Clone Trooper Lieutenant - TVC - Basic (VC109)

Celebrate the legendary Star Wars saga that changed the universe forever! This collection brings to life the incredible story of good versus evil that captured our imagination and took us to a galaxy far, far away. Iconic Star Wars heroes and villains are captured with incredible detail and premium features to commemorate each epic tale in the Star Wars saga. May the Force be with you!

Celebrate 35 years of Star Wars in 2012 as we recreate a "lost" packaging line look that was created, contemplated... and put aside in favor of Kenner's classic black-and-silver Star Wars design. For the first time ever, we're bringing this line look out of the Kenner archives and treating you to a glimpse of what might have been. The same creative team who designed the black-and-silver look also developed this design as one of several options to be considered for the line. In this lost line look, they created high-tech imagery incorporating a signature Star Wars vehicle and an epic space theme. What might have been, what was and what is: It all captures our imaginations, just as the Star Wars saga captures out imaginations today, tomorrow and always!

When Hasbro creates a new base Clone Trooper buck, it goes without saying that they’ll likely use it countless times to bring the rest of the clone ranks into our collections. In the past, a basic Phase I Clone Trooper sculpt often got us captains, commanders, lieutenants, and sergeants. A base Clone Trooper (Phase II) sculpt is accountable for bringing us 501st Legion Troopers, 212th Attack Battalion, Shock Troopers, 41st Elite Corps, and many, many more. The list feels nearly infinite. However, Hasbro slowed the pace down with the recent 2011 TVC Clone Trooper (VC45) figure, and we attribute that to the surrounding controversy, which stems from Hasbro’s change to what we previously understood about the Phase I Clone Troopers. The well-developed and collector favorite 2003 CW Clone Trooper (’03 #50) figure and 2005’s ROTS Clone Trooper (III 41) figure solidified in our minds how all Phase I and Phase II Clone Trooper action figures “should” look in our collections. So, when Hasbro made the fairly aggressive move to change the shape of not only the silhouette of the Phase I Clone Trooper but also all of its features and proportions, the outcry was audible enough to be heard throughout the entire collecting community. Now, it’s time to start knocking out the different officers. And first up is the Clone Trooper Lieutenant. And frankly, this variety of clones hasn’t looked better in the basic figure lineup. We know not all will agree with us. Admittedly, it was tough for us to get used to 2011’s TVC Clone Trooper (VC45) figure, but it has grown on us tremendously, and we’ve come to accept how accurate it is to the on-screen character.

The digitally rendered clones in Attack Of The Clones make it challenging to compare them to real-life actors or human forms. So Hasbro has little to no tangible reference to design an action figure based on them. However, they did an outstanding job with the materials they had, as a careful analysis of the Clone Trooper (VC45) figure proves how right they got it. Honestly, the Clone Trooper Lieutenant looks fantastic. There are some inherent but minimal issues with the base sculpt. Some details aren’t perfect, but we hope Hasbro produces all the clone officer flavors using this tooling before they move on to something else. Ultimately, you can easily overlook any of the small things that bother you with this action figure. Sadly, obtaining a perfect Clone Trooper action figure isn’t something Hasbro has perfected yet. But we’re pretty darn close now. We’re thrilled about the inclusion of ball-jointed hips, but Hasbro hasn’t fine-tuned their functionality, and sometimes they can be more cumbersome than helpful. It often seems that the legs need to be posed in the same fashion to achieve the best result when displaying the figure. Another way of saying this is the legs aren’t entirely independent of each other in the more static poses. And we’re not sure why this is, but it is certainly a strange phenomenon. Action poses are more natural-looking. We’re also thrilled to get ball-jointed wrists. Hasbro has undoubtedly found a happy medium to blend them into the figure seamlessly. However, the shape of the hand is too narrow, and you’re limited in how you can utilize the figure-holding aspects of the figure.

The accessories work well, but they’re not a perfect fit. For instance, it’s challenging to have the Clone Trooper Lieutenant hold the stock of the gun in a support fashion because of the narrow grip of the hand. And it seems that the only way to stand it up without getting too clever is to spread the legs out a bit. And this, of course, limits the full range of motion you’d think we have with a figure this super-articulated. The blue color flashes are exciting. They look perfect to us, but we have begun to wonder if Hasbro got the exact shade of blue correct, as it’s very light. It seems ever so slightly off in our eyes – but we could be wrong about that. The chest dots look especially good. They are all even, perfectly sized, and all in a perfectly straight line. The maddening “mohawk” running vertically down the top of the helmet has been a point of chagrin for years, and Hasbro is still having issues with painting this evenly. We currently have four samples of this figure in our possession, and the one featured in the photo gallery has the best blue helmet stripe (which you can see is uneven). We wish that they would upgrade their paint operation process so that they look better. They have seemingly mastered it in the past with figures like 2011’s TVC ARC Trooper Commander (VC54), so we’re not sure why their figures keep returning with these issues. But all that put aside, it’s cool to start getting the clone trooper officers in this new format. Clone Trooper Lieutenant was a great first choice! But we’d be remiss not to beg Hasbro to get them all out in the line as soon as possible.