San Diego Comic Con 2017 has come and gone, but the memories–and exclusives released at the show–will last forever. And for those who didn’t attend SDCC 2017, you’ll still have a chance to order the Exclusive Marvel Legends Battle for Asgard set online on HTS on August 14th! To help the fence-sitters decide, I’ll be posting a review of each figure in the set leading up to 8/14. And the first review is of a character who may ultimately be exclusive to this set: Marvel Legends Ulik!

The San Diego Comic-Con Marvel Legends box sets have been giving us figures that never hit mass retail for quite a while now, and 2017 looks to be no different.

While some of the more prominent characters in these box sets have found their way to the main line, Gladiator, Ghost, Blastaar, Magik, Purple Man, Dreadknght, Moonstone, Satanna and comics-based Hela have not.

This year, three more characters look to be added to the “Comic Con Only” club: Ulik, Bor and Makekith.

Some people questioned the size of the SDCC Ulik Marvel Legends figure based off the promo photos, but make no mistake: this Ulik is a big boy. As you can tell easily with this figure in hand, it’s the fourth use of the Marvel Legends Abomination and Rhino mold, and as such is basically exactly the same size and presence (give or take a millimeter).

Not only do I not mind seeing this mold reused for a third character, though–I dare say it works better for Ulik than it did the Rhino and Abomination Build-A-Figures! The proportions look perfect for Ulik, and he’s not hindered by the weird shoulder pads both those figures got.

Of course, a big part of Ulik’s success is that Hasbro went through and retooled and replaced much of Ulik’s body, which only the arms, legs and crotch being totally recycled from the previous BAFs.

The ferocious Ulik head is 100% new (obviously) and looks all-out fantastic to me. The rock troll head looks straight out of fantasy (or Thundercats), and is one of my favorite Marvel Legends heads this year.

The armored upper torso is also a unique sculpt that I can’t see Hasbro being able to reuse for any other character. The texture on the mail armor is terrific, and I love the glossy sheen of the green paint. There’s also nicely-detailed tufts of fur peeking out from under the armor atop Ulik’s shoulders.

Another distinct difference between the Marvel Legends Rhino/Abomination figures and Ulik is the fists. Ulik has new hand molds that place his uru metal-forged “pounders” (which have always looked an awful lot like brass knuckles) onto his fists.

The pounders are a critical part of Ulik’s look and fighting style, so I’m thrilled to see Hasbro spent the extra funds to include them.

As you might expect, the articulation on the Ulik Build-A-Figure is identical to his predecessors: ball-hinge head/shoulders/wrists; ball-jointed hips; hinged knees and elbows; swivel waist/biceps/thighs; ab crunch and hinged ankles with ankle rockers.

This isn’t the extreme amounts of articulation we see on characters like Spider-Man with butterfly swivels and double-jointed knees/elbows, but it’s more than enough for a bruiser like Ulik. All of his joints are nice and tight and hold a pose without a cinch, his large feet hold up his bulky frame perfectly, and I had no problems getting him into any kind of fighting stance I thought looked natural for Ulik.

Overall: The SDCC Exclusive Battle for Asgard Ulik figure is a fantastic toy of a character I never thought we’d see in this scale. The newly-tooled portions of this figure are the MVP here, but even the existing tooling works tremendously. From the bulky proportions to the more than adequate articulation and spot-on paint apps, the Marvel Legends Ulik figure is a winner. I doubt anyone will ever make a better Ulik toy than this, so if you’re a fan, snap him up.

GRADE: A