Review – Wolverine and the X-Men Magneto

“From the very beginning, Magneto, the master of magnetism, has been the X-Men’s foremost adversary. Although he and Charles Xavier were once friends, Magneto now stands in direct opposition to Xavier’s dream of peaceful coexistence between humans and mutants.”
— from X-Men: The Ultimate Guide

Someone over at Hasbro has either lost their mind or, possibly, they feel so sorry for Mattel that the decision was made to produce substandard, crappy action figures in the 3.75-inch scale. For those of you who love this toy line, I warn you now that I’m not a fan and consider this series — Wolverine and the X-Men — to be no better than Mattel’s DC Universe Infinite Heroes series.

Basically, Magneto sucks. Keep reading if you want to know more.

Packaging

A pretty standard setup. Color card back with clear blister. Unfortunately, the packaging is the single greatest part of this particular action figure, and that’s only because Hasbro couldn’t find a way to make simple packaging design suck. I’m sure they could have, if they had worked at it, but I guess they were too busy using their time machine to go back to 1981 and didn’t have the time they needed to put as much suck into the card back as they did the toy. Poor guys; maybe next time you can make every single part of the action figure suck.

Magneto, the Wonderfully Crappy Action Figure

Normally, these days, this level of garbage is reserved for Mattel’s 3.75-inch offerings like Bizarro (reviewed here) and Scarecrow (reviewed here). Why does Magneto suck? Let me count the ways:

1. Articulation — I guess I am an articulation snob. I never thought that I was, but why else would I be bothered that Magneto has articulation worthy of a 1981 Star Wars action figure? (To be fair, he also has a twisty waist, twisty knees, and twisty wrists! That doesn’t make it better, Hasbro, it only means that he can stand with his foot pointing right, left, or straight ahead.) For a company that makes 3.75-inch G.I. Joe action figures, Hasbro sure can forget how action figures should be constructed. Unforgivable, especially since DC Universe Infinite Heroes have better articulation than this, and we all know that those figures suck.

2. Sculpt — I understand that the goal is to match the cartoon and not the comics, but the sculpting on Magneto — especially his face — isn’t all that good. His tiny head, combined with his dead stare facial features, makes him look like he would be right at home in Kenner’s 1980s Star Wars collection and not something from the same company that makes great action figures like the Marvel Universe Captain America (reviewed here). For shame, Hasbro.

   

3. Paint — You would think that a guy that’s 99% purple wouldn’t have any paint problems, but Hasbro was there to find a way to screw it up. It’s not a horrible paint job — to be fair, it’s at least average — but when a toy sucks then every flaw is magnified. Sorry, Magneto, but it’s just not your day.

4. Accessory — A chunk of chain? Well, at least it’s better than Marvel Universe Spider-Man’s webbing accessory (reviewed here). Still, a hunk of plastic that shoves into an action figure’s hand is not an acceptable accessory. When will toy companies learn this?

I have nothing good to say about this version of Magneto. All I can do is hope that the Marvel Universe 3.75-inch series comes out with a decent Magneto.

Closing Thoughts

What more can I say? Hasbro — normally known for making fantastic 3.75-inch action figures — dropped the ball and then went out of their way to run the ball over with a steamroller. Magneto is easily one of the worst 3.75-inch action figures on the market today and you should avoid him.

Unfortunately, I made the mistake of buying two figures in this series at the same time so I have a second piece of garbage — Beast — to look forward to. I can tell you, though, that I’m not in a huge rush to write that review.

Philip Reed needs to remember the ‘Buy One And Check It Out’ rule the next time he sees a new toy line on the shelves. Buying one junky figure is bad enough, but buying two at once . . . well, that just makes him a sucker.