I'm not getting onto the forum at the moment, but I still try and dip in for the vintage figure reviews - I love seeing other fans' thoughts and memories.
This week... well, it's been a few weeks since we've done a Heroic character, so put that right now, as we turn our attention to that Heroic giant-fisted warrior, FISTO.
Fisto was released with the third wave of figures. As the line started to drift towards many more creature-based characters, I liked that he was a humanoid. His action feature was his spring-loaded right arm, which brought his giant chrome fist smashing down.
Of course, although it was never played upon in any medium, there was always a speculated rivalry by fans between Fisto and Jitsu, who both had the same action feature.
The figure's sword was a purple version of Tri-Klops', and his armor was later recycled for the late figure Clamp Champ.
Fisto was given a great showcase in the mini-comic "The Clash of Arms", which is in my opinion one of the very best mini-comics, especially after the early ones.
The figure was also released in a pack with Stridor, and although not commonly used, this pairing was also used in "The Clash of Arms" and the odd other story.
There have been a number of debates over the years about who is the strongest Heroic Warrior behind He-Man, and the answer has often been cited as Fisto in terms of strength (with Man-At-Arms in terms of brains and leadership).
I always wanted a Fisto as a kid, but for some reason I never had one in my original collection. When I started re-collecting the line seriously, he was one of the very first figures that I got.
Fisto is about average to find on the second-hand (no pun intended) market, although his silver detailing has sometimes tarnished, and sometimes his arm spring has gone a bit limp.
Fisto appeared a few times in the second season of the Filmation cartoon series. While it was good to see him, I hated his voice - Filmation's limited vocal resources really came through with him.
He was also given an origin episode, "Fisto's Forest", which seems with many, including myself, to rank amongst the least favourite episodes of the series.
The character was given a 200x revamp. He was originally intended to be released earlier in the line (complete with an update of the vintage figure's sword), but was held back and tweaked to fit in with the (re)introduction of the Snake Men (which included his sword being replaced with a Snake-catching weapon, and some 'anti-snake' logos).
He also appeared late on in the Mike Young Productions cartoon series where - shock of shocks - he was revealed as Man-At-Arms' brother, and possibly Teela's real father! This revelation met with mixed reaction to fans.
Due to copyright conflicts, the revamped figure was marketed as 'Battle Fist', although the character was still referred to as Fisto in the cartoon.
All-in-all, in terms of the vintage figure, I really like the character. I was going to give him a very favourable 9, but I think I actually like him enough to give a full 10 marks!
So there is my own little Fisto review. Now I'd like to hear your own thoughts, comments, memories and such like related to the character.
And whether you post or not, don't forget to rate the vintage in the poll!![]()
(And with us covering Fisto this week, I wonder which spring-armed villain we’ll be looking at next week!!)