Have you ever had a figure you desperately wanted, but just knew it could never happen? Then against all odds, it happens? It’s a great feeling I highly recommend. ROM is that figure for me, so a panel that was already impressive became epic.
The panel started off with the usual recap of recent releases but then kicked off with a bit of an unexpected coolness with the mention of Inumans! Lockjaw is one of those figures I’ve wanted for a good long while so he was exciting to see. I like the idea of the swappable back legs for seated poses, but wish his front legs had a knee joint. I think my mental image of Lockjaw is more of a Kirby style with a much larger head, but I’ll get used to this more realistic dog proportions. Crystal is just beautiful. No notes! Also I love that they’re a two-pack, so there’s no worry about a BAF with figures I’m not into.
From there we moved to a classic Avenger and Crystal’s sometimes husband, Quicksilver. This is another one where I default to Kirby so I tend to think of his gloves and undies as a lighter green. I’m sure this version has reference point that I’m not aware of, so I’m not mad about it. The hair wings are great.
Another really cool and unexpected figure was Wong from Dr. Strange. He’s a classic supporting character for that book, so I’m so stoked to get him even though I don’t think I need Dormammu infected Dr. Strange. All the magic parts and Kung Fu options look so damn rad. His ghost dog is cool, I’m assuming that’s a modern thing?
The Punisher Bushwacker set looks fun. I’ve got a few ’80s books with Bushwacker, so I was stoked to see that weirdo. As gross as his power looks here it’s even grosser in the books IIRC. I’m not a Punisher guy, but that portrait is insanely good.
Next up was some Deadpool stuff. Not for me, but I understand it’s the big thing at the moment. I hope those who care are into this. I gotta say though, that Wolverine Jackman portrait is just over the top good and adding movie Colossus was an unexpected pull.
The MCU army builder guys look pretty gnarley. I’ve got such a big MCU hero collection, so I appreciate them making some more opponents. They mentioned more MCU army builders were possible, so I’m hoping for Chitauri.
There was a teaser for upcoming figures. I took the shoes to mean Spider-Boy, not sure about the bracelet other than it reminded me of plastic Halloween spider rings you’d sometimes get trick-or-treating.
Next up was another long awaited figure for me, a Dragon Man re-do. They mentioned that this would be a pricier exclusive item on Pulse rather than a HasLab and I’m glad that the Marvel team is moving in this direction. It feels a bit like how the Classified team has added larger price point exclusive items like the VAMP to build up the world.
His height has been all over the place in the comics, so I feel like they chose a good one. The scaley texture is not always there in the books either, but I love the way it looks here. So, pretty great panel all told. We thought we were done then Jesse Falcon started screaming at us, asking if we wanted more. Honestly I was rolling my eyes a bit at all the yelling (I’m old, guys, too old for yelling and carrying on) until the word MORE shifted to ROM and I joined in on the insanity, whooping like a nutball.
Before the panel I was chatting with Veebs and Robo about what we wanted to see most. Funnily enough Veebs said Inhumans and I said ROM, but we both said we didn’t really expect to get what we wanted. Man, do I love being wrong sometimes. They just had a digital render at this point, but Dwight did mention doing something special to capture ROM’s unique eyes. If you read the book, he’s almost always depicted as shining red light eyes, so I’m hoping for some light piping or maybe even a LED powered light up feature. Sometimes they eyes in the comic look like the tiny red laser blast effects we already have in legends, so maybe some kind of blast effect would work. I don’t know, the render looks awesome and I’m super stoked we’re finally getting one of my most wanted figures in Legends. If you don’t know ROM, there are a couple of Omnibus collections of his book out now.
