Review: 75116 Finn
Posted by CapnRex101,
The second wave of Star Wars Buildable Figures has proven to be as impressive as the first on the whole, offering a nice mixture of heroes and villains which are surprisingly faithful to the movies given the limitations of Constraction elements and CCBS building techniques.
However, the similarities are not all positive. While 75110 Luke Skywalker was the weakest of the six sets in the first wave, 75116 Finn is my least favourite of the second. Despite its shortcomings I must state that this is not a bad figure in my opinion and is certainly worthy of consideration, particularly at a reduced price and if you already own some of the others in the range.
Box and Contents
Finn is shown standing in the lush forests of Takodana but is not posed very well and therefore looks fairly static, despite being fully armed and ready for action with a lightsaber and a rifle. The figure looks no more appealing on the back of the box but the height of the figure is shown as 24.5cm.
Two bags of pieces and a 32 page instruction booklet are found inside. It is worth noting that the heads in this set and 75113 Rey are not packaged in their own little bag while the other four are. I can only think that this is deemed unnecessary for heads which feature a human face, although I don't know why that should be the case.
The Completed Model
Finn's head is the best part of the model in my opinion. The generic design works in its favour as it promotes alternative uses but the head also closely resembles John Boyega and I really cannot think of any possible improvements which could be made. The realistic texturing of the hair is especially worthy of comment and is far superior to that of 75109 Obi-Wan Kenobi or 75110 Luke Skywalker.
The right arm of the figure is geared just like 75113 Rey and 75117 Kylo Ren. Although the knob used to activate this function is not hidden it is not nearly as obtrusive as that on Rey and it works just as well. This is facilitated by the inclusion of a brand new piece which forms the back and shoulders of the figure while also allowing an axle to be threaded through. Thus far the element only exists in dark tan and black but will hopefully appear in other colours soon.
Despite the versatility of this new piece, it is not perfect. In order to support the ball on which the head is mounted a thin strip of plastic runs up the back of the neck, restricting its articulation as you can see in the image above. This issue exists on all three of the figures which include the component but it is particularly disappointing in this case as it makes it slightly more difficult to pose Finn as though he is firing his rifle with a two handed grip.
It amazes me that the small Technic panels only appeared for the first time in 2013 as they have been used in almost every Technic set since then as well as many of the Buildable Figures. Here they are used to represent the back of Finn's jacket and a pair are angled to give the impression of the garment wrapping around the body. This is somewhat successful and they look much better in person than in the official images, but still seem a little awkward from some angles in my opinion.
While the view from the back is not bad, the front is certainly more impressive. I like the accurate printing on the chest and the inclusion of red striping on one of the shoulder pads, although this does mean that only one plain dark tan shoulder pad is included which reduces the usefulness of the set to CCBS builders.
Finn's legs look a little odd from some angles due to the exposed knees but it is possible to conceal this depending on how the figure is posed. If the pieces at the core of each thigh were black I think it would look much better. In my opinion the presence of leg extenders at the hips and ankles is a more important issue. These are totally unnecessary as the character is not particularly tall in the movie and for that reason the figure scales very poorly beside the rest of the range.
I must conclude by mentioning that Finn's head can, of course, be placed on the body of 75114 First Order Stomtrooper to correspond with some of the early scenes in the film. He is armed with a rifle which can fire a missile as well as Luke's lightsaber which features a metallic silver hilt, providing plenty of possibilities for play and display as Finn can fight in close quarters or at a distance.
Overall
This is a good figure on the whole but it lacks the exceptional quality of 75113 Rey, 75114 First Order Stormtrooper or 75117 Kylo Ren. I love the head component and the jacket is rendered effectively too but this figure is not without flaws. While the legs require some improvement and the head's poseability is obstructed, the most pressing issue is the price point. £19.99 or $24.99 is too much and I think the design of the figure has suffered in an attempt to justify the price, for which I blame the person who decided upon the cost in the first place.
Ultimately, I think my lukewarm feelings towards this set are a result of the source material more than the quality of the model. Finn is a great character but his attire is rather drab and does not look nearly as impressive as the bright orange of Poe Dameron's flight suit or the intimidating visage of Kylo Ren's helmet. For that reason this figure looks somewhat dull beside the others in the range on display, although the play value is just as high.
This is the last of the six Buildable Figures based on Star Wars: The Force Awakens to be reviewed. However, I will be posting another article shortly in which I compare the second wave with the first and discuss my thoughts on the range as a whole.
JANGBRiCKS' Video Review
25 likes
26 comments on this article
I can imagine the 'thin strip of plastic' running up the back of the neck was added late in the design process of the part because the part wasn't strong enough without it. On the front of the box, the head seems to be rotated further than is possible in the finished product.
To me, the character just looks too thin. In addition, as @yuffie said, the head looks somewhat detatched from the shoulders. There's no neck! One of the things I like about the Rey figure is that the cowl around the head means this isn't an issue there.
The Traitor can face off against the hero of the movie (TR-8R) giving that we have both of the figures here (or he could be taking a beating by Kilo Ren).
The last two sets--Rey and Finn--are the weakest of this line. Finn's head is better than Rey's.
I wonder if it would be worthwhile for Lego to A) create new CCBS pieces that look more... well, natural to 'organic' characters, or B) include even more cloth elements, instead of trying to create, for example, Finn's jacket using technic, which turned out pretty meh.
Ugly, just like the movie it's based on.
Finn and Kylo Ren are probably my favorites. Love the design of this guy particularly.
Don't get these at all - it's like a Star Wars / Transformers mash up.
Still - wouldn't do if we all liked the same things.
these are just horrible imo
I'm interested in the Finn set mostly for his head and hands. He's got maybe the best, most versatile head sculpt in the entire series so far. Superb likeness of the actor, but not so Star Wars–specific that you can't use it for original characters in MOCs.
It's interesting that he's the only character with both a gearbox AND a firing blaster. The blaster looks good, very authentic to the one he receives after landing on Takodana. His jacket looks cool, but otherwise there's nothing super impressive about his build. Still, I think his outfit is more interesting visually than Kylo's or Phasma's simply by virtue of having more color.
If you want to make his legs shorter, make his thigh beams black, and fix the gap in his knees all in one go, you could conceivably just swap the 7M upper leg beams with two of these 6M upper leg beams: http://brickset.com/parts/4593562 Or to fix the height alone, you could just remove the extenders from his ankles, because I agree that he probably doesn't need the extra friction that badly. Speaking of his ankles, it's nice that those feet now exist in Dark Stone Grey!
Overall, even though this is far from the best of the range (that'd be Rey, easily!), I still look forward to getting this set!
I'll stick with Stormtroopers and Sithlords for now. The human characters in this wave are definitely a step-up from last wave though.
Horrible on so many levels - almost freakish in appearance.
Is it an android? My kids certainly don't remember seeing robot-Finn in the film.
And that floating head! Reminds me of the Bobbleheads.
0/10 from our family.
Matt89190 - Imminently. Within the next day or two.
Stepalex: Please stop complaining about the movie. You complained about it in the review of 75131 as well as another article (can't remember which one that was now) Everybody is entitled to their own opinion, but this isn't a website for discussing films and we don't need you to keep telling us about your intense hatred of TFA.
I can see the Flinn figure will be full on shelves and will be heavily discounted to move stock in the near future.
I really don't like Finn. His head looks horrendous, he's way out of proportion, and the price is absurd. Some nice pieces, but overall, BLEH.
All these figures with nothing covering the hip area just look ridiculous. And the lack of a neck on this one jst makes it worse. The Rey and Stormtrooper figures, as well as being the cheaper ones, do look good.
All these figures with nothing covering the hip area just look ridiculous >> Completely agree, only figures where a) the face is covered with a mask/helmet and b) wearing some type of armour or with some cloth covering parts of their body work (Vader, Rey, Kylo Ren, Stormtrooper), whereas all the 'human-like' look ugly (this, Luke etc)
"the head also closely resembles John Boyega"
Really? I think it looks quite different from him- John Boyega's face is smoother and slightly round-ish, whereas the figure's face is thin with distinct lines. Something about the hair is off, and the eyebrows are also a little too thick. IMO, it looks a little too cartoonish overall, even compared to the other figures (maybe it's just that the expression is too stoic?). Other than that, I personally don't see anything wrong with the figure!
I think these buildable figures look terrible, with the exception of General Grievous. I don't mind because I already can't afford to buy every Lego set that appeals to me!
That head is just the worst, the face and style come together to create something absolutely horrendous. Definite shelfwarmer.
The "sort of photorealistic" faces are at best a questionable attempt for making the final figure not look like Lego, I was a bit surprised to find them being called the best part of the model. It's a bit wrong scale to the body and looks out of place even if it's produced as a 1-purpose piece only = in my eyes that's bad design. For this reason Cpt Phasma and Stormtrooper figs look better than the ones with "human like heads floating atop the bodies."
IMHO the price tag here is a little too high for what you get - but I guess I understand there's money to be made on these anyway.
My brother got this set today. Pretty awesome seeing it IRL! And yeah, his head sculpt is definitely a great likeness of the actor, while still having crisp enough contours to match the building system. Might end up being the first of these heads I manage to work into a MOC.
I think the head looks better IRL than it has in pictures, since the lighting of both the official pics and this review give it some pretty strong highlights/reflections that aren't quite as striking under more ordinary lighting conditions.
@Aanchir - LEGO elements are, by their nature, reflective and this is exacerbated by darker colours.
@CapnRex101: Yep, I know that! It just looks a bit peculiar here since it draws attention to the face's plastic-ness. The glare isn't as pronounced under my regular household lighting as it is under "studio" lighting.
I'm sorry but I can't look at that figure without thinking he looks like a child.