Pros : Menacing head sculpt. Articulation is spectacular
Cons : Is a BAF so harder to obtain. There is some paint variations between the BAF parts that is very noticeable
Ultron was the third Marvel Cinematic Universe Build-A-Figure, released in 2015 within a wave of comic book figures that was partially themed as an Ant-Man wave to celebrate the release of that MCU movie. Of course Ant-Man was not a true representation of the movie look, being more akin to the Disney XD cartoon version.
For collectors of Marvel Legends as a whole, this way Ultron was laid out in the wave was not an issue - for MCU collectors they had to fork out around £120 to obtain Ultron initially, although there is always the option to resell the figures they didn't want. At the time of writing it is not overly difficult to purchase a complete Ultron for circa £40 - £50
6 parts were required to build Ultron and once collected they were easy to assemble by means of pop in and clip joints. While it wasn't hard to work out what went where, Hasbro also included a small paper insert (in UK releases at least) to show how Ultron should be built.
Ultron Prime is a perfect example of a BAF, standing a massive 8" tall and dominating any shelf he is placed upon. Here we can see him against the War Machine from the same movie.
The head is a spectacular sculpt and captures the look of Ultron Prime perfectly with that almost robotic insane smirk and those deep set red eyes.
It is coloured in a decent silver metallic finish, with the inset areas such as the cheeks painted a matt black. The silver does blend to a matt grey around the back of the head.
Moving down to the body and the sculpt continues to impress with the chest area and the upper arms. There are plenty of panels and mechanical tendons on show. The trunk of the body is also coloured in the bright metallic silver with some smaller red highlighted panels down the neck and round the lower and side of the chest.
Like the head we see a blending to a matt grey around the side and back of the torso and similarly down the arms. This is obviously a deliberate effect, but does end up making these parts look unpainted.
This worsens where the upper torso meet the groin area. There is no variation here, just a straight line change from silver gloss to grey. It does look like you've used two different finishes when assembling your BAF - yet of course the Torso and Join all came together pre-assembled with the Wasp figure.
Articulation for Ultron is 19 points, and he is extremely maneuverable for a big BAF figure.
The head is a fully mobile ball joint allowing total rotation and some impressive forward and backward movement to the point he can put his chin on his chest. This allows some nice poses having him look down at other characters. The only thing it doesn't do well is be able to be cocked to one side as we see him do a few times in the movie.
The torso has a joint midway down and this is a ratcheted T-joint that allows forward and backward leaning. Again this has a big range of mobility and while the leaning back looks a bit odd, leaning him forward is another impressive pose as he looms over his adversaries. The waist is also jointed and can rotate. But by doing so you will lose the lines of the figure sculpt and further expose that ugly joint.
The arms are ball jointed shoulders with a full range of movement up and out. There is a bicep swivel just under these to rotate the arms, and the elbows are then double jointed and can bend back well past 90 degrees. We finish with a rotating pivot wrist.
Legs are a similar construction with ball jointed hips and then thigh swivels which are disguised by the large thigh panels. The knees too are double jointed and there are rockers on the ankles
While there is all this movement. the sculpt of the hip does clash with the groin area. Ultron will therefore never kneel (not that he would) but you can get some good wider action stances for display.
Nearly all the joints are ratchet joints so Ultron does hold the pose you put him in and he is not difficult to stand and for him to stay standing.
As the big bad of the 2015 Avengers sequel Ultron is a must for MCU collectors. Being a BAF makes him trickier (or more expensive) to obtain and that is a shame, but I think Hasbro have learned in the past 3-years and are getting better at balancing the MCU and comic book releases and associated BAF's
The faults are purely with the paint work and the fact areas do look unpainted and there is that distinct difference between upper torso and lower groin. Even just a black wash all over might have pulled it together
I score Ultron Prime BAF a solid 4 out of 5.
