Packaging: What a dreary looking box. It is ice-blue, grey, and white. The front cover opens to a window displaying the Gray Edwards figure in the box.
Headsculpt: A hard-resin-like material would make this head hard to remove without affecting the paint-applications. Gray Edwards has a sort of generic action-movie character look. An interesting face to add to your Corps.
Articulation: A Dragon-style body made with cheaper plastic. It feels like it would not be hard to snap apart. The hands are different from Dragon or Blue Box Elite, and they are similar to the G.I. Joe "Flipper" hands that have appeared on a few G.I. Joes. The hands are sort of open and they are made of soft rubber. These hands will hold something in a pose, but they are not made for gripping tools, weapons, etc.
Outfit: The outfit is a dreary grey with some "weathering" spots and dirt-marks. It just looks like the character does not get near a Laundromat very often. The first time I saw this on the shelves, I thought "Here comes the Iraqi Army." The figure is wearing a sewn on shirt and space-shorts. The material is wafer-thin. This outfit should go on a "bad guy" figure. A SWAT outfit or something similar could be used to kitbash and improve this oufit.
Gear: The armor plates are soft rubber, and they are kind of cheesy looking. With some gear from a G.I. Joe, Ultimate Soldier, Blue Box or Dragon sets, this figure could look like a legitimate "Space Marine." Aside from the cheap rubber armor; there are some real odd points about this set. 1. The boots are so high in order to meet the space-shorts that they cover the action figure's knees. So if you bend the figure's knees, the foot comes out of the boots about a half-inch+. 2. The figure has what looks like a butter-knife that has a little prong which you attach to the shoulder plate. Obviously, the butter-knife will fall off very quickly. This is another example of non-playability and bad design. 3. The Space Rifle has some little prong openings underneath the frame which were apparently for some kind of accessory that was later scrapped. Someone on the "design team" should have filled in the holes in the mold so it would not be so obvious that the customers got short-changed.
Price: At Toys R Us, it was $19.99. Eventually these were on clearance for $4.99-$9.99.
Overall: A really crappy toy which reminded me with nostalgia of the early 1980s when unscrupulous toy companies would convert a tire-recapping plant into a toy manufacturing plant and pump out hastily put together Star Wars imitation junk. This toy brought to mind the old DEVO song SPACE JUNK.
Grade: F
