Warlock

You, a fool: "Warlock isn't a character you're likely to see in Marvel Legends." Me, an intellectual: A refugee from an alien world of intelligent machines, Warlock fit right in with the mutant outcasts at Xavier's School. But that association made him a target of Cameron Hodge's evil X-Tinction Agenda and cost him his life! Since Build-A-Figures don't have bio text, that comes from the 1994 Fleer Ultra X-Men trading card (#128), which was part of a sub-set featuring dead characters - thus the line about him dying in the "X-Tinction Agenda" crossover. Unsurprisingly, he (and pretty much every other dead character featured on those cards) has since come back to life, so this BAF does represent a currently active character, not one who died decades ago. Warlock is the BAF for X-Men Legends Series 3: buy six of the seven figures in the series - you could skip Old Man Logan if you wanted to - and you'll end up with all the pieces to assemble this techno-organic alien. It's surprisingly tough to get the arms into their sockets, too. Dang things kept trying to pop back out! I had the best luck pushing the arm in as far as I could get it to go, then twisting it to get it to "pop" the last little bit needed. Warlock's look was created by artist Bill Sienkiewicz, an artist known for his dreamy, expressionistic style - like, if you wanted someone to illustrate the inside of Joker's mind, Sienkiewicz is the guy you'd get. Consequently, Warlock was a vaguely human-shaped morphoid, constantly shifting his parts around. Clearly that wouldn't work on a solid toy (at least, one not made entirely out of Lego), but this version of 'lock keeps the basics: a tall, thin body with wild hair and extra armor around the forearms and shins. The detailing in the sculpt is truly impressive, with exactly the kind of technological/mechanical shapes artists used to draw on his body - lots of pseudo circuit-board textures abound. This specific design doesn't come from the old New Mutants comics, however; rather, it takes its influence from Warlock's re-appearance in 2007's Annihilation: Conquest, circa Nova #12 - the biggest clue being the way he has satellite dishes sticking out of his ears. The asymmetrical eyes and the massive mouth could be any era, honestly, but those ears really help narrow things down. It may also explain why the body isn't as dark as it should be - instead of black with yellow accents, like Warlock traditionally looked, that issue made him look yellow with black accents, like a member of the Phalanx. This toy favors the former, but could have gone darker; as it is, he looks like dirty bronze. May Thamtarana found an interesting way to create Warlock's hair. Having a wild spray of wires sticking out of his scalp might work great on the printed page, but not so much for a molded plastic toy. So they made his hair thicker and more solid, like an afro. A technological afro. A techfro. It's done like a cone, with various curving and overlapping cables sculpted around the outside, and then a "plug" that fits in the end, representing the tips of all the cables we can't see. That's a really clever way to do things! The hair is rubbery, too, so you don't have to worry about any of the strands snapping off. Although no toy could hope to duplicate Warlock's extreme, Reed Richards-like maleability, this is a Marvel Legend, so it gets as many joints as possible: balljointed head, hinged neck, swivel/hinge shoulders, swivel biceps, double-hinged elbows, swivel/hinge wrists, balljointed and hinged torso, balljointed hips, swivel thighs, double-hinged knees, and swivel/hinge/swivel ankles. The arms are limited slightly by the tubes running from his elbows to his back, but if you simply must have him raise his hands over his head, the tubes unplug. While the right hand is balled into a fist, the left is open and gesturing. The BAF pieces also include an alternate hand, converted into a buzzsaw. Theoretically it could replace either hand, but it's a lot easier to get the left hand out than the right, primarily because it's easier to get a grip on it. The blade itself doesn't spin, but the hand retains all the same articulation, so that's something nice at least. Warlock is an unexpected choice to get an action figure, but he's highly welcome: this is definitely a character who's too big to release by himself (brushing up against the 9⅞" mark), and isn't that one of the things we look for in a BAF? There may not be any New Mutants for him to pal around with, but he can technically hang out with Nova and the Guardians of the Galaxy to fight Ultron. Colossus | Shatterstar | Dazzler | Polaris | Cyclops | Sunfire -- 07/15/19

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