Galen Erso - RO - Basic

A scientific genius, Galen Erso was coerced by the Galactic Empire to help develop a weapon of ultimate destruction. With deep regret, Erso perfected methods to harness the magnifying effects of kyber crystals to power the Death Star's planet-shattering superlaser.

So, we’re still not sure if Mads Mikkelsen stole Hasbro’s thunder or not. Either way, Hasbro sent out a press release that the actor had officially revealed the Rogue One action figure and the buzz quickly made its way through the collecting community. The figure itself is standard Hasbro. It’s a great, albeit simple, sculpt with horrid paint operations. Well, the paint operations are actually very nice from the neck down, But the actual facial paint operations are just a disaster. Despite the sloppiness of them, you can definitely tell that Hasbro designed an accurate portrait of the actor. It’s just a crying shame that a major detail like a figure’s likeness is approached with a lack of care and precision. 3.75” super-articulated fans might be a little more forgiving of the 5POA products if they just looked better. But looking at this figure we just don’t see that becoming a reality. Galen Erso, the father of Rogue One lead Jyn Erso, played a very interesting role in the film. He was responsible for bringing the Death Star to fruition, a weapon that would wreak havoc on the galaxy. He realized the path he’d chosen was the wrong one, and ultimately would betray the Empire leading to his untimely death. Jyn was only moments from reconnecting with him but that sadly never came to pass.

The Galen Erso action figure has great potential but ultimately doesn’t deliver thanks to the shoddy paint operations. The base of the figure is as standard as these figures come. A ball-socket head is joined by swivel shoulders and swivel hips. And that’s it. Now, Galen Erso may be a perfect example of what should be contained in a hybrid line. A figure like this doesn’t need super-articulation. In fact, maybe five points of articulation is all this character needs in this outfit. Then Hasbro could add super-articulated figures like the Imperial Death Trooper and the Scarif Trooper Squad Leader from the Walmart exclusive line and put them in the same case assortment. We’re certain Hasbro would be able to cost something like this out while making everyone happy at the same, in addition to making super-articulated 3.75” a general market release item again. But if this were to happen, Hasbro needs to find a way to get paint operations up to par. Because right now Galen Erso is almost painful to look at – it’s almost as if a child has painted his face. As we’ve mentioned briefly, the rest of the figure has been painted very nicely. The Imperial uniform he’s wearing is cast in a military green, but then there is a mint green colored cap around his shoulders; something we really haven’t seen with those who are part of the Galactic Empire.

One of the bigger positives with Galen Erso is his accessories. Hasbro graciously included a nice mouse droid accessory. The mouse droid is beautifully sculpted and has rolling wheels. Hasbro appears to have used previous tooling to create this accessory, but the panels are removable on this one, something we haven’t seen before until now. We’re not sure why Hasbro did this, but we found it to be problematic. The panels fell off constantly while we took pictures of the mouse droid for our photo gallery. When posed with Galen Erso it looks fantastic. We can’t recall if Galen Erso was near one of these in Rogue One, so we’re not going to deem it a screen accurate accessory for him right now. Galen Erso also comes with a gauntlet that houses two ends of a grappling hook. If you’re so inclined, you can make the well-dressed Galen Erso swing from one cliff to another. Of course we’re being sarcastic. We’re not so sure why Hasbro felt that this play accessory made the most sense for him. We think a blaster cannon with a crazy colored projectile may have gone over a little bit better. Either way, it’s probably a good bet that collectors are going to have a difficult time offering their seal of approval with this figure. It may be an admirable effort as far as the sculpt is concerned, the once again the paint job leaves quite a bit to be desired. Yes, it’s Groundhog Day once again.