Cosmic Legions

[Poe Ghostal]

Love that Santa kitbash, Poe!

I'm meh on that new exclusive but mostly because I don't love that supersized mech suit body - I have the first one they released and it's just... so much action figure, but with limited ROM. It LOOKS good but it doesn't have good hand-feel if that makes sense. Hilariously though, I actually bought an exta Duban head a few weeks back to try sticking on one of my armored space suit bodies to make a sort of space crusader (the hood got in the way of the shoulder/neck armor though, unfortunately, so I just... have an extra Duban head.)

This feels VERY Warhammer coded though. I gotta assume "religious space crusader" is pure Games Workshop vibes. (More of 4H's shenanigans, I guess.)

It's bizarre to me they don't try to work on creating their own style more - their own vibes, etc. I still wish Cosmic Legions would give us some more traditional or retro designs - astronaut suits like the one in Alien or 2001, or Flash Gordon-y 1950s atompunk stuff. The Anthem/Destiny looks are just not as interesting to me. The good news is the Horsemen almost always seem to get around to doing that sort of thing.

That said, I've been a bit surprised by how little crossover there's been between Mythic/Cosmic Legions. The Man-E-Faces-style figure was a pretty cool "space knight" look, but aside from some of the larger monster-types, they really haven't had much opportunity for mixing and matching.

 

[docsilence]

It's bizarre to me they don't try to work on creating their own style more - their own vibes, etc. I still wish Cosmic Legions would give us some more traditional or retro designs - astronaut suits like the one in Alien or 2001, or Flash Gordon-y 1950s atompunk stuff. The Anthem/Destiny looks are just not as interesting to me. The good news is the Horsemen almost always seem to get around to doing that sort of thing.

That said, I've been a bit surprised by how little crossover there's been between Mythic/Cosmic Legions. The Man-E-Faces-style figure was a pretty cool "space knight" look, but aside from some of the larger monster-types, they really haven't had much opportunity for mixing and matching.

Yeah, Cosmic hasn't shaped up to be what I hoped for. I like some of the figures a LOT, but their continued efforts haven't really got me inspired. Even that new space wizard tries to do something a little different but doesn't make me need one.

 

[RunestoneCowboy]

I'm right there with you. The first OxKrewe wave from '23 had a lot of strong designs and new parts. Then the second OxKrewe wave from '24 had a few new parts, but it was mostly repaints from the wave before. Now the last two years of Cosmic reveals have been repaint convention figures without a proper wave, and half of those convention figures are homages to other properties.

I'm assuming this is because the first few Cosmic waves, which are still lingering in their online store, paled in comparison to Mythic sales, so the line doesn't get as much attention or investment from the Horsemen. I swear I heard Jeremy Girard confirm on one of their podcasts last year that there's more audience consensus when it comes to what fantasy figures should look like, but the Cosmic line has struggled because there are so many different looks to science fiction so it's harder to hit big sales numbers like Mythic can.

I'm still holding out hope, however misguided, for one last big Cosmic wave so I can finish out the Cosmic lady team on my Detolf shelf. I will add a caveat that if they don't reveal a new wave this year, I think it's unlikely we'll ever see more than convention figures from this line again.

 

[Mint In Boks]

Okay, trying to make this thought make sense:

Cosmic fails where Mythic succeeds because it has zero visual storytelling.

Like if you read ZERO lore and stumble upon Mythic Legions. You know what a knight is, you know what a knight is, you know what a dwarf if, you know an orc and a skeleton are… you can cobble together a team of heroes and villains pretty easily. Even if there’s some in lore shit like “oh this King Dwarf is actually an evil follower of the Debil!!!” (True lore fact!) you can not know that and just make him your regular King Dwarf…

Cosmic does not have a clear villain faction.

The Monsterpalooza Space Wizard (the one fucking year I pass on Monsterpalooza is the year they have a Cosmic exclusive I actually like…) is maybe the closest I’d given them to a true “villain” villain from a visual standpoint, and Skeletor’s doing a lot of the heavy listing making bright blue and metallic purple and neon green read as “evil”… but even he feels like he should be a Jafar or Wormtongue type, some little creep who has the ear of the king and not the Biggest Bad…

Like, glancing over the check list you can break the characters down into the following groups:
-Jobber Enemies (Slogg, Kanoxx)
-Weird Aliens (the tall Babu Fricks, the greys, the horse dog thing
-Lizard Men (Thorraxans, the blue guy from wave 1, Snake Predator, if you want to get technical Snake head Boba Fett and the dragons)
-Bugs (red arnor, blue armor, albino black armor
-Bounty Hunters (Snake head Boba Fett, Turkey Head bikini bug lady, Red Magnus face Boba Fett, the two muscle mommas)
-Gamoras (Jobara, Kaliann, Zeerian)
-Power Loaders (Blue, Purple, Red, Short Orange, Ape White, Gylos blue and purple)
-Generic Space Suits (yellow, black, white, grey, black, blue, green, olive green, red, orange)
-MotU characters (Buzz Off, Man-E-Faces, Whiplash, Horde Trooper)

Like to put it in Star Wars terms you can get Gamorean Guard, Tuskan Raider, Genosian Warriors, Boba Fett, Bosusk, Baby Frick who’s 6 ft tall for some reason, Leia in a couple costumes, all various ranks of Storm Troppers, if you went to Monsterpalooza you could get the Emperor, and then you fill out with Buzz Off from Master of the Universe and a some War Hammer figures…

But there’s no Luke, no Han (hot take: the Cat Rogue in soon to ship Mythic wave is a Cosmic character and fills the Han Solo role), and ESPECIALLY no Darth Vader. No strong hero types to fight a strong villain type, just a bunch of jobbers and background gleep glops to fill space.

I think Ox Crew had a stronger concept than “it’s a prison planet full of random gleep glops” since Space Miners! We get it… but even that drops the ball since two of them are fucking monsters.

Like there just needs to be SOMETHING to latch into visually, something were we can say “oh okay, these guys are fighting these guys…”

I don’t know, I’m rambling, Bye!

 

[Alt]

Your thesis statement is on point. I have felt that way for a while. I know it doesn't really matter since you can kit bash and do whatever you want, but I think it's a combination of what you say and that most of their designs just aren't that interesting. I know the main designer apparently doesn't want a Flash or Barbarella aesthetic, but what I am getting isn't that interesting.