Marvel Legends Outback Psylocke Review
The Outback era of X-Men is one of my absolute favourites, and Betsy Braddock one of my favorite X-Men, so it’s safe to say this figure was pretty high on my most wanted list, especially as we’re getting pretty close to completing that team. With Asian Psylocke being so much more popular I was a little surprised that we got her. And even if it’s a BaF I don’t care about at all in a wave with some figures that don’t interest me at all, it’s nice to see an actual BaF wave again, it feels like they’re becoming increasingly rare, even with non-blister card waves.
So this Psylocke is all new except for the legs and accessories. The legs are from Lilandra and later Deathbird, and many fans called out to be used for this figure the second Lilandra was revealed. Being completely pinless she is very sturdy when posed but there is a bit of a balancing issue. The cape is a rather thick and heavy piece of plastic compared to the rest of the figure and does cause her to fall backwards often. It’s got great cloth detailing though compared to the usual smooth cape. The paint applications are clean on my copy and even feature painted line work for the different parts of the armor. At least they are painted on the front of the figure but are cut off before you get to the back. The head sculpt is pretty but the expression is a little odd. It’s very emotionless, I can’t tell what she is supposed to be feeling and it did make some poses feel off. Her shoulder pads are even sculpted with the ring system. All combined the look of the costume is depicted well for the most part. I really like the hood/hair combo mold, and even though the face mask is just printed it looks great.
With this being the first “White Betsy” figure it’s hard to find a lot to compare it too, but it’s certainly a big improvement over a lot of the earlier Psylocke figures, it’s so refreshing to see the double jointed elbows becoming increasingly standard for female figures, it does wonders for the articulation. The actual articulation on Betsy is really good, even the shoulder armor pad does impressively little to hold back the articulation. I can’t help but feel there could be another joint around the waist to give a little bit more mobility, the sculpt even looks like it’s designed for it. The head doesn’t have a whole lot of up-and-down mobility, but it’s still nice to see a hood-cape combo that feels connected. The real thing that holds the mobility back is the hard plastic cape, but it doesn’t stop most of the way’s I’d want to pose it.
The figure is lacking in the accessory department but at least we have matching hands. There are a set of open hands and a set of fists that we have seen on so many female figures. Then the power effect is a carried over from the recent GamerVerse Psylocke. Which is cool but it’s rather difficult to get it on the face properly with how close the hair is on the headsculpt. Like on most releases, I could always ask for alternate heads but it seems like BaF waves always get the short end of the accessory stick. While the lack of accessories feel a little disappointing, it’s hard to think what you actually could include – it was before her psychic knife was developed and she didn’t really have anything beyond her telepathy.
Overall, Austin and I, with whom I co-wrote this review, have differing opinions based on whether we’ve read the Outback era or not. Having not read the Outback era, though he promises to read it soon, Austin thought this was a solid release, but wasn’t blown away even if it was nice to continue to fill out another team. On the flipside, this is a figure I’ve been dying for and with the exception of the disappointing butterfly accessory, which should have been a great representation of her powers, she does not disappoint at all and I hope the last few pieces of the team aren’t far off.
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