Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace - 1/6th scale Darth Maul™ Collectible Figure (25th anniversary)

[jaztermareal]

For sure. I've owned every 1/6 Maul except for the original HT, and as far as portraits go, I'd rank them as follows.

1. Hot Toys MMS748/9
2. Sideshow v2
3. Hot Toys DX16/7
4. Medicom
5. Sideshow v1
6. Hasbro

wonder which crazy collector has them all and will do a full comparison?....

 

[agonistes86]

I received my Maul from kit today!

What a great figure. He improves on the original in so many ways. This is everything a V2 should be.
All my previous doubts based on the blogger shots are gone.

I'll go into more depth later, but for now some quick phone pics.

 

[ObiGlennKenobi]

Get we just take a moment to realise where the MMS numbers are now.
ALMOST hitting MMS 800s soon.
wow!!!

But also,had sold the og Maul and speeder set a few years back,so am glad to see this one as an upgrade.
Hoping they redo QGJ and Obi wan soon.

 

[Stealth V3teran]

Some more of maul mostly just the regular portrait as ill be honest i dont like the alternate sculpt but i was never much a fan of the V1 either, gritted teeth would have been better.

 

[Bluemonday]

Hopefully Sideshow starts shipping this out soon.

 

[Raleig.h]

Maul is my second favorite SW character, so excited for this.

 

[agonistes86]

Maul is my second favorite SW character, so excited for this.

Similar for me. My top 3 characters/designs are Darth Vader, Sandtrooper & Darth Maul.

I'll try to make some time later today to write down my thoughts on this release.
He's not perfect, and I'll likely do some mods to him in the future, but he's by far the best 1:6 Maul ever made, and improves on the V1 in almost every way.

 

[agonistes86]

So Maul has a completely different upper body compared to the V1!

Important note: The V1 on the right is modified. I dremeled the lats and extended the neck. And I repainted the sculpt.

The new upper body gives him much better proportions in the traps, upper arms, and overall silhouette.

The arms can move closer to the body now by making the lats smaller. This is something that bothered me about most HT figures I have, I'm glad they fixed that.

They also fixed the neck length, which was too short on the V1. My mod and the new neck length match pretty much exactly.

So they really fixed all the issues the V1 had!

The one downside is that the neck has a much smaller range of motion since the rubber neck sleeve and chest are one piece. I might have to do something about that. Otherwise I fear it really limits dynamic posing.

He also comes with fatsuit pants by the way, but I left those off when redressing him. I feel they are completely unnecessary.

 

[Raleig.h]

Crazy how different those sculpts look next to eachother.

 

[agonistes86]

I absolutely love this figure! This is by far the best HT figure I own.

I still have to take some more time to write down all my thoughts on this, but here already the result of my photo session today.

If you have the V1 and want to wait to grab the new sculpts parted out, please do yourself a favor and get the whole figure. You won't regret it. This is a better figure from top to bottom.

 

[MaulFan]

Fantastic posing and photos.

 

[newapelles]

I absolutely love this figure! This is by far the best HT figure I own.

I still have to take some more time to write down all my thoughts on this, but here already the result of my photo session today.

If you have the V1 and want to wait to grab the new sculpts parted out, please do yourself a favor and get the whole figure. You won't regret it. This is a better figure from top to bottom.

View attachment 759348

Gotta pick this up eventually. That's definitely one of Hot Toys' best sculpts! Now we just need Padawan Obi and 2.0 Qui-Gon. The displays will be epic

 

[Wor-Gar]

I love that open palm, 'let's dance' pose.

 

[rayeknor]

Gotta pick this up eventually. That's definitely one of Hot Toys' best sculpts! Now we just need Padawan Obi and 2.0 Qui-Gon. The displays will be epic

To be fair Qui Gon is accurate if you consider the 4k release of the movie, his face looks just as smeary and low res.

 

[agonistes86]

wonder which crazy collector has them all and will do a full comparison?....

I don't actually have them all - I never got the medicom - but here's my line-up.
They are also not all stock, so perhaps somebody else will make the ultimate comparison in the future.

 

[MaulFan]

While teeth gritting vs open would be the best alternate Maul look, at least the new open teeth head looks good and feels fitting more Maul, it has a snarling look to it, where the original looks more like "ow I stubbed my toe!"

That style of open mouth gesture is very hard to get right in figure form it seems, this new Maul is the first time I've seen a head with an expression of that type where I liked it. The HT X-Men 3 Wolverine looked bad, the HT Hulk looks bad, v1 Maul, etc.

The new neutral head does a great job of capturing the eye intensity of the Sideshow v2 with a very accurate sculpt.

 

[agonistes86]

While teeth gritting vs open would be the best alternate Maul look, at least the new open teeth head looks good and feels fitting more Maul, it has a snarling look to it, where the original looks more like "ow I stubbed my toe!"

That style of open mouth gesture is very hard to get right in figure form it seems, this new Maul is the first time I've seen a head with an expression of that type where I liked it. The HT X-Men 3 Wolverine looked bad, the HT Hulk looks bad, v1 Maul, etc.

The new neutral head does a great job of capturing the eye intensity of the Sideshow v2 with a very accurate sculpt.

Agreed on all accounts.

Whenever I look at the V1 open mouth sculpt, I hear a "nyah" in my head, like this:

While I would also prefer teeth gritting instead of open, it still works surprisingly well on this new sculpt, particularly with the eyes looking to the side.

For me the SS V2 didn't work anymore since I found it to be too underscaled (pretty much 1/7 scale) and too much of a charicature, but I did always love the intensity of the eyes. I'm happy the new HT captures this as well, while keeping the realism.

 

[agonistes86]

Another great improvement: the eyes.

• The sclera is less stark white: this makes it less looking like a toy
• The yellow iris is less vibrant: this is a common mistake in Sith eyes, making them too yellow
• The paint is more dimensional and detailed: the blood vessels are more subtle than before, the back of the eyes are more reddish
• The eyes are smaller: based on a quick Google search, the new eyeballs (4 mm) are more accurate to true 1/6 scale, compared to the old 5 mm size

I still would have liked to see slightly smaller pupils, but I know it varied in size in the movie, and the end result is still pretty good. He has an intense stare, which is my goal.

The more I study this figure, the more I love it. I can only reiterate that HT really did their homework.