Marvel Legends
Thanos Series: Thanos Review

“Beef him up! If you’re going to steal one of the New Gods, at least rip off Darkseid, the really good one!” – Roy Thomas, on Thanos.

Thanos has appeared in a lot of Marvel comics… and, to be honest, I have not read a lot of them. I still have a huge fondness for Thanos, for Starlin’s work overall really (can I get a Hardcore Station shout out? No?). Starlin introduced Thanos in Iron Man #55 way back in 1973 and, yes, the Darkseid comparisons started pretty much instantly. Starlin has said, though, that it didn’t start out that way. Check out this interview for more of the story, but Starlin was originally channeling Metron when Roy Thomas uttered the infamous line above.

Thanos didn’t see much use in the 80s, when I learned to love comics, so I don’t have the same huge affinity I do for him that I have for so many other Marvel characters. Thanos made his big come back in the 90s when the company got a little cosmic and then came back into prominence again recently as Marvel went a little cosmic again. Unfortunately, I wasn’t really reading Marvel at either time. I did follow Abnett & Lanning around during Annihilation (love those guys), but those boks featured a very different Thanos.

In the comics, Thanos was from Titan, before being retconned into being the son of two Eternals (there’s your Kirby influence coming back around, albeit directly this time), but is probably best characterized with his obsession for death – in this case, the personification of it, Mistress Death. He will kill pretty much anyone & everyone in order to please her. He’s essentially the ultimate nihilist. I haven’t read up on him lately; I think he’s back from the dead again and back to being a pure villain (he has his anti-hero days too, which I tend to prefer).

Thanos is also, of course, coming back in a big way thanks to his appearances in the Marvel Cinematic Universe! We really haven’t gotten a ton of characterization on that version of him just yet, though that will change as we get closer and closer to 2018. Interestingly, even though the Thanos Wave includes three figures from the MCU, Age of Ultron specifically, the Thanos Build-A-Figure is from the comics. Though it probably wasn’t the look many long-time ML collectors were expecting.

See, if you’ve been collecting Marvel Legends for, I don’t know… the last thirteen years, or even just the last decade since the BAF was introduced, you would’ve thought that Thanos would be pretty high on the “get this guy done” list. Well, you would’ve been mistaken. Now, we did get a pretty sweet Marvel Select Thanos – it’s got some paint issues and limited articulation, but it looks great and at least tries hard at the previous things. But he’s been it. This whole time. MU has, I think, three Thanos figures already. ML? First one, right here.

And it’s the new costume. Now, I’m not a stickler – the new costume does look good, it echoes the original. I love the dark blue and gold color scheme. It’s a great looking figure, but I still kinda want a classic one? I do have that MS one, so I’m feeling a bit tormented. I don’t need both of these guys. But which one to keep? Continue to Page 2…

11 thoughts on “Marvel Legends
Thanos Series: Thanos Review

  1. Check his right leg to see if his calf/shin is facing the wrong way. If it is, do a 180 with it and rotate the foot back to the front. This seems to be a common problem with Thanos. I took mine apart to fix it only to realize this.

  2. I always had the impression that Thanos'(and Darkseid’s) “skirt” was actually a long tunic, with the belt over it for stylistic reasons. Not liking this “tech-y” look that seems to have infected Marvel Cosmic with Annihilation, but you can see the section on the waist piece that should be blue around the hips.
    altho, tbh, I haven’t read any Annihilation comics, so I may be wrong. Last I saw, he was wearing a white toga?

    paint slop seems to be rampant on this wave. I ordered two cases from HTS and… yikes.
    One more reason to keep the MS on the shelf and chalk this up to…fodder? what’s the story on his “son”, Thane(?) aka Marvel’s Grayven? maybe a stand-in for him?

    I also made it up into StL county this past wkd and saw the wave was somewhat plentiful either for or despite that BOGO1/2 sale that just ended. Most of the figures I saw had similar paint slop.
    In fact, it was discussed in a ML FB page today that the two ladies should have had a variant head (closed mouth) and Infinity Gauntlet instead of sharing the same pieces.

    I don’t know if you’re going to try and give a full wave review or not, but my quick rundown:
    Hellcat- I’ve heard rumors she MIGHT be appearing on Netflix’s “AKA Jessica Jones”? (NOT Rosario/Night Nurse!) pretty decent figure, and great base for FIRESTAR, or maybe an updated Tigra? body is mostly yellow plastic, but the lower legs and a few other bits that aren’t have weak yellow paint, so it stands out.

    Spider-Woman – needed a do-over from ToyBiz, and this fills it nicely. not a fan of either set of the (easily lost!) wings, and again, the same complaint about the thin yellow paint.

    Batroc – another “debut” comic version of an MCU character, this being the Winter Soldier merc early in the movie. Decent figure for a medium male buck, but he just screams “French Wolvie!” and continues the metallic purple plastic that Hasbro apparently got a deal on? LOL I know there are more muscular bucks out there, right now, Batroc just seems to have hit when those molds were already ear marked for other figures, so he has to make due with what was available? sacre bleu!

    Hulk – seems to be a fairly new sculpt over the previous movie version? Best of the bunch, imo, after ladies, but how much could they mess up on when all that really needed painting was the head and pants?

    AoU Cap – yet another unnecessary “tweak” to Cap’s uniform, which tbh, I wasn’t feeling on TWS, so a few extra details here aren’t impressing me that much. seems to be a pretty faithful rendiiton of a costume we’ve barely seen. maybe that will change in a few weeks? the movie “Cmdr Rogers” suit I didn’t care for and now think it’s the best after the WW2 suit.

    IM mk43-? not sure of the actual numbering, but pretty much a redeco of mk42 from IM3. only selling point is the “open mask” head…which blocks half the face and is really pointy.
    I think we need a really good UNmasked RDJ head, as seen in that new AoU 5pk set, which hit ebay without advance warning (like the new MS Hawkguy/pizza dog set), and now seems to be a Disney Store exclusive?
    IM=Bleeding Edge in bright comic colors+RDJ head
    Hulk= Valkyrie 2pk Hulk? some slight tweaks?
    Ultron= “chrome” IM3 redeco
    Cap= um…not really sure how he’s different?
    Thor= Now!/RoML in new deco.
    news broke with an ebay sale a few days ago and good pics are still filtering in, including one pic that wasn’t ‘shopped to hide the “Disney Exclusive” bubble in top right corner of box. Several people thought it was a custom box/hoax, but a few more sales have popped up to confirm it IS real.

    now about the other recent ML waves….
    (and TF combiners…! Stunticons, YES! Aerialbots, meh.)

  3. As the MS one is hard to get here. (Dunno.where all my LCS MSs vanished to asbhe had a bunch. All DC now) will gobwith this but yes would love a Legends Classic Thanos. Can’t remake the DC vs. Marvel card without that. Yes I am having a Darkseid vs. Thanos fight happening on my shelf. I saw the wave once triple upped and no.$$$ to spend but now BAMF gone. Da fuq and same with the Hobgoblin wave.

  4. Marvel Select for the win, man! Infinity Gauntlet extra hand and Mistress Death not to mention the larger size… Now, I’m gonna play Marvel Superheroes!

  5. Great review as always! I really like this figure. I never got the MS Thanos because of the whole scale thing, so this was a figure I’d been hoping to see for a while. I’m usually a lot more of a classic costume fan, but I kinda dig Thanos’s new threads. I just wish he had the Infinity Gauntlet! (Even if it’s not technically accurate)

  6. No kind words for that winning smile? The expression is what I love the most, he just looks so HAPPY at being so EVIL!

  7. That expression is a huge selling factor to me.
    That and the scale, but you’re so right when you describe the MS and the ML as “massive, cool-but-out-of-scale classic Thanos or this more in-scale modern version”
    I’m not sure yet either, but I may want to pick this one up. The big ol’ MS one is not really doing it for me.

  8. The new one looks fantastic holding the cosmic cube that came with Red Skull.

    MS is my Thanos on the villains shelf. The new one is fun to pose towering above all fallen MCU heroes figs.

    Thwipp!

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