Kithaba

June 1, 2013 | By More


 Kithaba (2)

Kithaba (11)Kithaba is one of the few characters I had no awareness of back in the old Kenner days. Of course, back then, Kithaba didn’t even exist as a named character, because when Kenner produced the klatooinian skiff guard figure, they sort of meshed two characters by making the actual mold to resemble Barada, but painted the figure in Kithaba’s color scheme.
Thus, when years later Kenner gave it another go at producing Barada, people was somewhat puzzled by having it in a more-or-less correct color scheme, which would be tweaked a couple of times more with subsequent releases of the figure over the years.

 

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Thing is, when I bought Kithaba a few weeks ago, I was actually thinking I was getting the TVC version of Barada, a misconception furthered by Hasbro using the reversed portrait of Barada for the card art. You would say that having the figure staring me in the face through the blister despite the wrong card illustration should have been enough to realize Kithaba was not Barada, but my perception of these things works funny sometimes.

 

The point is, once I opened the blister, I was rather underwhelmed by Kithaba. The character design is certainly very similar to the other klatooinian pirate, but his costume is considerably less elaborate, consisting on a short sleeved tunic worn over a rather filthy shirt and red pants complemented with a pair of boots, a few pouches and a rag tied to his head.
The actual sculpting on the figure is good, but it just isn’t very exciting. As it happens with most background aliens in Return of the Jedi, the more interesting bits are the ones that are patently not human, which in this case are hands and head. The hands are scaly but rather generic while the head sculpt shows more effort, although not quite enough to say it is an improvement over the sculpts of previously released klatooinians.

 

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The one definite improvement is in the

articulation, as Kithaba has the following:

 

• Ball jointed neck.

• Pegged hinge shoulders.

• Pegged hinge elbows.

• Swivel wrists.

• Swivel waist.

• Swivel hips.

• Pegged hinge knees.

• Pegged hinge ankles.

 

All of these joints are fully functional, and even though the lower edge of his shirt was accomplished with a rubber skirt piece, it still allows Kithaba full sitting poses.

 

Kithaba (4)The paintjob on Kithaba is decent, but rather uninspired. While the weathering on his shirt is nicely applied and all block color applications are quite neatly applied, the thing that bothers me a little is that Kithaba has noticeably less color to his face than other members of his species rendered in plastic.

As far as accessories, the pouches running across Kithaba’s chest can be removed and he also comes armed with another of those ornate blaster pistols favored by Jabba’s guard and a pike made from a surprisingly pliable plastic. Both of these weapons are decorated with gunmetal accents and can be held securely in his hands.

 

In the end, Kithaba is a fairly decent figure of the guard that tries to push Luke into the Sarlacc Pit in the movie, and that fact alone would be reason enough to add it to my collection, despite not being one of the more interesting character designs from Return of the Jedi.

 Kithaba (3)

Errex Score: 88/100

Kithaba (7)

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Category: Featured, Star Wars, Toy Reviews

About the Author ()

I've been collecting action figures since the original Kenner Star Wars days. Nowadays, I still collect pretty much anything that catches my eye.

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