Thursday, March 17, 2016

Dream Waves: Earth X

Happy St. Paddy's Day People!!!
GO GET DRUNK!!!





I was originally gonna' talk about this yesterday, but it was Austin 3:16 day, so yeah....

For this week's edition of Dream Waves, I'm showcasing what my ideal ML Earth X-themed wave of figures would look like.

The serious lack of Earth X merchandise, especially action figures, has bothered me for a long time. Even at it's height of popularity, outside of trades and omnibus collections, a few busts here and there, Marvel never really put there marketing muscle behind promoting the big hit and phenomenon that Alex Ross and Jim Kruger's Earth X trilogy was. I mean shit, Ross and Kruger basically handed Marvel their version of Kingdom Come,and yet it wasn't given the promotional love it should've, compared in direct contrast to how DC treated KC, with plenty mini-series spin-offs and whole waves of action figures.

Today I'm rectifying that grievous wrong by offering my ideas for at least two waves' worth of Earth X figures.
Maybe later I'll revisit the Earth X trilogy, since there's also the sequels like Universe X and Paradise X to cover as well.

Ok, let's get to it shall we?......


Earth X Wave 1:

1). Captain America



Gotta' start things off with Cap right? Ross really tapped into the despair and hopelessness Cap was feeling at the time in that reality. Most of the world was taken over by the Red Skull, and Cap was helpless to fight his growing influence.

Damn if this imagery in a ragged-looking Cap doesn't reflect how I see America looking these days as Trump/Drumpf takes on the role of the Red Skull.

Here's how he could look:


2). Reed Richards( in his Dr. Doom armor)



Personally I think Ross' visual of Reed Richards living and roaming around the home of his former arch-enemy while wearing his armor is a very powerful one that speaks on many levels.
That being said this should be a relatively easy figure to make, where you just repaint and reuse a ML Doctor Doom body with either a new head, or reuse the King Thor BAF one. I'd also throw in a Cerebro helmet with him to re-create that very cool scene in which Reed literally stretched his brain to activate it.

Here's some examples of how he could look.



3).  Thor


When Loki convinced his step-father Odin to teach Thor a lesson in humility again, Odin turned his son Thor into a woman. and out of this we'd get a pretty unique and cool figure that'd kick all sorts of ass on your shelf. Hasbro could no doubt reuse some parts from their Thor and Valkyrie figures, but more than likely this would be a completely new piece. I'd make this figure tall like the other Thor figures, complete with a taller hammer to come with her.

4). Daredevil



If this guy was ever finally made and placed on the shelves, I have no doubt at all he'd fly off them. Assuming the name of Daredevil, this mysterious circus-performing man with no fear, never had his identity revealed, but still became one of the breakout stars of the Earth X series.
I don't see any problems recreating him in figure form. As for accessories, other than his motor bike, I don't know what else to include with him except one of his death traps or mangled body parts to snap on him.

Here's how him and Cap could look:


5). Magneto and 6). King Toad



When the earth's magnetic poles became reversed in the Earth X reality, a strange thing happened;
Magneto lost his mutant magnetic powers....and the Toad gained them.
In bizarre twist that some might call a rightful example of karmic retribution, King Toad mistreats Magneto just like how Magneto used to mistreat him.


I figure it ought to be worth a good laugh or two to see a King Toad/Mortimer figure complete with a Magneto figure in a jester outfit, don't you?

7). The Red Skull


Can't have an Earth X wave of figures without the story's big bad villain right? So it should come as to no surprise that I've included the Red Skull on this list. Depending on the height they'd want to make this figure, this one would more than likely be an all-new figure, as even the skinny Spider-Man buck is too tall, but I'm sure they'd be able to work up something befitting this little dictator. Just for shits and giggles, he should come with the hollowed-out body of M.O.D.O.K. that he uses as his throne.
Kinda' like this:


BAF: Hulk and Bruce Banner



I debated with on myself on how to go about presenting the Earth X Hulk; should he be a regular, albeit taller figure, maybe a two-pack with both little Bruce Banner and Hulk, or should he be a BAF? I ultimately went with the BAF idea, but a two-pack would probably work as well since you'd get a little Bruce figure to sit on top of Hulk.

Earth X Wave 2:

1). Redwing


Redwing was Cap's last partner before he too was taken over and mind-controlled by the Red Skull in Earth X. He's gotta' pretty unique costume that I'd like to see made into a figure.
Hell maybe the mask/helmet could be removable or a an alternative head, and he should come with a mind-controlling Hydra squid-thingy.

2). X-51/Machine Man (The New Watcher)


You can't have a wave of Earth X figures without this guy, er robot. Arron Stack/Machine Man was permanently turned translucent by the Watcher as a way to force him to give up on trying to blend in humanity and become the new Watcher. He'd be exactly like the ML Machine Man figure released not too long ago, but see-thru of course, and with an option to extend his arms and legs. Might be a bit tricky to pull off, but very worth it in the end.

3). Black Bolt


Hell yeah Black Bolt! The guy who died while summoning Franklin Richards/Galactus to Earth to fight the Celestials deserves to have his own figure, if nothing else for the cool design Alex Ross gave him.

Here's how he could look:



4). Captain Mar-Vell/Marvel Universe


Captain Mar-vel promised to return to the MU one day, long after his death. He ultimately fulfilled the promise, and the Earth X MU would never be the same afterwards. I'd love to see how the makers and sculptors at Hasbro replicate his starry form.

5). Venom


Spider-Man's daughter became the new Venom (can you say irony kids?) in Earth X, which led to very cool design for that character. Since Hasbro currently has Spider-Man fever, why not re-use the Spider-Girl figure they already have and give it a new paint job so we can have this Venom figure?
I'd toss in alternative May Parker head in there as well.

6). Clea


Clea became the MU's new sorcerer(ess) supreme when she killed (sorta) her longtime lover Dr. Strange. while it'd be great if Hasbro finally gave us a regular Clea figure, this version would really be worth making. Maybe she could come with Dr. Strange in his astral form?


7). Namor

Rounding out the wave, is Namor the cursed, called so because Franklin Richards cursed half of Namor's body to burn forever after he killed the Human Torch.
He'd make a kick-ass figure, complete with either an range translucent half like the regular Human Torch figure, or something more like this custom figure:



BAF: Giant Iron Man


The Big BAF for this wave for me just has to be the final giant Iron Man armor the Earth X Tony builds to fight the celestials with. Now I'll admit this armor isn't as ascetically pleasing as some of his other armors, or even the recently released Hulkbuster BAF, so Hasbro would no doubt have to employ just enough creative license to pull this one off. It'd also be cool if this was designed similar to the original ML Hulkbuster figure, with a hidden Tony Stark head underneath, except this one would have Old Man Tony underneath instead.

Earth X Wave 3:

1). King Britain


Why not King Britain? He just looks even more regal than ever sporting that fur cape and long white beard, like how this customs looks:

 Should include an alternative head (I'd reuse the King Thor BAF head myself) and his royal sword.

2). King Colossus



In this reality Colossus is the Tsar/king of Russia and is sporting a goatee.
Shouldn't be too hard to modify his old Toy Biz body with some new pieces.

3). Iron Maiden


One one of the few new creations in this series, Iron Maiden has the classic lab accident origin story and a pretty unique design.

4). Ahura Boltagon(Black Bolt's son)



Black Bolt's son and heir to the Inhuman throne, Ahura here has some of the coolest bodyguards around since he the Iron Avengers themselves protecting him. Plus he's a pretty powerful individual himself. I like the cool design and color scheme myself.

5). Spiders' Man

I guess I really should include this guy, more so based off his design more than anything. He shows again after Earth X in the sequel Paradise X, so I guess you could always make a variation of him from that series too.

6). Mr. S


I really struggled on this one in that even though he's a central figure as far as being one of the last surviving members of the original X-Men and current leader of the new incarnation in this reality, he's not much worth looking at other than an old, balding man with ruby red glasses.

7). The Vision


Here's a simple repaint for Hasbro, and personally I think he looks really fucking cool with the hood thing.



BAF:Galactus/Franklin Richards or A Celestial


Pretty self-explanatory here. Either include the Earth X Franklin Richards Galactus as the BAF or one of the Celestials.

 Or, Or.....do a running change and include extra parts so you can make both.
Just a thought.

But then there's still plenty of characters left to get to, like The new X-Men, Xen, and the Iron Avengers.





I'd make box-sets of most of these guys, and make the Iron Giant Man an already complete 12 or 8-ish- inch figure and maybe have a Him/Her two-pack and see where the rest goes.

That's my list, what would yours be?

3 comments:

IADW said...

Cap Earth X would be in my shopping trolley like a shot, and same for Daredevil - both of those looks I think Ross really nailed.

Surprised his wasn't one of the timelines Marvel revisited recently, but maybe when the time to renew the trademarks rolls around...

Shlomo Ben Hungstien said...

In regards to the Earth X Machine Man do s Google image search with key words Micronauts Time Traveler Mego.

Mr. Morbid's House Of Fun said...

@Dan: me too, Dan me too! I still can't get over the fact that Earth X wasn't represented in Secret War. I mean it's not like Marvel has bad blood with Alex Ross since he's been doing covers for their All New Avengers series, so that glaring omission is very weird indeed.

Personally I liked the new slight retcon explanations Kruger and Ross gave us for the motivations of certain characters, even if Marvel didn't since they A). made logical sense, and B). Still respected the original history that came before, it just presented things in a new light is all.

@Shlomo: HOLY SHIT!!! That's a pretty dead-on design replication if that's what Ross intended.

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