Official solicit:

Star Wars Saga Legends - R2-D2

Left alone to guard a pair of Jedi starfighters in the hostile landing bay of the Invisible Hand, Artoo is captured by super battle droids. Thinking quickly, he sprays his attackers with highly flammable lubricant and activates his booster jets, frying the battle droids’ circuitry.

Based on the character from the epic Star Wars saga, this R2-D2 action figure has detailed styling and features electronic lights and sounds! Figure comes with an exclusive collector coin!

Includes 3 A76 Button-Cell Batteries

SUMMER 2008
MSRP 6.99USD

When I was a kid, and we’re talking really young, probably around 1980 or so, I got a remote controlled R2D2 as a gift. Christmas maybe, or a birthday, something like that. I remember it was pretty cool, but I’m sure it probably really wasn’t. It wasn’t really remote controlled at all, more like those cheap Radio Shack cars that have the 4 foot cord sticking out the back into the handheld controller that has like 2 buttons for you to hit and see the same 2 movements over and over. Yeah, real yawn, right?

Lame as that was though, I do have fond memories of it. It was pretty big, and did all the beeps and bloops we love from R2, lights flashing etc. Despite my almost complete dislike of all things Star Wars now (thanks a lot, prequels), I still think it’d be cool to have a little mini R2 robit rolling around the house. When I saw this R2 on sale at Target though, I figured this would be a much more economical alternative.

Packaging is pretty standard. I’m sure there is someone out there far more Star Wars nerdy than me that could tell you if this is rare packaging, or worth more or whatever, but I’m not that guy. Also, it wouldn’t matter anymore because I open my toys. GASP!

Off card but still in bubble, we see R2 comes with… well not much. Just some coin. Oh boy! I’m not really sure what to expect that he would come with, but this seems pretty bare considering the price is equal to another figure which might come with a bunch of guns, have more articulation etc.

Hmm.

Out of bubble we see R2 in all his droidy glory, as he… well. Again, not much. Sitting at a stout 2.4 inches, his footprint isn’t much. He doesn’t have very many points of articulation either, like this thing is about as much a brick as it gets. His “arms” move on a pivot joint, and his ankles move forward and back for stabilization, and that’s about it. His head doesn’t rotate, no opening secret compartments, nada. I mean, the feet don’t even have wheels for him to scoot about on! What you see is strictly what you get here period.

I’ve seen other R2’s on the shelf that do come with stuff like that, even shoot a lightsaber out of it’s head. Problem is, they all have some stupid gimmick that comes along with it too making the overall figure undesirable. Battle damaged R2, or rockets coming out of his butt or whatever. I just wanted a plain old R2, too bad that meant plain as plain gets.

Making up for some of the missing features on this, we do get some noises and lights thanks to a button on R2’s “chest”. His eye lights up, and we get to hear various bleeps and bloops, ending with the infamous R2 scream from all the movies. Nice enough feature, but again, doesn’t really justify the price.

Regular MSRP is like 7 dollars or so on these figures, and sure, the mold is detailed enough and it clearly looks like R2, but the lack of movement or other features is just pretty pathetic. For nearly the same price, you can buy a Transformers scout size figure with a ton more articulation than this thing. For nearly the same price, you can buy a GI Joe figure with tons more detail, articulation AND weapons. All of these are Hasbro toys too, so it all just seems out of skew for what you get. Now if R2 was like 5 bucks, then I could see it, but man…

Overall, I mean, I wanted an R2 to set on the shelf and that’s what I got. Like I said earlier, I’m not much of a fan of Star Wars anymore, but I do still care for the droids. And R2 is a good, albeit completely boring representation of one. If you’re interested in something with ANY play value at all, move on to a different R2 with more features, or probably a different figure altogether. If you just want a little R2 to set on the shelf an be all OBI WAN YUR MY ONLY HOPE with, well then this will work just fine.

But that’s about all it will do.