These two characters had nothing in common, and they went against my rules for pairing up Marvel Legends figures. But I did want to kind of represent the duality of two figures in the Retro line-up. One feels very basic and is best getting on clearance, while the other is worth getting at full price. While Vision is a character we've had plenty of times, with this being our second ghost version of the character, this is our second version of Spiral, and amusingly, the previous one was also made by Hasbro. Let's see what I mean by this comparison in the review!
Let's get Vision out of the way. This is a ghostly white version of the character based on his appearance in West Coast Avengers, part of the Vision Quest storyline where the character was disassembled while his exterior got damaged over time, resulting in its coloring being lost over time. This results in the aforementioned white and light grey remaining after the operation. He also loses his emotion matrix. It's more interesting to discuss than the figure itself because while it's not the same as the 3-pack version that came with an Ultron reusing Ultimate Beetle's buck or the not-Bruce Banner Hulk, its deco is minimal and the cape is now opaque. The feet having regular toes is a nice touch, though.
Head sculpt is not the best unless it was either filtered or painted with a wash to make it look more detailed, but it is better done than the version we previously got. Since this is a Bucky Cap reuse, I won't go over the articulation but I wil say that the rigid cape makes some poses hard to pull off. If you got this guy for $10 bucks, he's fine, but as much as I don't care about the MCU, at least its own White Vision was a new sculpt IIRC. Sadly, this guy will be your cheapest bet at a comic Vision that is more classic-inspired since the first Retro one is ridiculously expensive on eBay. Marvel Legends scalpers are no different from Transformers scalpers, but with how more common the Bucky Cap buck is, it's more insulting.
Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
And here is Spiral in-hand, who is an entirely new sculpt to my knowledge. While the first version was from an era where Hasbro Marvel Legends were getting worse because they started to be phased out in favor of smaller toys (look at the selection from 2007-8 compared to 2009-11), this figure shows how some retro-carded Legends are worth getting even in spite of their price. The tooling appears to be new for her as we can consider the three pairs of arms on her, but we also get stuff like the pockets on her pant legs, the boots, the shoulder pads, and the belt all being unique for her. While there isn't much paint on the outfit, I do like that the arms, in addition to having double-jointed elbows, are given unique bicep and forearm guards along with even a left arm on the back that is entirely made of metal. Even some of the arms are unique in terms of the layout.
This figure's head is well sculpted and contains the great level of badassery that one would expect from someone who's either known to follow Mojo around or kicks ass in Marvel vs Capcom 2. Her eyes are blank white with no pupils in sight, but the eye makeup along with the lips and eyebrows not being misaligned is a win in my book. Her helmet is molded silver plastic but it otherwise works well given it's in a darker shade while the blue does not look faded on it. I believer there is even an outline for it which I appreciate. As for the articulation, it's about the same as with the Bucky Cap mold in terms of how the joints move, especially with the addition of double-jointed elbows, but the diaphragm joint is different from the ab-crunch/waist swivel combo. After swapping the open flesh-tone hand and metallic fist-hand (both on the left side), we can give her four katanas, and two golden weapons in the form of a sword and an axe. The katanas have some nicely added paint to further complete their look in contrast to the golden weapons.
Overall, you get a sense of the duality of Marvel Legends' retro line. One side has really basic repaints while the other side has releases with more effort put into them. White Vision isn't a bad toy, he feels more like a budget release that you'd only buy if you see him on discount and have nothing else to buy. By contrast, Spiral is way worth picking up at the MSRP she goes for, especially if you wanted an updated version to replace the 2007 mold as someone who mained her in MvC2. In any case, happy hunting getting Bleasion and the not-Woman Spider!
Final ranking: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ out of ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
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