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Slave Leia (Black Series)

January 3, 2015 | By Errex More

Slave Leia BS (8) I never quite got the reason Hasbro decided to make this the first version of Princess Leia to appear as part of their Star Wars Black Series 6-inch figure line.

Princess Leia as Jabba’s Prisoner (or more colloquially, Slave Leia), is a figure that came a bit too early in the line, especially if you consider the amount of production issues these figures tend to display.

The overall design seems sound on paper; Slave Leia is essentially an up-scaled version of the 3.75-inch design with upgrades allowed by the larger, 6-inch scale. The main issue with this version of Leia is that articulation is way too conspicuous with the amount of bare skin showing. The articulation design itself is pretty good, consisting of:

• Hinged ball neck.

• Pegged hinge shoulders.

• Pegged hinge elbows.

• Pegged hinge wrists.

• Floating torso.

• Pegged hinge hips.

• Upper thigh swivels.

• Double jointed knees.

• Pegged hinge ankles.

Even though articulation works just fine, considering the character design, it does affect other aspects of this figure. Specifically, the upper leg joints are implemented in a way that Leia is left with what can only be described as a wide set of birthing hips, which in turn looks weird paired with the rather modest bust size.

The skirt piece on Leia’s bikini is made from a new type of fabric that doesn’t really drape and fold like the materials used in the smaller lines, which further detracts from this figure’s appearance.

However, all of the previous criticisms don’t hold a candle to the debacle that is the paintjob on Slave Leia, despite how little paint applications are actually there.

Most of Leia is molded out of skin colored plastic, so the only paint applied can be seen on the bronze trimming of her outfit and the moss gray fabric bits. These areas look decent enough and are neatly applied, but the real problem is the paint applied onto the figure’s head.

I would concede that the head sculpt may not be an bad portrait of actress Carrie Fisher circa 1982, but the paint apps on a lot of the figures I got to peruse at the store had seriously misaligned or uneven facial features. And even on those few that had properly painted faces, the overall look on Leia was incredibly plain.

The one aspect where Slave Leia more or less came through is in the accessories, as she comes with a removable collar with a small length of chain attached to it, and a couple of pole arms of the type favored by Jabba’s henchmen.

Overall, Slave Leia is not a terrible figure to have, but it neither is a figure anybody needs to rush out to buy at full retail price, as evidenced by the pegs full of her even now, a year after her initial release.