Marvel Legends: Lizard Wave Review

At this point, this is kind of considered a Crawlspace catch-up review, but I’m determined to get it out anyway! This time we’ll be looking at the Lizard wave. There’s been a review of these figures on the Crawlspace already, so I’ll try to keep my thoughts about ’em brief and let the pictures speak for themselves.

As always, let’s start with the Spider-Men

Sculpt and Accessories:

As far as sculpts go, there’s not much new here. Noir is using the old AIM body with the trench coat from the MCU’s Nick Fury. He’s got a new head of course, and that looks great though, and I believe the added turtleneck is new too. The stitching on his mask is perfectly done, and since he’s basically all black, you don’t have to worry about any paint errors. His guns are admittedly pretty disappointing, they’re generic sci fi looking ray guns rather than any era appropriate pistol.

For Spider-Punk, he’s got the typical pizza spidey body, though he does have new feet. The sneakers are awesome looking, and very well sculpted. His head has the nice added spikes with some very angular eyes, but the most impressive part is easily the ripped denim jacket he’s wearing. It’s super well done with the detailing, and has spikes, buttons, and even his perfect looking emblem on the back.

While Spider-Man Noir’s pistols aren’t impressive, Punk’s guitar is better, though the paint is a little lackluster. But hey, you can always add your own design onto it! The hands he comes with for it are pretty cool too, with 1 fist, 1 rocker hand that doubles as a web slinging one, one guitar holding hand, and one guitar playing hand with a pick in it.

Articulation:

There’s not much to say in this category that hasn’t already been said before, and they’re both pretty good. Noir would’ve benefited from some butterfly joints like other spider characters, but the trench coat is a little restrictive anyway. Spider-Punk’s butterfly joints are a little restricted by his denim jacket, but I really like that they added a swivel on his sneakers, because it works in place of a calf swivel that the pizza Spidey body is missing.

Now it’s time to get purple and green.

Sculpt and Accessories:

I think Prowler is a great looking figure. The dark purple contrasts very nicely with the green parts on him, and all his newly molded parts are perfect, especially the claws which are very effective. I believe his cape is the same one that the Moon Knight figure had, but it absolutely works for him, though if you plug it into his back using the peg slot, the scarf does float a bit off his chest.

Lasher is a figure I’m admittedly a bit disappointed with. This one just screams lazy reuse, and is a complete repaint with no new parts at all. He just uses the Superior Venom mold with the Scarlet Spider head, and it has eyes that don’t really match the character, and while the metallic green looks nice for a symbiote, it doesn’t quite seem to be the same color that he was in the comics. Just a disappointing figure over all, especially when you like symbiotes as much as I do.

Mysterio though, oh baby. I adore this figure. From the sculpted lines all over his body to the intricate details on his effects, this is an awesome figure. It absolutely captures Mysterio perfectly, especially the hands he has. I have almost nothing but good things to say about him, and he’s even got a pattern on his cape.

As if Mysterio wasn’t already a cool looking enough figure, he even has a fancy looking skull head with a tentacle weaving throughout it! The level of detail they put into him is awesome.

Articulation:

For Mysterio and Prowler, they more or less have the same standard posability that most Marvel legends have these days, Though of course Mysterio’s fishbowl is attached to the cape, so he can’t technically look up or down, even though the head still has a ball swivel.

Lasher like I said is entirely reuse, so there’s nothing he has that I didn’t already cover in my Superior Venom review, though I will say that for some reason you can sort of jam his tendrils into different positions, something I couldn’t seem to do with Superior Venom

Now let’s see what the ladies of the wave have to offer.

Sculpt and Accessories:

Hoo boy. They tried with Gwenpool. They really tried. The amount of accessories she comes with is great! She has a little penguin backpack that her swords sheathe into, she has two heads, two grabby hands, two heart shaped hands, a peace hand, and even a hand to hold the cellphone she comes with (that is incredibly easy to lose, and I have almost done so multiple times!). And there’s nothing specifically wrong with most of her sculpt or paint, but… man those heads. I don’t know what they were going for, but I think they look awful. Most people who like the character appreciate her because of the cute art her book had, but these downright scary expressions are not doing her any favors. She’s got the same teen body mold that’s been around for awhile, which also isn’t the best.
Honestly, my favorite part of her is that her hands also fit on the Spider-Gwen figure, so you can give her some other hands.

Spider-Woman is also not anything amazing. It’s Jessica Drew’s new costume (that she has since ditched) and it’s as standard as you can get for a female Marvel Legend figure. The only accessory she has at all is her glasses which can come off, which is a little boring. An extra hand that’s a fist at least would’ve been nice.

Me too Jessica, me too.

Articulation:

First off, you have no idea how long it took me to balance Jessica on that one hand. No idea.
But as far as articulation goes, like I said, they’re pretty average figures for female Marvel Legends, and it’s a solid “could use improvement” unfortunately. Jessica can’t even look around a whole lot because her hair gets in the way. Gwenpool thankfully doesn’t have the same problem, but you just have to deal with that face instead.

And of course, onto the build-a-figure

Sculpt and Accessories:

This guy is goooorgeous. Look at those scales! All the ripped and tattered clothing! Even the nice touches of the edges of Curt’s lab coat that have been painted to look like they’ve been dirtied. I’m a big Lizard fan, and he does not disappoint. A lot of people have said that they don’t like how his head looks like a dinosaur rather than a lizard, but I myself quite like it. It’s not like there hasn’t been a ton of different ways artists have drawn the Lizard anyway, though he is a bit beefier than I’d normally expect him to be, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
The biggest complaint I have about him is that tongue. Why’d they have to make it so long? Why not make it detachable at the very least? Very odd choice.

“Trust me, I’m a doctor.”

Articulation:

While this figure does have some pretty good articulation, there are some weird choices. The added jaw, head, and even neck articulation is all super well done, but his tail and leg articulation leaves a lot to be desired. Instead of some sort of wire bendy tail, they opted for a strange jointed system that makes it look incredibly unnatural when you bend it certain ways. Not to mention one of the joints is a swivel that bends horizontally and the other joint is one that bends vertically.
The other problem he has are the legs. They’re fine at the hips, but for the knees, there’s almost no movement there at all, and they’re stuck in a bent position. Don’t know why Hasbro decided on this at all. Thankfully, he does make up for it a bit with the toe swivels, though the ones on mine were a bit loose.

While this wave has some high highs, it’s also got some low lows. I still like it overall because it’s given me some characters I really wanted in figure form, so I can’t complain too much. Look at the photos below and decide if they’re the right figures for you!