Anakin Skywalker - SW [TPM 3D] - The Clone Wars (CW1)

Anakin defeats battle droids with a whirling lightsaber attack. Using the Force, Skywalker launches into combat with lightning-swift maneuvers. The droids are no match for this powerful Jedi and soon fall under the spinning strikes from Anakin's blade.

Typically the Expanded Universe is much more special to “movie only” Star Wars fans when the dots can be connected to eventually reach the films. And authors of the various Expanded Universe stories are have picked up on this for years. Sometimes it’s more obvious than others. In the original Clone Wars micro-series, Genndy Tartakovsky brought the final Battle of Coruscant right to the opening crawl of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith (and it was amazing). Likewise, David Filoni seems to have picked up on the same cues and with Season 3 of The Clone Wars he has dramatically begun to “connect the dots” in very memorable ways. This does wonders in pulling in more and more Star Wars fans into a multimedia event that they probably wouldn’t normally acknowledge. It’s almost common sense. The episode Heroes On Both Sides brought us the Episode III looks of Anakin Skywalker (as well as Obi-Wan Kenobi) and Hasbro was quick to add the action figures based on these looks into the toy line. The releases were fair, but perhaps they were a little too rushed as they clearly needed some fine tuning before seeing release. Anakin Skywalker in particular looked like he got his head stuck in a vice. And if his head didn’t look dramatically too elongated for you, you probably couldn’t deny that his likeness was too far off to be considered accurate. Thankfully, Hasbro decided not to tweak the original version and instead built a new one from the ground up.

Anakin Skywalker may not make you feel that you need it right away, but you do. And please listen to our reasons of why this is so. This all-new sculpt sports 18 points of articulation. You probably already know that Hasbro has forgone articulation in the ankles again. We have always been OK with this in the past, but The Clone Wars basic figures are getting better than ever and the limbs are getting thinner and thinner. Some extra balancing reinforcement is abundantly needed more than ever because of this. We really hope that Hasbro makes it a top priority to not skip over this very important joint in the future. We admit it’s very important now. Anakin Skywalker suffers from balancing issues a little bit and ankle joints would have remedied the problem. But Hasbro did design a spectacular version of Anakin and we’re thoroughly impressed with the results. Hasbro worked in a soft-goods skirt to go under the extremely pliable plastic skirt that sits over it. As a bonus, the cybernetic forearm that came with 2011’s TCW [SOTDS] Anakin Skywalker (CW45) figure can be utilized here on this new figure as they have the same attachments. An all-new neck-joint has been added to this figure. Instead of ball-socketed, it’s ball-jointed. The joints offer amazing movement back and forth, but left to right movement is inhibited. And just like the chronic mismatched ankle joints, would you believe that Hasbro stuck a brown joint in his neck? (It’s looks terrible.)

That being said, the head sculpt is absolutely fantastic. It gets bad press, but we think it looks rather incredible. The expression on his face, the concern in his eyes, the wound on his face and the style of his hair look just like the Anakin Skywalker we know so well from The Clone Wars. We believe there is very little to complain about as far as the portrait of this figure is concerned. Collectors have asked why Hasbro has revisited this version of Anakin Skywalker so soon before many other yet-to-be-made figures. We see your point, but we also have to say this upgrade of him was sorely needed. The future of The Clone Wars line feels uncertain, so it’s good that we got a near-definitive version of Anakin Skywalker while The Clone Wars was still an active property. Anakin comes with his trusty lightsaber. As far as “realistic” accessories, that’s it. Hasbro did however make him kid-friendly and added a launched and “spinning lightsaber” projectile. We tried it out. It’s fun, but we’re already over it, so into our storage box it goes. The action figure stands, die and Galactic Battle Game card have all been revised. And we can say the the new design of the cards are so nice, they might be collectible themselves one day. And don’t laugh at us, but the “animated cels” (for lack of a better word – it’s only part of the packaging and not meant to be collectible) are so neat that we want to collect all of them too. Anakin Skywalker is a figure you definitely need. It’s the best The Clone Wars version we have. So make sure you have the best version!