1/6 1/6 Hot Toys - MMS 452 - Star Wars: Episode V ESB - Darth Vader

[GodParticle]

I don't think he's bulky at all. If anything, he looks too thin so much that I added padding. Just compare to ANH version to see the difference. Also, my helmet stays on pretty tight

 

[D.R.37]

I agree. Haven’t added padding to mine but have though about beefing up the chest a bit. I did a mod to adjust the dome (lowered and brought forward) and the helmet still stays on really well.

Looks nice with that snow commander... great shot JB!

 

[canofhumdingers]

I think he looks great. Sure there are nits to pick if you wanna talk super-insane-ultra level accuracy. But when I look at him on my shelf, I see ESB Vader. Unmistakably, undeniably ESB Vader. And (unlike my previous SS ANH) I don’t look at him think “cool, but this is off” or “that doesn’t look quite right”. When I look at this guy my first reaction is “dang, he looks spot on!” It’s only if I start searching for flaws and holding up comparison photos of the real deal next to the figure that I start picking out innaccuracies (ok ok, except the tusk angle, that one’s obvious but in hand it just doesn’t bother me b/c it’s not that bad in person).

Yes the articulation is limited (as all 1/6 Vader’s are), but if you take your time you can get some pretty awesome poses out of him. Bottom line, if you want perfection you’re going to have to customize a Vader yourself (and even then, perfection is in the eye of the beholder. Personally I’ve only seen a handful of custom Vaders I think hold a candle to this guy, but your mileage may vary). But out of the box, this guy is *really* nice.

 

[Indyfan1234]

Still working on my set up. Thinking of putting luke on floor with his cut off hand but I do like the look of him with his saber out. Still need to add cloud city to the sides of the glass. I have the shaft on the bottom and the back.

 

[Lord Valefor]

Still working on my set up. Thinking of putting luke on floor with his cut off hand but I do like the look of him with his saber out. Still need to add cloud city to the sides of the glass. I have the shaft on the bottom and the back.

OMG this shot highlight all the flaws of the ESB helmet

 

[jedibear]

That's amazing! Very cool!

 

[ZE_501]

OMG this shot highlight all the flaws of the ESB helmet

LOLOLOL... get over it man.


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[Cicada17]

OMG this shot highlight all the flaws of the ESB helmet

While I haven’t seen this in hand, I think it’s fair to guess there is quite a bit of lens distortion in that pic. Remember, he’s literally in a fish aquarium...


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[Indyfan1234]

That's amazing! Very cool!

Thank you! I’m liking how it’s turning out so far

 

[Indyfan1234]

While I haven’t seen this in hand, I think it’s fair to guess there is quite a bit of lens distortion in that pic. Remember, he’s literally in a fish aquarium...


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I think it looks great in person! I don’t really see flaws except for the tusk thing but I’m not picky as long as you can look at it and say yep that’s that character.

 

[Saintv1]

Got mine today. This is my first Vader, so I have a question about the shoulder armour. How is it attached? I'm nervous about moving his arms around to much because I'm not sure if the shoulder pieces are glued to his arms or velcroed. The arms and chest piece are very flush so it's preventing me from moving his arms too much.

I've seen pictures so I know it's solvable (I've seen the chest piece overlap the shoulders and vice versa), just not sure how to get there.

 

[GodParticle]

Got mine today. This is my first Vader, so I have a question about the shoulder armour. How is it attached? I'm nervous about moving his arms around to much because I'm not sure if the shoulder pieces are glued to his arms or velcroed. The arms and chest piece are very flush so it's preventing me from moving his arms too much.

I've seen pictures so I know it's solvable (I've seen the chest piece overlap the shoulders and vice versa), just not sure how to get there.

If you mean the shoulder bells themselves, they're glued to the chest armor with a strip of material (almost like electrical tape if I remember correctly). The chest armor just attaches to a piece of velcro in the front

 

[canofhumdingers]

Yeah the shoulder bells are really stiff at first but the tape stuff they’re attached with is pliable and stretches and becomes easier to manipulate as you work with it. If you pop the head off (easy to do, just be gentle and make sure you set aside the dome first!) then you can easily remove the chest armor from the Velcro patch and get a look underneath which will make it more obvious how the armor and shoulder bells work.

I did that with mine as soon as I opened him. Took the head, cape, chest armor, and belt off so I could better futz the inner robe to my liking and get the shoulder bells to tuck under the armor like they do in so many scenes. It was all very easy, just be gentle and take your time. The only challenging part was putting the belt back on, but that was because I was trying to get it to overlap the codpiece. I don’t see how people have managed that since the belt is so tight, it felt like I was going to break something. But once I gave up trying to put it over the codpiece and settled for it just sitting as low as it can go above the cod, everything went back on quite easily.

 

[canofhumdingers]

To those who say the silver button on the belt was only a ROTJ detail, I offer evidence to the contrary. I was only able to find a very few shots where it’s visible (my guess is it’s often hidden behind the belt boxes, plus the lighting often makes it difficult to spot), but it definitely IS there.

 

[TaliBane]

Yeah, it's a bit like Fett's U.S. divers belt (black belt with wide buckle) - its a functional part of the costume in both movies, and is sort-of visible in ESB in a few places, but its clearly visible in ROTJ most of the time, so its associated with the ROTJ version of the costume, not ESB.

I said that partly out of frustration that HT gave us their ROTJ reveal/split helmet just glued together, rather than a "clean" helmet like it should be for ESB. It bugs me that it has such obvious breaks/bumps in the tusk rails, the helmet brace greeblies are visible all the time from the front (totally incorrect for ESB and ROTJ) and that the fact its two halves glued together (with a slight mismatch/seam) makes the mouth too big, etc. They shouldn't have done that with such an expensive figure.

 

[TaliBane]

dupe post

 

[sithocan]

Yeah, it's a bit like Fett's U.S. divers belt (black belt with wide buckle) - its a functional part of the costume in both movies, and is sort-of visible in ESB in a few places, but its clearly visible in ROTJ most of the time, so its associated with the ROTJ version of the costume, not ESB.

I said that partly out of frustration that HT gave us their ROTJ reveal/split helmet just glued together, rather than a "clean" helmet like it should be for ESB. It bugs me that it has such obvious breaks/bumps in the tusk rails, the helmet brace greeblies are visible all the time from the front (totally incorrect for ESB and ROTJ) and that the fact its two halves glued together (with a slight mismatch/seam) makes the mouth too big, etc. They shouldn't have done that with such an expensive figure.

Though the figure is very good, I agree with you. A figure of this price should have its own mold.

 

[jake26]

Yeah, it's a bit like Fett's U.S. divers belt (black belt with wide buckle) - its a functional part of the costume in both movies, and is sort-of visible in ESB in a few places, but its clearly visible in ROTJ most of the time, so its associated with the ROTJ version of the costume, not ESB.

I said that partly out of frustration that HT gave us their ROTJ reveal/split helmet just glued together, rather than a "clean" helmet like it should be for ESB. It bugs me that it has such obvious breaks/bumps in the tusk rails, the helmet brace greeblies are visible all the time from the front (totally incorrect for ESB and ROTJ) and that the fact its two halves glued together (with a slight mismatch/seam) makes the mouth too big, etc. They shouldn't have done that with such an expensive figure.

It will be at least a year before ROTJ Vader is revealed and allot can change in that time. There can also be many more changes before production.

Besides, I do not understand what difference it makes if there is details on the inside of a sculpt that is not meant to be seen. Would you feel better if none were present and the helmet was still the same?

One last thing. Many times a sculpture will sculpt the bones and muscles to understand how they affect the finish pose. Could Hot Toys be fitting those helmet elements in an attempt to see how they will affect the outside look? This helmet sculpt is including a head after all where the others did not. Do you thing those inside sculpts are finished designs?

 

[rayeknor]

I'm pretty sure they did what they did because it lines up with the suitup scene in episode III. Hot Toys staff have a lot of prequel fans. When what they should have done on a helmet design like this with the head in there is make the seams like in the episode V meditation chamber scene or flush along the tube lines.

That said in hand and not in a photo from inside a fish tank figure looks good, so I dont really care.

 

[AdumarSF]

"Join me, and together we can rule the galaxy as father and son."