4-LOM - TVC - Basic (VC10)

What more is there to be said about a figure that was released pretty much perfectly in the 30 (77-07) line and then gets carded again in The Vintage Collection three years later? Well, that’s exactly the sentiment we have for 4-LOM, the bounty hunter from The Empire Strikes Back who has been receiving quite a bit of attention as a Star Wars collectible lately. The true reason that you would want to buy 4-LOM again is for the packaging. And mint-on-card collectors have a reason to rejoice. For this will be the first time that 4-LOM appears on a vintage-styled card with his correct name. What’s so particularly interesting about this release is that on the back of the figure’s card, there is a picture of an old vintage Zuckuss (the old 4-LOM) with a caption that says “4-LOM (1980-1982)”. This makes a pretty cool statement and the fact that Hasbro was able to make this card without confusing or messing things up says a lot to us. So, unless you keep your figures in the package, you may be able to skip over 4-LOM, but of course we wouldn’t recommend doing that.

For all intents and purposes, 4-LOM is a very slight repaint of 2007’s TAC 4-LOM (No. 41) action figure. For The Vintage Collection release, the “eyes” have been colored in the slightest bit darker green paint. This is barely noticeable unless you are looking for it. Also, you are well aware of how there is light orange rusty wash throughout the figure. Well, this time around, the torso has a lot less of this “wash” and the final result makes 4-LOM look a little shinier in this section. The red has mark on his left breast is also darker which makes it looks a little more hidden that the TAC version. There are some variances in the way the arms have been painted too, but again, it may not be enough to document it as a definite change. But other than that, the two figures are exactly the same. This likely won’t entice a collector to pick up another 4-LOM for a lightly different paint job, but we consider a change like this to be “new enough” and hence we purchased it for our collections. The paint job is in no way as dramatic as the revised Boba Fett so we’d advise you not to expect to look at this figure and think what a difference it is from the original.

You can expect more figures like 4-LOM making their way into the basic figure line. Hasbro has given enough forewarning that some straight repack will be definitely forthcoming in the line. While we think any action figure culd stand to go through a cursory review just to see if anything more could be done to make it absolutely perfect, it seems as if Hasbro may not be too interested in taking this route. This sort of worries us. We know for sure that 2009's LC Clone Commander Cody (BD44) is being repackaged into The Vintage Collection, but will Hasbro at least add the dirt to his boots as show as SDCC 2009 and will they invert the belt so that it’s the right way up, especially with all the Hasbro Q&A questions about this? We hope Hasbro is listening, because it is our opinion that these figures should endure a little tweaking to make them the best they can be. While we don’t see a dramatic improvement in 4-LOM, he is pretty awesome as is, but others like Cody, we do hope revision is on the way!