REVIEW: Captain Action Marvel Costumes Wave 3 - Iron Man & Wolverine

**JeffSaylor** · 01-07-2014, 08:48 AM

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Review By David Yeh

In the fall of 2013, Round 2 and Captain Action Enterprises released their third wave of Marvel costumes for their 1960’s retro action figure, CAPTION ACTION. Captain Action is the super hero super spy who is a master of disguises, much like Zartan only he’s on our side. The basic figure comes with his standard outfit, belt, hat and blaster weapon.

The previous two waves consisted of Spider-Man, Captain America, Thor, and Loki. We’ll be looking at the latest Iron Man and Wolverine costume sets today, each sold separately. It is also important to note that the toymakers have taken a play made popular by Marvel Legends' Build-A-Figure model and released a Build-A-Costume (called the "Assemble-An-Avenger" promotion) in the form of Hawkeye. Parts of Hawkeye’s costume can be found in each of the six sets mentioned above, Iron Man (wrist & arm bands) and Wolverine (mask) including the last two pieces to complete the outfit.

The Captain Action figure is also released once again in a slimmer packaging with retro Marvel artwork gracing the front. The result is a more affordable Captain Action figure (SRP $19.99) that takes up less retail space. The Iron Man and Wolverine costume sets are all about the same size but I hope nobody mistakes it for including a figure! Even though they’re boxed similarly to Captain Action, there’s no figure contained within, only the costumes.

The box themselves are great displays themselves of how fun retro toys can be and simple enough to get into. Just cut a piece of tape and you’re pretty much ready to go. Although I almost forgot that there’s changing involved...

Your Captain Action figure has a removable... everything! From belt, hat, boots, and hands. The one piece costume is held together through a strip of Velcro on the back of the costume. Pull off the hands and boots and you can start removing him down to virtually nothing.

Iron Man’s costume consists of a one-piece body suit, boots, gauntlets, body armor, belt, and a helmet with faceplate. The body armor separates and snaps back together fairly easily. The boots glide on with ease and the gauntlets plug into the peg where the hands used to be. The right hand is cupped to hold something but the left hand is open and ready to fire. Iron Man includes the wrist bands and arm bands for your Hawkeye Assemble-An-Avenger.

I like how Iron Man’s helmet is put on like a normal helmet and the facemask added on second. The rubber belt decided to give me trouble putting on so I decided to leave it off.

Moving on to Wolverine’s outfit, it’s pretty much the same deal as Iron Man only he doesn’t have body armor. The main difference here is that his head is a giant mask that fits over Captain Action’s head.

Wolverine’s outfit comes with the head of Hawkeye as well. Since I don’t have the previously released parts, I can’t show you the whole thing but you can probably get an idea of how he’ll look.

If I did have one small complaint from a toy buyer’s perspective, it's that the costumes remove what used to be an articulated wrist joint. The gloves, or gauntlets, are pre-posed and you are not be able to pose them as freely as you’d want.

Modern toy buyers may have a tough time appreciating the classic Captain Action figures with Sideshow Toys and Hot Toys running the current 12” market but this isn’t meant to replace that. It’s just a return to how things once were and they did a pretty remarkable job doing so. These are toys first and foremost and with great prices to boot.

This wave three is not sold in stores and can only be found online for about $19.99 each (BigBadToyStore.com has them in-stock now!). Wave four, however, will return to Toys’R’Us stores and will feature Captain Action with Batman and Superman costumes.

CLICK HERE FOR OVER 40 NEW CAPTAIN ACTION WAVE 3 PHOTOS!

Review and Photography by David Yeh

Review Samples Courtesy of Round 2/Captain Action Enterprises