Macro photography | Yoda Archives, Macro adventures of a Jedi Master

Sauron Marvel Legends Build a Figure Review

Last fall I bought a 1990’s ToyBiz Sauron figure at a comic convention. It was a cool figure, and I thought it would be great for photography. The guy at the booth said they were coming about with a Sauron Build A Figure series. How many times have a bought a loose figure only to have a new version come out soon afterwards? Well there was Toy Biz Sasquatch I got then shortly later the Sasquatch build a figure, was announced, I bought a loose Leonardo mini-fig and literally the next day the Karai Bike Escape Building Set (79118) with Leonardo set was announced. I’ve bought custom Captain Marvel and Storm(1)(2) LEGO mini figs only to have official versions released later. So it happens, just part of being a collector.

Here’s the ToyBiz 1990s Sauron figure. You may have seen him on the blog earlier. He’s nicely sculpted, but there’s not a lot of paint, His jaw opens and there’s articulation at arms and legs. Cool figure but a little hard to stand. I tried to several times to get a good shot of him standing overhead. The image is not as intimidating as I envisioned.

I looked up the Sauron build a figure and it looked awesome. But I really didn’t have that much interest in the figures from the series. I already had a Deadpool. Lady Deadpool was neat. Wolverine and Bishop are cool looking figs the but not worth $20 a pop to me. Sauron was cool but not $120.00 cool.

A few months pass and the post-Christmas sales start. I see the Lady Deadpool at a decent price online. Which led me to to start checking online and offline for other deals. I didn’t find any figures on sale, but there’s always the secondary market. Some people part out the sets. I won a few auctions and started collecting the parts. I gave in and got Deadpool in boxers figure and rounded off the set with a couple more eBay purchases.

Finally, I have Sauron. He is massive. This figure is amazing. The sculpt is detailed. There are scales on the torso, veins in his arms and neck. The head is large with a movable jaw, pointed teeth, and nasty red eyes. Sauron has huge freaking wings. They are segmented so parts can move as the arms move.

The paint job is well done with great hues of green and yellow on the torso and wings. The leathery textured wings have some slits in them that give it a more realistic appearance. The loin cloth is sculpted to show motion. Blue pouches give a visual pop to his belt. There’s not a lot of paint to the legs, arms, or tail but they do have sculpted scales.

You can move his legs, turn his feet, bend knees but this isn’t a figure you would crouch. It is tall and has a wide wing span. There’s articulation at his head, neck and jaw, shoulders, and elbows. His hands rotate. The tail is great to balance him standing but I need some of those action figure stands so I can pose him flying.

Sauron builds a figure standing in a jungle scene.

Now that’s an intimidating Sauron.

This is only the second BAF I have collected. The other was Dormammu which I got cause I liked the series and got many of the figures super cheap at Target post-Christmas. Then finished it with parts via E-bay. You can see Dormammu on this post.