Toy prototype details
Name: Fai-RhaTM
(Horizon Edition)
Subtitle: heroic advice-giver
Line: KR|Horizon
Item type: action figure - Nº 16 in the line.
Character details
Name: Fai-Rha
Real name: Rhadiel AmhalgaardTM
Classification: human-primivod hybrid (but she looks completely
human)
Sex: female
Relationships: younger sister of Desion (Masq-Lor) and Herrion,
cousin of Nemhetra
Home: Tahron
Era: 15 years after Foundation
Affiliation: Theriom
Rank: Senior Advisor.
Background
First appearance: KR|Horizon #1 - The Destructomorph legacy
Brief bio: during her childhood, Rhadiel was abducted together with
her older brothers by her uncle Ir-Ash and offered to the Spektrosaurs in
exchange for recruitment in their army. In Artelon, she was raised under the
name Fai-Rha by Lor-Drek, to whom she looked up as her father until she
learnt of his villainous nature and chose to defect to the Independent
Warriors. While helping her leader Bellius fight the evil reptilian forces,
Fai-Rha was recognised by Elykta as one of Tir-Hing's abducted children.
Called to fulfil her destiny, she joined forces with her brother Masq-Lor
and the Therioms, who were caught in a four-way war with the armies of
Bi-Harr, Lor-Drek and Deptilion. After learning to use a prodigious helmet
for channelling an ancient power and acquiring incredible abilities as well
as forming new arms in the midst of battle, Fai-Rha remained in Theriom City
to fight off evil until she and her family could reunite with her long-lost
brother Herrion. While she was serving in the role of Senior Advisor years
after the oppression of their foes had been ended, the threat of the
Therioms' old enemy once more brought Rhadiel and her brothers to one final
conflict with the wicked Nemhetra and her army of dreadful creatures. By
wielding their halberds and recovering an ancient power hidden in their
magical helmets, the three courageous siblings could at last return to their
mission in a glorious new form.
Articulation
Standard, excluding hinged abdomen.
Description
In the Horizon comics, it is revealed that each prodigious helmet holds a
sample of liquid alloy, which was hidden by Galamars after forging the
enchanted artefacts. When the liquid metal is combined with a tiny amount of
the helmet wearer's blood, a small
cyan
ball lightning
arises and creates a statue (called totem and made of the same
material as the helmets and halberds) of an animal, behind which there is a
sort of chair. When the helmet wearer introduces their halberd into a slot on the side of the totem, and sits in the chair with their hands and
feet positioned on apposite rests, a connector automatically inserts into
the helmet's socket, i.e., the hollow left after extracting the liquid alloy
vial. The wearer appears to lose consciousness, when in fact their
consciousness is relayed into a robotic avatar (called robatar) that
forms from the totem moments later. Fai-Rha's totem is a sitting
panther
and her robatar, which is the figure included in this pack, can be described
as follows:
Head: similar to the
White Ranger's helmet, characterised by a silver outer shell with a pair of cat ears
and a sharp-toothed mouth guard, a matte black face shield, and a glossy
black visor surrounded by a cyan glowing edge that is connected to two
fierce feline eyes on the forehead
Body: protected by a vac-metal gold
cuirass
with metallic red details, vac-metal gold gauntlets, boots (with knee
guards) and belt, and a metallic red crotch shell. Besides these basic
components, there are various dull black pieces of armour to protect the
rest of the body, such as shoulder guards,
rerebraces
and thigh guards. There is an impressive amount of intricate decorative
features all around the numerous components of this protective covering; I
especially like the small Theriom emblems engraved on the wrist and knee
guards, and the little gaps here and there that reveal steel tech-mech
details beneath the armour.
Both the helmet (with vac-metal gold side and top crests) and the cuirass
(with added Theriom emblem, i.e., a seven-pointed star with the two side
points elongated) display a few decorative details that recall
Foundation Fai-Rha's outfit.
|
| Fai-Rha's robatar's stylised cuirass; the oval on the chest plate represents the Theriom symbol. |
Action feature
To simulate the retractile laser-like claws seen in the comics, a pair of
long cyan glowing blades (kind of reminiscent of
ULTRAMAN's specium blades) can snap into each forearm armour. Additionally, two
articulated flaps at the back of the armour on the calves can reveal a pair
of leg boosters with cyan glowing propulsion effects.
Weapons and accessories
Fai-Rha's robatar comes with a set of accessories that are meant to update
Apprentice Advisor Fai-Rha, for representing her older version in the role of Senior Advisor. The set
includes three heads, a piece of armour and two weapons. The first head is
characterised by light brown skin, long black hair drawn back into a chignon
and secured with elaborate gold barrettes, and green eyes. The other two
portraits are identical, except that they wear the silver magic helmet, one
in its inactive form and one that displays the black panther visor
activated.
The additional backless armour/tunic is painted in
golden-yellow
with pearlised red details and is made from a flexible plastic. It can go on
and off easily thanks to its wide, plunging neckline that slides over AAF
figure, and has a waistband that clasps in the back - although it makes the
figure look a bit bulky, it thankfully fits the original dress and works
well for the most part. I really like the Romanesque quality to it, owing to
those four large
lappets
on the front, and I am actually quite surprised how much it doesn’t inhibit
the movement and articulation, even with the cape on.
The weapons include a halberd, which is one of the four components of the
Key (the one with the
S-shaped blade) and the same halberd that belongs to Lor-Drek in the Foundation series,
except from being painted with some greenish oxidised bronze details here
and there rather than plain silver. The other weapon is Fai-Rha's signature
bō
stick made of worn out reddish-brown wood and adorned with relatively simply
designed tarnished silver ends.
Finally, the figure comes with some great additional accessories: a
cyber-steed, an extra cyber-head and a massive bladed weapon that serve as
the third and final instalment of the Build-a-Figure plan in the
KR|Horizon series. As explained previously, some of the action
figures in the line come with a number of components needed to build an even
larger figure, specifically a heroic super-robatar that is shown at the end
of the KR|Horizon comic book series. The included creature is
a robotic version of
Merados, which in the comics also forms from the totem together with the robatar.
This figure features joints all over the place: ball jointed upper neck,
hinged lower neck, hinged shoulders/hips, and swivel-hinged knees/hocks,
fetlocks and tail. It is, of course, an all-new sculpt that resembles a mix
between Fai-Rha's original steed and
Jeeg's Panzeroid, and has a detailed silver&metallic-purple body marked with jagged
black stripes here and there, a translucent red mane and tail, and two
pivoting launchers with separate missiles (which can be replaced with two
included spiked silver sword blades) on both sides of the body. The extra
head (which is supposed to form from the robatar's body when Fai-Rha's black
panther visor is activated, and to become the right wrist of the
super-robatar) looks like a large-scale,
Voltron-like robot panther head, while the weapon is a huge tech-mech version of
the three siblings' halberds joined together. Now that I have completed the
cyber-steeds line-up, which all feature multiple weapon attachments and
include motorbike-like seats for their respective riders, we finally come to
the main attraction, the fully transformed super-robatar (or SR)! I had a
blast converting the three figures into this towering toy and, I must say,
the transformation process is not too challenging. Morphing the mechanised
version of Ki-Wun, which balls all up to form the torso, is the initial
step: its tail lifts and flips against the back, its head swings down to
form the beast crest on the SR's chest, the forelegs fold and compress into
the shoulder armours (which become part of the SR's shoulders and rotate
forward, so that the missile launchers are placed on top), while the hind
legs straighten to become anchors for the SR's four-legged lower body.
Cyber-Merados' back splits open wide and then shuts to accommodate its head,
which bends and retracts into the body. Mecha-Zor-Kan's legs and tail
collapse down to fit around its belly, while the nacelles, which form the
SR's arms, slide outwards and its body swings 180 degrees to become part of
the SR's winged back. The rest of the process is as simple as sliding out
all the six missiles (for replacing them with other pieces) and connecting
the three components: Ki-Wun docks into Merados by entering the neck hole
with its legs, while Zor-Kan locks onto Ki-Wun's back and shoulders.
Finally, there's the head and the wrists-plus-hands that have to be
attached: Herrion's and Fai-Rha's giant cyber-heads attach to the SR's
forearms (their jaws open wide in order to insert two of the four available
hands into their mouths), while Masq-Lor's one connects to the SR's neck
(its ears rotate outwards to become horns and its lower jaw opens wide to
reveal the SR's humanoid, bright-eyed face, which strongly resembles
Desion's visage). The entire process reveals remarkable craftsmanship, not
only in how it all transforms, but also in the toy's solid construction - I
never once feared that anything would break. The impressive combined SR form is 30 cm tall (around 12'') and features a four-winged anthropoid upper body with a horned beast's head on
its chest, as well as a horsey lower body; it also has laser blasters on the
shoulders, shooting fists (while new hands fictionally regenerate from the
forearms), giant sword blades on the hindquarters, a triple halberd for
melee combat as well as for throwing (fictionally dispensed by the unfolding
"peytral"), and the ability to produce a powerful energy beam from the mouth cavity
in its chest. A beautiful panel in the third and final KR|Horizon
comic issue shows how the SR's silhouette recalls the Theriom symbol, with
the head, upper wings, arms-plus-lower wings and forelegs representing the
seven points.
|
| Senior Advisor Fai-Rha's stylised helmet with side and top crests. |
Final thoughts
Character value: ♦♦♦♦ Although Fai-Rha is one of the main characters
of the KR|Horizon comics since the beginning of the story, her
robatar version only appears in the second issue of the series and, I have
to say, it is captured perfectly here - she looks great!
Articulation: ♥♥♥♥ The figure features the same strong durable joints
as others in the KR line: stable enough to hold poses, and solid enough to
stand up to play
Sculpt and paint: ♣♣♣♣ Many excellent design decisions have been made
here, making this robatar version of Fai-Rha different enough from the two
previous figures that are linked to her brothers. The paint detail is
excellent too, I spotted no overspray or mess anywhere on the figure
Accessories: ♠♠♠♠ Among the many add-ons, with its great articulation
and pivoting rear cannons, cyber-Merados is a really fun toy on its own
Playability: ♪♪♪♪ It's tough to go wrong with this figure. She's fun
to play with, has a cool design, and her mecha-steed is just aces
Overall: ☺☺☺☺ Horizon Fai-Rha is one of the best figures in the line,
and an excellent complement to her brothers' variants. However, even if you
didn’t want to complete the super-robatar figure, but you did want a great
toy, this would be a figure worth owning.
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