Imperial Engineer (Star Wars: Battlefront II) - TLC - Basic (BD 22)

Architects of combat, Imperial engineers establish defenses and use various weapons and tools to destroy Rebellion emplacements. They employ devastating detpacks – remotely-detonated explosives – to destroy heavy machinery and enemy positions.

A repaint of the fan favorite Death Star Gunner (SAGA 041) from 2006’s The Saga Collection line was inevitable. While the action figure can serve as both versions seen in Episode IV and Episode VI, we expected some tweak to be performed on him and subsequently repacked in some Saga Legends assortment. But in 2008, Hasbro made this inevitability a reality with the release of 2008’s The Legacy Collection Imperial Engineer (Star Wars Battlefront II), technically not really either an Episode IV or Episode VI Death Star Gunner. Not movie specific, he is based on a character from the Star Wars: Battlefront II video game. The repainting of a black Imperial soldier to a gray color only stirs a new hope inside of us that 2007’s TAC Death Star Trooper (30 13) will get the same treatment too so we can knock that vintage one off of our wish lists, but we digress! The Imperial Engineer was a fair candidate for the “repack & repaint” wave of 2008, but other than being a rework of the Death Star Gunner (SAGA 041), there is not much more to say about it. He is faithfully decorated to his appearance in the Star Wars: Battlefront II video game (in realistic style of course) and since the Star Wars: Battlefront games are very popular among collectors this figure should be very well received. Not an old figure, his articulation is still a bit dated since he has swivel elbow joints and no ankle joints. But we get so spoiled sometimes as collectors and tend to expect ball-jointed "everything" on our action figures. Imperial Engineer (or Death Star Gunner for that matter) will have to wait a little bit longer for that extra fine articulation. Despite this limitation, he is still an excellent action figure and initial and subsequent shipments of him sold through quite well. Not that drastic of a repaint, some collectors may confuse him as a repack of the Death Star Gunner with a new name, but unless you have a discriminating eye, he is essentially just that.

While not super-articulated, Imperial Engineer has 16 points of articulation. This is the perfect amount of joints for him and there is really no need to make him have more. As stated earlier, we would like to eventually see a new version of the "Death Star Gunner" (movie specific) but this figure certainly satisfies well for a repaint intended to be a new character. And he is painted very nicely. Nothing too stunning, they did a fair amount of new decorating to make him distinct from his action figure ancestor. His dark gray uniform is accented with a wonderful heather type of pattern which gives it texture and depth and his silver buckle contrasts well with the dark uniform. Additionally, the boots, gloves, chest plate and helmet are all colored differently from the jumpsuit to add stark contrast to the rest of the uniform. This is something that is easily overlooked on the Death Star Gunner figure since his uniform is all black. It is nice to see multiple colors on a very solid action figure. The helmet was insignificantly repainted but there is enough difference to tell it apart from its distant cousin. We do wish to point out that the head of the figure is a bit too tan. And while and looks just like all of the other clones you have purchased thus far, we don't know why his skin color is so dark. The clone trooper face shades vary drastically from one to another. Interestingly, we were surprised by his gray body glove (on the head) with his black hair sticking out. This is something we initially missed on the Death Star Gunner figure, (no doubt due to the fact of the black on black paint application). The old adage “you learn something new every day” certainly applies here. And we suppose Hasbro could have just packed the Death Star Gunner here, but they reinvented it to be something new.

While the “repack & repaint” (wave 3) set of figures is a crazy mix of random characters, the attention to detail given to all of them is very impressive, especially their paint applications. The figures appear very differently from their original source template, showing us that Hasbro can utilize a great mold multiples times and make it look even better (and at minimum, different than they did the first time) as time moves forward. In fact, Hasbro has even surprised us by how well some of them came out. Fans of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope characters may have been suckered into buying this wave just for the droid parts, since they make the 5D6-RA7 Death Star Droid. And the Imperial Engineer is partially responsible if you wish to totally complete the awesome 5D6-RA7 figure (the dark Death Star Droid to be specific). So, you may have to buy this figure even if it isn't your first choice. Regardless, wave 3 of The Legacy Collection has been relatively popular (especially since it is a repaint wave) and these types of waves are essential periodically in the basic figure line. This wave has come and gone and you likely may have missed the boat on them if you held out. But if you are a gaming fan or an Expanded Universe fan, this one is a wise choice and very satisfactory figure to add to your collection (which you probably already have done). We did and there have been no regrets to date. (And we aren't even gaming fans.) We look forward to what else Hasbro can bring us as far as gaming figures are concerned and we bet if we do see more that they will indeed be part of another “repacks" repaints wave in the future. This was certainly a very easy figure to make, but he is significantly different than the original figure. That works just fine for us.