Sculpt--4/5
R2-D2. Without good ole' R2, Star Wars just wouldn't be Star Wars. Perhaps the most important character in the Star Wars saga, he's always there to save the main characters' butts in the nick of time. So have we finally got the ultimate R2 figure? In a word, no. But that doesn't mean this isn't a great R2-D2 figure, because it most definitely is great. For one thing, this R2 gets a lot of things right for a change. One of my biggest gripes about prior R2's was the inaccurate proportions that seemed to get worse and worse with each new astromech. So I was very pleased to see that they went back to the drawing board this time and made R2's proportions much more accurate. The body isn't as long as Sail Barge R2 and thus closer to the stubby look of the R2 in the movies. They've also improved the detailing on R2-D2's body panels. For instance, many of the body panels now have a double beveled edge and it looks pretty darn spiffy. There's also added details in the little octagonal recesses at the bottom of R2's body and everything on the whole is just more accurately shaped and detailed.

Another great advancement are the separately sculpted hoses coming out of R2-D2's feet. This increases the realism of the figure and is a vast improvement over past generalizations. R2-D2's dome, despite being vac-metalized, sports plenty of sharp details and the incorporated sensorscope within the dome is well hidden.

Hasbro has done a lot of good sculpt work on this figure, so it's a bit disappointing that such work is diminished by some negative points. Now, I don't mind when Hasbro uses artistic license on background characters by adding details that weren't seen in the movies (i.e. adding holsters), but when it comes to a main character like R2-D2 it's best to just stick to real deal. So what did Hasbro do? On R2's left leg, they've added some extra details at the top of the leg in the form of some lines and slight indent. The right leg is as it should be. At first, I doubted myself and thought that maybe they were totally accurate, but after looking through all my reference material and tons of photos from websites like Astromech.net, I can only conclude that these details are inaccurate and should have never been sculpted.

Another gripe associated with the legs is that they didn't sculpt the little details that are present where the leg goes from fat to narrow. These details have been sculpted on most modern astromechs so it's puzzling that they forgot to sculpt them here. But the biggest gripe of all is the fact that ONE LEG IS LONGER THAN THE OTHER!! I am not even kidding on this one folks. At first I didn't notice it, but soon it became apparent that my R2-D2 was perpetually leaning to his right. And when in three-legged mode, I would level all the feet but the angles of the legs were different from each other. The easiest way to see the difference in height is by comparing the space between the bottom of R2's body and the top of the oval-ish boxes on R2's feet. Using a ruler, the difference in height is only about a millimeter, but at this small scale a millimeter makes a big difference. I have not heard of anyone else reporting this, but judging by photos from other websites, it would appear that my R2 figure isn't the only one with this trait. So check your R2's if you have one and let me know if the left leg is longer than the right on yours as well.
UPDATE: I came across some R2-D2's today (11-1-04) and noticed that their legs were the same length in relation to each other. Apparently the longer leg is the correct length on my figure. Either Hasbro fixed the problem or I just got a poorly molded R2-D2.

Articulation--4/5
Astromechs usually get perfect scores in this department, but not this time. R2-D2 has five points of articulation: head, legs, and ankles. R2-D2's removable third leg lacks articulation at the ankle which brings the score down a bit. The head articulation also knocks the score down a bit since turning the head activates the pop-up scanner, thus limiting the number of poses you can create unless you don't mind the scanner coming out of his head.

Accessories--3/5
You get R2-D2's third leg, a closed body panel, an open body panel, a saw arm, and a scomp link arm. On the whole, these are some nice accessories for an R2 figure, and the removable panel idea is a step in the right direction since it allows the option of connecting the arms without leaving obvious holes or other openings in the body. Where things go wrong is with the open panel piece. I'm not exactly sure why this piece will not stay on, but every time I attach it, it pops itself out after 5 seconds, thus the use of the clear rubberband in the photos. Other than that, I like what they've done with these gizmos. One last minor quibble is that the saw arm isn't totally movie accurate--this one looks like a pizza-cutter.

Features--3/5
This R2-D2 sports a built in pop-up scanner, also known as the sensorscope. The sensorscope smoothly rises out of R2's head when you rotate it and proceeds to go back into the head if you keep rotating it or turn it in the opposite direction. While I appreciate the smooth action, I don't appreciate the fact that you can't turn R2's head without the scope coming out. The scope also cannot be rotated like on previous versions, but that's nitpicking. R2 also sports the aforementioned interchangeable body panels so you can display him with or without scomp link and/or saw arm extended. That feature is also not perfect for the reasons mentioned earlier. R2 also features a detachable third leg. While I would have preferred the leg be extendable from the body, this works just as well and is a good compromise. R2 also sports rolling wheels on all three of his feet just like Naboo Escape R2-D2, allowing him to roll along a flat surface. Lastly, R2 has that old favorite, the light pipe eye. Shine light through the top of the dome and his main eye lights up in blue. I actually don't like this feature that much since his main eye is supposed to be black and it never lights up in the movie, but as a play feature it is pretty cool.

Paint--3/5
Technically this R2 is painted well, with decently clean edges, solid application, and a nice dark blue as opposed to the lighter blue on more recent R2-D2 figures. BUT there are several little details that are left unpainted on this figure. The feet lack any paint whatsoever and it could have benefited from some silver and blue accents that appear on the real thing. The legs are also missing some silver and blue paint toward the ankles. And then we have the dome. While not painted incorrectly, the vac-metalized dome doesn't quite convey the look of the movie R2-D2. While I appreciate it as a nod to the vintage R2-D2 figure, I would have rather seen a painted dome like the Episode I R2-D2 figure which is, in my opinion, the best painted R2-D2 figure made yet.

Packaging--4.5/5
I am foregoing my usual copy and paste job on this section (sorry about that by the way) because this package has veered slightly from what we've been seeing. How you might ask? Well, the vintage card had the statement, "Now!! With Sensorscope," but Hasbro for some strange reason changed it to say "Now With Extension Arm!!" Why do that though? Both figures have the sensorscope, so leaving it as is would have been accurate to the toy and to the original vintage card. Instead it is now only accurate to the modern toy. Other than that, I still dig the whole repro/retro feel.

Overall--4/5
VOTC R2-D2 is another case of two steps forward, one step back; there are some great improvements to the R2 sculpt here and this definitely has pushed the toy closer to its movie counterpart in terms of accuracy, but the little missing details and other errors keep it from being all it could have been. The figure is full of features which is definitely cool, but their execution could have been better. Overall though, this is one of my favorite R2's and is the most accurately sized R2-D2 figure in this scale.

--Photos and review by Garett Yoshimura
garett@carrotnetwork.com