It's time for Part 2--the main event. Well...depending on how you look at it that is.
As you may remember my in my previous post, I wasn't really thrilled with the quality of a lot of the Power Rangers Legacy Morphers and Weapons. If there are two things I can commend the roleplay toys for, it's that A) Saba is pretty rad and B) the quality is fairly consistent between toys. If you own one Legacy roleplay toy, you pretty much know what you'll be getting with the rest.
I honestly could have gone Super-post as I usually do, but I really needed to give the Zords their own post. You'll...probably figure out why by the end.
One thing I should note before I begin is that all of the Legacy Zords are part of the "Zord Builder" gimmick that Bandai America has been using with their toys. What this means is...say you want the legs from Megazord to be the legs on your Mega Tigerzord for some reason. Sure, you can do that. There seems to be a divide with fans on whether or not this is a good feature. On one hand, it opens up combinations to your imagination given your wallet can handle it. On the other hand toys are designed around the feature which, in the case of the Legacy Zords at least, means they'll never quite be as good as they can be. The feelings are mixed among fans...but let's take a look at each toy to see how they are before I draw any conclusions on the feature.
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Legacy Megazord
I guess if this line was going to begin somewhere...it was going to be here. Heh.
The double-edged sword of mass-production rears it's ugly head here. The MSRP on this toy was $60 if I recall correctly. Honestly...it's not worth that. Fortunately it could've been had all day long for $50 during it's second wave, which is when I bought mine.
It's safe to call this toy a good first attempt at the line, but it does have a number of glaring flaws. The aforementioned Zord Builder aspect makes this toy rather small. I have all of my Legacy Zords in pretty deep storage (hence the stock images for this post...sorry), so I wasn't able to compare it with my DX Daizyujin. The difference in size is pretty big, and one that set the mood for this entire line unfortunately. I mean, it has a slightly more humanoid look, but...I don't know. It just feels like Diet Megazord to me. Daizyujin is God for Daizyujin's sake. He's supposed to be enormous. This just looks frail when it's all put together and the individual Zords look weak as a result.
As I was saying about the price. $50 is much more appropriate in this case. The Pteranodon is utterly pathetic. I mean...tragic. It's a thin piece of plastic with some wings and a head haphazardly attached. It juts out so far as a chestpiece while the original carefully folded in on itself to form a flat and smooth piece.
I know I beat the "but the price was right" drum a lot in Part One of this post. Let me get this out of the way now... This is probably the only toy on this list that I'll let slide for it's generous second-round pricing. This is not a collector's toy. For that to happen, it would have to be better than the original--it would have to have a reason for you to seek this one out to quench any desire you had to get the original. Nope. The feeling I get from this toy is "that'll do."...
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Legacy Dragonzord
Owned this guy and never bothered to open it. I don't know if it was my disappointment in Megazord that inspired me to never open it up...but whatever. It looks cool and I appreciate the tail and the stylized fingers.
I ended up selling it off to a friend who was gutted that she missed out on it and really couldn't afford the almost $200 this now goes for. If they ever do a second run in normal colors I might end up replacing it, but I really haven't been clamoring for a new one since I sold the last one.
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Legacy Titanus
It's funny. The Christmas after this one came out, Toys R Us was selling these at half price. I snagged mine for what would then seemed like an outrageous $100. Only now does it seem like I made a wise purchase...
This is kinda where the Legacy Zord line started changing for the weird. The retail on this was a whopping $200. It's smaller than the original and doesn't include any of the trademark electronics. Kinda absurd when you think about it. It looks great, but boy is it small.
Since I never opened Dragonzord, I never was able to put all of them together. Based on some of the photos I've seen, I prefer the look of the original anyway. Remember, the original prop of this looked closer to what the toy ended up looking like. Legacy Ultrazord looks......strange.
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Legacy Thunder Megazord
Now, I'm going out of order a little bit here since it's fair to go back to back with this against Titanus. Both had a steep MSRP of $200. You can tell a TON of work went into this one. I mean, it's very detailed and pretty damn impressive. I'd like this one if it weren't for two damning issues.
1. Zord Builderitus. The stock image above is the best you'll ever see this toy look. In reality, it stands off balance, and the humanoid mode of Red Dragonzord has these freakish long legs. It looks brilliant in the Dragon mode, but damn...it's kinda disappointing that it couldn't have it all like the original did. This toy really could've been closer to perfect if it were constructed the same way the original was.
2. The helmet. Zord Builder isn't an excuse for how weird it looks. Oh well.
Seeing as this has been out for an entire calendar year now and that Toys R Us removed it from it's site, it might not be available for much longer on Amazon. If you've been waiting, you better get moving. You can see where the money went on this toy, even if it isn't perfect.
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Legacy Tigerzord
Alright. So remember how I thought Legacy Saba was the best of the roleplay toys so far? Bandai definitely favors the White Ranger...
Excellent toy. Everything about it. This was actually released before Thunder Megazord, so I guess it can be considered an early toy. While I never saw too many Thunder Megazords or Titanuses on the shelves at Toys R Us, they packed the shelves with Tigerzord. You know what that means, right? Discounts!! I got this one for like $40...and not even long after it was released.
I gotta say, this is probably the one toy in this line I would say can be a total replacement for the original. It's that good. Like damn.
The only minor...and I mean MINOR complaint I have about this one is that it doesn't have the black flecks that the suit had. The original Won Tiger toy also had the flecked plastic, but the original Bandai America Tigerzord did not. Here's a photo for reference...
Imagine someone shaving over a vat of white plastic. That's how they got those little flecks in it... #commitment
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Legacy Falconzord
Again, Bandai favors the White Ranger.
Definitely another great effort from Bandai on this one. I love the wing articulation. I really think the sole reason the original didn't have it was because DX Tsubasamaru had the lights in the tips...and all of the electronics were removed for the US release. Heh.
Problems? A bit on the small side, of course. $60 is a lot. The gaps in the talons are also a liberty that the designer took for some reason. There were no gaps in the original toy, nor were there gaps in the prop. So why are there gaps in the wings/talons on this toy? An odd choice, for sure. Again, this is one of the good Zords in this line...but the price has been consistently steep.
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Legacy Ninja Megazord
As of this writing, this is the most recent release in the Legacy Megazord line. Hmmm...
On one hand, it kinda takes something I've been doing for years and made it a reality...
As usual, the individual Zords look really good, but as a Megazord, it looks pretty weak. At the very minimum, the price has been much more reasonable on this one. MSRP is $100, but I've seen it go as low as $75 until very recently. I do wish they would've gone with a lighter shade of blue on the Wolf Zord since, well, Ninja Blue was a light blue in Kakuranger which gave all of his mecha that lighter shade of blue as well.
As this one is still new, I don't have a strong opinion either way on it. The Zords are good, the Megazord isn't. Meh.
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So those are my thoughts on the Legacy Megazord line so far. Overall...I genuinely have no idea why I've purchased all of them. The big winner is the White Tigerzord. It's fantastic. It's the toy that Bandai should have made in 1993. It really isn't all that different from the original, but the attention to detail is incredible. If you have it, you probably know what I'm talking about. It isn't even hampered by the Zord Builder nonsense. Speaking of which...Zord Builder. Yeah, not a fan. It gets in the way on some toys more than others, but when it does...it really brings it all down rather unnecessarily.
Thanks for checking in on me. I'll be back in February with something from the CD vault (now that I can hear again) and an update on the car that I ordered.
Take care. I'll see ya soon!
-CC
PART ONE: Legacy Morphers & Weapons
