It's possible you already own this figure and don't know it - she might be disguised as someone else!
Whether operating undercover or fronting a band of thieves, the metamorphic mutant known as Mystique possesses an almost pathological capacity for deception. A mutant metamorph, Mystique can psionically shift the atoms and molecules of her body and clothing so as to mimic the appearance of any human, humanoid or semi-humanoid being of either sex. Her control is so precise she can exactly replicate another person's retina, finger, palm and skin-pore patterns; even vocal cords are not beyond her ability to duplicate. A sworn enemy of the human race, Mystique wages a one-woman war against those who hate and fear mutants!
Though promotional pictures (and the art on the back of the card) show Mystique as a reworking of the Invisible Woman figure, the final version is actually much different: she's a reworking of the Invisible Woman figure. Wait, what?
Instead of the ML version of Sue, Mystique is based on the movie figure, though with some pretty substantial modifications. It's not that she uses the same body parts, but that she has the same design, with movement at neck, shoulders, biceps, elbows, wrists, fingers, chest, torso, waist, hips, knees, and ankles. Mystique doesn't have the ridiculous wasp-waist that Jessica Alba did, which is good. Even better is that she doesn't have the superfluous biceps joints that all the ML women from Elektra onward have suffered with. She could have used joints at the tops of her gloves, though.
Mystique is painted nicely, with a wonderful blue for her skin. Her hair is less vibrant than it should be, looking almost brown instead of bright red. Her yellow eyes are perfect,
but the tiny skull on her forehead looks like it missed part of its gold app. There's a blue wash on her costume and, as usual, it's too much: it looks like she's wearing powder blue rather than pure white. The skulls around her waist look good, but the black that connects them to one another is a bit sloppy.
Sadly, Mystique has no accessories, other than
the Doop-stand that seems to be an ML10 standard. It's not like ToyBiz could actually reproduce her powers in any physical sense, but she's never been above using guns to get what she wants. Unfortunately, you can't even loan her anyone else's sidearms, because Dave Cortes hasn't sculpted her hands to hold them.
Rather than a display base, Mystique comes with part of a giant Sentinel, the Build-A-Figure pack-in for Marvel Legends 10. Buy all the characters in the line, and you can assemble a 16" death machine. Mystique includes the hips and lower torso.
If you didn't know that this was part of a Sentinel, you might not
be able to tell. The technological detailing is great, making this look like something from The Matrix. The tubes and pistons are all detailed nicely, and painted a faded bronze. The entire torso section is soft rubber over a hard plastic core. Don't know why they chose to do it that way, but it's not like it looks any different than the rest of the pieces.
Both Mystique and Omega Red come with the same Sentinel piece because, unlike Galactus, the head and chest are one piece. If you're buying the whole set, then you're going to have two of these big metal crotches lying around your display. However, if you just want to build a Sentinel and don't want the entire line, Mystique is the one to get - given the choice between the duplicitous blue shapeshifter and the albino Russian octopus, it's not really much of a choice at all.
Mystique comes not with a reprint comic, but with a poster book. Whenever we get one of these, you can't help but feel ripped off. I want a story, dammit! If I just wanted pictures, I'd buy more Image comics. Mystique recently had a decent series of her own, which would have been perfect material. Heck, she's been in lots of interesting stories over the years, so give us one of those.
Mystique has been kicking around the Marvel Universe long enough to easily qualify her for the "Legends" moniker, and it's nice that she's finally got a worthwhile figure.
-- 10/07/05
Mystique or Omega Red? Tell us on our message board, the Loafing Lounge.
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