With no cape, no weapon, and precious little deco, Thor feels like something you would find in a thrift store bin and would pass on because it was missing parts. If you told someone it was a flea market bootleg, they would believe you. But no, they sold this and it's a fully-licensed 3 3/4-inch action figure designed for sale in "value" (discount, food, and drug) channels in the USA and elsewhere in the South American and Asian markets. If you are fond of the low-detail, off-model toys of the 1970s and early 1980s, this is something you'll want to see. And if you have no sense of toy humor, you already hate this so why keep reading?
If you love the old Fisher-Price, Mego, and Kenner figures of old this is something I might nudge you to track down. I'd love to encourage Hasbro to make more figures like this - cheap stuff to preserve trademarks, for example. I'd buy a couple of $5-or-under bagged Micronauts if they were constructed this way. Or a ROM, or Air Raiders, or Inhumanoids, or anything else they feel like. Surely Family Dollar or Dollar General need some more unique items. For those of us who grew up in an era where a 3 3/4-inch action figure could be $2-$4, Thor shows that you can make an impulse price point licensed action figure - it's just that nobody seems to value the lower-dollar transactions anymore. I assume a lot of kids are outgrowing toys because of screens, but also because the cheapest figures you can find are sometimes $20 or $25. When they're $4, it's not exactly a price-barrier anymore.
I think it's fascinating, with a unique design choice that I assume has got to be intentional to get the cheapest product that Marvel would approve. I would go even further and theorize that some of these are "bad" on purpose so as to not detract from higher-cost alternatives. Thor is molded in dark blue with a printed chest, with a grey head with a flesh-painted face. What attracted me to this figure is that the head looks a lot like old Kenner figures and Fisher-Price Adventure People - with age, the nose will no doubt rub off and the lines-only eyes look like something out of the late 1970s. Hasbro makes a "retro 375" Thor for $12, and it's far too ornate to be a product of the 1980s. This bugger, though, looks like something a company on the verge of bankruptcy would crank out and sell for a dollar or less. (And supposedly in China, it may have sold for as little as that.)
The figure has signs of sculpted armor - check out the bands on the arms. The boots show some detail, but no distinctive color, and Thor benefits greatly from his colorful costume. You can see less-muscular arms here compared to what you see on a full-price figure - I have every reason to assume they decided to make him seem less powerful on purpose, so kids could still get a dirt-cheap Thor and put money into the Hasbro x Disney coffers without resorting to an unlicensed (or differently licensed) product. The lack of "flesh" arms is unusual for the character, but not unheard-of - he wore a costume similar to this around 2007, except that one had some more color. And hair. And a cape. This one has printed definition on the chest, without which it might actually look fine.
I also think this figure just barely misses the mark of being pretty good. If they molded a hammer to his hand (much in the same pose as the 1970s retractable lightsaber Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, and Obi-Wan Kenobi figures only not removable) I think it would've been a hit. Instead of a fist like we got, you could have a turned-down wrist grasping a handle for another chunk of an inch with a block at the end of it. If Hasbro threw a cloth cape around his neck - which I assume was left off for cost issues - this would be a pretty nice-looking figure. Because of the lack of yellow hair and red cape, it looks more like some sort of "Night Ops Thor" which is, arguably, also an incredibly fun idea. It doesn't look quite right, but it fits in well with a lot of older toys and seems more retro than the branded "Retro" $12 Hasbro alternative.
If you own actual toys that date back to the Carter administration, figures like this are absolutely delightful. His face looks like a cousin of Tonka Play People, with a plastic feel that seems to match any of a number of old toys I've had over the years. Were it not for the printing on his torso, I would say this feels the most like something I'd have seen at Kmart when Marvel wasn't quite the cultural darling that it is today. I have no doubt most people reading this as I post it live will not care one bit about this figure, but I'd like to hope someone in the future will see Thor's silver hat and bland face and, if they can't otherwise identify him, wind up here and go "Oh, I had that one." As I'm on a huge old figure kick as of my writing this, Thor fit the bill. I paid slightly more than retail on eBay to get him and his pals shipped to me, but the going rate for him on Amazon is pretty low if you get him with their "free" shipping and I have no doubt non-big-box, non-department, non-toy stores near you may have him collecting dust somewhere. (And I still see them pop in 99 Cents Only stores.)
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