Review : FN-2187, Finn as Storm Trooper (The Force Awakens)
Star Wars Black Series (Hasbro)
Wave/Series : Figure #17 (Phase 3 Wave 5 / Wave 1 2016)
Released : January 2016
Price : £22.99
One of the very first images of The Force Awakens was of Finn in his Storm Trooper armour, and it is surprising that it has taken until Wave 5 to get him out there.
FN-2187 arrives in Wave 5 (Wave 1 2016) in the Phase 3 red & black packaging. He is number 17 which is boldly printed on the right hand spine. Both the front lower right and the rear of the packaging contain a very nice grey lined illustration of Finn in his armour and across this on the rear of the box is a short paragraph explaining Finn's exit from the ranks of the First Order.
Out of the box, and Finn stands 5 3/4 inches high which is a good match to the height of John Boyega, and consistent with the wave 1 Finn figure. Packed with him are the usual Storm Trooper weapons of the larger blaster and the smaller hand gun, which like the other First order troopers slots neatly into a slot on Finn's right thigh.
He also comes with his Storm Trooper helmet, which is decorated with the three blood stripes that he receives during his Jakku mission. The helmet decoration is neat enough, but quite sterile in terms of red paint on bright white. It doesn't quite capture the grimy look that Finn had on his return to the First Order transport ship. The helmet however is one of the better fitting helmets that the range has seen. There is very little difference between it and a standard First Order Trooper head. It also slots snugly over Finn's head, maybe a bit too snugly and I would watch out for paint wear on the nose and hair if you swap the helmet on and off regularly. Once on, Finn is only given away by a touch of flesh visible in the chin area from certain angles.
Of course the rest of Finn is essentially the same body and sculpt as any First order Trooper. However, it's not that simple as Hasbro' have gone with the nice touch of reducing the torso height to make Finn a little shorter than usual troopers. This is pretty effective, although not necessarily needed considering there is very little in the film to show Finn being considerably shorter - not to the extent it was with the Luke figure from A New Hope which is of course mentioned on screen.
Outside of the torso tweak, the armour is identical to all the other First Order Troopers and is cast in gloss white. There is a good definition between the armour and the black under-suit, with my only real complaints on paint application being around the belt area where there is a bit of bleed as these are black plastic painted white. It is good to see that the issue of massively variant white finishes that we saw on the Original Stormtroopers and the Clone Troopers has been rectified and there is no clear difference between a painted piece or a cast piece.
The head sculpt is pretty much the same as the wave 1 Finn, but the paint application on this one have improved the look no end with neater eye application and a more realistic skin tone which has a hint of gloss to reflect Finn's clammy/sweaty skin.
Articulation is half decent but, like all armoured trooper figures so far in the range, it is restricted by the bulkier parts of the armour. The head swivels and looks up and down with the helmet either in or out of use. The shoulders are ball jointed and can rotate fully round the figure, and they can then extend out to the side of the figure by almost 90 degrees thanks to the shoulder pad being designed to retract into the chest armour. Elbows are on a single joint, but they do rotate and that allows two handed weapon poses if needed. The wrists are pegged, but cant really do much other than rotate thanks to the wrist armour.
Like the other First Order troopers the torso joint allows for a huge range of movement - bending Finn forward and back and also twisting his upper half to either side. The hip joints allow you just about enough to get Finn sat down, so there is a chance you can get him into your 6 inch scale Tie Fighter if you want to. The knees remain double jointed so can bend really well, and then the ankles are finished off with a rocker joint that means Finn stands pretty well neutrally or in more action orientated stances.
Both guns are painted well with white panels on black plastic, and both can fit into either hand with as mentioned the smaller hand gun clipping to the thigh armour for storage.
All in all this is a no risk figure for Hasbro. It was a look that had a key part in the films plot and was simply a case of combining two existing figures and applying a bit of extra paint application. It is also good to see the facial paint decoration is improved and the way the torso has been shortened does show Hasbro trying to go a bit extra for collectors when in all honestly they could have missed that off and not many fans would have complained. I worry over paint wear from the helmet, but had they made the helmet a looser fit they would have lost the look of a realistic helmet. I am also thinking adding a bit of weathering, similar to what we saw with the Sandtroopers, would have perhaps given this figure a bit of a stand out look on collectors shelves.
I scored the original wave 1 Finn a 3 out of 5, and I think this Trooper version deserves at least a +1 to this and gets a strong 4 out of 5 from me.
A special shout-out to Louise of Craft Geek Diorama's who helped me get this Finn for our review when all looked lost as to finding this figure. Please check out the Craft Geek page if you have a few moments - stunning work.