Clone Commander Cody (CW7)
It has been quite some time since I bought (or even found) any Clone Wars figure. With Hasbro’s resources stretched thin among all of their lines in production, in 2012 we are not getting as much Clone Wars product as last year and some of the figures shipping in 2012 are re-issued from last year.
One of the really new figures is this version of Commander Cody in his phase II armor. This is how the character appeared in the fourth season of the TV show, and it is fundamentally the same suit of armor he used at least until the events depicted in Revenge of the Sith.
The styling is animated, of course, but the uniform incorporates all of the distinctive elements seen on the movie. For this version of Cody, Hasbro used several elements developed for the new basic clone body, which adheres more closely to the look of the digital models seen in the cartoon.
This also means that some changes were made to the articulation of the clones, leaving Cody with:
• Ball jointed neck.
• Pegged hinge shoulders.
• Pegged hinge elbows.
• Swivel wrists.
• Swivel waist.
• Swivel hips.
• Pegged hinge knees.
• Double-pegged hinge ankles.
Gone are the pegged hinges at the wrists that allowed the clones to bend as well as rotate their hands and the barbell-mounted, floating torso joint. These were very well received innovations back in 2010, and it is really disappointing to see them gone.
One concern I had with Cody is that also the legs seemed to be the new kind, with recessed knee-pads and no ankle joints, but thankfully Hasbro developed a new set of shins with the ankle joints that let the feet rock to the sides.
Now, to be brutally honest, this kind of ankle joint would be best used in conjunction with a more versatile hip design, but I’m not really complaining.
The paint applications on Commander Cody are pretty good. The abdomen armor is painted in a grayish tan hue, with muted orange markings on the armor. Even though some white scratches were painted over the orange bits at shoulders and knees, the overall result is very clean. The silver badge on Cody’s left breast isn’t actually sculpted, but painted and is possibly the most elaborate paint app on this figure.
The head sculpt was also updated, but it still has the facial scarring sculpted on the left side of Cody’s face. The scar is painted in a reddish skin tone, and the hair and eyes are painted solid black.
This time around, Commander Cody comes with a good number of accessories: a removable phase 2 helmet, a small rocket backpack, a newly sculpted blaster rifle and a larger rocket backpack with a harness and pivoting guns.
The helmet seems to have more sculpted detail than the realistic version although the paint-job is less elaborate. On the other hand, the small rocket pack looks more stylized, but it was designed to actually stay in place much better, either at Cody’s back or placed onto the larger rocket pack.
This large rocket pack I don’t like all that much. It is very bulky and the harness bends the antenna on Cody’s left shoulder unless the arm is positioned near the body and left alone. The harness has a holster sculpted on the front, but no weapon was included for it, which I would have preferred over the Galactic Battle Game stuff.
Yes, Cody comes with yet another game die (now molded in black with gold symbols), a display base molded in tan plastic and a full-color gaming card. Of these, the only useful item is the base, but since the peg-holes on Cody’s feet are placed at the toes, the base has to be used facing backwards.
As a whole, this new Commander Cody turned out better than I expected and as one of the very few newly sculpted characters in this line is worth getting.
Errex Score: 80/100
Category: Featured, Star Wars, Toy Reviews