Lando Calrissian - POTF2 [R/G] - Basic

Height: 1.77 meters
Status: Cloud City Administrator
Classification: Human
Affiliation: Rebel Alliance
Weapon of Choice: Holdout Blaster Pistol

Lando Calrissian has been called many things over the years; con artist, smuggler, and rogue. He never expected to be called a leader and war hero... but then, he never dreamed that the Empire would force him to betray his best friend.

His past a well-guarded secret, the charming and roguish gambler used to travel the galaxy as captain of the modified Corellian light freighter, the Millennium Falcon. He lost the ship in a high stakes game of sabacc to his good friend and fellow gambler, Han Solo. Lando embarked on a galaxywide tour to see what the future held for him, eventually winning control of Bespin's Cloud City, a floating mining and gambling establishment infamous throughout the galaxy. As the city's new Baron Administrator, Lando proved adept at administration, helped by his chief aide Lobot. Cloud City and its Tibanna gas mining operation, were profitable, and Lando became a respectable businessman.

Lando was soon to get a jolt from visiting Imperial forces. The Dark Lord of the Sith, Darth Vader, forced him to betray Han Solo. The Baron Administrator grudgingly set Solo up for a fall, but when Vader changed the terms of the deal Lando took action. Helping free Princess Leia Organa and Chewbacca the Wookiee, Lando abandoned his precious Cloud City and escaped in the Falcon. A fugitive from the Empire, Lando Calrissian's future now lay with the Rebel Alliance... and his first task would be to help rescue Han Solo.

Right from the start, ill-informed collectors felt the panic to acquire quite a few of the original The Power Of The Force “2” figures. If you thought there was mass panic with C-3PO and Princess Leia Organa, well, Lando Calrissian probably steals the show as one of the most sought after action figures of 1995. He initially shipped at two per case, but that case assortment was quickly revised and and this point he was temporarily removed from it. (This is a move that didn’t make any sense. Why remove the new figures?) Perhaps it was clever marketing to create demand when he reshipped, but whatever the case, Kenner/Hasbro created unnecessary compulsion in the collecting community to get this figure no matter the cost. It took months before he started showing up in revision cases, and in this relatively short timeframe both collectors and scalpers took advantage of this scarcity at the time. Like C-3PO and Princess Leia Organa, Lando Calrissian could fetch upwards of $40 and in extreme rare scenarios, it has been documented that desperate collectors would drop a Ulysses S. Grant for him. Obviously this was ridiculous, but this is what happens when the possibility exists that a collect may be denied a Star Wars action figure.

While beefy and bulky, Lando Calrissian is actually pretty interesting action figure. Collectors immediately dubbed him “Disco Lando” though it’s something we have never been able to fully understand. (We have heard the explanations already so there is no need to explain it again to us.) Lando Calrissian sadly attains instant novelty status as an action figure because of the association of Billy Dee Williams and what he has done with his post Star Wars career. But we prefer to look at Lando Calrissian as an important leading Star Wars character and do our best to ignore the silly Colt 45 jokes that always surround him. As mentioned, Lando Calrissian is a nice action figure despite his muscular frame. He certainly has a broad chest, but if you look at his other features like this arms and legs you’ll find that he really isn’t that much out of scale to the onscreen character. That doesn’t mean the figure is without other issues. For example, we feel his head sculpt is fair. it really doesn’t capture the expressive face of actor Billy Dee Williams and it certainly isn’t a dead ringer for the character. Kenner/Hasbro did however manage to capture the colors of outfit and even his skin color perfectly in our opinion and its hard to deny that in many ways that Kenner/Hasbro did some justice to this action figure.

Lando Calrissian comes with three accessories. His molded cape is removable and attached to a plug in his back. It doesn’t have the fancy lining that the real costume does. It’s just been colored in shade of dark copper. The outer blue color of the cape has been shaded as well. It’s impressive the level of deco they gave this cape but it is much appreciated. Another nice thing is that although the cape is thick and heavy, the figure has been given a perfect center of gravity and is able to maintain its balance even while wearing it. (Not even Boba Fett can stand well with only a jetpack attached, so we’re counting our blessings here.) Lando Calrissian also comes with two guns: a Bespin styled gun and then an Imperial E-11 blaster. Both are relatively screen accurate more or less and befit this action figure very nicely. If Kenner/Hasbro can just streamline these bulky bodies down we would really have some amazing action figures in the line. But we have to admit that despite Lando’s bulkiness, we find the action figure enjoyable. It’s definitely far from perfection, but look at our gallery carefully and see why it possesses some charm. The Power Of The Force “2” line is really doing a great job at representing the Original Trilogy. Lando Calrissian is a perfect example of this.