Out of the box, the set includes three pieces: The Medallion, a very abbreviated version of the staff, and a base. You will need to have a screwdriver handy to pop in the two AA batteries needed for the light effect. I think Hasbro did a great job designing the whole display piece, as it’s perfect for putting on a desk or bookshelf and it has a pretty nice shelf presence to it without actually including the entirety of the really long staff. There are actually four holes that you can put the staff into, but only one is the correct one that will light it up. OK, that’s kind of clever, I see what you did there, Hasbro.
While the base isn’t terrible, I definitely think it’s the weakest element of the whole set. It is, however, fairly heavy, as it holds the batteries and electronics. In addition to the holes for the staff, you get some deeply cut hieroglyphs and some spray to look like sand. The edges are sculpted to look like rock to give it a kind of pedestal display effect. Like I said, nothing here is bad, but I think the hieroglyphs look a bit too chunky and fake. Then again, it’s a toy and not a high end replica, so I should probably cut it some slack.
The Medallion itself is actually quite impressive in terms of the sculpt and finish. I’ve seen some rather expensive replicas of this piece get the finish all wrong by making it shiny gold and not antiqued bronze. Yeah, there should be a bit more of a sheen to it than this one has, but it still looks better to me than a bright mirror polish I’ve seen on the metal ones. The sculpted detail is quite nice with with all the feathers in the bird and the Hebrew lettering laid out around the circumference. I also think the red crystal in the center looks great. Overall, it feels like it’s sized pretty correctly, albeit maybe a tad too thick, but I’m not even sure about that. The Medallion can be detached from the staff just by pulling it off, but it’s a bit scary because it locks in pretty tight. It would have been cool if Hasbro included a chain.
It seems like forever ago that the Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny hype train pulled into the station with a wet thud and then chugged on off into the sunset. I’m on record saying that I didn’t love or hate the movie, it was just something I watched and have since mostly forgotten. But, just like Crystal Skull, at least it meant new toys, and while I’m waiting for more of the 6-inch Adventure Series figures to show up, I decided to have a look at today’s worthless bronze medallion.
