(Femme-Bot Friday #54)
And here, we have another write up of a repaint within a month of dealing with the original iteration. I was honestly surprised to see this appear, given how niche the Combiner Hunters set was... Iron Factory have yet to tackle Chromia, but now both Windblade and Arcee have had their Combiner Hunters paint jobs reflected in this range of diminutive reimaginings of TransFormers figures, though this is the only one to get a solo release.Packaging:
The only thing this box shares with that of the original is the cutting guide - its window is in exactly the same position, but the design, font choices and colouring are very different. This Hunter version has a much lighter, brighter box with actual product shots on both front and back rather than silhouettes (though those on the back are a little dark and lacking contrast). There is another similarity in that flower patterns are dotted around and, while they may be more prevalent on the original's box, I think they're used more effectively here.
While the window and the product shots only show one sword, Hunter Windsaber is actually packaged with two Stormfall Sword analogues, one being the mirror image of the other for more visually appealing dual-wielding. Interestingly, the instructions in this version are folded more cleanly and packaged within a self-seal polybag, where they were carelessly folded and jammed into the box with a random piece of rough, black paper in the original. Definitely a huge step up in presentation.
Vehicle Mode:
The mold remains the same as the original Windsaber release so, much like the Combiner Hunters figure, the only changes are cosmetic. Red is more prevalent, use of colour has been dialled back generally, leaving larger areas in a single colour, and gold highlights are applied to the wing tips, turbines, the stabilisers and a couple of the raised parts around the middle of the fuselage. It's actually remarkably close to the Combiner Hunters paint job, albeit lacking the gold lines on the trailing edges of the wings and with the paint on the nose mirroring the original Windsaber rather than the CH toy. The cockpit's canopy here is painted yellow, with the framework painted black, and the only other paint colour used is cyan, for just a couple of dots on the tops of the afterburners. The back end is pretty much the same as on the original, just with the red and black switched round.
Something I didn't note with sufficient clarity in the original's writeup is that this model actually has sculpted afterburner details... or the tops of them, anyway. Given that the Titans Return/TF Legends version has no visible/sculpted means of propulstion other than the turbines on the wings, this figure ends up being superior in terms of detailing, despite being less than half the size and having an almost identical transformation.
One really cute aspect of this figure is that, with the only weapons storage being on the backs of the turbines, it's possible to use her swords to imply contrails - the black of the hilts sinks into the background while the pale blue of the blades swishes out behind the wings, almost like the effect shown in the comics.
Robot Mode:
Where the original Windblade and Windsaber featured a fairly even distribution of red and black in robot mode, this version follows the Combiner Hunters version in being predominately red up top and predominately black down below, with a few touches of gold and cyan to break it up a little. Broadly speaking, it keeps the same blocks of colour in the same locations as the CH Deluxe, albeit adjusted to fit Iron Factory's cutesified sculpt. It doesn't feature the painted-on chest panel-lining, the cyan details on the cuffs and collar, or the black central portion on the collar, but everything else is bang on. This figure even does a better job of her headgear, because the red 'mask' is fully intentional, where it was just the result of missing paint applications on the CH figure. The gold 'wings' and fan are fully painted, the 'hair' is neatly done, and even painted in on the back of the head. While the face is lacking the adjusted kabuki makeup of the SDCC exclusive, it's not a big deal because it's very much in keeping with the original Windsaber's simplified face. Trying to replicate the red and blue makeup would only detract from her big, blue eyes anyway.
She comes packaged with left- and right-handed versions of the Stormfall Sword - the difference being the orientation of the blade when the fan detail in the hilt is facing outward - both of which are molded in black plastic with the blade painted a pale, pastel blue. While, in some ways, I prefer this to the oversized staff weapon included with CH Windblade, I do wish Iron Factory had produced their own version of the staff, preferably more appropriately-sized for the figure. Also, of course, with two swords, she suffers even more for the lack of anywhere sensible to store them when she's not actually holding them...
I have to confess I'm a little confused about the way Iron Factory release their repaints. IF EX-16N, the 'Night Assassin' reworking of their Pink Assassin was a solo release, this was a solo release... but IF EX-16A, the 'Alleria The Lady Commander' Elita-1 analogue (which came with a translucent pink Stormfall Sword), and IF EX-16H 'Hunter', the Combiner Hunters version of Pink Assassin, were both packed-in bonus figures, the former with IF EX-14 Ultimate Commander, the latter - annoyingly - with IF EX-24 'Cannon Chariot', the Onslaught analogue in their 3-part set of miniature Combaticons. Then there's the baffling translucent pink convention exclusive that was limited to 500 copies...
While I get that CH Arcee is a valid pack-in for a combiner figure, it strikes me that it would have made more sense for Iron Factory to either make all their Combiner Hunters analogues pack-ins, or none of them.
Of course, I'm just bleating because I'd rather not buy Cannon Chariot just for their CH Arcee, which I really, really want... But I wish there was a more logical pattern to the way they did things. The better outcome would be if they'd also made a Chromia, and released each of the three characters separately in their original paint jobs, then as a Combiner Hunters set of their own... Alternatively, releasing each one as pack-ins with IF EX-22, -23 and -24 may have encouraged me to buy all three of the Bruticus component sets where, currently, I have to decide whether I want to buy one part of the combiner just for the bonus figure...
But I digress.
On balance, I'd have to say that the original Windsaber is the better of the two, but either are worth picking up. Both, if you're that way inclined. I really like the style of Iron Factory's Femme-Bots so far, even if that isn't entirely in keeping with their other figures.
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