SANDTROOPER Escape from Mos Eisley
30th Anniversary Collection Saga Legends
Item No.: Asst. 85770 No. 86830
Number: n/a
Includes: Orange shoulder pauldron, blaster, backpack, detonator, prod, coin
Action Feature: n/a
Retail: $6.99
Availability: Fall 2007
Appearances: Star Wars

Bio: Jedi mind tricks often work on the weak-minded. Such is the case when a squad of sandtroopers asks Jedi Maser Obi-Wan Kenobi about the two droids that are with him in a landspeeder. Obi-Wan tricks them into concluding, "These aren't the droids we're looking for." (Taken from the figure's cardback.)

Image: Adam Pawlus' toy room.

Commentary: Sometimes repaints make good sense. This Sandtrooper is a repaint of a 2006 figure, which itself was a modified 2004 figure. This release has 14 points of articulation, a removable grenade, and tons of goodies. Basically, short of having the right Sandtrooper sculpt (it's just a Stormtrooper with added parts and none of the Sandtrooper-specific armor features), it's almost perfect. If they had a way for the hips to be ball-jointed so the figure could sit on top of a Dewback, it'd be pretty much perfection.

What Hasbro did here was take the 2006 Sandtrooper and apply the 2005 Evolutions Sandtrooper paint job to it. This simple change allows collectors to add a new trooper to their ranks and build a more varied army. If you like the idea of a diverse legion of Sandtroopers, I sincerely hope you go out and buy one-- it looks really sharp, is widely available (at press time), and well, who doesn't want more troopers? As always, if you want just a dirty Stormtrooper, you can pop off the backpack and pauldron and you've got, essentially, a muddy Stormtrooper. Nice!

Collector's Notes: There are currently several Saga Legends Sandtroopers, all of which are shipping in the same packaging. This is version 2. Version 1 was a very dirty trooper, with a grey pad. Version 3 is a completely clean trooper with a white pad. (Version 3 was originally to be with a black pad, but it appears Hasbro changed it from black to white.) Versions 4 and 5 are currently expected to use a different mold entirely. All versions (so far) come with a silver Episode IV coin, so if you buy them all, you're going to have a lot of spare coins.

Day 550: November 7, 2007