Swamp Creatures [A] - EI - Battle Bags

Relive the epic thrills of Star Wars: Episode I with 4 highy detailed swamp creatures from the Planet Naboo! To recreate memorable moments from the movie, place your Battle Bags in water, then cut it open to unleash the creatures from the ooze inside!

For the Episode I line, Hasbro determined that interactive play would be an integral part of the Star Wars experience. They added things like Battle Bags and Jabba Glob into the Episode I line to enhance the play experience, to help introduce all of the new creatures at as fast a pace as possible, and to offer a budget line of toys that may exclude some younger fans. Science-focused playsets were big at the time, so Hasbro thought they’d follow suit for a couple of items in their Episode I lineup. To achieve this, they thought outside of the box and produced Battle Bags. A synthetic fabric bag contained four creatures from Episode I. But to make it “fun,” Star Wars fans soaked the bag in water for five minutes. A special absorbent material sucked up the water to create a blue or green gel/slime. And then Hasbro included a plastic “cutting” tool (think Star Wars scalpel) to cut the bag open and reveal the ooze and four creatures contained within it. Most collectors didn’t show much interest in the Battle Bags line, but they went over well with new Star Wars fans. What kid doesn’t enjoy something messy and something creature-based? Battle Bags offered both.

Hasbro produced four unique sets broken down by two categories: Sea Creatures and Swamp Creatures. Sea Creatures [A] contained the following: Angel Fish, Opee Sea Killer, Soe, and Trigger. Sea Creatures [B] contained the following: Colo Claw Fish, Faa, Grouper, and Sando Aqua Monster. Swamp Creatures [A] contained the following: Falumpaset, Ikopi, Kaadu, and Mott. And finally, the Sea Creatures [B] contained the following: Fambaa, Nuna, Pikobis, and Shaak. For the price, an MSRP of $9.99, Star Wars fans get a decent amount of play value and product here, but they still feel overpriced. Keep in mind, once the bag is soaked in water and cut open, half of the set needs to be discarded. You’re only left with four creatures to add to your Star Wars collection, and they’re non-articulated. They’re the equivalent of what $.25 would get you from a bubblegum machine. Despite the creatures’ small sizes, Hasbro made an admirable effort painting them with detail and accuracy. Some of the creatures appear to have colors that look brighter than what we saw in the film, but perhaps that was intentional to make them a little more interesting for children. Collectors will have to accept them as is.

The issue with the four creatures is scale. Whether or not that’s obvious is one thing, but when you have a Fambaa and a Falumpaset at about the same height and width, you know something is wrong with the approach taken here. This line might have gotten picked up with collector interest if Hasbro made the creatures to scale with one another. They don’t have to be 3.75” scale, of course, but making them in scale to each other would have been a great strategy. It would have been great to see how all of the new creatures from Episode I compare to each other with accuracy. Also, it appears that many creatures are to scale with the 3.75” action figures, after all. For example, we see Jabba the Hutt pushing them off the ledge to their death during the Boonta Eve Classic. The included figure in the Battle Bags set looks close in scale to a 3.75” Jabba The Hutt. But then you have the Opee Sea Killer or the Colo Claw Fish which don’t come close to their actual scale. These miniature figures are all over the place that way. But they do add an enjoyable view to any desk at your office or workspace. These are cheap toys, and that’s their only purpose, Don’t look at them as Star Wars collectibles, because you’ll be forever disappointed.