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Avalanche epitomizes everything that I didn’t really like about BattleForce: 2000 back in the 80’s.  His helmet is strangely shaped and doesn’t make much sense, his uniform attempts to look armored and padded, but just kind of looks fat, and his weapon is a bizarre radar dish on a block of metal that doesn’t manage to look especially futuristic or even very interesting.  Combine that with the fact that I’ve never loved arctic figures to begin with, and I didn’t find a whole lot to love about Avalanche back in the day.

I don’t find a whole lot to love about this one either.

While I like the use of Retaliation Firefly’s torso and the way they combined armored pieces on the right shoulder, the rest of the figure feels relatively blah.  His slender legs and knee-high metal boots are an interesting contrast and provide some great range of motion, but the use of 25th Anniversary Iron Grenadier Destro arms completely kills any sense of decent articulation with this figure.  Elbows that only bend at a 45 degree angle should really be banned from all future use, no matter how accurate they might look to the source material.  Aesthetically they are intriguing, but functionally they disappoint, preventing the figure from carrying any weapon in a realistic way.

Like several of the other BattleForce team members, Avalanche gets a new head sculpt, but I gotta tell you, it’s not real pretty.  The head bleeds into the helmet and ends up looking pretty uncomfortable for poor Avalanche.  Sculpt wise, the face is smooth and flat and unfeatured and just does not do the figure any justice whatsoever.

Using the vintage figure as a template, Avalance is mostly white with assorted brown camouflage and the paint scheme is fine, though again, nothing too special.

Accessories

Like the other BattleForce members, Avalanche comes with a reproduction of his vintage weapon as well as a modern weapon as well, and I actually really love the sniper rifle he comes with.  It’s a great choice.  The radar dish weapon, not so much.  Also, it would have been great if his microphone could have been sculpted and tooled alongside the helmet, but the Club elected not to do so, apparently.  Avalanche also comes with a removable knife for a sheath on his left thigh.

Avalanche was never my favorite BattleForce: 2000 figure and he remains my not favorite one today.  The head sculpt is soft and not up to spec for what I expect from a modern G.I. Joe figure.  Not the best foot forward here.

BattleForce: 2000 Avalanche
  • Character
  • Sculpt
  • Articulation
  • Paint Deco
  • Accessories
2.2

Summary

There unfortunately isn’t a whole lot to love here. The head sculpt isn’t great and it gets little better from there, with old school arms that don’t move well, an uninspired and boring paint scheme and a lack of a key accessory which would have shown some real initiative in producing. As we’re expected to pay more and more for these limited run exclusives, the value seems to be getting less and less, which is not a great combination.


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