Spider-Man

By jove, they've done it! Hasbro has at last released a Marvel Legend that's worth paying $25 for! Who is Spider-Man? There is no text on the packaging. There is no text in the marketing material, or in the sales promo copy. Because Capitalism is a fundamental cognitive impairment, one that makes publicly traded companies think their job is to make money. Other than a literal mint, no business' job is to make money. Hasbro's job is to make toys. Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks' job is to make the company make toys. Obviously the company needs to earn money in order to make toys, but putting the making of money above the making of toys is like a restaurant deciding its job is not to make food, but to make clean plates; soon they begin favoring foods that won't make the plate dirty in the first place, foods with no sauce or no crumbs, even if that means the food gets worse every month, with dull textures and no flavor; because after all, "our job isn't to make food, it's to make sure we have enough clean plates." When Hasbro charges $50 for a 6" action figure and can't even bother to pay a copywriter to write three sentences about one of the most famous characters in history, the CEO needs to be physically dragged into the street by a mob and pilloried on live TV until he learns what his job is. And anyone who thinks his business plans were right needs to know they would be next. Hot diggety dog, it's Spider-Man! Who doesn't love innocent childhood character Spider-Man! Everybody just glazes past the italic text anyway, right? This is part of Hasbro's new Marvel Legends "Maximum Series," or, as any sane person is going to call them, Maximum Legends. These are fancy figures with tons of extras and the best articulation the company can muster. So, you know, "what Marvel Legends is already supposed to be providing every goddamn time." That. Spidey is a great character to start with, because he can really show off what this new is capable of. The sculpt isn't anything shocking: it's mostly similar to the Retro Collection body we've seen a handful of times, though the later version with the pinless joints. This is a Todd McFarlane-style Spider-Man, judging by the eyes - or at least, it is until someone wants to falsely pretend it's a J. Scott Campbell. If they truly wanted this to be "Maximum," he'd have sculpted webs on the red parts of his costume, not just painted, but then - oh no! - Cocks would have to give the Marvel team more money for tooling, and he doesn't want to do that! Poor baby, not being able to make toys without laying out cash! Life must be so hard for him! Boo hoo hoo! Reminder that one of the things that made ToyBiz's greatest Spider-Man so hot was that Dave Cortes didn't just put a new head on an existing body, he sculpted something that was well and truly just Spider-Man, webs and all. If Hasbro had sculpted the webs into this body the first time they released it, it would have been amortized by various repaints and rereleases by now. The paint is, at least, clean. He'd have looked good with a slightly brighter blue, but Todd favored a darker shade, and so that's what this toy gives us. The webs are very thin and closely spaced, but they line up well with no immediately obvious errors. What is weird, however, is the spider-symbol on his back: for whatever reason, the top legs extend onto the joint for the pectoral hinges, meaning that when you flex his arms, they now get weirdly stretched out; it would have looked absolutely fine to just stop the paint apps at the edge of the joint, no one would have noticed anythng amiss about them. We did say the sculpt was "mostly" reused - the arms and legs, and possibly the pelvis are shared with the old figure, but the stomach and chest are new. How unexpected! Like the Retro figure, ML Max Spider-Man has pectoral hinges, swivel/hinge shoulders, swivel biceps, double-hinged elbows, swivel/hinge wrists, a balljointed chest, hinged waist, drop-down balljoint hips, swivel thighs, double-hinged knees, swivel shins, and swivel/hinge ankles. But we don't stop there, because today we also get hinged toes, swivel forearms, a balljointed neck, and a balljoint/​hinge head! Wowsers! Those are some good additions. The head/neck is particularly good, since having a balljoint and a hinge for the head means he can already look almost directly up, and having another balljoint at the base of the neck allows him to tuck his chin all the way down against his chest. This makes all the barbell head joints Hasbro's been so fond of lately look even more like crap than they already did! When home video went from VHS to DVD, there was an unmistakable leap in quality; when it went from DVD to Blu-ray, the advancement was less noticeable, and thus adoption of the format was slower. Similarly, when ToyBiz started making Marvel Legends, they were miles ahead of the other toys the company made, but Marvel Legends Max is only a slight improvement over ML Reg(ular). And so it falls to the accessories to be the thing that really makes this release look like it should cost more than those. We begin with the heads. There's the normal Todd McFarlane head on the figure when you take it out of the box, but we also get a second version with one slightly squinty eye - not the greatest inclusion ever, but it's something. (The smart thing to do would have been an Erik Larsen head, or Mark Bagley, like they did with their various Venoms for a while.) Then there's a fully unmasked Peter Parker head, not the same one we've seen in the past, but it's an "inoffensive white boy" face, so it suits him. The irises could stand to be darker: the character has brown eyes, but the toy's look weirdly light. The figure includes fine selection of alternate hands: fists, holding, thwips, and posed to stick to walls. Additionally, the reason the figure has swivel forearms is because you can pop them off and replace them with a pair that has bare hands and his webshooters. Since the triggers for those extend into his palm, normal wrist articulation wouldn't have worked, so that's why these go up so high. The right hand is fully in thwip position, while the left is just starting to curl. We already mentioned one pair of (red) thwip hands, but there are actually two: the normal set, like any figure might have, and a pair that actually have webs thwipping out from them! One has a single strand with another spaghetti-ing around it, while the other has a spread of three that sticks out a little farther. In addition, the toy also includes two straight, stretchy, 9¾" long weblines, a web shield, a big spray that's forming a net, and one that is presumably supposed to be some sort of splut, but ends up looking like a gigantic spermatazoa. Taking a cue from Jada's Street Fighter toys, there's a clear(ish) display stand to support the web, rather than just having to lay it on the ground. And finally, one last accessory, one we've asked for in the past, one Marvel Minimates managed to do over a decade ago: Spider-sense! There's a clear halo piece that fits over the top of the head, and is painted with wiggly lines radiating out from the center so it looks like his Spidey-sense is tingling! That's a lot of fun, and given the side, you'll be able to loan it out to other Spider-Men in your collection if you so want. Rather than a typical Marvel Legends box, or a Retro Collection card, Maximum Spider-Man comes in a a broader box with stylish red-and-black graphics, a single, large photo of the toy in a dynamic pose on the back, and a clear window covering most of the front so you can see the figure and all his extras. Maximum Spider-Man isn't meant to compete with Marvel Legends; he's meant to compete with things like Figma or MAFEX or SH Figuarte or stuff like that; he's here to get you to spend money on Hasbro instead of on import toys. And while what we get is better than a typical Marvel Legend, in no world is he "pay $50" better. At $25, this would have been the Toy of the Year, no contest; at $50, he might not even be in contention. This is, honestly, not even a $40 action figure. It's good, but within reason. I wasn't even going to bother getting it until the price dropped, but Sprocket shared his preorder with me so you wouldn't have to wait for a review. The tldr version? Almost the best Spider-Man ever made, but not as good as a $50 pricetag wants you to believe it is. -- 05/05/25 Hasbro has already announced Hulk will be the second Marvel Legends Maximum figure; who do you think will be #3? Tell us on our message board, the Loafing Lounge.