farming clones, being inept with weapons and generally being an important part of the Star Wars mythos. One of the more controversial things that the folks over at Camp Lucas have done in recent years is to make sure that everyone who had even a 15 second cameo in the Star Wars films, has an important backstory that ties them to key moments in the Empire’s history.

So what was Hammerhead’s bio when I was a kid? Well my backstory was that he was a Cantina drug dealer. Simple as that. Yeah I guess it’s not as elaborate as farming clones of Imperial Captain Alima to pay off his sins, but I think it’s a better story. It explains why he’s in the Cantina and also why he has a Stormtrooper gun as a weapon. In my world he sold “dirt” which was essentially slang for intergalactic Marijuana.

Packaging

Because he was a freaky, stoned out of his mind alien, he was always one of my favorite Star Wars figures. In fact, he’s one of the few Star Wars toys (and toys in general) that have survived with me until now. He gets a cameo credit in this review. When Sideshow announced that they would be releasing an awesome 12 inch version, I decided it would become mine.The package is pretty sleek and generally a nice presentation. The box features a wrap around lid, complete with magnetic closures to keep it from flying open. The magnet is definitely better than say, a piece of velcro.

Inside is a pretty simple window, with a cool quote from Ben Kenobi and details about the Hutts and the Cantina. It also has a little bio on the glory days of Hammerhead. It leaves out most of the convoluted parts, which definitely serves the package well. It also has a breakdown of what’s included inside… Except it lists a cup which was supposed to come with the figure but for some reason was scrapped.

The rest of the packaging is your basic plastic container. Everything is packed well and there aren’t any twist ties. As always, I approve of packages that can keep my figure safe and don’t have 900 twist ties inside. Packaging is important at this price point, because once you’re paying over $50 for a figure, I believe it’s more akin to buying a piece of art than a toy.

He’s easy enough to take out and play, then store back in the package for later. Of course I don’t know why you’d want to store your Hammerhead away. This guy makes a great centerpiece for your coffee table.

Sculpt :

In the original Star Wars film, we don’t actually see most of Hammerhead’s body. In fact Momaw’s total on-screen appearance is far less than a minute. Nadon’s longest appearance is actually in the Richard Pryor “Star Wars Bar” comedy sketch, in which Hammerhead laments that he’s in love. With whom, we never find out.

Because we never see much of the costume in the film and the Star Wars Bar appearance shows only bits of the costume, we’re left with concept art and Kenner’s first take on the figure as the only real reference for the guy. Kenner depicted him as scrawny, almost sickly thin, but Sideshow has definitely bulked him up a bit. Hasbro’s recent figures have had Momaw with about this same sort of physique, so by all accounts, Sideshow has done a good job.

The feet and hands are definitely reminiscent of the old Kenner figure, which will no doubt please many longtime collectors. The feet themselves have a lot of great sculpting and detail, even on the bottom!

One of the big keys to mention here is that this is Sideshow’s Prometheus body with special arms and legs. This means that underneath his clothes is a rather basic looking brown body. I’m okay with that because Sideshow did a really good job on sculpting the legs up to the knees and the arms up to the elbows. That’s actually more sculpting than would be on a typical human figure.

His head is of course, the most important part of the design. The good news is that the sculpt is absolutely brilliant. This is far and away, the best that Momaw Nadon’s hammer head has ever looked. The head itself is sculpted of a very soft rubber, which may turn some folks off. Personally I assume this was done to keep costs down and to prevent the figure from being too top heavy. That said, the head is definitely a little more rubbery than I would have liked.

Hammerhead’s outfit is pretty basic with some decent stitch work but nothing that will likely knock your socks off. He does have a simple belt with a variety of plastic pouches on it. I really like the look of the pouches, but some folks take issue with the fact that they’re plastic and not cloth. It doesn’t bother me, but your mileage may vary.

Also important to note, his “hump” or “hunch” is actually done by having a little fabric piece underneath. No alteration has been done to the body, that’s created by cloth.

His neck is wrapped in a scarf/hood deal that is pretty accurate to the actual costume. This was used to hide rods and heads in the original prop. Here it helps hide the neck joint, which can be seen from certain angles underneath. I prefer the scarf down, but I haven’t gotten my latest issue of Ithorian GQ, so I’m not sure if that’s in fashion.

Finally, it would be really easy to create perennial badass Ithorian Jedi, Roron Corobb with some leftover Jedi clothes from your other figures. I suspect that Sideshow will reuse these molds and make a Roron at some point in the future. If not, that would be a blunder on their part.

Paint :

At this kind of pricetag you might expect a lot of paint applications, however that is not the case here. Most of the paintwork is on the head, which has some good detail painting and a fair amount of wash. It’s not necessarily the grandest paint I’ve ever seen, but it does the character justice.

The rest of the paint is on the arms and legs. Again, it’s good but mostly just a wash. It helps to give him a little color and serves it’s purpose. The head and the body are definitely two distinctly different colors, with the wash bringing balance between the two.

Articulation :

This figure features Sideshow’s aforementioned Prometheus body with 30+ points of articulation. I’m not going to sit here and count them all or label them all. It’s pretty suffice to say that you can get this guy into a ton of poses and he’s vastly more articulated than 99% of the 6 inch and under figures on the market today.

The neck has a great range of movement, allowing a lot of lifelike posing. It really gives him a ton of character. For whatever reason, I’ve always felt that Hammerhead had a lot of charm and the amount of neat positions you could put him in is really limitless.

My one complaint would be that the figure is generally pretty loose. Not flop around loose, but looser than I’d like. His leg can not stand straight out for a kick, as an example. His knees are ratcheted, which is a nice addition. Unfortunately, his feet are not ratcheted at the ball joints in his ankles and that seems like a real missed opportunity.

He probably won’t fall over, but some ratcheting ankle joints would have made him the bees knees.

Accessories :

These types of figures are either loaded down with additional stuff or are pretty light in this category. Momaw Nadon has just enough to get by, but definitely feels a little short on additional doodads to put him over the top. For starters, he’s missing the cup that was advertised with him.

Truth be told it’s a small omission, but when it’s his only other tangible accessory other than his blaster, it feels worth noting. His weapon is the Stormtrooper blaster. This is the same mold that’s been used on Sideshow’s other releases, but it’s weathered with paint here. Of course, this is a nod to the old Kenner figure.

The other accessories are all variant hands, with a trigger finger hand and a more general “fist-like” hand. Both are right hands, leaving it impossible to create a left handed gun slinging Hammerhead. Personally I would have like a closed left hand as well.

Finally, he gets a basic Star Wars doll type stand. I should mention there is a special edition version exclusive to Sideshow that will run you about $15-$20 more and it includes a large lthorian staff. That’s similar to the one that Hasbro released in their last Momaw, but wasn’t worth the extra change in my view.

Value :

Some of us will never spend over a $100 on a single action figure. If you’re the kind of person who would never spend that much money on a single toy, there’s nothing here that will convince you otherwise. However, if you’re even slightly inclined to buy one of these higher end toys, Sideshow’s take on Hammerhead is definitely “worth it”.

He’s not 100% perfect, but he’s very, very close. If the joints had been tighter, the accessories a little more generous and the sculpting a little more thorough I would have had no problem giving this guy a perfect score. As is, he’s really good, even for guys who don’t normally drop this kind of dough on a toy.

Score Recap

Packaging: 9Sculpting: 9Paint: 8Articulation: 8Value: 8

Despite a couple of very minor grievances, I’m still giving this guy a full 9 out of 10. Considering the price, to me that’s a good indication of how generally awesome this figure is. I really doubt we’ll ever get a better version of Hammerhead in any form and as I often say, when you find yourself in the possession of the best version of a character, that’s a good toy.

Now nearly 30 years since my Kenner toy’s release, Hammerhead is free to sell his “dirt” to anyone who’s jonesing for a fix. He has the best dirt, just ask around.