Likeness

Sculpt

The sculpt is great but it does show its age as a 2015 product. First, the parka’s hood does not sit fully on Solo’s head and leaves a huge gap at the base of the neck. The scarf that is sculpted there should have been longer to hide the gap. It can be a bit difficult to see Solo’s eyes when he wears his parka’s hood. Without the hood, the head feels too small for the action figure’s body. The balaclava he wears is tight on his head. The googles can be removed and added to his face but keeping them on as he wears his hood can be tricky. It takes patience to align and hold them well, so they stay on inside of the hood.

The legs are fine and surprisingly, they do not reuse the Hoth rebel trooper’s legs nor the Hoth Luke Skywalker’s. The forearms are the weakest part of the build. They look clunky next to the rest of the figure. It is not easy to have a Hoth Han Solo’s whose parka flap (or skirt) are aligned correctly. The flaps are neither aligned perfectly in the front nor at the back.

Paint

There is paint application on his shins, and uniform detailing on his parka. His forearms have paint on them to cover the light grey plastic used for his hands. Han Solo’s face has digital face painting which adds more dimension to the character when compared with the initial release of this toy. The quality of the paint application is not great with many spills.

The Hoth Han Solo action figure is one of the tallest Star Wars Black Series characters on the side of the rebels. He towers over other versions of his self by a significant margin. He is much taller than the Hoth rebels and almost a head taller than the Hoth Luke Skywalker. Because he is wearing heavy winter gear, it makes sense. However, he is on the shorter side when put next to G.I. Joe Classified action figures. I mention this as the Hoth Han Solo is a perfect base for Snow Job custom action figure.

Stability

The Hoth Han Solo will topple. His feet have little grasp on the ground and his rather top=heavy chest can easily see him fall. You will need to adjust his ballpoint waist articulation to fully balance his out. He could probably use some wider and longer feet.

Articulations

The articulations on Black Series are not strengths. We see this with the weird forearm articulations that were used instead of classic wrist articulations. This was probably done by Hasbro to easily mould the hands and the wrists as one piece instead of fully separated forearms. Hans Solo’s head is on a ball joint that has some movement, but the full range is not easy to see because of the hood on his head. His neck can bend up and down.

Although his shins are glued to the lower the upper shins just below the knees, he does not have shin/calf curls. His ankles can bend up, down and pivot on a rocker.

Plastic

The base plastic is used for most of the figure’s parts such as his feet, his legs, thighs, torso and arms. The head’s face is glued on to the balaclava base while the cap is added on top. The colour of peach joint in his neck is surprisingly a different shade than the one used for his face and neck. It does not look good. The plastic is ABS for the chest, and PVC for the legs and arms. The flaps and the hoodie are in rubber-like plastic.

Props

Han Solo comes with his huge binoculars which are moulded with a strap that he can wear across his chest and shoulders. The googles are not transparent plastic that can show his face. He comes with his classic DL-44 blaster pistol which attaches to a holster and strap to his thigh and waist. There is some nice detailing on the blaster.

Packaging

Because I bought an archive version of the Black Series, the Hoth Han Solo comes in a card back with a plastic bubble. On the back, there is a short biography on the character in several language, explaining how he stuck with the Rebel Alliance. The package celebrates the 50th anniversary of Lucas Film and shows significant dates of the major film releases on a timeline.

Hasbro Pulse lists this action figure for $19.99 USD although you may find it at retail or online for a few dollars more. In Canada, I paid $32.99 CAD for this toy.

Availability

As a re-release, this toy should be easy to find everywhere as of now. It is a cool piece but not a must have for most fans. Many collectors already have the 2015 version of this toy. The version of Han Solo is available in so many scales from different manufacturers that there is nothing special or making it hard to find. If you want this toy, chances are that you will be able to find it in the next few months.  Within the Black Series, there are better versions of Han Solo who, along with Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, and the Imperial Troops, are some of the most reproduced toys from the Star Wars franchise.