Baze Malbus/Imperial Stormtrooper - RO - Two-Packs

Hardened by the harsh reality of his Imperial-occupied home world, pragmatic soldier Baze Malbus is a crack shot with his heavy repeater cannon who uses his natural bravado during the occupation of Jedha to face off against the Galactic Empire's deadly, white-encased loyalists, the Imperial Stormtroopers.

Well, this one may fall under “different enough to make you mad" but probably not for the reason you’re thinking. The Baze Malbus/Imperial Stormtrooper Two-Packs set isn’t perfect by a long shot. Clearly, you get an all-new Star Wars figure that currently isn’t available anywhere else. But you also get a “more” proper Imperial Stormtrooper too which is more accurate than the basic counterpart. Instead of some gimmicky removable snap-on parts, Hasbro this time actually tooled a full pauldron for the Imperial Stormtrooper this time. The aesthetics are obviously much more improved with this approach. It’s likely that this version of the Imperial Stormtrooper will see additional releases in the Rogue One line, but we have to admit that we’re disappointed that the basic version didn’t come with this same versatility. It would have been appreciated. The Baze Malbus/Imperial Stormtrooper is a bit different from the format/trend we have seen in the Rogue One line. We don’t get two new characters here. We get one new one and “repack” (not really, but hopefully, you understand our point).

You already know a great deal about the Imperial Stormtrooper figure. It has a lovely sculpt. The helmet proportions are almost nice and look great from every angle. Unlike the basic figure release that had some missing paint details, Hasbro seems to fix that all with this release. This may be the pack to “army build” although we’re sure not too many collectors are looking to army building Baze Malbus. Specifically, the belly dots have been updated here which makes the action figure look all the better. While we can get complacent with Hasbro’s shortcuts, it’s nice to see that they’ve improved something here, even if it is just a kids’ toy. The Imperial Stormtrooper doesn’t get any extra play parts here. So far the trend has been that only one figure gets the “off screen” gun/cannon. And with this Two-Packs set, those all go to Baze Malbus instead. So the Imperial Stormtrooper only comes with the removable officer’s pauldron and the revised E-11 blaster. While Hasbro is intent on bringing additional play features with the 5POA action figures, we have said time and again that we don’t mind the extra gimmicks as long as they’re separate parts not afflicting the aesthetics of the onscreen character.

Baze Malbus is clearly the point of interest here anyhow. Honestly, the sculpt looks pretty good. That being said, it also has some quality issues as well. The legs once again aren’t even and when you finally get him to stand up unassisted, he stands at a terrible lean (something we have tried desperately to hide in our photo gallery but failed). Don’t expect your figure to look upright when displayed in your collection. We thought about it long and hard, and maybe the reason he leans so badly is to counteract the gravity that is added with his extra parts (the cannon). But even with the cannon on him he still looks wonky (from a posture perspective). From every other perspective, Baze Malbus looks pretty darn cool. Baze Malbus has an “OK” face. The paint operations are very simple, but it does mimic the onscreen character in a somewhat possible fashion. We’d still like to see more technical paint operations given to these action figures. If they can tool wrinkled clothing and decorate insignias and emblems on these small figures so well (as evidenced by Sabine Wren), then they can spend more time on the characters’ likenesses. We have to say that the Baze Malbus/Imperial Stormtrooper Two-Packs set has merit. It just needs some finer tuning is all.