Sandtrooper - TLC - Saga Legends (SL 21)

Jedi mind tricks often work on the weak-minded. Such is the case when a squad of sandtroopers asks Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi about the two droids that are with him in a landspeeder. Obi-Wan tricks them into concluding, "These aren't the droids we're looking for."

When Saga Legends got picked up for The Legacy Collection, it just didn't match the same level of enthusiasm as the 30 (77-07) line. Hasbro sort of grabbed the line by the horns and started making all of the decisions surrounding it. Collectors weren't engaged in the character selections, Hasbro decided to take a new approach with the line by focusing on characters that were somehow related to a Clone Wars source and the variety of the army-builders was rather amoebic. Instead of five or six versions of Sandtroopers or for versions of Battle Droids, we were lucky to get two in The Legacy Collection. It was initially cool to get a new pack-in premium (the arsenal locker), but after two or three of them, they started becoming as boring as 2006's miniature holograph figures. (Hey, at least there were 12 different holograms – 36 if you count all red, blue and silver.) One of the figures that never made it out to mass retail in the TAC line was the Sandtrooper corporal. While carded samples did surface before cases starting making their way to retail, no confirmations of this figure being found at retail were ever established. If you were lucky enough to attain a sample of this figure in the 30 (77-07) line look then you best not open it up. It is one of the easiest figures to cobble together loose. Obviously it was a figure that collectors wanted, so Hasbro made sure it became a priority for the relaunch of the new The Legacy Collection line look.

Sandtrooper is a clean repaint of 2006's TSC Sandtrooper (SAGA 037) figure. Hasbro "accidentally" released a clean Sandtrooper with white pauldron in the corporal's place in the 30 (77-07) line. They eventually realized their mistake and they promised time and again to us that the corporal was coming but he unfortunately never came. Wow, we have been through things like this before with Hasbro, haven't we? While we got some pretty awesome Sandtrooper action figures in the 2007 TAC line, most fans wanted this figure basically since we couldn't have it....until now of course. The figure looks great, but it is very unlikely that anyone of us would see such a clean Imperial Stormtrooper on the Tatooine terrain. Interestingly, Sandtrooper has a backpack with a very dirty deco which looks out of pace against his very clean body. It clearly was reused from another "more dirty" Sandtrooper. The figure is super-articulated and has a pretty decent helmet sculpt. His legs are a little bit too close together, so don't expect yourself to be able to pose him in a multitude of ways because it won't be possible. The backpack stays in place very well as does his thermal detonator. And while it takes some elbow grease to make him hold the dewback prod (or staff or whatever it's called), once you get it in place in looks rather fantastic. This figure of course was meant to be part of the original 2007 Saga Legends line, so it's definitely nice to officially get him.

As mentioned earlier, Saga Legends figures in The Legacy Collection all come with a weapons locker full of repeat blaster and rifles. We don't think this was the best pack-in the Saga Legends figures could have gotten but it is what it is for now. Since Hasbro decided to take away collector input for the Saga Legends candidates, Hasbro's new approach for figure eligibility in the Saga Legends line now is that they must be somehow related to a Clone Wars source and if not, they must be a core kid main character. We understand the logic, but it really sacrificed a lot of slots for Star Wars figures that were in desperate need of re-release. We really didn't need some of the figures they decided to repack this time. It seems too redundant too soon. We suppose it depends if you don't have these of course. We think all of you should have these figures by now. Wouldn't you have rather seen Darth Revan get re-released for example? And focusing on characters from The Clone Wars line means that it totally took away any possibility of seeing more figures from 2007's TAC Saga Legends line like TC-14, R4-I9, Utapau Shadow Trooper and many others in the line going forward. We hope that Hasbro brings back collector input. Having a collection that was culminated from both Hasbro and collector opinion is an absolute must for any greatest hits line. We are happy to see that the Sandtrooper corporal has finally seen release, but savvy collectors probably made him a long time ago for their collections. Now you can have him "officially."