R2-D2 - TSC - The Episode III Greatest Battles Collection (10 of 14)

Left alone to guard a pair of Jedi starfighters in the hostile landing bay of the Invisible Hand, Artoo is suddenly captured by a pair of super battle droids. Thinking quickly, he sprays his attackers with a flood of highly flammable lubricant, and activates his booster jets, frying the battle droids' primary circuitry.

The Episode III Greatest Battles Collection and The Episode III Heroes & Villains Collection seemed to both complement and work against each other. Instead of releasing 26 completely different characters between the two different sub-lines, Hasbro often repeated the same main characters (although different sculpts were used between the two versions released). Take for instance R2-D2. Hasbro released both Revenge Of The Sith basic figure versions in The Saga Collection. The Episode III Greatest Battles Collection R2-D2 is a straight repack of 2005’s ROTS R2-D2 (III 48) figure; the electronic version that lights up as well as makes movie-accurate sounds. This same R2-D2 figure was the only basic figure with electronics in the entire Revenge Of The Sith line. Always a popular version of this figure, it is a very welcomed addition because both kids and collectors love the play value this figure offers. Who wouldn’t love a version of R2-D2 that lights up and makes sounds? Articulation suffers when it comes to electronic action figures because the wiring inside of it prevents some parts from moving completely. No matter what, there are indeed many collectors out there who don’t like to sacrifice articulation in place of bells and whistles. Regardless, this is a very good sculpt of R2-D2, so it’s possible that stringent collectors may just overlook some of the setbacks here.

R2-D2 looks very clean and for the most part has been painted very nicely. The lines are very crisp and the panels that are painted blue look about as perfect as they will be in a mass-produced scenario. In our opinion, we think the paint operations are great. The eye port that lights up is inaccurate, and it will be inaccurate until Hasbro retired this sculpt. The main eye port should be solid black, and the smaller eye port below it should have the electronics, but this is something that has been wrong for as long as Hasbro has been utilizing this figure’s sculpt. It would be silly to fix the figure at this point. This tooling has experienced changes here and there throughout the years, and if they haven’t updated it by now, it’s not going to happen at all. Although a straight repack of the 2005 Revenge Of The Sith figure, R2-D2’s sculpt dates back to the 2002 SW [S - P1] R2-D2 (Coruscant Sentry) (’02 #14) figure. The latter figure goes back to 1998’s POTF2 [FF/TKC] R2-D2 Electronic F/X figure also. As you know, Hasbro gave him all-new sound effects (and obviously included fewer accessories) for the Episode III version. Limited to only six points of articulation (one of which we’re including is the button press for the electronics lights and sounds), R2-D2 lacks the most by having a dome that doesn’t rotate. What’s worse is that the dome is cocked to the figure’s right about 20 degrees and frozen in this position forever. We think this is a setback on any version of R2-D2.

We’ve reached a point in the Star Wars action figure line that it’s time to see Hasbro attack an all-new electronic version of R2-D2. They now approach figures in a way that they ensure that they encapsulate every last accurate and authentic detail into the sculpt. Again, electronic figures are certainly welcomed, but as this particular sculpt gets more and more outdated, it slowly becomes obsolete. This version of R2-D2 probably has a few years left before the figure reaches that out of date status, but Hasbro should probably be thinking about how a new version should be done. R2-D2 is not a bad figure. The updates made in 2005 has carried over well into 2006’s The Saga Collection. As one of the most popular Star Wars figures of all time, you should probably expect to see this R2-D2 figure a couple more times in the basic figure line. The electronic R2-D2 action figure doesn’t bring that much new to the table, but it goes without saying that it’s a figure that will bring some form of enjoyment to Star Wars fans. It seems more likely however that Hasbro would have sought a super-articulated version of R2-D2 to bring into the line instead of one with gimmicks. For example, 2004’s VOTC Artoo-Detoo (R2-D2) (With Extension Arm) figure seems like a better choice. All figures in The Episode III Greatest Battles Collection comes with a miniature red hologram figure. Yes, they become old very quickly.