Dave's Toy Rant: Silver Surfer Cosmic Racers: Super Nova (Rich Ryder) I'm starting to wonder if the case assortment for Series 3 of Surfer is one each of Super Nova, Ronan and Adam Warlock, and the rest Lava Surfer. When I find Nova, the pegs had about two dozen Lava Surfers and one each of the other three (sorry, I didn't think to pick up the Warlock and Ronan to offer to non-scalpers until I was already home). CAPSULE Great articulation for a Toy Biz 5.5" figure, with reasonably tight joints. Colors are bad, though, and the figure is molded so that it doesn't really work with the racer accessory (which itself looks stupid). Still, recommended if you can find it for shelf price. $5.99 in stores, probably $15 or more from a scalper. RANT I think the first thing that struck me with this figure is that while yellow usually represents gold in comics, actual gold looks pretty lousy for this costume design. Regular yellow would have been a lot better. Additionally, Nova's arms shouldn't be all gold, and it looks like Goldfinger got his hands on Rich. Once I got past the gold, I noticed Rich doesn't have irises or pupils...blank white eyes. I'll be fixing that once I dig up an old issue and make sure of his eye color. The big selling point on this figure, of course (aside from being Nova, man!) is the poseability. Ball joint shoulders, twisting waist and neck, hinges for elbows, knees and ankles, swivel hips. Plus the helmet is removable. One hand is in a fist, the other in an open grasping pose. The figure's legs are spread wide for maximum drama poses, although I think ball joint hips would have been a better choice. Sadly, the figure is molded in such a way that a lot of this poseability is stymied. The shoulder joints are constrained by the epaulets, so a lot of good arm positions, especially FLYING poses, are nixed. And someone apparently decided a slouching figure would look better, because Nova's head is tilted forwards about 30 degrees from true. Yeah, just what you want in a flying character, a figure looking at his feet. The fact that the helmet cants forward as well only further aggravates the problem. The gimmick for this line is the pull-back racer, and Nova's looks like it was designed for a cancelled Phoenix figure, a big clear yellow energy bird thing. When placed in it for flying mode, he looks like he's about to dive into the ground. And he simply doesn't stand up on it well, his feet are way too far apart for them to both stand solidly on the platform (another hint that this might have been designed for Phoenix, as the foot slots are also a bit too narrow for Ryder's feet). Pegs for his feet would have gone a LOOOONG way towards making the racer something other than a waste of plastic. Dave Van Domelen, annoyed that the figure's poseability prevents him from doing any meaningful repainting....