Bishop

Idea: an X-Man whose power is only to attack diagonally. On the advice of his grandmother, Alpha-mutant Bishop seeks out the X-Men and uses energy conversion and concussive blasts to join the ranks of his heroes of legend. Bishop hails from one of Marvel's many alternate future timelines. His is kind of like the "Days of Future Past" future, in that Sentinels monitor mutants in concentration camps; but in his, humans and mutants joined together in the Summers Rebellion to destroy the Sentinels, which is why he could end up serving as a law enforcement agent for the XSE - "Xavier's Security Enforcers," the police force founded after the rebellion by Forge. Chasing a fugitive criminal, Bishop stepped through a portal from his future to the present, and only discovered once he was here that it was a one-way trip. When the character was under development, Whilce Portacio and Karl Altstaetter intended to make him Filipino, but before they could tell anyone that, Marvel's marketing department let it be known that they wanted a black character. The original intent was that Bishop would just be African American, but Chris Claremont decided to make him Aboriginal Australian instead. The big M over his right eye is a brand used to identify mutants in his time - and on this toy, it's sculpted in, not just painted. Bish was a large guy, so the toy uses the big male body. To re-create the elements of his costume (which was really just his standard XSE uniform), he gets several new pieces: a big red scarf, a belt with some technological detailing, yellow "cuffs" that fit around his biceps to make it look like his sleeves are rolled up, and a harness around his shoulders that features a giant holster for his shotgun. There are also rolled cuffs on his gloves, but no detailing on his boots. A pair of yellow stripes run down the left side of his body, and there's a logo on each shoulder: XSE on the left shoulder, and some sort of V thing on the right. The figure moves at the head, neck, shoulders, biceps, elbows, wrists, chest, waist, hips, thighs, knees, boots, and ankles - all the usual points. His only accessory is the big future shotgun. Why does a guy who can absorb and redirect energy need to carry guns, anyway? Days of Future Past (the movie, not the comic) actually made that make sense: he absorbed the energy, but needed the gun to direct it. That works! The fact that he only has the one gun does feel limiting, however; ToyBiz's had two, though we'd easily have settled for some energy effects here. Or even a glowing pink hand, like Magneto had. Both his hands have the trigger finger extended, which does make the lack of a second sidearm feel all the more conspicuous. Part of the Sauron series, Bishop includes the BAF's right arm/wing. This figure isn't a big improvement over the ML12 one, but it does have the advantage of being newer and thus more readily available. And although Bishop has had some other memorable costumes over the years, Hasbro was smart to go with the original. -- 06/03/19

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