Princess Leia Organa - TBS [P3] - 3.75 Inch Figures (Exclusive)

Determined to bring down the Empire, Princess Leia delivers top-secret plans for the Death Star to her Rebel allies.

Her fate was up in the air for quite a while. Despite our own reports providing proof that she had been canceled from all case assortments as far as the eyes could see in The Black Series [Phase II] line, other sites ran to Hunter PR to be assured that this wasn't the case. Despite the attempt to discredit, she was canceled. Thankfully, Hasbro was able to make her permanent fate a positive one as she will be the LAST all-new Original Trilogy figure released right now in the Walmart exclusive The Black Series [Phase III] 3.75” line until further notice. The reason for her delay is a simple one. Hasbro couldn’t get the soft-goods to look the way they wanted, so they went back to the drawing board and weaved together a whole new fabric and approach to make the best action figure possible. We think they succeeded. Frankly, we don’t think the final version turned out as anyone has expected. There are both positive and negative things about the figure, but in all honesty it’s so refreshing to see another all-new Original Trilogy character that we’re not going to put much clout into even the negative things that we’re saying. So neither should you. Last attempted as 1998’s POTF2 [FB/CT] Princess Leia (In Ceremonial Dress), the new generically named Princess Leia Organa is a figure that’s wonderful to see updated, but many feel that there are other versions of Princess Leia Organa that should have received attention first. We’re on the fence about that. While we agree, we think this upgrade is extremely needed as anything POTF2 is obsolete at this stage of the game (sculpt wise, clearly not articulation wise).

The first thing that you’ll notice about Princess Leia Organa is that she is clearly meant to be a display piece first, then an action figure second. She comes with decent articulation, including ball-jointed shoulders and elbows with swivel forearms, but a great deal of it was sacrificed to allow for uninterrupted aesthetics like in the lower body where articulation points are basically nonexistent and would seem more obtrusive than helpful. Some may find fault in this, but we appreciate the artistic approach taken here. After all, let’s not forget what hyper-articulation did to 2014’s TBS [P1] Luke Skywalker (#21) figure. Sometimes less is more and that certainyl applies here. Let us not ever return to an era like that please. Originally meant to be figure #08 in wave 7 of The Black Series [Phase II] line, as mentioned above, Princess Leia Organa was postponed until Hasbro could get the soft-goods right. But we’re just not sure if they successfully did. Actually, we're on the fence about this too. They have a wonderful drape, but the cut is slightly bizarre. Regardless, we’re nonetheless thankful to finally have her upgraded to a relatively definitive status in the 3.75” collector-focused line. We imagine that many collectors are going to feel similarly. Many had criticized the likeness portrayed on the prototype, but we’re happy to report that whatever happened on the prototype has been softened because the resulting final portrait looks pretty great in our opinion. Seemingly in scale, delicate and beautiful, Princess Leia Organa is a long-awaited release that will hopefully please those who feel that Hasbro doesn’t make enough female action figures as well as those who feel Hasbro has completely abandoned the Original Trilogy. Princess Leia Organa provides something for everyone it seems and we’re extremely pleased with the results.

Princess Leia Organa  comes with a medal of honor accessory which is probably included to present to either Luke Skywalker or Han Solo. But within the collecting community there was a strong belief was that since she was meant to ship with Chewbacca (#11) (originally) that this was meant for Chewbacca instead. We’d like to think that we agree that sentiment as well. (Besides, both 2011’s TVC Han Solo (Yavin Ceremony) (VC42) and 2013’s TBS [P1] Luke Skywalker (#05) figures each come with their own medals. Isn’t time for the Wookiee to get his?) She can hold it without issue and she looks good doing so. Aside from some deco issues on the figure, Princess Leia Organa has incredible potential. A little fine tuning would have been good for her. Enjoy Princess Leia Organa now, because it is likely going to be a very long time before we see any other figures complementing her in The Black Series [Phase III] line. That’s somewhat alright with us because we are truly exciting for what this super-articulated line will bring for characters in The Force Awakens. We want to see Hasbro go to town with this and make all the figures they can in this super-articulated scale. Besides, we’d rather them add as few repacks as they can into this line, because look what happened with Darth Vader. He is seeming to sell quite well (which is really no surprise), but we certainly don’t need action figures with swivel articulation cluttering up precious few spots for the all-new action figures. Perhaps the biggest thing to get used to are the newly constructed boxes that accompany these exclusives figures. We honestly believe that the aggressive change in packaging was necessary to clearly denote it as an exclusive sub-line now instead of the mainline, but we’d be lying if we said we didn’t miss the standard card back with the accompanying bubble coffins.