Fire and Ice Electron+ The Man from Pluto Outer Space Men Cosmic Creators Mel Birnkrant Edition TheOuterSpaceMen.com Exclusives Item No.: n/a Manufacturer: Four Horsemen Includes: 2-piece helmet, bent arms, ray gun, staff, 3 other figures Action Feature: n/a Retail: $80.00 (sold as a set with Alpha 11, Red Devil Mystron, and Blue Angel Commander Comet) Availability: July 19, 2013 Other: The Sixth (or seventh, counting accessory deco variants) Electron+
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I was holding back on the other Outer Space Men Cosmic Creators Edition figure reviews so I could say "it sold out!" Well, it didn't yet - the long-delayed Fire and Ice Electron+ is a pretty gorgeous low-run figure (to the tune of 200 pieces) and you can still get it, if you want, in a fairly priced set. The line as a whole seems to have found its audience to be increasingly more selective, with very few non-Infinity Edition figures selling through a) in a timely manner and/or b) at full price. As a supporter of the line from the word "go," it's unfortunate to see that there's a strong possibility that each and every one of these figures were purchased by individuals who, like myself, are writing reviews for them. (Seriously, the ratio of the run to reviewers is pretty high.)

Cast in clear plastic, the figure is designed to look like it's phasing in and out of existence. The figure's body is the "ice," while the chest and blaster make up our "fire." Mel Birnkrant shared that the idea here is that the figure looks best under an optimal lighting condition which my set-up cannot easily replicate, so in most conditions the figure looks barely different from the Infinity Edition Electron+. Orange accessories, silver armor, and the dark purple helmet hides the fact that the head now looks significantly different. If you light the figure from behind, it looks like a marvel. In most rooms, well, that's not going to happen - so you've got a slightly different (and more expensive) figure to sit on your shelf.

As with before, the figure's design prevents it from being able to sit. The chest box hinders the hips from swinging forward, but given the nature of the release it's not like kids were ever meant to play with it anyway. He stands around and looks good - like the rest in this series, he excels at standing and looking good. It's not tough given the clean coat of silver paint, with the gold staff adding a little "wow" to the design. The blaster isn't anything too special, and the purple helmet, well, I wish it could be a paler purple or even a clear colorless plastic.

He has no problems standing with his gear in his hands, and I assume this is the ultimate fate of the figure for most collectors. It's not disappointing in and of itself, but in the context of the line it would be nice to have seen the silver changed to a different color for variety's sake. The Four Horsemen cast a rather wide net on this line and in my toy shelves I'm seeing six versions of this character. The clear colorless and clear colorless versions are nice. The glow-in-the-dark and regular painted versions, I love. The White Star version... is also there. I would say that this figure (or indeed the entire Cosmic Creators sub-line) is a worthy substitute for the Infinity Edition version, which is just as well given its occasional out-of-stock status. I hate throwing around terms like "acceptable" when we're talking about premium pricing and premium deco on the sixth squeeze out of a mold, but that seems to be the nature of the beast with numerous toy lines aimed at anyone over 18. I enjoy the fact that I have a complete set, sort of, but at least the Mystron of this set provided some much-needed "wow!" and "golly!" We'll get to him soonish.

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