Cosmo

They're good dogs, Bront. "1966. The Soviets put me on a rocket, knowing full well I never to return and I will die in a fiery ball of death. But one thing even мудак Soviets never do is call me bad dog!" It never stops hurting! If Cosmo's MCU origin matches the comics, then she was a normal Earth dog who got her powers - increased intelligence, psychic powers, and apparently extreme longevity - by being exposed to cosmic radiation after her ship drifted out of Earth's orbit. She first showed up in the original GotG movie, as part of The Collector's collection, but now gets a major role in Volume 3. Cosmo is the Build-A-Figure for Series 1 of the Guardians of the Galaxy vol.3 Marvel Legends. There are seven figures in the series (plus that bigger Groot), but Star-Lord doesn't have any pieces, so you only need to buy the other six. The pieces go together easily, but getting the helmet right can be tricky. To begin with, you have to take the head off the neck to get the lower half of the helmet on. Fortunately, the tabs that fit into the slots on the neck are different sizes, so there's no question about which way that goes on. Once that half is in place and the head is back on, the shorter slot/tab side goes under the throat, and the longer slot/tab over the neck. You can tell this is right, because the otherwise the outer half of the bubble will be forced down under the chin: although it looks like the visor would slide down to form a complete sphere, it won't; the shape of the pieces forces it to automatically snap to one side over the other. It's possible to put that front piece on upside down, as well. Just remember that the side with a slight ridge goes to the back, where it will meet with the bowl of the helmet; if you put it to the front, there will be a small gap where the halves meet. We do trial-and-error so you don't have to! Cosmo had her helmet in the first two movies, but ditched it by the time of the Holiday Special, so if you prefer to diaply the toy without, that will be perfectly fine. She's a Labrador/Golden Retriever mix, aka a "Goldador." Did you know most professional editing style guides would have you only capitalize proper nouns in a dog's name, and leave the generic terms lowercase? That's dumb. It's not "a retreiver" that happens to be golden, it's a "Golden Retriever"; it's not "a retriever" that happens to be from Labrador, it's a "Labrador Retriever." (Technically a "Labrador Retiever Dog," per the AKC, but that's equally dumb. And you notice neither Chicago nor AP bother with that part, so why should we listen to them about the rest?) If you want to capitalize it, capitalize it all; if you want to lowercase it, lowercase it all. As long as you're consistent, it'll be fine. Apparently eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge has opened Cosmo's eyes, and has introduced to her the concept of shame; why else would she still wear the little spacesuit the Soviets made for her, 60 years later? It can't be comfy to wear a full-body nylon suit when you're also entirely covered by fur, so we can only assume that with sapience has come more recognizably humanistic moral tropes. After all, if you have a dog, you know how much they love taking their collar off (aka "naked time")! A lot of the details on this suit match those in the first movie more than the third, but the brown leather pad on her back doesn't seem to come from anywhere. The suit is also missing the speakers on the sides of its red collar. Nor do we get the CCCP logo on the chest or the red star on the left arm, either. This isn't the most-articulated canine Hasbro has ever made, but the movement is good. Cosmo has a balljointed head, a swivel/hinge neck, balljointed shoulders, swivel/hinge elbows, wrists, and paws, a balljointed waist, balljoint hips, swivel/hinge heels and toes, and a swivel/hinge tail. With some effort, you can get her to sit, though having knee joints would make that better. And sadly, the tail's hinge only goes up and down, not side-to-side, meaning she can't accurately wag. Poor puppy! Cosmo's fur is a rich, dark orange, which stands out well against the off-white of her suit. The collar is grey and metallic red, and there's silver lining that brown harness she's wearing. Although her feet have sculpted paw pads, they don't get differentiated by paint; they should probably be tan like her snout. At least her nails are painted black? There are red and blue patches on her suit, a thin black wire along the left side, and she's got bright eyes. Wait, why is the snout lighter than the rest of her fur? That's not how goldadors work. Now that I've seen it, I can't unsee it. There has been a Cosmo toy before, but it was in Marvel Universe scale, unarticulated, and only available in an expensive SDCC set. This Build-A-Figure is very welcome! The removable helmet means this can be from any of the movies, and the design is close enough that you could use it as a comic version, as well (616 Cosmo is a boy, but James Gunn opted to make MCU Cosmo a girl in honor of fellow GOOD DOG Laika). If not for having Cosmo as the BAF, I would have waited for most of the GotG3 ML to go on clearance, but who can wait for this fun space dog? Cosmo is going to be a tough one to beat come ToY time. Drax | Mantis | Nebula | Rocket | Adam Warlock | Kraglin -- 05/23/23

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