Beast

Oh my stars and garters! One of the original X-Men, Hank McCoy is a genius whose mutant ability gives him a furry, blue, beast-like appearance. Technically his mutant ability gives him strength, agility, and really big hands and feet - the serum he brewed up for himself gave him the furry blue appearance. Being precise counts. You wouldn't say Travis Barker's drumming ability gave him tattoos, would you? It's important not to blame your circumstances on outside forces when they're self-made. This is as close to a "classic" look as Beast has, considering the near-constant genetic tweaking the character has undergone. He's blue and furry, and has the same haircut as Wolverine (though, to be fair, he had it before Logan had ever even taken his mask off, so really Hank is the one who's being copied here). His mouth is open to show off his fangs, and his eyes are blank white, because Jim Lee was allergic to drawing pupils. Naturally, the body has to be a new sculpt. Beast is covered in fur, so simply repainting the big body blue wouldn't have cut it. The proportions are very broad and stocky, though perhaps the arms should have been longer and more simian. Think X-Men Evolution. The fur varies from thick to thin in different spots on the body, and thus manages to look like a natural pelt, not just a texture applied to an existing sculpt. We often say this (and are just as often subsequently proven wrong), but it's hard to imagine who else these molds could be used for in the future, outside of a grey-furred "original look" Beast. His hands and feet end in pointed claws, and the only smooth area of the whole sculpt is his trunks. Hasbro stepped up their articulation game for this one. Even back in the ToyBiz days, Beast was a figure who demanded more joints, and here Hasbro has decided to go better than their already-good average. The toy has a balljointed head, hinged neck, hinged pectoral joints, swivel/hinge shoulders, swivel biceps, double-hinged elbows, swivel/hinge wrists, a balljointed chest, hinged torso, balljointed hips (mounted on an angled barbell, to provide a better range of motion), swivel thighs, double-hinged knees, swivel/hinge ankles, and hinged toes. Usually we have to wait for a Build-A-Figure to get hinged toes! Not even Spider-Man gets hinged toes! But here they are on Beast. he lacks the hinged fingers ToyBiz's had, but ToyBiz didn't do any kind of motion in the chest at all, so it evens out. Beast has four hands, each with a different pose: clutching or fist (right) and gesturing or flat (left). They swap at the wrist with no real problem. He also includes the head of this series' Build-A-Figure, Caliban. And the skin color makes it really easy to see the "multi-part face" thing we talked about in the Kingpin review. Rather than the '90s look, it would have been cool to get Beast the way he looks now - it's pretty similar to this, but without the big hair. Heck, they probably could have gotten away with an alternate head in this pack. But a bunch of this series seems to be intended to build out your X-Men: The Animated Series team: take Beast, Gambit, and Jubilee from this series, stand them in front of Professor X, dig out your Cyclops and a Wolverine... then all we need is a ponytailed head for Jean Grey and a Storm, and that'll be the entire lineup. -- 05/30/19

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