Medusa

Walgreens' last exclusive Marvel Legend just came out about a month ago, and now we've got another. Hot on the heels of Johnny Storm (no pun intended) comes Medusalith Amaquelin Boltagon. Born into Inhumans royalty, Medusa is a formidable leader who uses control of her steel-like hair to command power. When she first appeared, Madam Medusa was an established villain who joined the Frightful Four because... well, basically because The Wizard wanted his team to have a girl on it. [And yet she hooked up with Trapster instead --ed.] When the gang is defeated, Medusa is the only one who escapes, going on the run. The notoriety this gains her leads her to being hunted by Gorgon, who she's terrified of. Then suddenly she's a heroic member of the Inhumans, and her entire criminal past seems to have been forgotten by the world at large. It took until 1990 for a story to address that change, though it only dealt with her personality, not why every police force in the world was no longer looking to catch her. Unsurprisingly, this figure is mostly the same as the Medusa in the SDCC-exclusive Thanos Imperative box set - there was no way on Earth anyone was going to pay to sculpt and mold a second giant head of hair, after all. That's not a slam against this figure, by any means: it's been more than three years since that set came out, and a lot more fans will have an opportunity to pick this figure up by herself at Walgreens than could get their hands on the Comic-Con one. There is some amusement to be found, however, in the fact that Walgreens has released two Medusa exclusives in such quick succession. If you want to get nit-picky, the hair (or specifically, the way she wears her bangs) isn't accurate to the comics of the era, but reference what we said earlier about not paying to re-mold things. And if you want a Medusa figure, you're probably going to be able to overlook that, right? This isn't a character like Batman, who'll have another release coming along in a week or two - when you're after obscurities, you learn not to sweat the small stuff. Since the previous Medusa is the toy that introduced the "medium" body, it's no surprise that this one gets the same mold - it's even the first version of it, with the highly defined abs! She trades in her more modern costume for the classic - since she began as a villain, she's wearing purple. All the Frightful Four did. Even Sandman. The base of the suit is a flat lavender, with a metallic shade for the boots, gloves, and the mask/throatal area. The contrast between the two could be stronger, especially when the light is reflecting off the shiny parts - it makes them look nearly the same shade as the rest of the suit, turning her into a solid lump. (At least, under normal room lighting conditions.) It might have been better to skip the metallics and just go with a darker tone. To further set her apart from the previous toy, she's has a free-floating belt with a stylized M on it. She's got all the articulation you'd want, including a balljointed head, hinged neck, swivel/hinged shoulders, elbows and wrists, a balljointed torso, balljointed hips, swivel thighs, double-hinged knees, and swivel/hinge ankles. The hair is so weighty that it pulls the head around - an unavoidable issue, really - but the fact that she's wearing flats instead of heels this time means the end of the hair is closer to the ground, and thus can more readily be used to tripod her. The back of the box shows a terrific action pose, proving that she need not only stand straight up or fall over. And speaking of the box, it's the typical Marvel Legends style, with a symbol on the top that we assume is meant to represent either Medusa by herself or the Inhumans as a whole. The general coloring is blue, similar to the Fantastic Four exclusives Walgreens has carried, but there's a hint of purple on the side panels as well (the art there is taken from J. Scott Campbell's variant cover for Inhuman #1). Meanwhile, the tray behind the figure is patterned to look like swirling hair. Sadly, it too is blue, probably in an effort to make the figure stand out, but imagine if they'd done it in red so it could serve as a diorama that boosted her powers! That would have been fun! If you got the Thanos Imperative set, you don't need this Medusa, but the odds are that you didn't get that set. And even if you did, this is far from a re-release, and it's not like owning multiples of one character is unheard of. Plus, if they ever make toys of Wizard and Trapster, you'll need a Medusa to complete their team. -- 12/04/17

Tweet