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REVIEW: Four Horsemen Carded POWER LORDS Wave 1
Full Launch Brings Five Incredible Retro Figures...
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If you’ve been keeping up with us, we’ve been following the Four Horsemen’s Power Lords project for a while now. We were there for the big reveal (and cake!) at Toy Fair last year, and this year for even more prototypes and a Barlowe exclusive variant. We also reviewed the first of the Horsemen’s Power Lords figures last year from Power Con and NYCC. All of that though was one big lead up to this week, when the first wave of fully painted and carded figures arrive in the Four Horsemen warehouse! Power Lords have come a long way from the original 1980’s prototypical action figures based on Wayne Barlowe designs, and this current lineup features classic characters reimagined for the modern collector in a great 4 inch scale. Without further ado, let’s take a look at Adam Power, Lord Power, Ggripptogg, Ggrabbtargg, and Ggrapptikk!
As mentioned, these aren’t the Horsemen’s first Power Lords figures, but they are the first to feature full paint apps and “collector friendly blister-carded packaging.” Previous entries in the line were mostly solid colors with a couple accents, and color swaps generated a multitude of variants. Those figures also came in simple bags with header cards. For collector’s those first entries with always have a special place in our hearts, but starting with this quintet is the “real thing.” The first thing you’ll notice is the amazing packaging, dominated by a cool retro sci-fi blue background and bright logos and lettering. The front panel has the Power Lords logo at the top along with the name of the figure, and at the very top-left corner is a Four Horsemen logo patterned after that of Revell (maker of the original Power Lords). The clear plastic bubble containing the figure and its accessories is offset to the left, leaving room on the right for cool new artwork (except for Ggrapptikk who comes with too much stuff!).
Flip the card around for a backing right out of the heyday of action figures. The top section shows off the other figures in this wave along with the upcoming Sydot, and at the bottom you’ll find an honest to god bio card! Each one gives you the character’s name, origin, weapon, and description along with a photo of the figure; there are even hash marks to help you cut it out. You can see from the photos just how awesome this packaging scheme is, and like with other Four Horsemen releases the plastic holds on to the card via bent flaps so you can easily take everything apart without damage or put it back together to display the figure on the card.
As someone who missed out on the original Power Lords I won’t go too far into the backstory, but to be honest you don’t need to be an expert to enjoy the new ones. The heroes center around Adam Power, Leader of the Lords whose power jewel transforms him into Lord Power, the Power Lord! His opponents in the epic battle of good and evil are Arkus the Evil Dictator and his monstrous Ferrikonian troops, all of whom have really cool and complicated names. Under Arkus’ mighty fist is the former ruler Ggripptogg, the Four Fisted Brute along with his second in command Ggrabbtargg the Four Fisted Sergeant and hordes of Ggrapptikk Soldiers and Grunts, Four Fisted Troopers all of them. All of these are captured in the Horsemen’s 4 inch scale and fit perfectly with the Outer Space Men, the Power Lords right at 4 inches and the Ferrikonians just over 5.
In our previous review we looked at the standard Power Lords heroic body that’s been used thus far on standard Power and Elite Soldiers. Adam Power shares the same body from the neck down, though at first you might not recognize it with all of the added pop from the full paint applications. At 4 inches tall he’s got the same sci-fi look with a full-body spacesuit open only at the neck. Mostly skin-tight, the deeply lined suit reveals Adam’s muscular but not overly large physique, and it’s embellished by a ton of details like the ridged piping on the arms and legs, a narrow belt, kneepads, thigh pouches, a skeleton of electronics on the backs of the hands, and a wide built in collar piece with a central triangular piece and additional tubing running down to the belt. Both hands are open fists for holding/wielding the included accessories. The Leader of the Lords comes with a matching dome faceplate helmet previously seen on the Power Soldiers, while in package he’s bareheaded with a great stoic face sculpt and wavy hair.
Meanwhile, the turbo-charged Lord Power figure shares the same lower body with Adam and the Soldiers but differs in everything above it. He has the first unique heroic upper body with a naked torso featuring a bodybuilder’s physique and a network of veins and power lines. The Lord’s head sculpt continues the classic look with a bejeweled forehead and energized hair. The Lord Power figure also comes with an Elite Power Soldier helmet head complete with the smaller face shield, fin, and discs at the ears and mouth.
While the initial Power Soldiers and Elite Power Soldiers were all solid colors with one or two additional colors as accents, the new carded figures feature full on paint applications that really take advantage of the great sculpts! Along with the same lower bodies both Adam and Lord Power’s spacesuits have the same coloration, a base light orange with red at the belt, thigh pouches, kneepads, and piping running down the legs. Adam continues that color scheme on his upper body with red bordering the top and bottom of his color and decorating the triangle there while also adding blue on the torso elements, arm piping, and back of the hand details. His normal looking neck and head have a dark complexion with brown eyes and hair. Lord Power’s cosmically enhanced body is a stunning dark blue with red veins and power lines, and that continues to his head with ruby eyes and power jewel. While spikier, the Lord’s hair stays brown. The helmets for each character retain the base orange of their spacesuits while differing faceplate color, blue for Adam and red for Lord Power.
Adam and Lord Power have the same articulation as previously released Power Lords heroes, utilizing Onell Design’s Glyos System in part while adding additional articulation in the form of more standardized joints. This means that the figures have a nice range of joints and poseability while also including some swap out ability with other Glyos items. The hero body has articulation at the ball-jointed head, neck, ball-jointed shoulders, ball-jointed elbows, wrists, waist, thighs, ball-jointed knees, and ball-jointed ankles. You can get some really nice poses with these guys, and the only thing that could really help take them to the next level would be some sort of ball joint at the thighs for more dynamic leg posing options. Notably they also have holes in their feet and at the center of their back.
Like the Power Soldiers, both Lord Power and Adam Power come with the same two accessories, an Ion Blaster Gun and Power Staff. The latter is straightforward with a long shaft and small conical head, while the rifle is a nicely complex weapon with a very detailed sculpt. It has two handles that the figures can utilize as well as a carrying handle at the top. Both figures’ rifles are a solid black and their staves silver; Lord Power’s also has some black accents. As noted above, the two also come with swap out helmeted heads.
And then there are the bad guys! All of the Ferrikonians are huge, brutish creatures with a barrel chest, reverse articulated legs ending in three-toed feet, long arms with two forearms extending from each elbow, and a vaguely insectoid head. Their skin is covered in thick sinews and meandering veins, while odd protrusions appear at the shoulders and lower arms. Each of their four hands has four fingers with the top two grasping and the lower two open. Meanwhile, their lower legs share some of the same appearance but add thick pads on their back sides and fleshy, flabby toes. For a uniform the Ferrikonians wear a tunic with scalloped chest piece and collar and a belt with integrated loincloth that comes in a standard and longer versions; on top of the outfit is a cool harness piece consisting of two straps and a control box.
Interestingly there are lots of differences between the villain figures that may not be immediately obvious. The new wave includes three such characters, Ggripptogg, Ggrabbtargg, and Grapptikk, all from different ranks in Arkus’ army and differentiated by subtle physiology and costume. At the top of the food chain is Ggripptogg, the Brute. He wears the smaller belt/loincloth piece and has the forearms with a single spike; his head has a thick-lipped face with a narrow crest on one side and an aquatic style face on the other. Ggrabbtargg, the Sergeant, is a Power Lords Fan Club exclusive (Power Ship and Volcan Rock levels) and has the longer belt/loincloth, double-spiked forearms, and a heavy-duty head design with small horns, a large crest, and a wraparound communications device. Finally there’s Ggrapptikk, essentially a deluxe presentation with a figure and tons of alternate parts for multiple Ferrikonians. The base Ggrapptikk as packaged has the smaller belt, single spiked forearms, and the same head design as Ggripptogg. Included parts feature the longer belt, double-spiked forearms for Ggrapptikk and Ggripptogg, a repaint of Ggrabbtargg’s head for Ggrapptikk, a medium-crested head for Ggripptogg, and an armored Ggrapptikk head seen before on the pink and purple NYCC exclusive Ggrapptikk Grunt!
Previously released versions of Arkus’ elite warriors started with the slightly more than two tone pink and purple Ggrapptikk Grunt and got more decorative with the subsequent green Ggrapptikk Grunt and Barlowe Color Concept Ggripptogg. These new aliens take it to “11” with full paint apps and differentiating colors. All three share the same black on their outfit, while Ggripptogg and Ggrapptikk also have the same gray on their pants, belt, and sash. Each has a unique skin tone and eye color with black spines and claws; Ggrabbtargg is a bright orange with black shading and blue eyes, Ggrapptikk is an aquatic blue with green accents on its head and bright orange eyes, and Ggripptogg is a dark red with green accents on arms and head with green eyes. Different colors appear on the warriors’ sash-mounted control panels, loincloth, and the one colored panel on their collars. The overall result is three figures who look very different despite sharing most of the same parts, and they’re pretty awesome.
Like the Power Lords, all of the alien figures share the same articulation scheme with a ball-jointed head, neck, ball-jointed shoulders, ball-jointed elbows, wrists, waist, thighs, and ball-jointed reverse-articulated knees. For its body shape and size that articulation is pretty perfect, retaining full stability in the small legs and offering lots of movement up top. Several of the new figures have Janus-styled heads with two faces, giving you lots of display options. Of course, Ggrapptikk expands those even more with optional interchangeable parts for that figure and Ggripptogg.
The “G” aliens coordinate with their weapons as well, each one wielding a color variation on the same item that’s called a Super Mace/Lance or Mega-Mace. A Glyos articulated melee weapon, it has a huge bladed head at one end and a ball at the other. Each one has a different colored tip and comes with two shafts to make a shorter or longer weapon. The alien figures can wield the weapons in their upper grasping hands.
If you’re reading this review chances are you fall into one of two camps: either you already know how awesome the Power Lords figures are or the photos here have just convinced you. I’m a big fan of the Four Horsemen’s Outer Space Men lineup for cool sci-fi figures, but these new Power Lords are probably the most impressive 3 ¾ / 4 inch figures I’ve seen in a long time. It’s really amazing how much more identity they have with the full paint apps and unique heads, though the previously released figures are still great for army building. The sculpts are as fantastic as you expect, the colors differentiate them, and the articulation and accessories give you the options you require for posing and displaying. Pre-orders for these five new figures are up on ShopFourHorsemen.com now, with shipping starting by this Friday the 30th. Adam and Lord Power are each a steal at $15, while the much larger and heavier aliens are a bit more; Ggripptogg is $20, Ggrabbtargg (only available to Fan Club members) is $25, and the Ggrapptikk Trooper with all of its accessories is $40.
Review and Photos by Scott Rubin
Review Samples Courtesy of The Four Horsemen
